As memory supplies get tighter and tighter and graphics card prices continue to rise, things are getting weirder and weirder in the discrete GPU market. The latest sign of the times is AMD's launch of the RX 9050 4GB, an OEM-only and region-specific variant of the already limited-release RX 9050 8GB. If 4GB GPUs are coming back, we wanted to see how much gamers should expect to suffer by attempting to play the latest games on graphics cards with such small memory pools.

For reference, the last time AMD launched a new 4GB product was all the way back in 2022 with the RX 6500 XT and the RX 6400. And at least for discrete GPUs, Nvidia got off the 4GB train years earlier, after the launch of the GTX 1650 Super back in 2019. At a minimum, most every discrete GPU since has had 6GB or 8GB of VRAM.

AMD says the existing RX 9050 8GB is meant for 1080p medium gameplay with no further details about settings or upscaling, so the bar is already low for that product before the 9050 4GB cuts both bus width and memory bandwidth in half. Despite its cutting-edge RDNA 4 GPU architecture, the 9050 4GB has a meager 64-bit memory bus and a mere 144 GB/s of memory bandwidth, specs that would have been low-end even 10 years ago.

But the RX 9050 brings support for FSR 4 to even this lowest rung of the discrete graphics ladder, and its more advanced machine-learning-powered upscaling model should deliver a massive leap in image quality compared to the temporal approach of FSR 3 and earlier generations. Upscaling is likely going to be key to achieving playable performance in all but the most lightweight games on 4GB graphics cards.

So, is it totally insane for AMD to release a 4GB graphics card in 2026? Does that tiny VRAM pool make a graphics card useless for gaming? We don't have an RX 9050 4GB at hand, but we do happen to have both an RX 6500 XT and a GTX 1650 Super in the TH GPU library, so we fired up a few popular titles on these cards to see what kind of experience gamers can expect if they’re stuck with just 4GB.

To track GPU memory usage, we used HWiNFO64 and logged both its “GPU D3D Dedicated” and “GPU D3D Dynamic” parameters. If a GPU reports a large dynamic memory allocation, it’s a good sign of spilling out of VRAM, but that’s not an immediate sign that performance is going to fall off a cliff. Different games handle this kind of spillover in different ways, so it’s worth knowing about but not necessarily cause for alarm.

Fortnite

We started our testing with Fortnite, which needs no introduction as one of the most popular PC games out there. While it may have a reputation as a potato game, it can just as easily showcase the most advanced features of Unreal Engine 5.

Fortnite recently started using hardware RT acceleration to enable UE5's flagship Lumen effects, so the RT-Core-less GTX 1650 simply can't run the game with the visual richness we've taken for granted on most every other graphics card we've tested this year.

As a fully DirectX 12 Ultimate-compatible graphics card with RT support, the RX 6500 XT would seem to have an advantage here. And you can certainly run the game with Lumen enabled at medium settings and with XeSS Quality upscaling on the RX 6500 XT despite reported memory usage totaling well over 4GB.

But even though those delivered frame rates might seem acceptable, input latency is not, even with Radeon Anti-Lag enabled. Nvidia’s FrameView utility estimates input latency of 63.9 ms with Lumen on, and that’s too much for a competitive shooter like this. To get input latency down, you have to disable Lumen, and since that makes for an apples-to-apples comparison anyway, that’s how we continued our testing.

Between medium settings and XeSS Quality upscaling, Fortnite ends up being perfectly playable, and reported VRAM usage on both cards hovers just over the 4GB mark.

We have to wonder whether the RX 9050 might be able to run Fortnite with Lumen enabled while delivering lower input latency thanks to its more powerful RT accelerators and more modern architecture generally.

Apex Legends

Apex Legends struggled on both the GTX 1650 and RX 6500 XT out of the gate with our usual maxed-out test settings. Dropping back to High reduced the VRAM footprint and resulted in playable frame rates.

Apex doesn’t have any kind of upscaling support, so you’re entirely dependent on its quality settings to boost performance. But we were happy to see that we didn’t have to dial them back much to achieve playability on these cards.

Cyberpunk 2077

We also called up Cyberpunk 2077 as an example of a triple-A title that gamers with entry-level PCs might want to run in 2026. We chose 1080p medium settings out of the gate for this game and immediately enabled XeSS 2.0 Balanced upscaling, as even with that dialed-back preset, VRAM usage was already well over 4GB for both cards.

But even with that massive indicated VRAM spillover, Cyberpunk’s performance remained perfectly playable, if not entirely smooth. The crowd density setting had the biggest effect on the immersiveness of the gameplay experience compared to our usual maxed-out test settings. With low crowd density, the sprawling streets of Night City are practically empty. Cranking it back up to High restored the bustle that makes it feel like a lived-in world without totally devastating performance.

Counter-Strike 2

Counter-Strike 2 showed the greatest divergence between cards for memory allocation, at least according to the tools we have available. The GTX 1650 reported a total of 3.5 GB of memory used, and the RX 6500 XT showed 4.6 GB.

But that apparent spillover once again doesn’t equal poor performance, as the Radeon handily beats out the 1650 Super here.

Bottom line

Across the handful of titles we tested, gaming with just 4GB of VRAM isn't the instant performance cliff you might expect in 2026, but it also requires careful finessing of quality and upscaling settings to achieve not just playable performance, but also tolerable input latency. Once you’ve done that, though, it’s possible to have a perfectly fun time on hardware that would make most people turn up their noses at first glance.

Judging by our experience with the RX 6500 XT and GTX 1650 Super, upscaling will be key for the best experience with the RX 9050 4GB, and its support for FSR 4 will be a huge image quality improvement for low-end PCs.

The 9050 also brings much higher RT performance to the table compared to RDNA 2 and RDNA 3 products, and if games as widely played as Fortnite are finally starting to lean on RT acceleration to enable their most advanced lighting effects, that’s another useful technical upgrade for enabling the best experience, even on low-end products.

We’re sure that some modern AAA games would be truly unplayable on these 4GB cards, but that’s not the reason they exist. For low-end PCs that are built to run the most popular esports and free-to-play titles, 4GB is still fine, and for markets outside of the United States, especially, products like this are important—just not to enthusiast PC builders.

In that light, the just-released RX 9050 4GB and the higher-end 8GB version are best understood as a much-needed technical update for entry-level OEM systems, much like how we described the RTX 5050 when we reviewed that card last year. If you have the luxury of spending more on a graphics card, you certainly should, but for those renting time in internet cafes and esports centers outside of the USA, low-cost products like the 9050 are an important bridge to the wider world of PC gaming.

Team Fortress 2 cases are worth pocket change. There are a few select cases that scale up to a few dollars, and even fewer with a market price in the double digits, but the vast majority of cases are worth a few pennies, no more than a Steam Trading Card. But one player, Vincent Stech, started collecting cases nearly a decade ago, racking up over 1.7 million cases across several Steam accounts. And now, he’s selling the whole collection, with an estimated value of $100,000.

Stech started collecting cases around Team Fortress 2’s last major update, in late 2017, outside of annual Halloween events that persisted through 2022. In order to accumulate so many cases, Stech largely automated the process, noting that he was careful not to upset the string-pullers at Valve as he amassed a stash of seemingly innocuous digital assets.

“That’s always been one of my biggest fears over the past decade, is one day they wake up like ‘hey, we don’t like what this guy’s doing,’” Stech told Tom's Hardware. “Because I know people with accounts with like 50,000 items that won’t load, and Valve won’t delete the items off their account, so they just can’t access Team Fortress 2 inventory ever again on their main account.”

Before understanding Stech’s process, however, we have to start with how Team Fortress 2’s in-game economy works. Like other Valve titles, you’re able to list items you earn in-game on the Steam Community Marketplace, selling them for real dollars or spending real dollars of your own to buy other items. That’s the normal way of doing things, but this in-game economy has grown beyond the bounds of Steam. A lot of transactions happen off the platform.

Websites like backpack.tf and stntrading.eu take trading off of Steam, allowing you to use in-game crafting materials (along with keys) to buy and sell items. There are several reasons for these third-party marketplaces to exist, not the least of which is bot automation, which is against Steam’s Terms of Service. This exchange of in-game currency for items happens through trades on Steam, creating a separate marketplace where real money doesn’t change hands.

That’s not where Stech started. “Team Fortress 2 cases, they weren’t worth anything. They were… people were just giving them away because they take inventory spots,” Stech said. “People were deleting things, and so I decided to scoop them up.”

The problem Stech quickly ran into was inventory space. You can only have a few thousand items in your inventory (Stech told me 4,000 for Team Fortress 2, others say it’s around 2,000). Regardless of the number, it’s far too low a limit to amass nearly 2 million items, even with dozens of alternative accounts. Stech bypassed this issue by using the community marketplace. He listed the cases at very high prices where they were unlikely to sell. That’s because you can have tens of thousands of items on the market “before Steam gets really angry at you.” It effectively multiplies inventory space.

As his inventory began to grow, Stech started automating the process of taking inventory and accepting trades, the latter of which was handled through a simple batch file. At first, Stech was just buying cases in bulk at relatively low prices, but the inventory escalated once he started digging into Steam’s local pricing in different regions.

“In Venezuela and, like, Russian [Rubles]... they are very weak currencies compared to the U.S. dollar,” Stech said. “What I found out is the lowest you can sell an item on Steam for us is three cents. For them, it’s a 10th of a penny. So I found this one guy in Venezuela… he would buy almost every case off the Steam Community Market for their extremely low price, and then he would sell it to me, and I would just give him, like, keys. And he was actually a doctor in Venezuela, and they don’t make much at all by comparison to, like, what $50 would be in USD. So a large majority of his income was case money.”

For context, $50 is equivalent to just over 37,000 bolívares (the official currency of Venezuela).

Stech’s first cash-out from Steam was $50 when he was around 16 years old. A few years later, he cashed out $2,500 to buy his first car. Stech stopped collecting cases about three years ago, and now, he’s looking to sell off the entire collection, which he estimates is worth around $100,000.

Selling this collection is no easy feat, however. For starters, Steam can break when trades get too large, necessitating hundreds of trades across dozens of different accounts. Further, Stech controls quite a large portion of known cases. “At one point, I calculated I had, like, 17% of all TF2 cases that are publicly known… I would have an extremely hard time selling it off because I am a large [portion] of the market. It’s like, you know, Elon Musk couldn’t dump a lot of his stock.”

Stech has, apparently, found a buyer that wants the whole collection, however, and the selling process is already underway. “The transaction has kind of started… he has admin privileges on the trade offers he sends to my accounts, so my accounts just automatically accept any trade from him,” Stech said. “An option was for him to just buy the accounts, but we know that is very bannable, so we haven’t done that.”

Stech says he expects to have the process complete around October. Just as he used case money to buy his first car, he says he plans to use the money from the sale as a down payment on a house.

There’s been a shift toward using a single DIMM of DDR5 to skirt the worst of the RAM pricing crisis. AMD has suggested to us previously, at least, that it’s an option PC builders are exploring, and it’s a wrinkle that’s shown up in dozens of prebuilts; one that we’ve been careful to avoid when recommending products, particularly during peak shopping events. But just how much gaming performance are you giving up with a single DIMM when using one of the best CPUs for gaming?

The conventional wisdom is that you’re giving up quite a bit of performance, resting on the ideas of previous DDR generations, where going down a single stick will cut your bandwidth in half. The same is true with DDR5, but things are a bit messier, which we’ll dig into later.

At a high level, using a single DDR5 DIMM doesn’t compromise gaming performance by nearly as much as you might expect. We saw drops of around 8% to 10% across Intel and AMD CPUs, and less than a 5% difference with AMD’s Ryzen 7 9800X3D.

A proper dual-channel configuration is still the way to go for optimal performance. However, our testing shows that even a single DDR5 DIMM offers superior performance to dual-channel DDR4 on CPUs that support both memory generations.

Using a single DIMM isn’t ideal, and it brings up compatibility issues if you plan on adding another DIMM down the line (another area we’ll touch more on in-depth later). But as a stopgap measure amid surging DRAM prices, a single DIMM of DDR5 holds up surprisingly well in gaming scenarios, and it represents a nice on-ramp into a DDR5 platform while prices are out of control.

Testing single-DIMM DDR5 in games

The geomean below speaks for itself. Moving down to a single DIMM drops some performance, but it’s not nearly as stark as I expected. There are some important notes about how we tested before dissecting the results, however.

As usual, we tested at 1080p with a mixture of High and Ultra settings, using Nvidia’s RTX 5090 Founder’s Edition to minimize the influence of the GPU. That’s even more important here, as we’re not evaluating CPUs but the memory that feeds the CPU. We're looking at a separate GPU and CPU here, as well; dual-channel memory is vital if you're using an iGPU.

We also wanted to create a realistic testing scenario. Assuming you’re going for a 2x16GB configuration, that means starting with a single 16GB DIMM, not a 32GB one. That’s what we did here. Our single-DIMM configurations run with just 16GB of memory, while dual-DIMM configurations run with 32GB. Capacity isn’t a major limitation for our testing here, though it will pose performance issues if you’re running several applications alongside your game.

The Ryzen 5 7600X was our biggest loser, dropping 10.9% of its average performance across our 13-game geomean with a single 16GB DIMM. The Core Ultra 7 270K Plus, meanwhile, dropped 8.7% of its average performance, while the Core i5-14600K similarly dropped 8.3% of its performance. The 1% lows are especially notable here, scaling with average performance rather than falling off a cliff.

Unsurprisingly, the Ryzen 7 9800X3D fared the best, dropping just 2.8% of its performance on average. As you’ll see through our individual game tests, the Ryzen 7 9800X3D shows identical performance with two DIMMs and a single DIMM in multiple games. The large and speedy L3 minimizes the impact of using a single DIMM, giving AMD’s 3D V-Cache CPUs another notch in their belt (as if they needed another).

Our other geomeans don’t say much. A single-DIMM configuration consumes a few watts less, leading to slightly lower efficiency when balanced against the lowered performance.

007 First Light, the newest game in our test suite, shows good scaling across our test pool, so it’s a good place to start. The Core Ultra 7 270K Plus dropped 8.9% of its performance with a single DIMM, while the 9800X3D dropped 6.5%. The 14600K is worth highlighting here. A single DIMM lost us 7.9%, but that’s still better than dual-channel DDR4, and by a decent 6.8% margin.

This trend is fairly consistent, too. Starfield is punishing for single-DIMM configurations, with the 14600K losing 10.6% of its average performance. Even then, a single DDR5 DIMM is 6.9% faster than dual-channel DDR4. Intel platforms can scale up to high data rates, and we use 7,200 MT/s for Intel chips. With slower speeds, the performance will equalize. Still, I’d strongly consider a single DDR5 DIMM if you’ve been eyeing an LGA 1700 platform with DDR4, assuming you’re primarily focused on gaming.

Starfield shows the benefits of 3D V-Cache in this single-DIMM configuration clearly. While the performance losses with other CPUs are brutal in this title, the 9800X3D dropped just a few frames, a 1.6% decrease in average performance.

Doom: The Dark Ages is similarly harsh on single-DIMM configurations. The Ryzen 5 7600X dropped 17.3% of its average performance, and the 270K Plus fell by 14%. The 9800X3D holds up well, however, with just a 4.2% average performance loss. Marvel’s Spider-Man 2 (in the gallery below) shows a similar dynamic.

However, the addition of 3D V-Cache mainly helps in these games where we see bigger losses with other CPUs. There are several games in our suite where the performance loss between a single DIMM and dual-channel configuration was minor, particularly in GPU-heavy titles. The Last of Us Part One shows that in action.

Similarly, the performance loss is minor in Counter-Strike 2, just a handful of frames even north of 600 FPS. Even the Core i5-14600K, which was hit the hardest by far, dropped just 5.9% of its average performance (and it’s still faster than a dual-channel DDR4 configuration).

You can browse the results of the other games we tested in the gallery above, though they tell much the same story as the titles we highlighted. The two biggest learnings from this testing are that a single, fast DDR5 DIMM often outpaces dual-channel DDR4, and that AMD’s 3D V-Cache can smooth over the rough edges of using a single DIMM, particularly in those memory-sensitive titles.

How we tested

We tested on our normal test bed that we use for CPU reviews, with the only difference being dropping one of our DIMMs. As usual, we enabled XMP/EXPO for testing, both on single- and dual-DIMM configurations, opting for higher speeds on Intel platforms. AMD’s sweet spot is around 6,000 MT/s.

The data rate is noteworthy for the DDR4 comparison, in particular. With slower DDR5, we expect the delta between dual-channel DDR4 and single-DIMM DDR5 to decrease.

In addition to enabling XMP/EXPO, we disable Virtualization-Based Security (VBS), enable Resizeable BAR, and disable any automatic overclocking features that aren’t covered by warranty, including AMD’s Precision Boost Overdrive and Intel’s Extreme performance profile.

Complexities of DDR5

DDR5 has much higher data rates compared to DDR4 (2x or more), and that’s the result of significantly more complexity on DDR5 DIMMs compared to DDR4. Notably for this testing are the two 32-bit subchannels of DDR5, as well as enlarged prefetch and bank groups. You are getting half the total bandwidth with a single DDR5 DIMM, absolutely, but it’s a little more nuanced than simply running your memory in a single-channel configuration.

DDR4 uses a single 72-bit channel, and 64 of those bits transfer data (the additional 8 are for ECC). With DDR5, you get two 40-bit subchannels, 32 of which are used for data transfer. Critically, these subchannels have their own Command/Address (CA) interface, allowing them to operate independently of each other.

In addition, DDR5 doubles the prefetch size to 16N, doubles the number of banks and bank groups, and increases burst length from 8 bytes to 16 bytes. The math here is straightforward enough. With DDR4, you can transfer 64 bits of data over the interface at a burst of 8 bytes, giving you 64 bytes of data and aligning with cache line sizes. Each of the subchannels in DDR5 can transfer 64 bytes of data, as well, with a 32-bit width and burst length of 16 bytes.

It’s pseudo-dual-channel memory on a single DIMM. There are two independent memory operations that can happen each cycle, both of which transfer 64 bytes of data. That is a big reason why even a single DDR5 DIMM (particularly one with a higher data rate) can outpace even a proper dual-channel DDR4 configuration.

The common wisdom about using a single DIMM comes mainly from previous DDR generations, where you can only get that single 64-byte transfer each cycle, necessitating a second DIMM to have two independent operations.

Let me be clear: two DDR5 DIMMs are still better. Instead of two operations per cycle, you can perform four. The main difference is that, for modern CPUs and games, just those two operations give you the vast majority of your performance, and you don’t run into a massive performance bottleneck as you do with just a single operation via DDR4. After all, there are still a lot of DDR4 systems out there.

On the issue of compatibility

The elephant in the room with upgrading to a DDR5 platform with a single DIMM is compatibility. If you get a single DDR5 DIMM now, you should plan to add another in the future. Unfortunately, there aren’t a lot of easy answers when it comes to combining two DIMMs that aren’t in a kit together. It should work, but mixing and matching can lead to stability issues and/or lowered performance.

Generally, combining two DIMMs of the same spec should work. For instance, if you bought this Patriot Viper Venom DDR5-6000 CL30 DIMM to start your new build, and then bought a second one later, it should work. “Should” carries a lot of weight on its shoulders, however. Maybe Patriot sources DRAM from multiple places, or your second DIMM’s timings don’t completely align with your first. That could cause stability or performance issues.

There have been some attempts to get past this hurdle, such as the ROG Certified program with select Asus motherboards, but it’s impossible to know for sure if two separate DIMMs will work together or not without testing. The best you can do is to make sure you buy the same brand of memory, with the same spec, if you add a second DIMM. Make sure to keep your receipt handy in the event you need to return it, as well.

