As we enter the last full week of April, we're finally back to a busy release schedule again. This week's AAA title apparently had some last minute bugs squashed just this week, so let's hope the released game delivers on its promise. As for the rest of this week you can look forward to a VR horror shooter, a side scrolling action-adventure medtroidvania game, a Robin Hood wannabe game, a dungeon crawler you can play with friends online, a game about a hermit crab, a JRPG and finally a very sandy action RPG.

Manor Lords / This week's AAA release / Friday 26 April / Early Access
Manor Lords is a strategy game that allows you to experience the life of a medieval lord. Grow your starting village into a bustling city, manage resources and production chains, and expand your lands through conquest. Inspired by the art and architecture of late 14th century Franconia, Manor Lords prioritizes historical accuracy wherever possible, using it to inform gameplay mechanics and visuals alike. Common medieval tropes are avoided in favor of historical accuracy, in order to make the world feel more authentic, colorful, and believable. Steam Link

Week 12 is really delivering a baker's dozen when it comes to big game releases, as we have both new and old big releases this week, with this week's AAA release being an open world action RPG game. However, if that's not your cup of tea, then we still have a week packed to the brim with big releases, although it starts off with a bug-sized indie game, but its theme carries over to the next release and this game somehow involves robots. This is followed by a game where you might want to have someone's hand to hold, as it can get a bit scary, even if it's a remake. Towards the end of this week we have another major release, which also involves robots and was a big hit on the PlayStation consoles. We end the week on a somewhat similar theme as the first two game releases of the week, even though it's on a much grander scale.

Dragon's Dogma 2 / This week's AAA release / Friday 22 March
Dragon's Dogma is a single player, narrative driven action-RPG series that challenges the players to choose their own experience - from the appearance of their Arisen, their vocation, their party, how to approach different situations and more. Now, in this long-awaited sequel, the deep, explorable fantasy world of Dragon's Dogma 2 awaits. On your journey, you'll be joined by Pawns, mysterious otherworldly beings, in an adventure so unique you will feel as if accompanied by other players while on your own adventure. All of these elements are elevated further through physics technology, artificial intelligence (AI) and the latest in graphics, to create a truly immersive fantasy world in Dragon's Dogma 2. Steam Link

Founded in 2022, Mighty Koi Studio aims to prove that "The Witcher" is not the only Polish fantasy story that can conquer the world. The studio holds the rights to two electrifying titles, offering creators vast creative possibilities. "Thorgal" and "The Night Wanderer" will launch on PS5, Xbox Series and PC. The release date is yet TBA. The team bases its productions on the Unreal Engine 5 with proprietary extensions and utilizes cutting-edge technologies such as photogrammetry and AI.

The approach to plans comes with great ambition, announcing two AA+ / AAA projects and engaging experienced experts from the world of gaming and animation - currently, the team consists of over 100 people, and the number is expected to double by the end of the year, with external studios also being involved. Mighty Koi hopes that the upcoming productions will conquer not only the Polish but also the foreign gaming market and, like "The Witcher," make Polish fantasy literature a world-class product.

As we enter the year of the dragon according to the Chinese zodiac, we have a week full of new game releases to look forward to, although none of them are unfortunately dragon themed. This week's AAA release has a more caribbean theme and has been a long time coming. As for the remaining releases, we're looking at a dash of phobia, banishment, some insight, dwarves, colonisation and a dark town.

Skull & Bones / This week's AAA release / Friday 16 February
Enter the perilous world of Skull and Bones, a co-op pirate open world action RPG experience, to become the most infamous pirate kingpin. Engage in thrilling naval battles, craft a variety of unique ships, forge unlikely alliances as you overcome the odds, and bring mayhem on the seas. Be part of an immersive world that introduces new challenges and features every season

Welcome to February proper, a week that brings one fairly big AAA release, followed by a few lesser titles. We have sparky tales, a remake by MicroProse, dungeons, inquisitors and a space based RPG game for you, none of which can be considered major releases, but might still be fun to play.

Helldivers 2 / This week's AAA release / Thursday 8 February
Helldivers 2 is a 3rd person squad-based shooter that sees the elite forces of the Helldivers battling to win an intergalactic struggle to rid the galaxy of the rising alien threats. From a 3rd person perspective, players use a variety of weapons (pistols, machine guns, flamethrowers) and stratagems (turrets, airstrikes, etc.) to shoot and kill the alien threats. Players can also aim down the sights for a more accurate 1st person camera view. Combat is accompanied by frequent sprays of blood and dismemberment as players exterminate the alien forces or players and squad mates are hit by environmental explosions or friendly fire. Enemy encampments and battlefield environments depict bloodstains and dismembered corpses.