Once you have your second DIMM, make sure to test it first at stock JEDEC speeds/timings (no XMP/EXPO). Run games or applications you normally run, and then use a utility like MemTest64 to check for stability. I’d recommend keeping your PC running in this state for a few days to see if any BSODs, application crashes, or poor performance issues pop up. After that’s done, repeat the process with XMP/EXPO enabled, assuming you’re using matching DIMMs (incompatible XMP/EXPO profiles won’t work together).

Assuming DRAM prices continue at an elevated rate before you upgrade, you may want to consider investing in a dual-channel kit down the line and selling your single DIMM. Even kits can run into compatibility issues, though the likelihood is far, far lower.

Developer PaisleyBoxers has released Backrooms 32X, with the strap line “welcome to the cutting edge of 1994.” Yes, this is a Sega 32X game set in the Backrooms, the dingy, yellowing internet phenomenon given a huge boost with the release of the psychological horror indie film earlier this year. Despite the ancient and relatively resource–starved console platform, the devs appear to have captured the Backrooms' essence of “buzzing fluorescents, damp carpet, walls that go on too long” with a raycasting engine written from scratch in C and SH-2 assembly (with some Claude AI assistance).

Above: a slightly earlier Backrooms 32X release running on real Sega 32X hardware. Since this release, some objects can now be pushed over, and there can be chairs in the rooms.

In keeping with the Backrooms theme, this is a claustrophobic adventure game in the signature endless yellowed beige rooms setting, where you seek the exits, then another exit, and another. The game packs in procedurally generated levels, providing endless ‘fun.’ However, there are also community maps built by your fellow players. As a bonus, there’s a browser-based level editor so you can contribute to map designs, too.

When playing the game, your first-person character can crawl and crouch, squeezing through crawlspaces, maintaining Backrooms aesthetics and mechanics. A six-button (rather than a 3-button) Sega control pad is recommended if you are using original 32X hardware to enjoy full control.

Technical achievements

Probably the most noteworthy element of Backrooms 32X, though, is the technical achievement. Highlights include:

• the endless liminal space with procedurally generated levels,
• dual-CPU rendering utilizing both 32X SH-2s,
• a real raycaster rendering textured DDA walls, dynamic ceiling lighting, distance fog, thin partition walls, and half-height cubicle dividers you can see over,
• crawl and crouch — full eye-height perspective,
• and a live, not pre-rendered,  3D intro to the game.

If you are interested in Backrooms 32X, or even in playing any of the new wave of Backrooms gaming content, feel free to give this a spin. Literally free, as it is open source, available on GitHub, and a trivial 1.5MB ROM-ready download via the itch.io link we shared in the intro (version 164, released a couple of hours ago).

You don’t need an actual Sega 32X and flashcart hardware to play. PaisleyBoxers assures that Backrooms 32X also works on MiSTer FPGA, as well as 32X-capable emulators such as RetroArch, BlastEm, Ares, or Kega Fusion.

A Grand Theft Auto (GTA) modder has developed a mod that lets you run Grand Theft Auto III (GTA 3) and Grand Theft Auto: Vice City (GTA VC) as mini games right inside Grand Theft Auto: San Andreas (GTA SA). The modder, DryxioGTA, demonstrated the feat in a video posted on YouTube on Thursday, running the game on a Windows virtual machine on macOS.

In the video, GTA SA’s main character, CJ, can be seen stepping up to a TV, apparently inserted into the game by the mod. Once in front of the TV, the option to start either GTA VC or GTA 3 appears. The selected mini-game immediately starts running on the TV.

Gamers can switch between controlling the main GTA SA game or the mini game, using the F10 key. When controlling the mini-game — say, GTA 3, as in the video — players can play it as normal while the rest of the outer SA game continues to run, with characters roaming about. Similarly, switching control back to the outer SA game leaves the mini-game running on the TV.

Just a few hours after uploading a brief gameplay video, the modder released another video demonstrating an even more mind-blowing mod, this time running GTA Vice City inside GTA 3, inside GTA San Andreas!

As shown in the clip, the game starts with GTA SA, where players can walk up to a large screen to activate and start running GTA 3. Within GTA 3 — now running on the large screen inside San Andreas — gamers can drive to another specific screen and launch GTA VC. So you can be playing GTA SA, switch to a fully functional GTA 3 within SA, and then switch again to play Vice City right inside the GTA 3 sandbox, all while the other games are simultaneously running.

The remarkable mods are just one of thousands that developers have created since the game was first released on PC over 20 years ago in 2005. There are also several Mods for other GTA titles. Older GTA games have seen renewed interest as anticipation builds for GTA 6, which is scheduled to be released on consoles on November 19 after several postponements.

The CEO of GameStop — one of the world's largest video game retailers — has said that Sony’s decision to halt the production of physical game discs in 2028 is “totally irrelevant” to the company's business. Speaking to BloombergTech in an interview on Thursday, July 16, Ryan Cohen made the comments while responding to questions on how console makers’ going disc-less might affect GameStop amid the company's controversial bid to buy eBay.

When asked, “If the hardware makers are reportedly moving to disc-less on the console side, future game launches are digital only, where does that fit in for the business plan?” Cohen responded, “It doesn’t matter at all. Software, it mattered in the past. Software today makes up less than 12% of the business, and collectables makes up over half the business. So, it’s totally, totally irrelevant.”

Cohen's characterization doesn't exactly match GameStop's own filings, but the underlying trend does. In fiscal year 2025, the company reported total net sales of $3.63 billion. At $729.3 million, Software — which includes physical game discs, game cartridges, and digital download codes by GameStop’s classification — accounted for 20.1% of the total, the lowest among the company's product categories. Collectibles brought in $1.06 billion at 29.2 percent, while hardware and accessories — including new and pre-owned hardware, accessories, hardware bundles, interactive figures, strategy guides, and mobile/consumer electronics — remained the largest single line at $1.84 billion, or 50.7 percent.

The year-on-year growth figures also appear to support Cohen's stance, with software revenue dropping 27% in FY24 and hardware revenue dropping 12%. Meanwhile, revenue from collectibles — covering apparel, toys, trading cards, gadgets, other pop-culture products, and submission services for authentication and grading of trading cards — grew by 47%.

Much of the Bloomberg interview was focused on Cohen's somewhat controversial bid for eBay. GameStop began accumulating eBay stock on February 4 and delivered an unsolicited, non-binding proposal on May 3 to acquire all outstanding shares at $125 apiece, split evenly between cash and GameStop stock — an offer valuing eBay at roughly $56 billion, against GameStop's own market capitalization of around $10 billion. eBay's board rejected it on May 12, with chairman Paul Pressler writing that the board had determined the proposal was "neither credible nor attractive." Cohen has said he intends to take the offer directly to eBay shareholders.

Over the past several years, I’ve reviewed a growing number of augmented reality (AR) glasses. For the most part, these shades share the same mission: to give consumers a way to enjoy video content and even work on productivity tasks with a Mac or Windows device via a 150-inch (ish) virtual screen.

Most of these glasses top out at a 120 Hz refresh rate and weren’t designed specifically for a gaming audience (though many can be used for gaming). That is changing with the Asus ROG Xreal R1, which is a collaborative effort from two big names in tech. Not only does the R1 boost the maximum refresh rate to 240 Hz to appease hardcore gamers, but it also serves as a breakout box for gaming on your PC, Xbox, PlayStation, or Switch.

The R1 promises and delivers a lot, but it comes at an even higher price than Asus’ AirVision M1, which debuted at $700 two years ago.

Design of the Asus ROG Xreal R1

Although it shares many of the same internals as the Xreal One Series AR glasses, the R1 has an unmistakable ROG flair. Whereas the “One” glasses have smooth surfaces and rounded edges, the R1 has a more angular design and chamfers along the temples. And in keeping with ROG design ethos, there is a line of 9 LEDs along both temples, along with Republic of Gamers etchings.

The glasses are constructed from high-quality plastic, which feels similar to that of the Xreal One and One Pro. But whereas the Xreal glasses have a soft, matte finish, the R1 has a shimmering grey finish. Unlike the One glasses, the R1 doesn’t have a detachable front frame, which probably isn’t too much of a hindrance, as the glasses already have a clean, modern aesthetic when viewed from the front.

The R1 features open-air speakers along the temples, with a USB-C port at the rear of the left temple. The top of the right temple features a programmable Quick button. On the underside of the right temples, you’ll find a menu button and a rocker switch that navigates through the menu system. When the menu is inactive, that same rocker switch adjusts the display brightness.

The R1 uses a flat-prism lens design, resulting in much less visual heft near your eyes than traditional bird bath lenses. This design also results in a 57-degree field of view, which is identical to the One Pro. Content is projected using dual 0.55-inch Sony Micro-OLED displays, featuring a 0.01 ms response time and a 240 Hz refresh rate (double that of competing AR glasses) with Frame Rate Boost enabled. The glasses can also project an image equivalent to up to 171 inches across at a distance of 4 meters.

Three levels of electrochromic dimming are offered on the R1. The darkest setting blocks most, but not all, environmental light to heighten the sense of immersion while gaming or viewing media content. Electrochromic dimming is a must at this price point, since less expensive glasses rely on cheap physical plastic light blockers to achieve the same effect. And the physical light blockers are an all-or-nothing affair, with no granularity in their light-blocking abilities.

One other item of note: The R1 features the same accessory port between the nose pads that accepts the Xreal 6 DoF camera module.

In addition to the R1, the retail box includes a hard carrying case, the USB-C-to-USB-C cable, a prescription lens frame, small and large nose pads, a polishing cloth, and the ROG Control Box.

Specifications for the Asus ROG Xreal R1

Asus Xreal ROG Control Dock and the Asus DisplayWidget Center

Our R1 review unit shipped with the ROG Control Dock. It’s a lightweight accessory designed to connect your R1 glasses to a PC or gaming console. The front of the unit has a single USB-C port for video out to your glasses. The back panel features two HDMI ports and a DisplayPort for video input. There are also two USB-C ports: one for power-in and one for power-in and data.

The dock ships with two USB-C-to-USB-A cables for connecting power and managing data throughput from your PC.

The top of the unit features a power button, an exit button, and a joystick to navigate the glasses' OSD. If you don’t want to install any additional software, you can control all R1 settings (including screen brightness, refresh rate, color modes, tint level, and more) using the joystick and the OSD.

However, I found that the easiest way to control (most of) the R1’s settings is to use the Asus DisplayWidget Center. After installing the app, the R1 appeared as a controllable “display” within it. From there, I could control R1 settings via three menu tabs: Gaming, Visual, and Spatial Screen. The only option under Gaming is to enable Frame Rate Boost, which allows you to set a maximum refresh rate of 240 Hz (up from the default 120 Hz). From the Visual tab, you can control the tint level for the electrochromic lenses, brightness, text sharpness, and color temperature. In the Spatial Screen tab, you can adjust the screen aspect ratio, screen size, screen distance, IPD (57 to 66 mm), and control spatial lock.

Using the Asus Xreal ROG R1

The R1 is designed with gaming in mind, so I dedicated most of my time to testing it in that environment. For my testing, I used two different gaming rigs: a desktop PC with a Core 7 Ultra 265k and an RTX 4060 Ti, and an MSI Claw 8 EX AI+ handheld gaming PC with an Arc G3 Extreme SoC.

Without question, working with the desktop system was the most involved, as it required using the ROG Control Dock with various wires going in and out for video and power. However, using the R1 with the Claw 8 EX AI+ proved to be the simplest, with me only needing to plug the glasses into a free Thunderbolt 4 port.

I’ll take the time here to talk about the much-ballyhooed 240 Hz refresh rate option. This mode is enabled by selecting Frame Rate Boost from the R1’s OSD. However, I found that switching to this mode resulted in worse image quality, with a blurrier image and some jitter (especially at the outer edges of the viewable area), which led to eye strain. The effect was noticeable when using the ROG Control Dock and when plugged directly into a Thunderbolt 4 port. This is the byproduct of Asus and Xreal using a software algorithm to “boost” the frame rate from its native 120 Hz.

I experienced none of the visual anomalies in the native 120 Hz mode, so the 240 Hz mode was more of a novelty to me than something I’d rely on extensively for gaming. However, your experience may vary in this respect. The R1 supports an IPD range of 57-66 mm, and I’m just outside that range at 71 mm. So it could have been that my eyes were more sensitive to the 240 Hz mode.

While gaming on the desktop, I was able to play Battlefield 6 at 1080p and achieve over 100 FPS with DLSS Balanced enabled at High quality settings. Likewise, I easily hit similar FPS with details maxed out playing Lego Batman: Legacy of the Dark Knight.

The monitor I use for gaming is a 49-inch DQHD 240 Hz OLED, and I love the widescreen gaming aspect ratio. Being limited to 1080p resolution just didn’t seem to do the desktop gaming experience justice for me when using the R1. Yes, the image quality and response times are good, but if I’m sitting at my desk, I’d rather use my monitor.

That whole sentiment changes, however, when gaming on the Claw 8 EX AI+. Going from the 8-inch 1200p display to the simulated 171-inch 1080p display, with no limits on mobility, is an amazing experience. Since there’s only one cable to manage, going from the R1 to the handheld, you have great freedom in where you can game. From gaming on the couch, to the car, to your back porch, to sitting at the airport during a layover – the big-screen sensation that isthe R1 follows you anywhere.

Given the Xreal One Pro starting point, it’s no surprise that the R1 uses similar (or perhaps the same) Bose-tuned open-air speakers. As with the One Pro, the speakers are decent, with a respectable amount of bass and clarity at moderate to high volume levels. If you just want a low-impact, throw-on-and-go experience with the R1 and a gaming handheld, you’ll be more than pleased with the sound output. However, if you want the best mobile gaming experience, nothing is stopping you from also wearing a high-quality pair of wireless earbuds or headphones.

Bottom Line

The Asus ROG Xreal R1 glasses are a real testament to what’s possible when two companies at the top of their game work together on a singular product. Xreal is arguably the leader in modern AR glasses, while Asus is among the leading players in gaming peripherals, laptops, and handhelds. They’ve created an impressive product with a 240 Hz refresh mode, customizable RGB lighting effects, and support for the existing Xreal accessory ecosystem (namely the Xreal Eye camera).

The included ROG Control box lets you connect an HDMI or DisplayPort output from your graphics card to the glasses. It also provides quick access to the R1’s controls using the top-mounted joystick.

But the R1 really comes alive when used with a handheld gaming PC like Asus’ own ROG Ally, or a competing device like the MSI Claw 8 EX AI+. The R1 connects to these devices via a single cable and delivers a fully “mobile” gaming experience projected onto a virtual 171-inch display.

However, the primary sticking point with the R1, like many other high-end AR headsets, is the price tag. $849.99 is a tremendously high price, even with the ROG Control Box included. For example, the Xreal One Pro is $599, the Xreal One S is $449, while the RayNeo Air 4 Pro will set you back just $239. If you look past the 240 Hz mode (which can be hit-or-miss depending on the person), is the R1 really worth $250 more than the One Pro, or over $500 more than the Air 4 Pro? The objective answer is no on both counts.

A PC gamer has created and demonstrated a handy Steam Game Cartridge system. Over on PCMR, Jibril-sama introduced the system, which blends the old-school console convenience of cartridges with Steam’s awesome and agreeably flexible games library. Ingeniously, it upcycles a bundle of old SATA SSDs into Steam-ready game cartridges using a disk mount detect and execute script on the software side and a SATA dock on the hardware side. Icing on this already tasty cake is provided by Jibril-sama’s colorfully encased and custom-labeled Steam Game Cartridges. Nice.

“Got a couple of used 2.5" SSDs for cheap so I decided to make a Game Cartridge system,” the Redditor casually informs the PCMR masses in the post embedded above. “Games are actually on those SSDs with a script to auto-navigate Steam to the game's page. Auto-starting the game right away is also possible.”

Further comments by the OP explain that all the drives bought for this project were 128GB in capacity, and €7 a piece ($8). That’s not bad in the current RAM and NAND crunch, and keeps these files off your built-in primary storage. As many readers will know, PC game libraries can easily grow to hog a lot of storage.

We reached out to Jibril-sama for some more background info about how the Steam Game Cartridge system is designed to work with as little user friction as possible. They informed us that the system in the video runs Linux and Valve’s Steam URL Protocol is leveraged to navigate to the game's page or launch the game.

“All it needs is a systemd template to check for a script on the SSD and launch it. And a udev rule to trigger the system,” Jibril-sama told Tom’s Hardware. “So basically: Plug in SSD -> udev rule sees the event -> triggers the systemd daemon -> systemd daemon looks into the SSD and finds the script -> execute the script.”

Commenters on PCMR have overwhelmingly welcomed the Steam Game Cartridge future teased by this system. Some want to see the system extended to include GOG game libraries. Others query how the system handles the inevitable hefty multi-gigabyte updates that are pushed (even to older games) from time to time. Jibril-sama told Tom’s Hardware that they didn’t plan to deal with updates often, as they didn’t use cartridges for ‘live service’ titles, and they are mostly used for the “games that I want to replay once in a while.” If and when updates have been flagged, “I just let Steam handle the updates and wait a bit before I can play,” they added.

I’ve had repeated firsthand experience with Steam Games libraries being fussy when moving across different PCs, so stretching the library system this way could reveal cracks and wrinkles as more games are tested. We shall see.

Hopefully, fuller implementation guides, scripts, and resources to help others purchase or 3D print their own Steam Game Cartridge shells will be shared in due course.

The Razer Blade 16 has long been leading contender among the best gaming laptops, thanks in part to its careful component selection and strong style. In this case, our review unit comes equipped with an Intel Core Ultra 9 386H processor and a flagship RTX 5090 GPU.

While the chassis remains the same as the Razer Blade 16 that we tested a little over a year ago, the 25W processor in our new review unit enabled some impressive runtimes that eclipse the competition. You’ll have to pay a considerable sum for the luxury, but the Blade 16 makes as strong a case as a compelling premium gaming laptop.

Design of the Razer Blade 16

We were impressed with the design of last year's Blade 16, and luckily, Razer hasn’t altered the formula for this year’s model. You get the same matte-black chassis that measures just 0.69 inches at its thickest point (0.59 inches towards the front). Build quality remains excellent in true Razer fashion.

The overall design is minimalist, with a minimal amount of RGBs and no obvious ventilation slats along the sides for heat management. Instead, the clean design would look at home sitting on your desk while you're gaming with an Xbox controller, or sitting on your desk in a cubicle at work. The only bit of flash that you’ll find is the RGB Razer logo on the lid.

You’ll find thin bezels around the glossy 16-inch OLED display, below which you’ll find the full-size keyboard and a large trackpad. There’s also a small status LED at the front right of the chassis (just below the Intel Core Ultra sticker on the deck). It pulses white when the laptop is in standby mode.

There’s a healthy assortment of ports on the laptop, including three legacy USB 3.3 Gen 2 Type-A ports. There’s also one Thunderbolt 4 port, one Thunderbolt 5, an SD card reader (UHS-II), a full-size HDMI 2.1 port, and a 3.5 mm combo audio jack. There’s also a proprietary power port.

The Blade 16 measures 13.98 x 9.86 x 0.69 inches and weighs 4.71 pounds. For comparison, the MSI Raider 16 HX also packs an RTX 5090, but measures 14.29 x 10.62 x 1.14 inches and weighs over a pound more (5.73 pounds). The Alienware 16 Area-51 is heavier still at 7.49 pounds, with dimensions of 14.37 x 11.41 x 1.12 inches.

Razer Blade 16 Specifications

Gaming and Graphics on the Razer Blade 16

Our Blade 16 review unit is equipped with a Core Ultra 9 386H processor, which has 16 total cores (4 performance, 8 efficient) and a maximum performance turbo frequency of 4.9 GHz for the performance cores. There’s also 32GB of LPDDR5x memory and a GeForce RTX 5090 GPU (1,597 MHz boost clock, 175W max TGP).