Alleged full specifications leaked for NVIDIA's upcoming GeForce RTX 3050 6 GB graphics card show extensive reductions beyond merely reducing memory size versus the 8 GB model. If accurate, performance could lag the existing RTX 3050 8 GB SKU by up to 25%, making it weaker competition even for AMD's budget RX 6500 XT. Previous rumors suggested only capacity and bandwidth differences on a partially disabled memory bus between 3050 variants, which would reduce the memory to 6 GB and 96-bit bus, from 8 GB and 128-bit bus.. But leaked specs indicate CUDA core counts, clock speeds, and TDP all see cuts for the upcoming 6 GB version. With 18 SMs and 2304 cores rather than 20 SMs and 2560 cores at lower base and boost frequencies, the impact looks more severe than expected. A 70 W TDP does allow passive cooling but hurts performance versus the 3050 8 GB's 130 W design.

Some napkin math suggests the 3050 6 GB could deliver only 75% of its elder sibling's frame rates, putting it more in line with the entry-level 6500 XT. While having 50% more VRAM helps, dramatic core and clock downgrades counteract that memory advantage. According to rumors, the RTX 3050 6 GB is set to launch in February, bringing lower-end Ampere to even more budget-focused builders. But with specifications seemingly hobbled beyond just capacity, its real-world gaming value remains to be determined. NVIDIA likely intends RTX 3060 6 GB primarily for less demanding esports titles. Given the scale of cutbacks and the modern AAA title's recommended specifications, mainstream AAA gaming performance seems improbable.

Chinese company Sipeed has introduced the Lichee Pocket 4A, one of the first handheld gaming devices based on the RISC-V open-source instruction set architecture (ISA). Sipeed positions the device as a retro gaming platform capable of running simple titles via software rendering or GPU acceleration. At its core is Alibaba's T-Head TH1520 processor featuring four 2.50 GHz Xuantie C910 RISC-V general-purpose CPU cores and an unnamed Imagination GPU. The chip was originally aimed at laptop designs. Memory options include 8 GB or 16 GB LPDDR4X RAM and 32 GB or 128 GB of storage. The Lichee Pocket 4A has a 7-inch 1280x800 LCD touchscreen, Wi-Fi/Bluetooth connectivity, and an array of wired ports like USB and Ethernet. It weighs under 500 grams. The device can run Android or Linux distributions like Debian, Ubuntu, and others.

As an early RISC-V gaming entrant, performance expectations should be modest—the focus is retro gaming and small indie titles, not modern AAA games. Specific gaming capabilities remain to be fully tested. However, the release helps showcase RISC-V's potential for consumer electronics and competitive positioning against proprietary ISAs like ARM. Pricing is still undefined, but another Sipeed handheld console retails for around $250 currently. Reception from enthusiasts and developers will demonstrate whether there's a viable market for RISC-V gaming devices. Success could encourage additional hardware experimentation efforts across emerging open architectures. With a 6000 mAh battery, battery life should be decent. Other specifications can be seen in the table below, and the pre-order link is here.

As we enter the last month of the year, the first week of December starts with a movie based AAA title that is likely to be popular with some and loathed by others. The rest of this coming week's releases aren't quite as impressive, with one exception it seems. However, you can look forward to a mix of underworld dreams, some 4X space action, eggs, another post-apocalyptic MMO and a horror game.

Avatar: Frontiers of Pandora / This week's AAA title / Thursday 7 December
Abducted by the human militaristic corporation known as the RDA, you, a Na'vi, were trained and molded to serve their purpose. Fifteen years later, you are free, but find yourself a stranger in your birthplace. Reconnect with your lost heritage, discover what it truly means to be Na'vi, and join other clans to protect Pandora from the RDA.

As it's getting darker in the northern hemisphere, we're seeing a continuing stream of new game releases and this week's AAA title appears to involve hammers and ruins of some kind. The rest of this week's releases includes tiny civilizations, rhythms, faith, flashbacks and a Japanese game. Take a gander below to see if there's something for you or maybe you're suffering from new game release overload already?

Warhammer Age of Sigmar: Realms of Ruin / This week's AAA title / Friday 17 November
Wage a campaign of brutal conquest in this realm-shattering real-time strategy game set in the Warhammer Age of Sigmar universe. Explore the nature of war from the perspectives of righteous champions and villainous warlords. Battle for survival and dominance across a campaign featuring four major factions, including Stormcast Eternals, Orruk Kruleboyz, Nighthaunt and the Disciples of Tzeentch! Experience a cinematic plot, penned in conjunction with acclaimed Black Library author, Gavin Thorpe.

With autumn in full swing, the first full week of November brings a bunch of new games along with it and this week's AAA title is the third in the series and appears to have something to do with duty. As for this week's other titles, we can look forward to managing some kind of sports teams, crafting robots, erasing names, messing around in dungeons and finally some old school action.