This combo generally performed well across our gaming benchmark suite, with a few exceptions. While playing Battlefield 6 at native resolution in Overkill detail mode, with DLSS Quality and Frame Generation enabled, I was comfortably getting between 110 and 120 FPS, even with a lot of action happening on the screen.

For this review, the competitive set consists of last year's Blade 16 (Ryzen AI 9 HX 370 at 28W, RTX 5090 at 160W TGP), MSI Raider 16 Max HX (Core Ultra 9 290HX Plus at 55W, RTX 5090 at 175W TGP), and the Alienware 16 Area-51 (Core Ultra 9 290HX Plus at 55W, RTX 5080 at 175W TGP).

As usual, we start our gaming benchmarks with the Shadow of the Tomb Raider (Highest setting) benchmark, where the Blade 16 delivered 182 FPS at 1080p. Performance at 1600p scaled down to 133 FPS. The 2025 edition of the Blade 16 was 16 FPS behind at 1080, but at the resolution that most would play at, 1600p, the older model was nearly 30 FPS faster (162 FPS versus 133 FPS).

Cyberpunk 2077 (Ray Tracing Ultra settings), the laptops were pretty evenly matched, with most running between 65 and 70 FPS at 1080p and at around 40 FPS at 1600p. For the Razer Blade 16 specifically, it achieved 65 FPS at 1080p and 42 FPS at 1600p.

Far Cry 6 (Ultra settings) saw the Blade 16 running in third place ahead of its predecessor (106 FPS at 1080p, 108 FPS at 1600p). The Alienware 16 Area-51 and Raider 16 Max HX were a few FPS ahead at each resolution, but it was still a relatively close fight among the top three.

Red Dead Redemption 2 (Medium settings) proved challenging for the Blade 16, as it lagged behind with 94 FPS at 1080p and just 71 FPS at 1600p. For comparison, last year's model eclipsed those numbers at 121 FPS and 94 FPS, respectively. The 25W CPU simply couldn’t keep up with the 28W Ryzen and 55W Intel HX chips

However, the Blade 16 was back to its fighting form in the Borderlands 3 (Badass settings) benchmark, easily slipping into second place behind the Raider 16 Max HX with 175 FPS at 1080p and 126 FPS at 1600p.

Metro Exodus is still our preferred benchmark for gaming laptop stress testing. Our review unit averaged 133.39 FPS at 1080p across 15 loops using the RTX benchmark preset. The CPU performance cores averaged 3.96 GHz, and the efficiency cores averaged 3.5 GHz. The RTX 5090 GPU also ran at 1.95 GHz.

One item of note is that the two system fans are incredibly loud while gaming, which may force you to use a pair of the best gaming headsets to block out the added noise.

Productivity Performance on the Razer Blade 16

The Razer Blade 16 uses a 16-core Intel Core Ultra 9 386H processor, 32GB of memory, and a 2TB PCIe 4.0 SSD. With some of the competition sporting upwards of 8 additional cores, the Blade 16 didn’t really break through in the multi-threaded benchmarks.

The synthetic CPU benchmark Geekbench saw the Blade 16 lag slightly behind its predecessor in single-core (2,895 versus 2,922), but pull ahead in multi-core performance (16,971 versus 16,025). However, neither Blade system was a match for the Core Ultra 9 290HX Plus processors in the Alienware 16 Area-51 and Raider 16 Max HX; the latter of which pulled numbers of 3,231 and 20,656, respectively.

In our 25GB file transfer test, the Blade 16 took second place by the slightest of margins, hitting 1,735.09 MBps. However, this result was still 1,000 MBps behind the first-place Alienware 16 Area-51.

The multi-threaded performance shortfall crept up again in our Handbrake test, where we transcode a 4K video file to 1080p. The Blade 16 pulled up the rear in this group, even falling behind the Blade 16 with the Ryzen AI 9 HX 370. It took 3 minutes and 17 seconds to complete the task compared to just 1 minute and 51 seconds for the Raider 16 Max HX.

Display on the Razer Blade 16

As Tom's Hardware's resident monitor editor, I’m absolutely smitten with OLED panels. Thankfully, the OLED display on the Blade 16 doesn’t disappoint: it’s a 16-inch panel with a 2560 x 1600 resolution and a native refresh rate of 240 Hz.

We found that color volume was 90 percent for DCI-P3 and 127 percent for sRGB. Brightness levels were also fairly impressive, earning second place behind the Raider 16 Max HX at 408.2 nits.

Although the instrumented tests show some regression compared to last year’s Blade 16 in the sRGB and DCI-P3 color spaces, the display looks amazing in a vacuum. The gritty visuals while playing Battlefield 6 in Overkill mode were a delight to my eyes, with sunlight glinting through windows and concussive bomb blasts kicking up debris all around me.

Keyboard and Touchpad on the Razer Blade 16

The keyboard on the Blade 16 uses scissor switches with 1.5 mm of travel. The key presses are slightly clicky, and my fingers had no trouble getting used to typing on the keys.

I used my standard keyhero.com typing test and scored 89 words per minute with 97 percent accuracy, which is about par for the course for me.

The touchpad is absolutely massive, measuring 5.9 inches wide and 3.8 inches tall. It’s one of the largest trackpads you’ll find outside of Apple’s 16-inch MacBook Pros. What isn’t Apple-like is the insistence on using a mechanical linkage for trackpad actuation instead of the steadier, more consistent presses made possible by a haptic touchpad. For a laptop with a sticker price of nearly $5,000, I don’t think it’s too much to ask for some haptics here.

However, if you’re using this laptop primarily for gaming, you’ll likely be using one of the best gaming mice for your competitive sessions.

Audio on the Razer Blade 16

The six-speaker audio system on the Blade 16 is THX-optimized, and the audio quality is good, if not quite price-appropriate. While playing Battlefield 6, in-game dialog, explosions, gunfire, and vehicle noise generally sounded good, but the effects were competing with the turbine whine of the dual system fans. Cranking the volume to near-max levels helped drown out the fan noise, but at that point, I was experiencing a bit of aural overload, so I opted to put on a pair of headphones.

When the CPU and GPU weren’t heavily taxed, I was able to better enjoy the speakers, such as by playing Dave Matthews Band’s album Before These Crowded Streets for the 300th time. I cruised through the album with the volume set to a comfortable 50%, savoring the acoustic and bass guitars on “Dreaming Tree,” which always results in a relaxing frisson for me.

Similarly, I watched the Mel Gibson-helmed The Patriot to get into the mood for the Fourth of July, and reveled in the heavy dialogue, flintlock musket blasts, and cannon bursts.

You can make adjustments to the audio using the Razer Synapse software,

Upgradeability of the Razer Blade 16

Accessing the interior of the Blade 16 involves removing 10 Torx screws. Once all screws are removed, the bottom panel lifts off with minimal force. You’ll find the large 90 WHr battery at the bottom front of the chassis, and above are two M.2 slots that accept full-length 2280 SSDs.

The right slot was populated with a 2TB Lexar NM790 PCIe 4.0 SSD, while the left slot was empty, allowing for future upgrades. Also accessible is the PCIe Wi-Fi 7 network adapter (Intel BE213).

Battery Life on the Razer Blade 16

One thing to keep in mind is that the Blade 16 maintained competitive gaming performance among its peers, while its multi-threaded performance took a back seat. However, those compromises were fully redeemed in terms of battery life.

The Blade 16 uses a 90 WHr battery, which delivered shockingly long endurance (for a gaming laptop) in our battery test, consisting of web browsing, video streaming over Wi-Fi, and OpenGL testing with the screen brightness set at 150 nits. The system lasted a staggering 12:46, besting the Ryzen AI 9 HX 370-equipped Blade 16 by over 5 hours and the Alienware 16 Area-51 by over 9 hours. Even the Raider 16 Max HX was no match, falling short by over 4 hours.

That is a fantastic result for such a thin and light 16-inch gaming laptop, and it is a testament to the miserly energy consumption of the Panther Lake processor.

Heat on the Razer Blade 16

While running the Metro Exodus stress test, we measured the temperature of Blade 16's aluminum-alloy chassis in various spots. The keyboard measured 102 degrees Fahrenheit (F) between the G and H keys, while the touchpad was 92 F.

The hottest part of the laptop was near the rear center of the bottom of the chassis, where we measured 130 F. So it’s best to keep the laptop firmly planted on your desk while gaming, lest you roast your legs.

During the Metro Exodus stress test, the CPU measured 75.3 degrees Celsius (C). Meanwhile, the RTX 5090 came in at 87 C.

Webcam on the Razer Blade 16

Razer continues to use a run-of-the-mill 1080p webcam with an IR sensor for Windows Hello support. It’s by no means a class-leading webcam, but it’s perfectly usable for Zoom or Teams meetings.

I found the colors to be mostly adequate, but there was a little lightness in the detail in my facial features.

Software and Warranty on the Razer Blade 16

One of my favorite things about Razer laptops is that they aren’t loaded down with too much added software. On our Blade 16 review unit, Razer Chroma and Synapse were preloaded.

Synapse is an all-in-one utility that lets you adjust performance profiles, keyboard macros, audio presets, and more. Chroma, on the other hand, gives you full control over system RGBs, including the per-key keyboard effects.

Otherwise, you’ll find requisite utilities, like the Nvidia app and the usual Windows app shortcuts (we’re looking at you, LinkedIn) on the Start menu.

The Blade 16 comes backed by a one-year warranty for the system itself and a two-year warranty for the 90 WHr battery.

Razer Blade 16 Configurations

Our Blade 16 review unit came configured with a Core Ultra 9 386H processor, 32GB of LPDDR5X memory, a 2TB SSD, RTX 5090 laptop GPU, and a 16-inch, 240 Hz. 1600p display. The price as-configured is a whopping $4,899.99.

There are cheaper configurations available — if you retain the Core Ultra 9 386H and opt for an RTX 5070 Ti, 1TB SSD, and 32GB of memory, the price drops to $3,499.99. Going with RTX 5080 bumps (all other hardware staying the same) takes the price to $3,999.99.

Bottom Line

Overall, the Razer Blade 16 was a strong performer in our gaming benchmarks, which is the primary reason why most people would be willing to spend nearly $5,000 for this system. More importantly, the Panther Lake-based system delivered nearly 13 hours of non-gaming battery life, outrunning its closest competitor by over 4 hours. Combine those results with the beautiful display, attractive chassis, and under-the-radar design, and you have a winning combination.

However, there are some detractions; the lack of a haptic trackpad at this price point is annoying, and multi-threaded performance significantly lagged the competition. Also, the $4,900 asking price is high, although not completely out of line for a system with these specs. You can save roughly $900 by going with an RTX 5080 instead of the RTX 5090 that was in our system.

But if price isn’t an issue for you, it’s hard to argue with this compelling combination of gaming performance and battery life.

I've reviewed several Razer gaming chairs over the years and have come to appreciate their style, adjustability, and overall comfort. Now, Razer is introducing a new line of gaming chairs that leans heavily into styling.

Meet the new Soma Chroma, a mid-range gaming chair with a racing-style design and integrated RGB lighting customizable via Razer Chroma software. The chair can be powered via a USB-C cable or a portable power bank, and it connects to your PC via an integrated Bluetooth connection or a 2.4 GHz wireless USB dongle included in the box.

But is beauty more than skin deep? Let’s take a deep look at the Soma Chroma to see if there’s more to see other than its flashy design to make it a contender among the best gaming chairs.

Razer Soma Chroma Specifications

Assembling the Razer Soma Chroma

This is the fourth Razer gaming chair that I’ve reviewed, so I could pretty much put one together blindfolded. From the packaging to the tools/accessories included, not much has changed. Inside the box, you’ll find:

• Fabric gloves for assembly (glued to the inner flap)
• Backrest and seat base (left and right arms pre-attached)
• Metal, 5-arm base
• Casters 5x
• Gas lift, tilt mechanism
• Allen wrench, screws, and plastic covers for left/right side arms
• 2.4 GHz USB dongle (attached to assembly guide)

The chair arrived in a massive box, and the actual weight listed on the shipping label as 70 pounds. Upon opening the box, I was greeted by a familiar sight: a pair of black-and-green work gloves for assembling the chair. It’s a nice touch, but I always toss the gloves aside because I prefer to work with my bare hands for a relatively simple task like this.

A large green cardstock assembly guide sits atop the components, with a tiny box containing the 2.4 GHz wireless USB dongle attached to it.

The seat base, seatback, and 5-arm base were all wrapped in clear plastic bags to protect the metal and fabric on the components during shipping. The first step was to insert the castors into the 5-arm base, and then to insert the gas lift cylinder into the base.

The next step was to remove the four screws that are preinstalled from the factory from the bottom of the seat base with the included Allen wrench tool. Once removed, I attached the tilt mechanism, reinserted the same four screws, and placed it on the 5-arm base. The seatback has two screws on each side that must be removed before you attach it to the seat base.

Once the seatback was attached, I reinserted the four screws and slipped on the plastic cover to hide the screws and attachment mechanism. I'll note that on Razer Iskur chairs, the plastic cover is secured with a single screw on either side, and the screw is covered with a tiny plastic plug. The cover on the Soma Chroma simply slides and locks into place.

Once the chair is fully assembled, you’re not quite done yet. You still need to get power to the chair for the RGB lighting to work. The chair includes a relatively short USB-C cord that hangs out the back. Razer also supplied me with a 10-foot USB-C-to-USB-C extension cable, which I used to connect to my desktop PC. However, this setup is rather cumbersome and requires continually fighting the cable as you move around your workspace.

My solution was to plug the USB-C cable from the back of the chair into a portable power bank, and then tuck it into the zippered pouch at the bottom of the seatback. This worked well, and is clearly how the chair is intended to be used — however, it does not ship with a battery pack, nor does it ship with an extra-long cable (Razer sent that separately). So you'll need to invest in a battery pack or an extension cable to use the RGB on this chair.

Razer Soma Chroma Design

The Soma Chroma introduces an entirely new design language for Razer gaming chairs. Whereas the Iskur line has a more organic design, with softer curves and radiused edges, the Soma Chroma is more angular—especially on the seatback.

The seat back and the base have recessed channels, which I assume would help to improve airflow under your buttocks and around your back. It's an interesting design choice, though I imagine the recessed channels in the seat base will also quickly fill with dirt, dust, and food crumbs. The same design is mirrored on the back of the chair. While previous Iskur chairs have used the same material on both the front and back, the back of the Soma Chroma is constructed of hard plastic.

You'll find a zippered pouch at the back of the seat base, which runs the full width. It's large enough to accommodate a portable power bank, so you don't have to be tethered to a long extension cord to power the RGB lights.

Speaking of the RGB lights, they are controlled using Razer’s Synapse software. I installed the Synapse app on my desktop computer and then plugged in the 2.4 GHz wireless USB dongle (the chair also has integrated Bluetooth LE, if you prefer to go that route). The Soma Chroma then showed up in the app, allowing me to configure it.

There’s a brightness slider and an option to dim the lights after a period of inactivity on the right panel. In the right panel, there are options to change the default effects pattern. You can configure more advanced effects using the Chroma Studio. As you might expect, you can sync the RGBs with your games, although the effect is not evenly remotely noticeable unless you’re in a dark room.

During the daytime, you’re not going to notice the lights at all, and the only people who will notice are your coworkers on Google Meet/Zoom/Teams calls.

Although you can control the RGB effects in software, there are also physical controls at the top of the headrest.

Razer Soma Chroma Adjustments and Comfort

The Soma Chroma features dual-density cold-cured foam for the seat cushion. It did a good job of conforming to my buttocks, as it's specifically designed to relieve pressure points. There's good thigh support for my 5-foot-10-inch and 161-ish-pound frame.

What you gain in RGB goodness, you lose in adjustability. There's no adjustable lumbar support — what you see is what you get. Razer said that the lumbar curve is designed to encourage a neutral position and reduce fatigue after long-term use. That may be true in theory, but my lower back begged to differ after sitting in the chair for 6 hours straight in an upright and "ergonomically-correct" position. This was never an issue for me with the Iskur V2, with its 360-degree lumbar support — or even with the Iskur V2 X, which has no lumbar controls.

The backrest is adjustable from its default 90-degree upright position all the way back to 155 degrees. I spent the majority of my time either fully upright or slightly reclined at about 100 degrees. Anything more than 100 degrees just doesn't feel natural to me in any gaming chair.

The Soma Chroma features 2D armrests, which are adjustable for swivel and height. The armrests have an up/down travel of 4 inches and can swivel in or out by up to 25 degrees. They're densely padded and were a comfortable home for my elbows during extended sessions.

The chair has a height adjustment mechanism via a handle located on the right side of the seat base. I preferred to leave the seat at its maximum height of 20.1 inches.

Bottom Line

The Razer Soma Chroma is an interesting chair for gamers who are already fully entrenched in the Chroma ecosystem. The Soma Chroma has full access to Razer’s software suite, so you can sync all your devices to suit your gaming (or other media) needs. The chair also features built-in Bluetooth LE and includes a 2.4 GHz wireless USB dongle.

The RGB integration is also well-done, with support for portable power banks and a zippered pouch on the back to discreetly hide it. You can also use a USB-C extension cord to connect the Soma Chroma to your PC, but it is a nightmare for ergonomics. Of course, the chair ships with neither a portable battery pack or an extension cord, so you'll need to purchase these separately.

On the flip side, the Soma Chroma isn’t as adjustable as some of Razer’s other chairs, as it lacks 3D armrests and lumbar controls. I also found that I had some minor lower back pain when using the chair for hours in my preferred seating position. Of course, your mileage may vary, but I haven't experienced this with previous Razer chairs.

And the other matter to consider is the $499 price. If you don’t need RGB wizardry, the Razer Iskur V2 X is $200 cheaper and just as good on chair fundamentals.

The Internationale Computerspielesammlung (ICS), a German effort to assemble the world's largest publicly accessible video game archive, is being wound down after roughly €1.5 million in public funding expired at the end of April and the federal government declined to renew it. GamesWirtschaft reported on July 3rd that the project's shareholders voted unanimously to shut it down, leaving the future of its database of more than 60,000 cataloged titles unresolved. This decision comes the same week that Sony confirmed it’s ending physical PlayStation disc production.

The ICS held more than 60,000 games spread across cartridge, floppy disk, CD, DVD, and Blu-ray, alongside manuals, packaging, and hardware, assembled since 2012 from the USK (Germany's game-ratings authority), the Computerspielemuseum Berlin, the industry association Game, and the University of Potsdam. Its public online catalog launched in April 2019 with tens of thousands of entries. The physical holdings remain with the institutions that own them, and whether the shared database and its infrastructure survive is under legal and technical review, according to GamesWirtschaft.

Funding for the ICS came from the Berlin Senate and the federal government's culture commissioner and ran only through late April. Germany's Federal Ministry of Research, Technology and Space (BMFTR), which took responsibility for games policy in 2025, examined a model for permanent institutional funding and concluded it wasn’t economically viable given the scale of the work involved. Berlin economics senator Franziska Giffey had cautioned earlier in the year that support beyond April wasn't guaranteed.

A 2023 study by the Video Game History Foundation and Software Preservation Network found that 87% of classic games released in the U.S. are out of print and commercially unavailable, a survival rate the researchers put below that of American silent films. In October 2024, the U.S. Copyright Office refused for the fourth time since 2015 to grant a DMCA exemption that would let libraries share preserved games with remote researchers, siding with the Entertainment Software Association.

Meanwhile, fan-run archives face a different set of challenges. Myrient, a repository holding more than 385 TB of preserved games, was set to go offline in early 2026 as AI-driven demand drove up RAM, SSD, and hard-drive prices, before volunteers backed up the collection in full. The ICS shutdown coincides with Sony's confirmation that it will end physical PlayStation disc production in 2028, which will make any future archival attempts all the more difficult.

GitHub has announced that it will be giving developers a way to obtain their public repo on a CD-ROM. Thanks to this initiative, a dev will be able to obtain a physical copy of their code and “Keep it. Lend it to friends. Pass it on to your children.” This would be a very unusual offer from GitHub without the context of Sony’s official announcement, stating that it will cease the production and distribution of PlayStation games via physical media in 2028.

Above you can see that GitHub is lending its voice to those who reckon Sony’s move is wrong or, at best, premature. The coding and collaboration platform, owned by Microsoft, states that “In light of recent developments in physical media, GitHub is proud to announce that you can now obtain your public repo on CD-ROM.” Moreover, it appeals to the human side of computing, adding the emotive line “Keep it. Lend it to friends. Pass it on to your children.”

It isn’t April 1^st, so thankfully this is no joke. However, if you check out the above-linked GitHub Your Code, On a CD offer page, it quickly becomes clear this is a very limited in time/scope stunt.

“Order a burned CD of your own public GitHub repo. Yes, a real physical disc you can hold in your hands, no download required,” begins the spiel. But this is a very limited run of 1,000 discs, with applications required between July 2 and July 6 (inclusive). Limit one per person, with availability varying between country/region.

“Your code is physically yours, forever. Until you lose it, let's be real,” says GitHub. At best, these CDs will be framed and put on a wall, some becoming collector’s items or eBay money spinners (discs like 0001 or 0888 would be good ones, if they are numbered). Also, many will be lost or eventually/accidentally discarded, as GitHub seems to know. So this 'protest' is arguably 1,000 doses of expensively shipped e-waste.

Circling back to the context of this GitHub story, it is clear it is a small protest at Sony essentially ringing the death knell for physical media in modern gaming. Consoles were already rolling inexorably down this road with the cheaper digital edition hardware releases, and other games industry players are pushing in the same direction. Digital-only isn’t likely going to end up well for gamers, archivists, second-hand stores, and others – with used game media disappearing from the scene, to name but one impending issue.

Price hikes! Get your price hikes here! Hot on the heels of Apple's upward push of dollar figures, ganging up with Framework, and harnessing the disillusion caused by the price of Valve's Steam Machine... It's now Microsoft's turn. The ailing division is enacting yet another increase to the price of the Xbox Series consoles, at $100 more for the 512 GB versions and $150 more for the 1 TB model. The pricing will come into effect in roughly a month and change, on August 1st.

The firm is also killing the 2 TB version of the Xbox Series X, in an echo of Apple slicing away the higher-RAM variants of its Mac Studio computers. If you were on the fence about buying one of those, it would be wise to rush, as at the current price of "only" around $799.99, stocks are unlikely to last. Here's the new pricing, in all its glory:

• Xbox Series S, 512 GB, Digital Edition: $499.99
• Xbox Series S, 1 TB, Digital Edition: $599.99
• Xbox Series X, 1 TB, Digital Edition: $749.99
• Xbox Series X, 1 TB: $799.99

Microsoft is also adding a few options for payment and alternative purchases. Buy Now, Pay Later for splitting purchases across short-term installments for consoles bought at the Microsoft store, confirming rumors of a partnership with well-known payment processor Klarna. If that's not quite your jam, there's also interest-free 12-month financing available at Amazon for Xbox hardware.

The company is expanding Xbox trade-ins, stating that it's "working with retail partners" to enable players to sell their consoles to stores for cash or store credit. This isn't a new thing in the gaming world, as GameStop and Amazon have historically had this feature, but Microsoft's wording makes it sound like the program will be expanded to more retailers. As always, you can buy a certified refurbished console from the Microsoft Store and a number of retailers.

The highly anticipated Steam Machine is being shot down by flak due to its high release price, but all of a sudden, the $1,349 on ask for the 2 TB version doesn't sound so absurd, considering the superior hardware, gigantic game library, and low prices for games. Following Microsoft's logic, the upswing for the now-dead 2 TB version of the Xbox Series X would be $300, putting it at a nice round $1,099.99. Are you not entertained, if not excited, to be living in such interesting times?

69-year-old Claude Guillemot, who founded Ubisoft alongside his four brothers, died on Friday, June 19, after his private twin-engine Cessna 421 crashed on approach to La Baule-Escoublac Airport in France, near the country’s Atlantic coast. Le Parisien said that Ubisoft has confirmed the passing of one of its founders in the accident.

“Ubisoft ‌was deeply saddened to learn of the death of Claude Guillemot, co-founder of the group and chairman ​of Guillemot Corp, in an accident,” the company said. “Our thoughts are with his family ⁠and loved ones during this difficult time. No ​further statements will be made at this time.”

Claude and his brothers founded Ubisoft in 1986 when they established the business by importing and distributing games in the country. It was also during that same year that it launched its first game, Zombi. In 1989, the startup was already making millions of dollars in sales and revenue, but it made its first globally successful original title, the platformer Rayman, in 1995. This allowed the company to go public in 1996, when it raised $80 million in its IPO.

Its successful public debut injected enough cash for it to open studios across the world, including Canada, China, and Japan. From humble beginnings, the company grew into one of the biggest names in gaming and entertainment, owning some of the most popular gaming titles and franchises in the past and present like Assassin’s Creed, Brothers in Arms, Far Cry, Ghost Recon, Rainbow Six, Prince of Persia, The Division, and Watch Dogs, among others.

Despite its success, Ubisoft has recently been facing some troubles. This includes a major cyberattack on its servers which forced the company to take Rainbow Six Siege completely offline as well as issues with generative AI in Far Cry 7, with one insider saying that it “looks like s**t.”

The Guillemot brothers no longer own 100% of Ubisoft, although they still own a considerable stake. According to Investing.com, Guillemot Brothers S.A., a holding company that manages the brothers’ stake in Ubisoft, is still the largest shareholder with 12.27%, while institutional bank JPMorgan Chase & Co. is the second largest shareholder with 9.94%. Chinese gaming company Tencent Holdings Limited owns 9.46% of the company, with the rest spread out across different mutual funds and ETF, retail investors, and other institutional investors.

Claude Guillemot was the president of the Guillemot Corporation (different from the Guillemot Brothers S.A.), which was the original company founded in 1986 and still owns brands like digital audio solutions provider Hercules, DJ equipment maker Djuced, and gaming accessories manufacturer Thrustmaster. His younger brother, Yves Guillemot, still serves as the CEO of Ubisoft.

Aside from helping build one of Europe’s largest gaming empires, reports say that Claude also holds a pilot’s license and was an avid and experienced pilot. He was en route to the airport near the accident site for a planned air show this weekend when the tragedy struck. Alongside the Ubisoft co-founder, a 70-year-old flight instructor was also killed in the accident.

Officials haven’t made any statements yet regarding the cause of the accident. It will likely take months, if not years, before we get a comprehensive accident report from the Bureau d'enquêtes et d'analyses pour la sécurité de l'aviation civile (BEA), the French equivalent of the U.S. NTSB, tasked with investigating aircraft accidents.

People seem all too ready to anthropomorphize LLMs and AI chatbots like ChatGPT, Claude, and Gemini. Some humans even admit to ‘relationships’ with one or more of the various examples of machine intelligence. To illustrate how flawed this instinct could be, a Microsoft AI researcher built a tiny neural network inside Age of Empires II using goats, grass, and bridges. Adrian de Wynter shared his work in a paper dubbed If LLMs have human-like attributes, then so does Age of Empires II. The Microsoft researcher, based at the University of York, also talked to 404 Media recently about how he likes to turn absurdism up to 11 to make a point.

In the research paper, De Wynter doesn’t make the argument that LLMs do or do not actually have generalized anthropomorphic attributes. Instead, he illustrates that the AoEII goats can also power the kinds of models that lay behind today's most popular chatbots. That hammers home the argument that “in no case is a machine’s activity to be interpreted in terms of higher cognitive processes, if it can be fairly interpreted in terms of processes which stand lower in the scale of cognitive evolution and development.”

De Wynter also raises the well-known concept of confirmation bias. Those looking for human traits in tech like chatbots will tend to find them, he proposes. However, the big contrast between the absurdist goat example and the commercial LLM chatbot is the way people interact with them, the interface that makes the likes of Claude ‘conversation friendly.’ De Wynter’s research indicates that anthropomizing LLMs is a common trend in computer science papers. From 337 such papers De Wynter looked at, published in the last two years, he says that 57% assumed that LLMs could have human-like traits. This basic assumption could color the research, testing, and, of course, conclusions of these papers.

So, how did the Microsoft AI researcher build the goaty AoEII LLM? Well, he didn’t quite go as far as developing a full-blown LLM. Instead, De Wynter thought it sufficient to use AoEII’s scenario editor to build a working NAND gate, with a 1-bit perceptron, where the goats act as bits. This crude perceptron and the circuit to train it in-game are enough to demonstrate that the simplest building block of a modern neural network could be made this way. And if you think it is absurd that AoEII goats can embody consciousness, then it should be equally absurd to regard any of the well-known chatbots as anything more.

Companies behind the AI boom aren’t discouraging people from anthropomorphizing their wares. In many ways, they might benefit from these human perceptions. Chatbots they deploy are trained with natural language and use techniques to mimic the shape and tone of natural conversation. This makes it easy for users to project personality, emotion, or even consciousness onto them. Top AI company execs have leaned into the perception of their customers, publicly entertaining the idea that their systems could or might be exhibiting signs of consciousness. In his 404 Media interview, De Wynter also highlighted research indicating that people buy more products when they can empathize with them, and that includes AI/chatbot/LLM subscriptions.

Goldeneye Recomp v1.0 has been released on GitHub by developer SunJaycy. Gaming-focused social media channels are excited with this release, which provides “a native PC port of GoldenEye 007 (Xbox 360 / XBLA), built by statically recompiling the original game into C++ with the ReXGlue SDK,” states the dev. “No emulator — the game runs as a real native executable.” I played the original Nintendo 64 classic for hours in the late 1990s, but this version comes with numerous benefits, including support for modern Windows controllers, online multiplayer, widescreen support, and post-FX filters, all at a purported stable 60 FPS frame rate.

GoldenEye was a seminal release for consoles, establishing that FPS games were a compelling proposition beyond the realms of PCs and keyboard/mouse control. Nintendo / Rare showed that slick, responsive FPS controls were possible on a console, and it felt good to play, with widespread praise from both reviewers and fans. In effect, GoldenEye trailblazed this genre on consoles, thanks in part to the N64’s 3D power and sensitive analog controller. Without its strong approval, we may not have seen the subsequent console developments/releases of games like Perfect Dark, Timesplitters, and many more.

Though it may be exciting for old GoldenEye N64 players (and even those who’ve only experienced the game on N64 emulators), getting the GoldenEye 007 — PC Recompilation installed isn’t a cinch right now. As SunJaycy highlights on the GitHub page for the project, “This repository contains no game code or assets. It is only the source that wraps the game (menus, hooks, online, post-FX, build config).” They go on to explain that “You must find the game files yourself. This game was never released publicly.” So, that’s a challenge you’ll have to work through on your own.

If and when you get the Xbox 360 version of the game recompiled for PC, though, you should expect the following thrilling benefits:

• Runs natively on Windows — no emulator, no BIOS.
• Controller support.
• Online multiplayer — host or join matches over the internet (LAN, Hamachi, playit.gg, or a public server).
• In-game pause/settings menu (ESC): video, resolution, frame limit, fullscreen, online setup.
• Post-FX filters (brightness, contrast, saturation, vignette, presets…).
• Smooth, stable 60 FPS (recompiled, with GPU-pacing fixes for the original's frame timing).

Instructions are provided for building the Windows version of the game from its collected sources, plus the Goldeneye Recomp v1.0 code.

Coincidentally, this Recomp release comes as the latest James Bond title, 007 First Light game, rides high in the charts on PCs and current-gen consoles. First Light is also the centerpiece of the latest Nvidia GeForce bundling promotion. PC gamers can grab a free copy of the action-adventure game 007 First Light when they purchase a qualifying GeForce RTX 50-series graphics card, gaming desktop, or laptop.

Game speedrunning enthusiasts once discovered that a greasy disc was the key to enabling a big time-saving trick in SpongeBob SquarePants: Battle for Bikini Bottom on the original Xbox. Speedrunner SHiFT, the current leaderboard champ in the game, reveals how, with the right console generation choice, the right drive, the right configuration of greasy smudges, and with mastery of the 'lag clip' technique, you could complete SpongeBob running from the optical drive in record time.

The above video is partly a detective story, as the competitive speedrunning community focuses intensely on any not-so-obvious speed advantages that can be achieved. The dream is to slice seconds off the completion time of this game and achieve a speedrun of under 40 minutes. SHiFT discusses how the gunked-up game disc tactic was confirmed as a winning strategy, while not breaking any community guidelines.

The original Xbox version of the SpongeBob game is the default choice of the speedrunning community, as it has faster loading than the PS2 and GameCube versions. However, there were various versions of the Xbox, too. For example, there are four different optical drive manufacturers, among other nuanced differences. So, detective work and experience were used to narrow down the best vintage machine.

Speedrunners, including SHiFT and Zim, worked for hours testing various combinations of optical drives, laser modules, and connector cables. They even wondered if the video chip (which varies between production years on Xbox) or the TV connector method had an impact on timings. In a daze from a super-long streaming session, they eventually decided to look at the condition of the disc. It was smudgy, but it could be worse...

An inspirational moment then occurred, and they tried making the disc filthy and smeary with grease and sweat. However, it was ultimately found that a strategically placed pattern of smears, with eight strokes emanating from the center like the petals of a flower, was a winning choice. This grease config made it easy for the player to induce the elusive lag clip timesaving technique – no hardware tinkering necessary – without making the optical disc unreadable.

They had found “the holy grail” of SpongeBob lag clipping speedrunning. SHiFT’s conclusion was confirmed in some correspondence with the then-champion among SpongeBob speedrunners, who goes by the unimproveable handle swagmasterdoritos. The master admitted, “I clean my discs via licking them then using a pillowcase to wipe and clean.” An image shared by swagmasterdoritos showed the spit-cleaned disc featured petal-like streaks. That’s how they had been enjoying super-slick lag clipping throughout the game: there was nothing particularly unique about their original Xbox.

Two new entrants have broken into the top five of the leaderboard in the last five days, but SHiFT's time of 40m 27s is still more than 90s ahead of the nearest challenger. Nowadays, the community has given up on optical disks. You will see that all the top SpongeBob speedruns play the game from the Xbox HDD. Some thought lag clips were too inconsistent, and that potentially damaging game discs by smudging or scratching them was unethical.

A software engineer has shared a video demonstrating their brand-new gamified running app for the Meta Ray-Ban Display glasses. Highlights of the app, made by Stijn Spanhove, include a ghost racer to help you to keep pace with your best prior runs, coin pick-ups, sprint zone bonuses, and a mini leaderboard. This is only possible now because Meta recently added display capabilities for devs in the Meta Wearables Device Access Toolkit and the Web Apps pathway.

The embedded video shows several compelling features of the unnamed gamified running app. As you run, you can see the route with you and your ghost racer’s position superimposed on it. There are also status details such as run distance, completed distance, vs ghost distance, coins collected, and even a score in the HUD. We also note that the wearable feeds the display with pace and distance info, with the compass used to keep the map oriented in the forward direction.

Spanhove makes developing this app for the Ray-Ban Display sound like a walk in the park. “I built a web app for the glasses, loaded a previous GPX from Strava, and dropped game mechanics on top,” he summarized. GPX is a standard GPS file format that contains a route’s data and Strava allows users to export any past run as a GPX file. So, Spanhove just took a previous run and exported it for this gamified web app project.

The software engineer also told folks not to worry about having to run with their chunky flagship phone in their pocket. With this web app, processing is light enough to run smoothly directly on the device, assured Spanhove. “Been wearing a lot of AR glasses, these feel ok. Honestly, comfortable to run in,” he surmised.

Meta's Ray-Ban Display glasses

Meta launched its Ray-Ban Display glasses last year, with early adopters being able to get hold of these wearables starting in October. As you may infer from the name, these were built on Meta’s earlier glasses designs by integrating a micro display in the right lens. The new waveguide display meant wearers would be able to enjoy new apps with AR overlays. So, in effect, Meta’s Ray-Bans were upgraded to include a lightweight AR HUD.

On May 15, Meta opened up developer access to the display on the Meta Ray-Ban Display⁠ glasses with two build paths: mobile apps and web apps. This unlock means devs and enthusiasts can unleash their imaginations. Quickly, there were examples of the new AR glasses being used for quirky fun like boxing games, Tetris, Breakout, and even a utility to interact with your car. Our headlining gamified running example may be the most compelling new use for the glasses yet, though.

We reviewed the original Meta Ray-Bans in Feb 2025.

Gaming laptops can be pricey, and in the past few years, they have only gotten more expensive. The components inside laptops have gotten more expensive, the market below $1,000 has effectively been decimated, and finding a good deal is harder than ever. But we're still testing, and while the goal posts of what defines a budget gaming laptop may be a bit more expensive than they used to be, there are still ways to save.

At Tom's Hardware, we test many gaming laptops every year at a range of prices with different features and parts, so we know what to expect at every price point, no matter what your budget. While even the budget gaming laptops may not be cheap, we can still point out where you get the most for your money. We thoroughly benchmark all of the best budget gaming laptops in numerous games, extensively measuring gaming performance under a wide range of graphical conditions to suss out the best cheap laptops on the market.

Most gaming laptops under $1,500 will use Nvidia's GeForce RTX 5050 and RTX 5060 graphics cards. Many of them will use the latest Intel Core Ultra or AMD Ryzen mobile processors, though sometimes you'll still find last-gen options. Above $1,500 (which, unfortunately, is still on the low end with all-new components these days), you should have the latest. That being said, don't cut corners so far that you settle for 8GB of RAM or just 256GB of storage. Those are outdated specs for gaming laptops.

With a budget gaming laptop, you'll be able to play most games — even graphically intensive ones — on medium or high settings, if not better. If you're playing lighter games, like esports, you should still be able to achieve high frame rates.

Best Budget Gaming Laptops You Can Buy

Best budget gaming laptop overall

The Acer Nitro V 16S AI is, as of this writing, typically selling around $1,500. This laptop is great for those who are willing to trade off some gaming performance for a bright and colorful screen and a ton of ports, including a microSD card slot.

Those ports, paired with a speedy storage drive in our tests, make the Nivro V 16S AI a solid productivity machine alongside one that can play most games. Acer is using an RTX 5060 with an 85W graphics card, so it's not the most performant system out there, but it's well-balanced if you're going to use just one laptop for gaming, work, or school.

The 16-inch, 1920 x 1200 IPS screen goes up to 180 Hz, allowing for smooth gameplay for esports and indie games. Our system came with a 1TB storage drive, which should hold a few games, and there's room to add another inside. It also came with 32GB of RAM, which should be a bit future-proof.

There is a bunch of bloatware that you'll probably want to uninstall, and the webcam is just 720p.

Read: Acer Nitro V 16S AI review

Best budget gaming laptop for work and play

We had previously seen this laptop as high as $1,800, but lately it's been on sale closer to $1,500. The machine is another good mix of productivity and gaming. Like many other budget systems, it's using an 85W GPU (in this case, an RTX 5070), which means you won't get the most powerful gaming performance.What it does allow for, however, is strong battery life, lasting 9 hours and 13 minutes on our test. We also found the keyboard and touchpad to be quite comfortable.

The Ryzen AI 7 350 is a recent chip, and one that offers strong productivity performance, should you be using this system for work other than just gaming.It would have been nice to see Wi-Fi 7 at this system's full price, though on sale, Wi-Fi 6E is more forgivable. That being said, the display and audio are both middling, so this may be best if you use a monitor or speakers to bump up your experience.

Read: Gigabyte Aero X16 review

Best for battery life

If you want something a bit more minimalist, the Alienware 16 Aurora, the gaming brand's stripped-down machine, may work for you. This one has been consistently available.

The Aurora has an attractive chassis that mixes its plastic body with an alumium lid. The indigo color seems almost black, but has a navy shimmer in the right light.

The biggest benefits we saw were in the 16-inch, 2560 x 1600 IPS display, which goes up to 120 Hz. That screen was brighter and far more vivid (112% of sRGB color volume, 312.2 nits) in our measurements compared to other budget machines.

We also appreciated the Aurora's 96 WHr battery, which helped the system last for 9 hours and 41 minutes on our battery test.

The 80W RTX 5060 is fairly low-power, which might help with the longevity, but means you'l have to set your expectations while gaming. Additionally, the storage could be faster, though you could consider swapping that out down the line.

Read: Alienware 16 Aurora review

Quick Shopping Tips

What to Expect From the Best Budget Laptops for Gaming

Google will leverage data from one of the most complex and multi-layered sci-fi MMORPGs to train its AI. With a quarter million monthly active users, Eve Online's deep living simulation of economics and politics, with strategic aspects involving exploration and combat, presents the opportunity to expand the capabilities and horizons of AI. Google DeepMind is now primed to learn from interactions in this expansive game world after acquiring a minority stake in the newly independent Fenris Creations, reports Bloomberg.

Readers are likely more familiar with Eve Online being stewarded by CCP Games. Fenris Creations was recently formed when the developers sought to buy back the Eve Online game rights from Korean game-maker Pearl Abyss. The new Icelandic company paid $120M in cash and crypto to set up. While that may sound like a huge sum, Pearl Abyss spent more than double that amount to acquire the game maker back in 2018.

It is important to understand why Google DeepMind would part with "millions" to secure a minority stake in Fenris Creations. Thankfully, Bloomberg has spoken to executives from both firms to more clearly assess how the deal benefits both parties.

A DeepMind director quoted by the source indicates that success in Eve Online relies on skills that are far from mastered by current-generation AIs. This MMORPG is (in)famous for some of its players succeeding using tactics ranging from politics to deceit to outright scams. Eve Online is also lauded for the long-term planning and continual learning involved in success.

DeepMind has previously dabbled with gaming, and among all the big names of AI, it seems like it is the most interested in tapping into this rich vein for training.

From the perspective of Fenris, the deal looks pretty irresistible too, earning millions from a partner with deep pockets and what seems to be a hands-off stance. The Fenris CEO is quoted as previously joking that Eve Online would be “the final boss for AI in games.” He went on to ponder that Eve Online gameplay shines a light on society and the human condition. We are also getting hints that AIs learning from Eve Online could learn something about humans pushed to extremes…

It is stated by Fenris that DeepMind’s initial research will look at player behavior on isolated servers, having no impact on the live game. Moreover, there may be benefits from this research outside of AI training to improve the game, or even inspire new experiences, according to the Fenris CEO.

Fenris is beginning to start work on the successor to Eve Online, dubbed Eve Frontier, as well as an extraction adventure shooter dubbed Eve Vanguard (see video above). So we’re sure the extra cash injection will be very useful.

Eve Online is 23 years old in 2026, but it still attracts a devoted following with between 200,000 and 300,000 monthly active users. Q4 2025 was the game’s second most lucrative ever, with November being notable for breaking records.

A PC gaming enthusiast and tinkerer has shared a video demo of the new DS5Dongle. As its name suggests, this is a Windows PC dongle for users of the Sony DualSense controller. Its raison d'être is that it allows users of Sony’s well-regarded controller to enjoy wireless connectivity without the lack of adaptive triggers and haptic feedback that this connectivity choice on Windows PCs previously entailed. We would also give bonus points for the low cost (<$20) and purported low latency of this generously MIT-licensed dongle design.

The brains behind this project are provided by a developer known as awalol on GitHub, linked above. However, the video and Reddit announcement from SlaveKnightSoman neatly encapsulate the experience of using a DS5Dongle. The Redditor explains that they were attracted to this GitHub project as they had “spent way too much time trying to get the ‘PS5 Experience’ on PC without being tethered by a 3-meter cable.”

There are some technical reasons behind the reduced DualSense features on Windows PCs using wireless connectivity. Windows Bluetooth can’t handle the full non-standard use of Bluetooth bandwidth that Sony leverages to make its controllers work so well on the PS5. In contrast, the full gamut of controller features is available if Windows users use a wired version.

This is where the new DS5Dongle comes in, and it is also succinctly described as a “Pico2W DualSense 5 Bridge” by the developer. In brief, the dongle pairs with the DualSense over Bluetooth, receives the full gamut of haptic, trigger, audio, and other controller data, then exposes itself to its Windows host as a wired DualSense, and neither side is the wiser.

As what might be described as a ‘handshake spoof’ rather than some kind of emulation or translation layer, the latency should stay low. The experience of Redditor SlaveKnightSoman goes a long way to confirming that important factor, and they assert that “I didn't feel any difference to wired. But I only play single player games.” See the Reddit embedded Days Gone gaming footage to help judge for yourself.

DS5Dongle plans, details, and other useful resources are available via GitHub, so you can make your own. SlaveKnightSoman says they built one for under $20, including the cost of the Raspberry Pi Pico 2W, central to the dongle’s functionality. That could be worth it if you feel that the DualSense is one of the best controllers out there.

A Redditor shared their prototype for a true single-handed controller combining the function of a mouse and keyboard in one device. u/Adventurous_Tie_9031, who also called themselves Joe, initially shared their design about a month ago, which they built after losing their right arm in an accident. They discovered that it’s difficult to continue playing games with just a single hand — whether using a mouse and keyboard combo or a traditional controller. Because of this, they decided to take matters into their own hand and created the ERCHAM MK1.

The prototype controller is heavily influenced by the Razer Tartarus but is way more than just a single-handed keyboard. It features an optical sensor to function as a mouse, but its keys have been replaced by a fully programmable 28-key keypad, allowing you to assign specific functions to each key. There also appear to be joysticks or thumb-controlled D-pads plus clickable scroll wheels on either side of the controller, allowing for left- and right-handed use without needing any modifications.

This project is a great way to let more people play games and accomplish work comfortably on their computers. Gaming PCs and consoles often require two-handed use, so anyone who has reduced functionality or lost the use of one hand would definitely be disadvantaged. But by combining the keyboard and mouse into a single seamless device, it could allow them to discover or return to gaming. Joe said that the ERCHAM MK1 is specifically created for “amputees, nerve injuries, RSI, stroke survivors, and anyone who struggles with a traditional keyboard and mouse setup.”

Many Redditors showed interest in the project, with the creator saying that their original post reached more than a million views. According to their latest Reddit update, that interest allowed them to hit to reach the fourth place of the Entrepreneur of Impact competition. Should they win the top prize, Joe plans to use the proceeds to “accelerate development and get this project moving faster toward production,” although they also said that they’ll push forward with manufacturing it either way.

Building a gaming peripheral such as this from scratch is already a challenge, but setting up a company to market and sell it will be an even bigger one. Nevertheless, the ERCHAM MK1 already has a potential captured market, especially as most peripheral manufacturers do not sell gaming equipment designed for single-handed users.

If you’ve been paying close attention over the past year and change, you’ll quickly learn that while PC gaming is clearly struggling from apocalyptic component pricing, players are slowly looking to alternative platforms and operating systems to play games on. Valve’s Steam Deck is a primary cause for this success and has spawned a breed of x86-based handheld devices over the past few years. While Sony is reportedly developing its own handheld, Valve has been hard at work developing its own hardware ecosystem, or at least trying to, no thanks to the ongoing DRAM and NAND pricing devastation.

Valve’s upcoming Steam Frame will make use of an ARM-based Snapdragon 8 Gen 3 chip, notably differing from the x86-based chips inside the now four-year-old Steam Deck and the upcoming Steam Machine. Alongside choosing an Arm-based chip for its upcoming VR headset, the company has been quietly contributing to a translation layer named FEX.

What is FEX?

FEX or FEX-Emu, translates raw x86 instructions into ARM64 instructions, with Proton handling the software and OS-level translations from Windows into something that can be understood by Linux. When FEX and Proton work in tandem, it means that Arm-based chips could very well run many “full-fat” games stored in your Steam Library.

Valve has been funding the development of FEX for years, which is, in itself, open source. As such, over the past year or so, development has started on getting FEX up and running on Android-based devices. One such example is GameNative, a slick open-source app that can tap into your Steam Library and allow you to make use of FEX (and Proton) to run games. There are additional apps that perform similar functions, such as GameSir’s Gamehub, which is a closed-source alternative that, in late 2025, came under fire for its capture of sensitive user telemetry data. So, be sure to research these options wisely if you want to try something like this out for yourself.

So, with that all in mind, let’s try to push current Android hardware to its limits and see just how well FEX is shaping up.

Setup

Of course, many Android devices might not be up to the task of running AAA, x86-based games. As it happens, I was shopping for a new Android tablet, and lucked out finding a deal on a used RedMagic Astra Gaming tablet, which is equipped with a Qualcomm Snapdragon 8 Elite Gen 4 SoC, Adreno 830 GPU, and 24 GB of LPDDR5T RAM. The device is also equipped with active cooling, which is a rarity in smaller Android tablets.

It should be noted that Snapdragon 8 Elite Gen 5 chips are rolling out in the Android ecosystem, but availability remains limited in the U.S. With a decently powerful Android device in hand, it’ll serve as a good testbed to see exactly how (and if) current hardware on portable ARM-based devices is capable of running demanding games.

GameNative’s APK is available directly from their GitHub repository, and installation was simple: Once the app was installed, all I had to do was log into my Steam account, and voila, my entire library was available to choose from. The gamepad-friendly interface allows you to select from “Compatible” titles, and with that flicked on, I was able to view exactly which titles might play nicely with the RedMagic Astra.

For this test, I wanted to test a handful of AAA gaming titles to see how well they might run and to get a good understanding of how these titles can perform on modern hardware. For a baseline, Cyberpunk 2077 (RED Engine), Clair Obscur: Expedition 33 (Unreal Engine 5), and Resident Evil 3 (RE Engine) all serve as solid showcases to see how well these games might run. Resident Evil 3’s remake is an older RE Engine title, but given my Steam Library's lack of newer Capcom titles, it’ll just have to do.

Stalled boot

With Cyberpunk 2077 installed on the device, GameNative automatically chooses the best configurations for you and then pulls all of your Steam Cloud data to sync things up. This part of the process took a while, which is (what I presume to be) the sheer number of save files on my particular Steam Cloud variant. But it dutifully whittled away at downloading all of the required files to get Cyberpunk off the ground. And then… Nothing. Cyberpunk 2077 crashed to a halt. It took some tinkering with graphics drivers and Proton versions, then running a driver test to see if everything lined up.

Afterwards, I managed to finally load Cyberpunk 2077. Given that we want to run this as more of a proof-of-concept, rather than testing the silicon to its limits from the start, I immediately went to the settings menu and put everything on low, with FSR 2 off. After loading a save in a dense urban area, the game hangs, and seemingly nothing I did managed to solve that particular problem. Onwards, I pushed to the next title, undeterred.

Playable perfomance

Resident Evil 3, by contrast, offered a much smoother experience when running the title at 720p. With settings locked in and the application allowed to access the large RAM pool of the RedMagic Astra, I was able to play the introductory segments of the title with little to no issue. That should come as little surprise to anyone who knows that Capcom’s RE Engine scales incredibly well with lower-end devices, especially if they are limited in scope, such as Resident Evil 3 – I wouldn’t chance running a heavier, open-map title like Monster Hunter: Wilds on here so soon.

With the game up and running, I then pushed the image quality with settings set to prefer performance, with no upscaling. Resident Evil 3 stayed at a steady 40- 60 FPS for most of the introductory segment, and only when dealing with more challenging scenes with multiple light sources and particle effects did our frames begin to drop to lows of around 27 FPS. That’s still playable, though not quite offering a perfect experience, and some subjectivity comes into play. Following this, testing the ‘Prefer Graphics’ preset with no upscaling, we reached a range of 25-42 FPS, which is again, more than playable enough for a single-player title. While you’re not going to get that ideal 60 FPS target, the game also doesn’t look like you’re playing it through a vaseline filter, which is a plus.

With Resident Evil 3 producing solid results, I marched on to Clair Obscur: Expedition 33. This Unreal Engine 5-based title was a tricky one to get up and running. Firstly, I had to set the lowest possible internal resolution, then select the correct drivers to get things set up. Following that, we were in the game. But there was one glaring issue: Image quality. The selected graphics driver (nor any other combination) actually yielded anything that remotely looked like Clair Obscur, with textures going haywire and environments missing some textures entirely. This one was a total, unplayable mess; even measuring its performance would have been a waste of time. So, what’s going on under the hood, and why is performance so variable between titles?

Fractured configurations

To understand why individual titles run so differently is to understand that each game runs a wholly different engine. CD Projekt Red’s RED Engine has proven to scale to systems like the Steam Deck and Switch 2, but performance in-game on the RedMagic Astra has yet to match either a Steam Deck or a Nintendo Switch 2 in image quality.

For Expedition 33’s Unreal Engine 5, this is a complicated nightmare. The CPU translation layer, in addition to DirectX12’s VKD3D translation, is what’s causing things to not load correctly, such as DX12’s mesh shaders. To put things simply, there’s a complex stack of operations required to run things smoothly, and when those graphical pipelines get as complex as a modern title, like Clair Obscur, the house of cards begins to fall down.

This isn’t a problem for Resident Evil 3’s RE Engine, which uses a lighter and cleaner implementation of DirectX12, especially when compared to Unreal Engine 5. You also have the option to launch with the DirectX 11-based DXVK, which, in itself, is much easier for a translation layer to handle than the more complicated VKD3D. The caveat here is that you’ll have to access a different legacy beta branch to enable that, as the main branch of the title forces DirectX 12.

Worsening things is the fact that so much of this support relies on community-developed graphics drivers, most notably, custom “Turnip” drivers, based on the open-source Linux Mesa project, which patches Vulkan extensions that are actively still being reverse-engineered by the developers. These optimizations get missed by the official Qualcomm system drivers, which are closed-source. Therefore, as demonstrated in Clair Obscur: Expedition 33, when Turnip drivers are met with complex shader pipelines from UE5, the GPU driver can fail to render geometry correctly, even if the title boots.

Many titles that do not require the usage of such demanding graphical pipelines can work without breaking much of a sweat: So, if you’re missing out on Slay the Spire, or Hollow Knight: Silksong, those titles are demonstrably stable using FEX and emulator apps like GameNative. For our tests, we wanted to see how FEX handled complex shaders, graphics, and modern “big-budget” experiences.

Where does this leave FEX?

In and of itself, FEX is an ongoing project, and we’re not going to see major miracles happen overnight when it comes to elements out of the project’s scope, such as Qualcomm’s development of official drivers that officially support mainstream games.

Qualcomm’s mobile chips were built strictly to run mobile apps and games, meaning that adding the wrinkle of supporting elements like desktop-level Vulkan instructions is a use case they simply never really considered supporting before. If the company wants to capitalize on the work being done by the FEX team, Qualcomm-based chips must also come with similar levels of support as desktop graphics drivers, and the likelihood of that happening is quite slim indeed. As of the time of writing, community drivers for specific titles can enhance the experience of some titles, if you're willing to go to those lengths.

While the efforts of FEX-Emu and its complex, layered translation to get things running are indeed impressive, you’re not about to be able to take your whole Steam Library with you anywhere, until there’s more maturation of these applications and the community-made drivers (potentially with the help of a company like Valve) to create workarounds, or dedicated drivers. For now, it’s still too early to start throwing FEX out as a feature in a mainstream product until all of those rougher edges, like driver support, are smoothed off for end-users. Anyway, my tablet’s back to being relegated to being a very fancy comic-book reader again until the entire software pipeline has matured.

Valve has released Proton 11.0-Beta1, but this perhaps inconsequential-sounding test version comes with something revolutionary – support for Arm Linux devices. It isn’t mainstream yet; it is a beta version, of course, but folks have already shown off the Steam UI running on a Nintendo Switch. So, Steam gaming support on more open gaming devices from brands like Retroid, AYN, and Ayaneo should be far easier.

Steam Linux ARM64 beta on Switch

— @aagaming.me (@aagaming.me.bsky.social) 2026-04-17T11:10:52.424Z

Steam Linux ARM64 beta running on Ubuntu Linux Noble Numbat on Nintendo’s popular handheld.

AAGaming, which posted the Steam on Switch demo on BlueSky, embedded above, says they have shared “a working copy of proton arm + steamrt arm that you can drop right into conpatibilitytools.d to play games with this client.”

You can find the official Proton 11.0-Beta1 release on Valve’s Proton GitHub, alongside some release notes. The key change, as far as Arm gamers are concerned, is flagged in a section under the heading ARM64 Builds. Not much is said, but handheld gaming enthusiasts on social media have been quick to realize the implications. The newly bundled FEX 2604 can enable Steam’s built-in x86 Windows to ARM Linux gaming compatibility on your Arm Linux device.

This new Arm Linux compatibility for Steam is thought to have been implemented now to prepare for the Arm-powered Steam Frame gaming headset, which we went hands-on with last November. That headset was described as a ‘streaming-first device’ but packs very respectable Arm mobile hardware, such as a Qualcomm Snapdragon 8 Gen 3 backed with 16GB LPDDR5X.

During our Steam Frame hands-on, we also learned about FEX bringing Steam games to Arm and running locally. In our demo, we saw the x86 version of Hades 2 running standalone with respectable performance at 1400p. The Valve rep clarified, “It’s actually running on Linux, running on Arm,” at the time. So, now we are seeing this ability surfacing in public betas, and already being used to get Steam OS and games running on alternative Arm hardware.

Valve is building a ‘Verified’ style list for the Steam Frame Arm hardware, much like its efforts seen on Steam Deck. Thus, users will know which games will run well locally and which they might prefer to stream from their gaming PCs.

Not interested in Arm? There's more...

In addition to the juicy Arm/Linux compatibility news, the new Proton 11 Beta includes goodies for existing Steam OS gamers. There’s a host of new certified playable titles for users, such as titles from the Resident Evil and Dino Crisis stables, plus Warhammer: Vermintide 2, SHOGUN: Total War, Breath of Fire IV, and more.

Numerous bug fixes are implemented in the release, too. For example, Valve has fixed Steam Overlay not working correctly with many EA games, and got the intro video playback in Crimson Desert to work properly.

Getting Proton 11 is easier if you already have a Steam OS device like the Deck. Just search for the update in the Steam Library.

If you've been following the story of Denuvo's recent struggle against the weaponization of savants in the piracy scene, there's a juicy double-whammy of news on that front. Grab your popcorn or fire extinguisher, depending on which side you're on. First, voices38, who's been steadily cracking Denuvo-protected games for a while now, released a full crack for Resident Evil: Requiem, a title that's just over 40 days old, with the DRM fully disabled. It also runs much better than the bypassed version.

As if that weren't enough bad news for Denuvo's parent company, Irdeto, the existing hypervisor-based bypass (HV) that currently requires disabling most of Windows' security layers is seemingly getting a serious upgrade. According to MKDev member KiriGiri, the bypass should soon become plug-and-play, as "[they] found a way to make HV crack to be used without disabling any windows security or other things" (sic).

If you're not up to speed on all this, the summary is that Denuvo has been successfully bypassed across many new games, resulting in zero-day repacks out on popular sites like FitGirl's. However, said bypass is cumbersome and risky; its characteristics are bound to change as soon as it receives the purported upgrade. Moreover, it keeps Denuvo's code in the game, leading to the usual performance penalties famously associated with the DRM.

A traditional crack, meanwhile, strips away or neutralizes all Denuvo code in a game. Doing that takes a particular set of skills, and the cracker (or group) voices38 has been the one spearheading efforts, slowly but surely cracking 2024 and 2025 releases.

The release of a crack for Resident Evil: Requiem, a title that's only 40 days old, implies with high likelihood that Denuvo will get completely stripped out of recent games soon enough. Voices38 has reportedly been working on toolkits for contemporary Denuvo for a long while now, and it apparently took them only two weeks to pull off this latest feat after all the virtual ducks were in a row.

The cracked Requiem predictably runs faster, smoother, and uses far fewer resources than the HV version, and presumably by extension, than the full paid-for release. One point does not a dataset make, but ChillyWillMD ran a quick comparison between the two versions, and the cracked one delivers roughly 5% better FPS, a shocking 1.5 to 2 GB drop in VRAM, and sometimes close to 1 GB drop in system memory usage.

Our trusty eyeballs also say that the CPU spike and frametime graph is slightly improved on the cracked version, with fewer CPU usage spikes and sometimes lower frametimes — both exceedingly important for a feeling of gameplay smoothness. The tested system has an Intel Core i9-13900K CPU and an RTX 3090 graphics card. We hypothesize that machines with weaker processors will see even greater benefits from removing Denuvo.

This spells serious trouble in all-caps for Irdeto, as now there's a two-prong attack against Denuvo. The company predictably already promised upgrades to its software, all while running the game at the standard user-space operating system layer. The DRM developers have to get really creative now, and as the saying goes, may the odds ever be in their favor.

A good portion of the gaming- and piracy-adjacent internet has been on fire for the past few weeks, as a bypass for the (in)famous Denuvo copy-protection method has become popular. Not only did the new method enable the release of existing titles, but zero-day repacks are now the norm.

Contemporary versions of Denuvo and its multilayered DRM approaches have stood the test of time well and were widely regarded as the benchmark in the PC game DRM space. Naturally, this spells trouble for Denuvo and its parent company, Irdeto, as its primary source of revenue is now arguably useless.

Irdeto sent a statement to popular DRM and copyright news site TorrentFreak, wherein it claims that it is already working on countermeasures, promising that "performance will not be compromised" by said improvements and that they will not go deeper into the operating system.

The performance remark refers to a past controversy in which Denuvo's checks caused CPU spikes that added strong stuttering and FPS drops in many titles and configurations. This fact was vehemently denied by Denuvo and subsequently mocked online, as cracked versions ran far better.

As usual for any DRM company or publisher, Irdeto also claimed that downloading games with the bypass is a security concern, but this time around, the company has a valid point. Using the hypervisor bypass, even in its latest incarnation, requires users to disable:

1. Virtualization-Based Security (VBS): a layer that separates the Windows operating system from the its security enforcement features that run at a higher privilege level.
2. Credential Guard: a sub-feature of VBS that keeps login credentials in an container isolated from the rest of the operating system.
3. Driver Signature Enforcement: verification that any drivers installed in the system must have a digital signature issued by Microsoft to an identifiable company or developer, in order to prevent installing random drivers at the system level.
4. Core Isolation / Memory Integrity (HVCI): similar to the above, but prevents any kernel-level unsigned code entirely, as well as modifications to existing signed code so programs can't attempt to mess with existing drivers.
5. Installing a community-made hypervisor (HV) with Windows running on top of it. This HV fakes responses to the checks that Denuvo makes, and runs with higher permissions (ring level -1) than the operating system itself and has full, nearly untraceable access to hardware and software.

As you can imagine, disabling any one of those security features is not advisable, much less deactivating all of them at once. Once all those digital checkpoints are down, anything you run on your system has free rein to take it over completely, in ways that will be difficult to notice or fix, and will naturally evade detection by nearly any antivirus package.

Adding further concern, there's no telling that even without any malicious intent, the new HV won't have a security flaw of its own that, once exploited, runs at an access level beyond even that of the operating system itself.

To its credit, the community foresaw all of these issues, and game repacks include an easy-to-use script to disable and re-enable the security measures. The recommended procedure is to disable them, reboot, and play the game. Once your gameplay session is over, you would enable them again and restart. However, that's a chore for anyone, and one might guess your average user won't think twice about bothering with such trifles as "security."

Even within the piracy community, the team that designed the HV bypass and popular repackers like FitGirl have warned about the security implications of these releases, as trusted as they might be. Prospective gamers who are leery of bringing down their PCs' defenses will have to wait for an actual crack to come around.

Crimson Desert is the type of game that shouldn’t ever see the light of day. Built originally as a prequel for popular MMO Black Desert Online before being scrapped and redirected to a single-player release, and sitting in development for close to a decade, Crimson Desert could have easily died in development. Add on top of that a proprietary game engine called BlackSpace, a modest headcount, and no external publisher — Crimson Desert defies the narrative about how AAA games are built and released today. But we’re here. Crimson Desert is real, it’s massive, and I’ve been poking around Pywel with the best CPUs for gaming to see how they react.

The results are positive. I mainly tested on the last few generations of AMD and Intel chips, though I threw in a Ryzen 7 2700X (just above the game’s minimum-spec CPU) and a Core i3-13100F (a weak quad-core chip) into the mix to see how they'd hold up. Unfortunately, I wasn’t able to get to as many older AM4 chips, due to time and some bent pins. It’s been a while.

Otherwise, Crimson Desert sets up a platonic ideal of how CPUs should scale in a modern game. Everything falls in line the way you’d expect, which is surprisingly rare to find in recent games, especially close to launch. You won’t find a performance wall like what we saw in Resident Evil Requiem, nor get the ever-present oddity of AMD’s eight-core offering outperforming its 12-core one.

That doesn’t mean everyone is going to have a great experience. Although Crimson Desert ran well enough with a quad-core chip, it can certainly leverage a higher core count. And older architectures like Zen+ struggle, though that shouldn’t come as a surprise.

I ran through 20 CPUs, but I also played the game myself to uncover any strangeness in this unique engine — and there is some. Overall, however, Crimson Desert is an enigma. It shouldn’t work as well as it does given its dense systems and overwhelming landscape, but developer Pearl Abyss was able to stick the landing.

CPU Scaling in Crimson Desert

For testing, I used the RTX 5090 FE to isolate CPU performance as much as possible. Naturally, the numbers change when looking at a weaker GPU, but we’re looking at the overall trend in performance across chips here more so than the numbers themselves. I tested at native 1080p without upscaling or frame generation — Crimson Desert supports both in DLSS and FSR flavors — and with the Ultra preset and ray tracing disabled. There’s a further Cinematic preset that pushes the engine’s capabilities to the max, though for only a small visual payoff. Even on my personal PC with an RTX 5080 and Ryzen 9 9900X, I stuck with the Ultra preset.

There’s a smooth gradient of performance from the top of the stack to the bottom, but somewhere in the range of a Core i5-14600K or Ryzen 7 9700X is the sweet spot. Past that point, we see much smaller jumps in performance. The Ryzen 9 9900X is only 2% faster than the Ryzen 7 9700X, and while the Ryzen 9 9950X is a solid 8% faster, it’s also twice as expensive.

On the Intel side of things, Raptor Lake stands out across both 13th- and 14th-Gen offerings. Alder Lake is a different story. The Core i5-13600K is 19% faster than the Core i5-12600K, and the Core i5-14600K is nearly 26% ahead. Similarly, you’re looking at around a 21% jump going from the Core i7-12700K to either the Core i7-13700K or Core i7-14700K.

In a surprise to nobody, AMD’s X3D offerings top the charts, though the margins aren’t as large as we’re used to seeing. The Ryzen 7 9850X3D is 7% ahead of the Ryzen 7 7800X3D, and the Core i9-14900K and Core i7-14700K aren’t far behind. More cache certainly helps, but BlackSpace looks optimized enough that cache misses aren’t completely killing performance.

On the other end of the spectrum, we have the Ryzen 7 2700X and Core i3-13100F. Pearl Abyss says you can get by with a Ryzen 5 2600X or Core i5-8500 for 1080p at 30 FPS, and you likely can — though, as the 1% lows show, you can expect some chopiness. Still, it’s shocking these CPUs hold up at all. It’s hard to overstate the scale of Crimson Desert, and even with these older, low-end chips, it doesn’t devolve into a stuttering mess along the lines of Dragon’s Dogma 2.

Looking at other metrics, the optimization underway in BlackSpace becomes clearer. In power, for instance, the load is modest. Even Intel’s Raptor Lake chips don’t crack 140W, while they can easily climb above 170W in a game like Starfield.

General impressions of Crimson Desert after testing

It was challenging to find a test scene for Crimson Desert. The game is large, for one thing, but more importantly, it’s varied. The performance window is fairly large. You'll see good performance standing alone on a mountainside, better performance in a room with a couple of NPCs, and worse performance in a town filled with dozens. You know the drill. There’s also loading and culling to deal with. Given the size of Crimson Desert and the speed at which you can traverse vast distances in some situations, you can immediately put a heavy load on your CPU. Even in these extreme cases, however, I encountered just minor hiccups in performance.

For testing, I used the first town you spot in Hernand, which is filled with at least several dozen NPCs on the streets and likely a hundred or more dotted throughout various buildings. Out in the open world, NPCs are more sparse, and naturally, the demand on your processor is lower. This was about as close as I could get to a stress test without hitting some massive loading zone that wouldn’t represent the moment-to-moment gameplay.

Although performance is understandably variable across different areas of the map, Crimson Desert glides to different performance targets, whereas most games stumble. The engine would much rather have pop-in than a stutter, which is probably something most players will agree with. Any stuttering I encountered was minor and quickly resolved, and it never showed up in an important gameplay moment.

BlackSpace is doing a lot, and if you pixel peep too closely, you’ll see the magic tricks unravel. It has a gritty, aggressive rendering style clearly meant for a TV more than a monitor sitting a foot away from you. That’s not a bad thing. If you look for every little rendering hiccup or aliased edge, you’ll see the sacrifices Pearl Abyss had to make to pull Crimson Desert off. Take in the full image, however, and you’ll be left with your mouth agape.

It’s not just the rendering that’s impressive. Crimson Desert is a systems-driven game, and you interact with everything. You won’t clip through an NPC if you run into them; you’ll crash into another solid being and get told off in response. If a vendor carrying a basket of apples or potatoes stumbles, their goods will tumble out in physics-driven glory. You can cut down just about any tree to gather wood, and hunt just about any animal for food. In one surprising moment, I was able to collapse an outlook where an archer was shooting at me by hacking away at the support beams. The game looks so beautiful that it’s easy to forget that the world reacts to your actions along the lines of Breath of the Wild or Tears of the Kingdom.

I have dozens of more hours I need to put into the game, but my early testing impressions are positive. This game is on my shortlist of new titles to add into our CPU game testing suite, but I want to see how players react to the game first. It scales well, and if the game is popular enough, it’ll likely show up in our suite before long.

If you've been anywhere near a PC in the last 20 years, especially if you've used one for gaming, then SteelSeries is a brand name that you no doubt will have come across. They've been making peripherals for a long time, with their mice, keyboards, and especially headphones being a very popular choice for PC gamers. With Amazon's Spring Deals Days sales event in full swing, we've spotted this money-off deal on SteelSeries' flagship gaming headset, the recently released Arctis Nove Elite, now priced at £559.49. A saving of £40.50 from the original £599.99 launch price. This headset was only released within the last five months, so it's nice to see a discount so early. However, this headset still commands a high price, as it flexes its audiophile-grade Hi-Res audio muscles. If you care not for the quality of your soundscapes, then avoid, as you can get a much cheaper headset for your needs.

• Grab this deal at Amazon

So what's so special about this version of the Arctis Nova? Well, the Arctis Nova Elite has Hi-Res audio certification. This Hi-Res audio gives you ultra-fidelity over a wireless connection for 96kHz/24bit audio. SteelSeries states this as a world first.

The headset looks very pretty, especially in the sage and gold colour scheme, which also happens to be the model that is discounted. Carbon fiber drivers power the sounds with brass surrounds for a "pistonic" motion. The headset also features powerful active noise cancelling (ANC), which can be a blessing for gaming in noisier environments. Plus, the retractable microphone uses AI to remove background noise, along with an additional discreet onboard mic to help keep comms clear during the heat of battle, or while chatting with friends over Discord.

The Arctis Nova Elite comes with the same premium features that you would find on the Nova Pro, including seamless multi-source mixing with OmniPlay to connect and mix up to four sources at once, handy for switching between various audio sources on the fly.

As with other SteelSeries headsets, the Arctis Nova Elite uses a ski-band design for the headband to make the headset feel lighter on your head and not add pressure and discomfort after hours of use. And speaking of use-time, the Nova Elite uses an infinite power system with two batteries for no downtime, always have a battery charging, so you can swap in a freshly charged battery before the headset dies on you.

The flagship SteelSeries Arctis Nova Elite is an audiophile-grade gaming headset for those with a significant disposable income. It's certainly not a cheap or budget headsest and is in the price range of some serious audiophile competition.

If you're looking for more savings, check out our Best PC Hardware deals for a range of products, or dive deeper into our specialized SSD and Storage Deals, Hard Drive Deals, Gaming Monitor Deals, Graphics Card Deals, Gaming Chair, Best Wi-Fi Routers, Best Motherboard, or CPU Deals pages.

A standout deal spotted in the current Amazon Spring Day Deals sales event is this Acer gaming laptop. The Acer Nitro V 16 AI gaming laptop is just £1,199.99, shaving £300 off the £1499.99 list price. Saving any money is always a good thing, and when you can save a tidy £300, it's even better. Although there's an AI moniker slapped on the product, don't be put off. This is a gaming laptop through and through. From the gamified aesthetics to the choice of hardware, inside the sleek black chassis. Don't be tied to your desktop, and play your games anywhere, thanks to this powerful little gaming machine.

• Grab this deal at Amazon

The Acer Nitro V 16 AI is a powerful gaming laptop equipped with an Nvidia RTX 5070 laptop GPU, accompanied by the AMD Ryzen AI 9 365 processor, able to bring games to life with crisp graphics and fast framerates. If you need a little more juice to hit the 180Hz refresh rates of the WUXGA (1920 x 1200) display, this current-gen Nvidia GPU supports DLSS 4, which enables multi-frame generation. In games that support this feature, you'll be able to boost your frame rates by the GPU inserting AI-generated frames, ensuring smoother gameplay, but there may be some trade-offs in texture and picture definition.

With 32GB of RAM, an RTX 5070, and 1TB SSD, the Acer Nitro V 16 AI is more than equipped to handle most gaming tasks. This is one of the best value-for-money gaming laptops right now, going by pure specifications. Thanks to the AI crunch causing surging memory and storage prices, the cost of gaming laptops is only going to rise in the near future.

If you're looking for more savings, check out our Best PC Hardware deals for a range of products, or dive deeper into our specialized SSD and Storage Deals, Hard Drive Deals, Gaming Monitor Deals, Graphics Card Deals, Gaming Chair, Best Wi-Fi Routers, Best Motherboard, or CPU Deals pages.

Apple has a new laptop release on the very near horizon, and even though the new, smaller MacBook Neo is priced fairly, you can save even more if you preorder the new computer on Amazon ahead of Wednesday's official release date. The Amazon Spring Deal Days sale is in full swing, and one of those deals is a 5% (£29.03) saving on the MacBook Neo launch price of £599.99, making it just £569.97. This is for only two of the colour schemes, though, the Indigo and Blush coloured MacBook Neo laptops.

• Grab this deal at Amazon

The new MacBook Neo uses the A18 Pro chip, previously used in Apple iPhones, and has six cores, a single-core clock speed of up to 4.0 GHz, and up to 2.4 GHz in multi-core use case scenarios. Other features include a gorgeous 13-inch liquid retina display, 8GB of unified memory, 256GB of SSD storage, and a 1080p webcam.

We reviewed the Apple MacBook Neo and were surprised by its premium feel and looks in comparison to the much more expensive MacBooks. The chassis of the Neo is premium, and the 13-inch liquid retina display is bright, with vivid colours. The touchpad is clickable anywhere on the pad, and overall, it's the most affordable MacBook laptop ever made.

Some things we weren't fans of, however, were the lack of backlighting on the keyboard, which made it harder to see keys in a darkened environment, and the lack of functionality labeling on the USB-C ports. The ports are quite different in the physical tasks they could handle. Apple's operating does notify you if you plug something like a small portable monitor into the USB-C port that doesn't support DisplayPort functionality, but it's a bit of a clunky design choice for Apple.

This is an interesting change for Apple and awesome if you're looking for an eBook-style laptop with a premium feel and build quality for a good price. The fact that you can already make a saving before the MacBook is even released is amazing and definitely something you should jump on if this is a product you're interested in. It's not a gaming laptop, and wouldn't be that effective as a high-productivity software machine, but for general internet activity and work/study use, it's a very enticing bit of kit.

If you're looking for more savings, check out our Best Amazon UK Spring Deals Days tech sales 2026

It's that time of year again when the sales season kicks off with a bang. Amazon often sets the trends today with sales periods, whether we like it or not. The retail behemoth can command the timing and pricing of a multitude of products, and for us, that means deals and price cuts on our favourite PC tech items. It also includes all the associated peripherals and sundries we need for our hobbies. You can have a killer gaming PC build, but without a nice desk and chair, you're never going to be comfortable enough to use it for long periods of time. Today, we have a deal in Amazon's sale from the well-known brand Corsair, on their TC100 Relaxed Gaming Chair for only £149.99, a delightful 25% saving of £50 from the original £199.99 list price. This is a very good price for a budget gaming chair from a reputable brand.

• Grab this deal at Amazon

The Corsair TC100 Relaxed gaming chair looks like many other gaming chairs with its sporty racing seat-inspired design. The dark colour is a clean look, with no flashy coloured accents. The material in this model uses a soft fabric exterior to keep you cool and sitting comfortably for long gaming or work sessions. The TC100 Relaxed includes memory foam lumbar and neck pillows for added comfort. You can adjust the lumbar pillow for your best fit to maintain a healthy body posture.

The frame of the chair is of a steel construction, with the seat back of the chair able to recline between 90-160°, more than ample to take a quick break between games. A powerful hydraulic class 4 gas lift gives you a chair height range of 100mm. The seat is also nice and wide to allow for more comfort, especially for those of us who like to sit crossed-legged at the computer.

If you're looking for more savings, check out our Best Amazon UK Spring Deals Days tech sales 2026

Australia’s Cortical Labs has demonstrated its 'body in a box' CL1 biological computer playing Doom. A video showing the Doom gameplay, and explaining the processes behind this feat was shared by the research and development team. In the video intro, it is claimed that “around 200,000 living human neurons on a microchip” were used to power the seminal FPS action.

We reported on the Cortical Labs CL1 launch last year. The biotech company behind “the world’s first code deployable biological computer” was very bullish about their combination of human brain cells with traditional silicon-based computing. Shipments of CL1 computers were scheduled for June of the same year.

Previously, the CL1 development team had demonstrated the neurons playing the pioneering arcade game Pong, but internet users bombarded Cortical Labs with requests for Doom (of course). Now, Doom has been demonstrated being played by the mass of neurons.

“Doom was much more complex,” explained Dr. Brett Kagan in the video. Its 3D labyrinths, enemies, weapons, etc., make it several degrees more advanced than Pong. This complexity inspired the ‘Cortical Cloud’ for training more complex tasks.

“Together with one of our collaborators, an independent researcher named Sean Cole, we coded the first working version of Doom using the Cortical Labs API, and running on a CL1,” said Dr. Alon Loeffler of c, who presented this demo video. Kagan added that the demo showed “adaptive real-time goal-directed learning” in action.

Company CTO David Hogan explains that Sean Cole managed to pipe the “video feed from the game into patterns of electrical stimulation” and, in that way, the neurons could feel the action. So, for example, if the neurons fire in a specific learned pattern, the Doom guy shoots, and another pattern will prompt him to move position. This way, the brain cells can find enemies, shoot them, and then progress.

Not an eSports champion - yet

This is impressive to see, but “Is it an eSports champion? Absolutely not,” states Kagan, employing some rhetoric. Importantly, though, “they are learning,” and feedback for the right and wrong actions needs to be refined. Nevertheless, Cortical Labs is happy it has “solved the interface problem” to interact with the brain cells in real-time, and then train them and shape their behavior. This is why the CL1 was designed. And it is hoped the CL1 will be able to soon excel at Doom gaming, and then take on ever-increasingly complex tasks.

The video ends with a call to developers and researchers to come and interact with the open Cortical Labs CL1 API – to see what they can build. “The neurons are ready.”

A games collector shared a most distressing unboxing video this week. Keripo had ordered an important historical video gaming artifact, one of only 50 known copies of Tsukhime Trial Edition (月姫 体験版). However, as the images and video (embedded below) show, it looks like the US Customs and/or DHL have been rather heavy-handed when checking the parcel contents. You can clearly see that the original Windows 95/98 demo floppy disk has been deliberately sliced into pieces, after its protective shell was twisted and torn almost beyond recognition.

As Keripo opens the parcel in the video below, they naturally utter a few expletives, so this is an NSFW video in that respect. Turn the sound down/off if you prefer.

We don’t know exactly where in the transportation chain, from sender to Keripo, where the wanton floppy disk rampage took place. Hopefully, they will get some kind of compensation payment. Though that won’t totally make up for a 1-in-50 video gaming artifact being ruined.

The gamer and collector shares some before shipping pictures of the Tsukhime Trial Edition game/packaging in the X thread. It is clear to see that the sender took due care in packaging the artwork and disk. The contents were sandwiched by cardboard to prevent bends and thumbed corners, and then there were liberal rolls of bubble wrap used inside an outer cardboard shipping box. “Would never have expected US Customs to both remove all that AND intentionally damage the floppy directly,” says Keripo forlornly.

If they see this game for sale again online, “I will definitely be buying plane tickets,” said the disappointed new owner of the floppy disk shards. However, the game cover art doesn’t seem to be damaged. And perhaps a fellow collector will be able to share a disk image for a digital replacement of the mangled floppy. According to a quick search, the Mr. Data 2HD floppy we see was just a mass-produced piece of blank media – no other branding/artwork can be seen.

Was an official triggered by the 'adults only' notice on the game artwork?

We can’t fathom the reason behind the video game history vandalism that has been shown by parcel checkers of one brand or another (US Customs or DHL). One possibility is that they saw the imagery and the ‘Adult only’ notice and decided to indulge in a bit of censorship.

I’m not familiar with the Tsukhime Trial Edition demo disk, which I read is part of the Type-Moon visual novel style game series. There’s a possibility that nudity graphics may feature in the game demo, but whether that notion triggered a customs official isn’t certain. From Keripo's replies to the thread, it doesn't sound likely that they will pursue the matter with either of the probable destructive parties.

The G’AIM’E Time Crisis Lightgun is an homage to a golden era of gaming. One of the most popular Arcade games of the 90s made a successful transition to the PlayStation 1 console, complete with a lightgun — and now the nostalgia is reborn with a new lightgun and teeny console that lets you play up to four classic lightgun arcade games on any modern television or monitor, using some funky AI screen recognition for accurate calibration.

The original Time Crisis game at both the arcade and on the original PlayStation are some of my fondest memories of gaming. Fun solo or with friends, lightgun games haven’t hit the same highs since then. For me, the celebration of 30 years of Time Crisis has brought back a massive wave of nostalgia — and I’m hoping for a resurgence in peripheral-based games (perhaps from franchises like Guitar Hero and Rockband).

Matching similar prices of other mainstream retro game systems, the G’AIM’E lightgun comes in three flavors with three different pricing options. If you just want to experience Time Crisis in all of its original glory, you can purchase the basic version with just the lightgun and the console with only Time Crisis installed for $99/£99. If you want more lightgun games (Point Blank, Steel Gunner, Steel Gunner 2) and the reload pedal, the premium version costs $149/£149. And finally, there's the ultimate edition for $199/£199: this has everything in the premium version, plus an additional lightgun for two-player action and some extra Time Crisis memorabilia for collectors.

Included in the ultimate edition are three Time Crisis collectables: a large perspex diorama featuring the titular hero Richard Miller, a metal pin badge of Richard, and a keychain with a 3D-effect gun inside a small perspex cuboid. These little items are definitely aimed at nostalgia-seeking collectors and are a nice touch on top of the rest of the kit.

Unboxing the G’AIM’E lightgun is an impressive affair. It comes in a well-designed box with all the contents individually packed and protected. I tested the Ultimate edition, which contained two blue lightguns with long orange braided cables and USB-C connections, a black hard plastic foot pedal with an equally long black braided cable and USB-C connection. A power brick with multiple adapters to fit any plug socket, an HDMI cable, and the G’AIM’E console. It also included a QR code for a pre-designed 3D-printed gun holster — if you happen to have a 3D printer handy.

Setup was super easy: a quick-start sheet gives you an easy-to-follow visual guide for connecting up the peripherals and console to a TV or monitor. To be fair, it’s only a couple of USB-C ports and the HDMI port — nothing too taxing. There are two buttons on the console: a power button and a second button for resetting the console.

Once everything was set up, the console powered on, played through a video setup guide, and provided an introduction to calibration. After peeling off the protective film on the camera lens of the gun, it was time to start calibrating. I took my time to slowly aim and hit all the targets, and then the gun was ready to start gaming. The G'AIM'E uses smart AI screen recognition alongside calibration to help with accuracy. You can also improve accuracy by reducing direct light reflection and making sure there are no other screens in view of the screen you're aiming at, as second screens can cause issues with both calibration and gameplay.

I started by testing out Time Crisis, and as soon as the music kicked in, the nostalgia really hit hard. The game ran very smoothly, and the aiming was insanely accurate — almost too accurate. I struggled to just casually aim the gun at targets and had to resort to using the iron sights to hit targets consistently. Popping in and out of cover and using the foot pedal to reload was fantastic — and was part of what made this title so appealing at its release. Memorizing the patterns of where and when the enemy appeared is what saved you credits and coins back in the day, and I was happy to find I still remembered a lot of the game.

Time Crisis was a delight to play, but what about the other games on offer with the G’AIM’E? Well, they didn't do quite as well at weathering the passage of time. I owned Point Blank on the PlayStation One, and I remember it being much smoother. The graphics really showed their age, and, although there are plenty of game modes, my accuracy seemed off. Point Blank is a quicker game than Time Crisis and requires more reaction speed, and the lightguns didn't seem to handle this title well at all. As for Steel Gunner 1 & 2 — I never played these titles when they were originally released, so this was my first experience with them. Their fast-paced, hectic playstyle was better than Point Blank's, but the lightguns also seemed to struggle with accuracy in these titles. I recalibrated several times, but it still seemed off.

The bottom line

The G'AIM'E's hardware aesthetics are impressive, and the quality and construction of the lightguns are top-notch. I had a lot of fun replaying and reliving Time Crisis in all its original glory — it was a delight. I was disappointed with the performance of the other game titles, however — in hindsight, I would probably opt for just the Time Crisis basic edition. It’s a shame that the console doesn't allow for game expansion, as that would definitely increase the value and potential of this little arcade machine. Regardless, it's a lovely nostalgia product that still provides plenty of modern-day fun and will be amazing for get-togethers with friends and family.

Blizzard Entertainment is celebrating its 35^th anniversary. The iconic American gaming firm was founded in 1991 as Silicon & Synapse. After a brief flirtation with SNES and Genesis ports, it soon forged its identity and its destiny by rebranding to Blizzard Entertainment and releasing three aces in quick succession: Warcraft: Orcs & Humans (1994), Diablo (1996), and StarCraft (1998). This legendary studio recently became part of Microsoft Gaming, and the youngsters out there probably know it best for the eSports-focused FPS title Overwatch 2.

The early years were rather tumultuous. Michael Morhaime, Allen Adham, and Frank Pearce graduated from the University of California, Los Angeles, putting their combined energies, hearts, and minds into this video gaming venture. However, it rapidly shifted names and artistic directions before finding its true path.

The trio of founders began as Silicon & Synapse, Inc., and earned a living crafting ports for the dominant 16-bit consoles of the era. In 1993, original titles like Rock n' Roll Racing and The Lost Vikings were spawned, and the company would rebrand to Chaos Studios, Inc. Then, in 1994, the studio transitioned to Blizzard Entertainment after being acquired by distributor Davidson & Associates.

1994 wouldn’t be just the year the Blizzard name would be established, its legacy truly began in the same year with the release of Warcraft: Orcs & Humans, which would receive numerous sequels and led to the direct ancestor to the hugely popular World of Warcraft, of course.

Before the year 2000, Blizzard Entertainment would also release the first games from the Diablo and StarCraft stables, too. That’s not all, in the background, the company changed hands yet again, and became part of Vivendi Games in 1998.

The next big event on the business front was the merger with Activision in 2008, with Activision Blizzard becoming independent from Vivendi in 2013. The corporate history story ends, for now, with Blizzard Entertainment existing as part of the Microsoft Gaming division since 2023.

Over the last decade, Blizzard hasn’t released any brand-new IPs. Its business has simply been to continue to pump out new versions/expansions for fan favorites set in the Warcraft, Diablo, StarCraft, and Overwatch universes. Nevertheless, the studio’s crown jewels retain a devoted following and continue to be celebrated at an annual BlizzCon event.

To mark its 35th anniversary, the studio is in the midst of a social media celebration where "over the next few weeks, each world will showcase what comes next." It has already released some what's next in WoW and Overwatch teasers, with new Hearthstone and Diablo showcases due to be made public over the next few days.

AAA gaming has been having a rough go of it the last few years. Microsoft's latest fiscal reports revealed a whopping $623 million drop in gaming revenue, compared to the same fiscal quarter last year.

The figure is bad enough on its own, but it gets worse when you realize that it represents a 9% year-on-year drop. Microsoft attributes the financial hit to "declines in Xbox hardware and Xbox content and services", letting on that Xbox consoles, games, and Game Pass sold 32% less than the same quarter a year ago.

Xbox fans have faced their share of struggles recently, with Microsoft hiking Game Pass prices three times in as many years, and increasing the price tag on the Xbox consoles not just once but twice in the same year (making them much pricier than the PlayStation) all while removing benefits.

If you're an Xbox gamer, Microsoft still promises it's in it for the long haul, as last October the company pinky-promised that it's not exiting the gaming market.

Microsoft is making more money than ever, but the "More Personal Computing" category, where the gaming income is included, represents only about 20% of the company's revenue. Some back-of-envelope math puts the Xbox section at around a third of that, thus at best an estimated 7% of the company's total revenue, depending on how you run the figures.

With Azure, cloud services, and the investment in OpenAI all seeing meteoric rises every quarter, it's not hard to see where the focus of the company is right now. Predictions that "gaming is dead" might be ten a penny, but the harsh reality is that just as with Nvidia, Intel, or AMD, Microsoft dropping a small portion of its business (or at least putting a hold on it) would hardly matter that much for its bottom line. At least the silicon shortage may lead to more optimized, and hopefully, original games.

Retro gaming handheld firm Anbernic has announced the RG G01 controller. This is a tri-mode controller with broad platform compatibility, a built-in IPS screen, and a plethora of desirable performance and control features. The RG G01 separates itself from the pack, though, with its built-in heart rate sensor and integrated smart screen monitoring app.

We consider the heart rate monitoring functionality wedded to the 2.5D curved IPS fully laminated smart screen at its center to be the RG G01’s main attraction. However, at this pre-release stage, details about these functions (and other specs) are still quite vague.

In the video, we can see that the heart rate sensor works by placing touch-monitors in either palm when a user grips the controller. “You can track your heartbeat in real time during intense boss battles, enjoying an unprecedented level of immersion,” says Anbernic in its PR. That monitoring is done on the aforementioned 2.5D screen.

Also in the video, you can see a chart being updated from the RG G01’s built-in app. Through the magic of machine translation, we know the display is relaying details like heart rate over time, and there are user settings for history, heart rate alarms, and more. Surely, the retail version of this controller will allow users to switch UI languages.

We don’t know the resolution of the screen, except that it is teased as being ‘HD’, so it should have decent pixel density, and in the video, on-screen elements look reasonably crisp. With that screen built in, and a modicum of onboard processing power, RAM, and storage, the controller is begging to be modded into a self-contained retro-gaming system. Doom anyone? RG name hints at retro, but the controller seems very modern…

The rest of the specs

With the Anbernic RG G01 special sauce thoroughly discussed, let’s ponder over its more general controller-centric specs. Digging through the Anbernic PR and video, other important specs and features of this controller include its:

• 1,000 Hz polling
• Six-axis gyroscope, affording plenty of scope for fast and intuitive movement control, alongside calibrated triggers, joysticks, and motion sensors
• Purple Kirin’s electro-inductive capacitive joysticks – a hall-effect tech rival with similar no-drift no wear promises – but also claimed to be super precise and immune to magnetic interference.
• Macros for button presses
• Rapid trigger settings with two-stage trigger locks – switching from linear to micro-switch mode
• A tactile D-pad
• Dual pendulum motor haptics
• Tri-mode connectivity (wired, Bluetooth, 2.4G wireless)
• Compatibility with PC, Steam, Linux, Switch, Android, and iOS

Anbernic’s RG G01 is said to be “coming soon,” but we don’t have an availability date, nor pricing information, at the time of writing. You will be able to grab one from the firm’s U.S. eBay store when stock starts to flow. The controller has been shown in Black, white, and yellow livery.

Children in Russia have raised their voices, demanding to be heard, saying the government has gone too far. A state representative admitted that 63,000 complaint letters were received in a single week, with half of the irate youngsters threatening to leave Russia. What’s the fuss? Is it something to do with the ongoing war or sanctions? No, it is a backlash against the banning of the Roblox gaming platform, reports The Moscow Times.

The ban is "for their own protection"

Official Russian media say that the Roblox ban was put in place to prevent the platform from distributing extremist materials and promoting “LGBT propaganda.” The game from the California company is full of “inappropriate content that can negatively impact the spiritual and moral development of children,” asserted Russian media watchdog Roskomnadzor, according to a statement viewed by The Moscow Times.

Probably more specific and worrying, for parents everywhere, were the assertions by the Russian watchdog that kids playing Roblox may be sexually harassed, tricked into intimate photos, or even be “coerced into committing depraved acts and violence.”

Indeed, this is a worry for the parents of all open online platforms frequented by youngsters. Thus, the Roblox corporation asserts it implements “moderators and automated systems to proactively identify behaviors that may violate our policies.”

Leaving Russia for the love of Roblox

Two figures pretty high up in the Russian administration have admitted that the children of the country have been vociferous in their complaints about the Roblox ban. Putin’s well known press secretary, Dmitry Peskov, confirmed that the Kremlin received “many” letters from children about the ban imposed on December 3.

Pro-Kremlin censorship advocate Yekaterina Mizulina also told her Telegram followers that she had received 63,000 letters from kids aged between eight and 16 on this ban. Half of them said they wished to leave Russia due to the Roblox blockade, according to Mizulina.

Roblox was the most downloaded game in Russia as recently as 2023. It is extremely popular with kids, with 111.8 million daily users, according to the latest monthly metrics we have seen. Around 40% of Roblox gamers are 13 or under.

The blocked in Russia club

Perhaps it is no surprise that Roblox, the latest Western-owned platform with social media elements, is being blocked in Russia. You also can’t use Facebook, Instagram, Threads, Twitter/X, or LinkedIn there, for example.

Meanwhile, YouTube is throttled and disrupted in favor of the state-backed RuTube. (Is there going to be a RuBlox soon?) Russia’s domestic VK social network is most widely used there, and is heavily moderated, and features automatic content filtering according to Roskomnadzor’s blacklist.

An investment in a new gaming chair or desk is one of the biggest improvements you can make to your setup. Luckily, thanks to Secretlab's UK Christmas sale, you don't have to break the bank to upgrade during this holiday season. The company has slashed its prices across its range of chairs, desks, recliners, and accessories.

Some of the company's biggest products are on sale right now, including the Secretlab Titan Evo and Secretlab Titan Evo Nanogen, as well as newer favourites like the Recliner add-on. With Secretlab producing some of the best gaming chairs that you can buy, these Christmas deals unlock a fantastic opportunity to upgrade your comfort and save some pennies while you're at it.

• Check out all of the Christmas deals at Secretlab UK

If you're going for that big upgrade, there are also further discounts of up to £120 on chairs and desks if you decide to splurge on a whole set of new Secretlab kit, depending on how much you spend. For instance, you can save an extra £40 if you spend over £690 if you purchase a chair, or an extra £120 sitewide if you spend over £1,799 in total.

These sale prices, along with these extra discounts, will stay live until 2nd January, or at least until the stock runs out, so you best be quick. You've got until 11am on 16th December to get your order in to guarantee delivery before Christmas, too.

Secretlab Christmas Gaming Chair Deals

Secretlab Christmas Desk Deals

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If you're looking for more savings, check out our Best PC Hardware deals for a range of products, or dive deeper into our specialized SSD and Storage Deals, Hard Drive Deals, Gaming Monitor Deals, Graphics Card Deals, gaming chair, or CPU Deals pages.

It's no surprise to see modern AAA games occupying hundreds of gigabytes of storage these days, especially if you are gaming on a PC. But somehow, Arrowhead Game Studios, the developers behind the popular co-op shooter Helldivers 2, have managed to substantially cut the game’s size by 85%.

As per a recent post on Steam, this reduction was made possible with support from Nixxes Software, best known for developing high-quality PC ports of Sony’s biggest PlayStation titles. The developers were able to achieve this by de-duplicating game data, which resulted in bringing the size down from ~154GB to just ~23GB, saving a massive ~131GB of storage space.

Originally, the game’s large install size was attributed to optimization for mechanical hard drives since duplicating data is used to reduce loading times on older storage media. However, it turns out that Arrowhead’s estimates for load times on HDDs, based on industry data, were incorrect.

With their latest data measurements specific to the game, the developers have confirmed the small number of players (11% last week) using mechanical hard drives will witness mission load times increase by only a few seconds in worst cases. Additionally, the post reads, “the majority of the loading time in Helldivers 2 is due to level-generation rather than asset loading. This level generation happens in parallel with loading assets from the disk and so is the main determining factor of the loading time.”

This is a promising development and a nudge to other game developers to take some notes and potentially make an effort in saving precious storage space for PC gamers.

One can access the ‘slim’ version of Helldivers 2 by opting in to the latest beta update via Steam, which is said to functionally offer the same experience as the legacy versions, apart from its smaller installation size. All progression, war contributions, and purchases are also expected to be carried over to the new slim version. There's also the option to opt out of the beta at any time in case there are any potential issues.

Pulsar Gaming Gears just released a new line of gaming peripherals to celebrate the 85th birthday of martial arts legend Bruce Lee. According to the company, this is its second collaboration with Bruce Lee Enterprises, after the successful run of another limited-edition gaming peripheral set three years earlier. All the items come in a navy blue and white theme, following the actor’s iconic look in Enter the Dragon, when he went face-to-face with O’Hara, one of the main antagonists in the film.

There are several items in the Bruce Lee 85th Edition collection — a Pulsar X2 CrazyLight gaming mouse in either Mini or Medium size, a Pulsar PCMK 3 HE TKL available in four different layouts, plus three different mouse pads. And just like the actor’s lightning quick reflexes, you’re also getting high-performance peripherals for competitive matches. The Pulsar X2 CrazyLight wireless gaming mouse comes in at just 39 grams for the medium variant and 35 grams for the mini version. It has a 32,000 DPI sensor with an 8,000 Hz polling rate, ensuring that it will capture your movements exactly as intended.

We also have the Pulsar PCMK3 HE TKL keyboard, which uses an 80% layout to save on desktop space without skimping on essential keys or functionality. It uses Gateron magnetic switches that rapidly respond to your button presses, mounted on a 6-layer PCB that reduces noise interference and improves reliability.

Lastly, Pulsar offers three different Bruce Lee-themed Superglide3 mouse pads — one heat-treated knitted poly fabric that features the navy blue and white theme, a glass mouse pad that features the same color scheme, and another glass option that features the iconically poised actor in his most iconic film.

These limited-edition peripherals do not come cheap, though. The Superglide3 starts at $24.95 for the fabric model, while the glass options cost $99.95. The gaming mice are both priced at $139.95, regardless of your size preference, while the PCMK 3 HE TKL keyboard will set you back $179.95. That means you’ll have to spend almost $420 if you want to get the complete set with the glass mouse pad. Still, this is a worthy expense if you are a fan of Bruce Lee, and demand peripherals that can perform as fluidly as the martial arts master.

The Black Friday sale weekend is still in full swing, and although Thanksgiving in the US has passed, along with Black Friday itself, there's no let-up on the deals train as it continues to chug along and spit out last-minute bargains from our favourite tech retailers. If you've been keeping an eye out for a gaming laptop at an affordable price with some decent specs, then we have just the ticket for you today. Lenovo's Legion 5 gaming laptop is priced at just £1249.99, and includes not only an Intel CPU and OLED screen, but also a powerful Nvidia RTX 5070 graphics card. Getting you gaming well ahead of the Christmas holidays.

• Grab this deal at Amazon

Packed inside the Lenovo Legion 5 is a surprising amount of hardware for the asking price. Not only are you getting a luxurious 15-inch WQXGA OLED display, but you're also treated to a powerful Nvidia RTX 5070 graphics card, Intel Core i7-13650HX processor, an ample 32GB of DDR5 RAM, and a 1TB SSD for storage. Windows 11 Home is pre-installed as your operating system. Both the memory and SSD capacities are upgradeable should you require more in the future.

The original list price for this laptop was priced at £1549.99, so you're saving £300 in this Black Friday deal, which is a pretty penny saved. You would normally expect to pay more for a laptop with similar-ish specs, but this Legion 5 model does use an older Intel CPU. The 13th Gen Core i7-13650HX is an older CPU, but it's not going to bottleneck this system, especially if you are playing games on a 2560 x 1600 pixel resolution on that OLED screen. The speedy 165Hz refresh rate will ensure buttery-smooth gameplay.

The Lenovo Legion 5 comes with 802.11.be WiFI connectivity, Bluetooth, a front-facing 5MP webcam, and plenty of ports for connecting peripherals and extra monitors. These include 5 x USB ports, an RJ45 Ethernet port, and an HDMI port.

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If you're looking for stellar performance in a compact system, then look no further than Cooler Master's own MasterLiquid 240 Atmos, which is 34% off at Amazon UK. The cooler's design and superb aesthetics are just the cherry on top of what is one of the best 240mm AIOs that money can buy.

In our 4.5-star review, we noted that the cooler boasted strong performance, quiet noise levels, and excellent aesthetics. Given the discount on offer here, it's unlikely that you'll find a better 240mm AIO deal at this price point, so long as you're not bothered about having a configurable display.

• Grab the Cooler Master MasterLiquid Atmos 240 at Amazon UK

In the box, expect to find a pair of Cooler Master's Sickleflow Edge 120mm fans, alongside CryoFuze thermal paste and applicators, a PWM Splitter, ARGB hub and splitter, and support for all modern CPU sockets. This AIO is commonly used in small-form-factor builds for its size and performance, as the CPU block is relatively low-profile, which means you'll have no issue with clearance for any large RAM heat spreaders. Additionally, with a total radiator and fan thickness of just 52mm, it'll fit just about anywhere.

Boasting impressive results in our testing, considering its size class, the MasterLiquid Atmos 240 often performs on the same level as a 360mm AIO, without all of the bulk. Expect this cooler to be able to handle the most power-hungry chips out there. If you're using a less demanding chip, the Atmos 240 will be able to handle it with no sweat.

Cooler Master's AIO was observed as reaching 38.2 dBA when paired with a Core 17-13700K, which is plenty quiet using the default fan curves. Just note that things can be noisier when pushing the cooler to its limits. Given the performance on offer here, even if you have a larger chassis, this might still be an excellent purchase. But if you have a smaller case that can only support up to a 240mm AIO, then Cooler Master's MasterLiquid Atmos 240 becomes a no-brainer.

Given that the price has plummeted by 34% this Black Friday season, it's reasonable to assume that you'll likely not find a better cooler than this right now. Thanks to its low-profile design, it'll fit just about anywhere, and the CPU block looks great, without being outwardly garish, as many RGB-laden PC components lean toward.

If you're looking for more savings, check out our Best Black Friday PC Hardware deals for a range of products, or dive deeper into our specialized SSD and Storage Deals, Hard Drive Deals, Gaming Monitor Deals, Graphics Card Deals, or CPU Deals pages.

It's almost Black Friday. You haven't started shopping for gifts — or for yourself — yet. Maybe there's a PC builder in your life. Maybe that's you. Either way, one thing is for sure: The price of RAM has skyrocketed, which will make building your own system more expensive than it was a few months ago. But those price hikes haven't yet hit prebuilt systems, including desktops and laptops, in part because the companies that make them have stockpiled memory to keep their supply chains moving.

As of this writing, you can get an entire PlayStation 5 for less than a 64GB RAM kit. So yes: If you're willing to let someone else build your system, it may be a far better deal to buy one of the best gaming PCs, best gaming laptops, or best ultrabooks before AI’s seemingly insatiable demand for RAM and storage causes price hikes on systems, too.

A lot of us prefer to build their own PCs. I get it! But this isn't the first time that financial wisdom has pointed to prebuilts. The same was true when GPU prices went orbital during the perfect storm of the COVID pandemic lockdowns and crypto mining on GPUs.

Let's do some price comparisons and see how this all shakes out. You can also see some of our other tips for navigating the shortages in our RAM pricing survival guide.

For an example, we'll use the CyberPower PC Gamer Xtreme gaming desktop, which we recently reviewed and uses all standardized parts. For some components, we had to make swaps for availability, so we used something comparable in those cases.

The total on our parts list is $1,322.80, or more than $200 over the $1,099.99 CyberPowerPC. And for Black Friday, the CyberPowerPC is down to $849.99, which is a price you couldn't come close to without making compromises when building on your own now. It sure doesn't help that when separated out, the RAM and graphics card are almost the same price.

Also, if you were building this yourself, you'd probably want a nicer PSU, which could add to the cost. You might also be able to bring along an existing Windows license or find a way to pay less, which could drop the price.

If you're looking for laptops, it's a bit harder to price out. After all, you can't usually build your own laptop from parts. Framework, the company that allows more upgrades and customization options than any other laptop manufacturer, shows that now is the time to buy. The company hasn't changed pricing yet, but has removed standalone RAM from its store and wrote on X that "Our memory costs from our suppliers are increasing substantially though, so it is likely we will need to increase memory pricing soon."

Framework is smaller than Dell, HP, Apple, and Lenovo, which almost certainly have larger supplies. But even their stock won't last forever, and depending on what the RAM pricing crisis looks like at that point, it would not be surprising to see prices go up from even the biggest companies. That will be the case for both ultrabooks and gaming laptops (perhaps even more for the latter, given that GPUs have their own RAM).

It's at least somewhat fortuitous that this rise in RAM pricing is occurring during a deals event. If you can find a good deal on a gaming PC or a laptop, it might be the lowest price you can find for a long time.

If all you really care about is gaming, it might also a good time to buy a console or a handheld. Those prices are already higher than they were last year, and it's possible they'll go higher still if the memory squeeze continues. It's the opposite of the way consoles usually work — they typically get cheaper as time goes on — but we live in surprising times.

RAM on its own is expensive now. But systems with memory in them already have it accounted for. There's no telling how long that will last, but until prices increase, you’ll likely save some money by buying a system that's already built. Building your own PC has, yet again, become something you’ll likely have to pay extra for.

Gaming PC Deals

Laptop PC Deals

The Asus ROG Xbox Ally X, despite its odd name, is the first contemporary Microsoft-sanctioned handheld gaming device. The power-packed portable play powerhouse is a pretty performant bit of kit, as we found out in our review. One of the most interesting aspects is the alternative to the stock Windows interface that Microsoft calls the Full Screen Experience (FSE) for short. This was a feature exclusive to the ROG unit, but as of today, Microsoft will make it available to "all gaming handhelds currently in the market".

Additionally, the blog post on the Xbox site says that FSE ought to become available for testing in "more PC form factors," probably meaning home-theater and console-like PCs. Interested testers can enroll their Windows computers in the Xbox/Windows Insider program to give FSE a spin soon.

As we remarked on the review, FSE makes the experience of using Windows for gaming much more streamlined and intuitive than the stock UI. This new development should brighten the day of owners of other Windows handhelds, such as the Lenovo Legion Go, MSI Claw 8 AI+, and AYANEO 2/Next machines. They should very soon be able to boot straight into FSE and not have to fuss and fumble with the Start menu.

Particularly proficient power users could already force-enable FSE with a handful of registry hacks, provided they're running Windows 11 version 25H2. If you've never tried it, FSE consolidates all your games from multiple online storefronts, like Windows Store, Steam, Epic Games, and Battle.net, into one place.

On the performance side, it's also a small step beyond simply activating Game Mode in Windows, as booting into FSE instead of Explorer should skip at least some RAM-hogging components. If you're really hardcore about performance optimization, as an alternative, you can try installing Bazzite Linux or a variant thereof and reportedly enjoy even higher, more stable FPS in many titles.

Steam has had its Big Picture Mode for ages now, and it was an easy argument to make that such an interface should be a baseline feature of any gaming PC, handheld or otherwise. Better late than never, as they say.

AOC is a name that doesn't quite carry the same brand cachet as the likes of Asus or Samsung, but the Taiwanese maker has been around for quite a long time. While it's mostly known for its value-oriented wares, its monitor department has now turned its attention to properly nice QD-OLED displays with jarringly high refresh rates. The new pixel slabs come in 27-, 32-, and 34-inch sizes, with refresh rates ranging from 165 Hz to an eye-popping 500 Hz, and in 1440p and 4K resolutions. The 27-inch model is $449.99 at Amazon, the 32-inch model rings in at $599.99 at Best Buy, and the 34-inch model is $699.99 at Best Buy.

• 27-inch Agon Pro AG276QZD2 with a resolution of 2560x1440 and a 240 Hz refresh rate is $449.99 at Amazon

As an exceedingly quick recap, OLED displays have a response time of effectively zero and a near-infinite contrast ratio, making for a blur-free experience with perfect blacks and popping colors. While AOC doesn't specify, given the specs and the company's history, the panels in these displays assuredly come from Samsung. By the way, if you're concerned about OLED burn-in, AOC offers a three-year warranty for any such issues. All the displays offer G-Sync Compatible VRR support.

Judging by online store stock, 27" is currently the most popular monitor size, so it makes sense that AOC has three riffs on it. The first one is the Agon Pro AG276QZD2, with a resolution of 2560x1440 and a 240 Hz refresh rate. Color and brightness-wise, it has a DisplayHDR True Black 400 certification, although it does claim a peak brightness of 1000 nits. It comes with a height-adjustable stand, rear RGB lighting, and a USB hub. This model is actually pretty darn affordable at $449.99 at Amazon.

If you're looking to have a career in professional Counter-Strike, then you'd do well to look at the Agon Pro AG276QKD2, essentially an upgrade of the above model with a massive 500 Hz refresh rate. The overall brightness in HDR mode gets a slight boost, with a corresponding DisplayHDR True Black 500 certification. We can't find it in North American retailers just yet, but it's selling for £679 at Amazon UK. Removing VAT and doing the currency conversion gives us a theoretical stateside price of around $740.

If the pedestrian 1440p resolution isn't quite your jam, you can check out the Agon Pro AG276UZD with its sharp 3840x2160 (4K) resolution. For this model, the refresh rate is 240 Hz and the certification is DisplayHDR True Black 400, but it's otherwise similar to its cousins. The current street price is £549 at Amazon UK, or about $598 once it reaches the United States.

Moving onto bigger sizes, we have the Agon Pro AG326UD, a 32" 4K display with a 165 Hz refresh rate and DisplayHDR True Black 400 certification. The 165 Hz refresh rate might look unimpressive in comparison to the models above, but keep in mind that it'll take at least an RTX 5080 graphics card to push that kind of frame rate at 4K in most games, at least without compromising on visual quality. This monitor has the same creature comforts as the rest of the lineup, and rings in at only $599.99 at Best Buy, a pretty good deal if you ask me.

Finally, ultra-wide fans can mosey over to the Agon Pro AG346UCD, a 21:9, 34-inch monitor with a 3440x1440 resolution and 175 Hz refresh rate. The display is curved, but gently so at a very reasonable 1800R. This model carries a DisplayHDR True Black 400 certification, and a price tag of $699.99 at Best Buy.

If you're in the market for a new graphics card, then Black Friday is a great time to get your hands on some more FPS. Many of the deals have already begun on both sides of the pond, and that includes UK PC hardware vendor Overclockers UK, which is currently shaving a welcome few quid off the RTX 5070 Ti, bringing the price below £700 and RRP in a rare discount. Our top pick would be the Zotac Solid SFF, now just £698, but there are similarly priced Palit and Gainward options too.

• RTX 5070 Ti sales at OCUK

According to price tracking tools, this is the cheapest you can expect to pay for an RTX 5070Ti in the UK right now, and it's also the best price we can recall seeing on this particular model. The RRP in the UK is £729, and even in late 2025, finding an RTX 5070Ti below recommended retail can be considered something of a rarity.

The RTX 5070 Ti sports 8960 CUDA Cores, a boost clock speed of 2482 MHz, and 16GB of GDDR7 VRAM for solid 4K gaming performance, even at fairly high fidelity settings. You can see our benchmarking data below to see how it stacks up against rivals.

If the 5070 Ti, which is admittedly still quite an expensive card, feels out of reach, then OCUK does have more deals on the cheaper 5070 and 5060 Ti RTX options. You can scoop a 5070 for £479, well below the RRP of £539. Likewise, the excellent 5060 Ti deal we covered earlier this week is still available, now just £379.99 for a card that sports the crucial 16GB of VRAM most serious PC builders would expect from a GPU.

If you're looking for more savings, check out our Best early Black Friday PC Hardware deals for a range of products, or dive deeper into our specialized SSD and Storage Deals, Hard Drive Deals, Gaming Monitor Deals, Graphics Card Deals, or CPU Deals pages.

An investment in a new gaming chair or desk is one of the biggest improvements you can make to your setup, and thanks to Secretlab's Black Friday and Cyber Monday deals, you don't have to break the bank to do so. Secretlab's holiday savings are now in full swing with huge price cuts on its chairs, desks, recliners, and accessories that could help you save you up to £200. Prices are slashed from 12th November to 5th December, or at least until the stock runs out, so you best be quick.

• Check all the Black Friday Deals at Secretlab

Some of the company's biggest products are on sale right now, including the Secretlab Titan Evo and Secretlab Titan Evo Nanogen, as well as newer favourites like the Recliner add-on. With Secretlab producing some of the best gaming chairs that you can buy, these Black Friday deals are the perfect chance to upgrade your comfort and save some pennies while you're at it.

Secretlab Black Friday Gaming Chair Deals

Secretlab Black Friday Sit-to-Stand Desk Deals

Secretlab Black Friday Desk Accessory Deals

Secretlab Black Friday Skins Deals

Secretlab Black Friday Ergonomic Recliner Deals

Secretlab Black Friday Lumbar Pillow Deals

If you're looking for more savings, check out our Best PC Hardware deals for a range of products, or dive deeper into our specialized SSD and Storage Deals, Hard Drive Deals, Gaming Monitor Deals, Graphics Card Deals, gaming chair, or CPU Deals pages.

Images purportedly showing a newly opened public PC gaming space in North Korea have been shared on social media. Technology enthusiast Iniysa shared photographs of a “North Korean PC bang” on X. A ‘PC bang’ translates as basically a ‘PC room’ and the term comes from South Korea, where it is widely used to refer to an ‘internet café’ or ‘electronic café’ where gaming is the main activity. There are thousands of PC bangs in South Korea, and they form a major part of the youth culture below the 38^th parallel. However, they aren’t really a thing in the North, as you might expect.

Click 'See more' to see the photo gallery.

The contemporary commercial architecture of this new venue is typical of many higher-end developments I have seen in East Asia. If anything, it looks too premium for a place where gamers typically just want to go and sit in the dark, in front of an adequate eSports PC, for a low hourly rate.

A critical thinker might question whether this is a premium showcase venue designed to frame the idea that a modern, advanced gaming culture exists in North Korea. Actually, tech-Twitterer Iniysa reckons that the swish new PC bang is located in “a newly built city in Pyongyang, and only the top elites selected by the state, such as those recognized by Kim Jong-un and nuclear test scientists, are allowed to live there.”

Also, while one might expect North Korean PC gamers to live by Chinese tech hand-me-downs, Iniysa is openly surprised to see premium Asus ROG-branded gear at this Pyongyang PC bang.

Images of what appears to be the net café games UI are also somewhat eyebrow-raising. The machine translation of the grid-layout game launcher banner is ‘Mars Computer Arcade’, which we haven’t heard of before. However, it features many AAA and eSports titles that are popular on the other side of the DMZ.

Without much pixel peeping, we can see the iconic covers of games from franchises like FIFA, Battlefield, Call of Duty, Rainbow Six, Crysis, Far Cry, and others. Iniysa chirps up to suggest that, while these games may be accessible in the Pyongyang PC bang, they will most likely be restricted to local – probably internal – networks. Thus, the North Korean bamboo curtain persists, even in the gaming sphere.

Some folks will go to great lengths, sparing no expense, to raise their gaming sim experience to thrilling new heights. Perhaps the crown prince of such extreme sim build-outs is Chinese enthusiast Blyat, best known among Tom’s Hardware readers for his immersive World of Tanks gaming contraptions and, most recently, a (frankly dangerous) fighter jet rig. Today, Blyat released a video showcasing his wild Tank Simulator 5, which comes with a full-size replica machine gun and cannons, on the Chinese video-sharing platform Bilibili.

You can watch the full video on Bilibili, but, as we can’t embed this Chinese social media format, we have also made a couple of GIF clips for your convenience.

Bylat’s new video is a showcase of sim hardware-enhanced fun inside the free-to-play hit, World of Tanks. The Wargaming-published vehicular combat MMO features an incredible array of tanks, adept at various battlefield tasks. The PC version is closely tied to the mouse and keyboard control that the platform is renowned for. However, this video is all about fun, and doesn’t go into the technical aspects of getting these crazy sim setups working.

The frantic video begins with Bylat driving what might be dubbed a ‘Tactical vehicle’ out of a garage, cannon blazing. It switches to the corresponding on-screen WoT action, where the anti-armor cannon can be seen peppering an enemy tank until it violently explodes.

Next, the scene switches back to inside the garage, and Bylat demos both the armor-piercing canon of his vehicle firing, backed up with our hero standing on the hood with a heavy machine gun. We guess Bylat is annihilating some other tank-foes, seen on the headset he is wearing.

There’s lots of overt humor in the WoT sim video, too. For example, at one stage we see Bylat’s pants fall down due to the incessant recoil of the machine gun. Perhaps funnier is the slapstick moment when, stood in the back of the truck with the machine gun blazing, the large armor piercing cannon swings around to smack our hero in the head – leaving him poleaxed in the back of the truck.

If you enjoy this kind of immersive sillyness, Bylat’s Bilibili channel also recently showcased his Airplane simulator, a Mech simulator with VTOL, and an erm… donkey riding simulator.