Call of Duty: Modern Warfare III / This week's AAA title / Friday 10 November
Modern Warfare III celebrates the 20th anniversary of Call of Duty with one of the greatest collections of Multiplayer maps ever assembled - both fan favorites and all new ones. All 16 launch maps from the original Modern Warfare 2 (2009) have been modernized with new modes and gameplay features and will be available at launch to get everyone started, while over 12 all-new core 6v6 maps will fuel post-launch live seasons.

As we enter the last full week of October, the AAA game releases are off the charts, with no less than three massive releases this coming week. Our top pick is a horror game from a Finnish developer that most of you should be familiar with. The remaining releases this week involve a bullet hell, skyscrapers, metal, a beast, a ghost and silent gods, of sorts at least. If that sounds confusing, read on to see what's being released this coming week.

Alan Wake 2 / This week's AAA title / Friday 27 October
A string of ritualistic murders threatens Bright Falls, a small-town community surrounded by Pacific Northwest wilderness. Saga Anderson, an accomplished FBI agent with a reputation for solving impossible cases arrives to investigate the murders. Anderson's case spirals into a nightmare when she discovers pages of a horror story that starts to come true around her.

As autumn continues, we have another week of big game releases to look forward to, hopefully with something that'll suit most gamers here. This week's AAA title involves a lot of sand, wars and monuments. As for the rest of this week's new games, you can be a tycoon, a driver of very expensive motor vehicles, craft your own stick, pretend to be a starship captain or you could be a monster slayer. Let us know if any of these tickle your fancy in the poll.

Total War: Pharaoh / This week's AAA title / Wednesday 11 October
In Total War: Pharaoh, the newest entry in the award-winning grand strategy series, immerse yourself in ancient Egypt at the zenith of its power and experience the dramatic events that threaten its destruction. With dynamic real-time battles and incredible turn-based empire management, can you rise above your adversaries to become Egypt's last great Pharaoh and stand against the collapse of an iconic civilisation?

As we enter October—as well as autumn in the northern hemisphere—things kick off with a fairly big AAA release that involves assassins. The rest of the week is full of new games that range from lighting lamps to choo-choos and exploring unknown galaxies, to thieves and sword action to some kind of ice related sport. In other words, yet another jam packed week of new releases to look forward to.

Assassin's Creed Mirage / This week's AA title / Thursday 5 October
Experience the story of Basim, a cunning street thief with nightmarish visions, seeking answers and justice as he navigates the bustling streets of ninth-century Baghdad. Through a mysterious, ancient organization known as the Hidden Ones, he will become a deadly Master Assassin and change his fate in ways he never could have imagined.

As we're about to enter the last week of September, we have another somewhat slow week of new releases, that is unless you're a football fan, the kind with a round ball, not the oblong pig bladder kind. That said, if you're into trains, house building, hunting relics or ever wanted to know what it's like to jump between worlds, there might be something for you this week as well.

EA Sports FC 24 / This week's AAA title / Thursday 28 September
EA Sports FC 24 welcomes you to The World's Game: the most true-to-football experience ever with HyperMotionV, PlayStyles optimised by Opta, and an enhanced Frostbite. Join us in building the future of football on a foundation of innovation and authenticity with more than 19,000 fully licensed players, 700 teams, and 30 leagues.

Digital Foundry organized an AI Visuals Roundtable earlier this week, with Alex Battaglia (Video Producer) acting as host—the main topic being a recently visually upgraded version of Cyberpunk 2077. Guests included: Bryan Catanzaro (NVIDIA's Vice President Applied Deep Learning Research), Jakub Knapik (VP Art and Global Art Director at CD Projekt RED), Jacob Freeman (GeForce Marketing Evangelist) and Pedro Valadas (PCMR Founder). Team Green, naturally, advocates its newly released DLSS 3.5 and Ray Reconstruction technologies—brute force rendering techniques are considered passé, and no longer an ideal solution for upcoming GPU generations. Valadas was curious enough to ask whether NVIDIA had any plans to target reasonable performance levels—minus DLSS—at native resolutions.

Catanzaro focused on the benefits introduced in Update 2.0 and Phantom Liberty: "I think that DLSS 3.5 actually makes Cyberpunk 2077 even more beautiful than native rendering...that's my belief. The reason being that the AI is able to make smarter decisions about how to render a scene...and I think that's going to continue to develop." He half jokingly states that rasterization is a "bag of fakeness." A combination of DLSS and path tracing is preferred over old hat methods—thus attaining the most realistic visual results. He summarizes with his own slogan: "Native rendering is fake frames." Catanzaro predicts that real-time graphics industries will become increasingly reliant on AI-processed image reconstruction and rendering technologies in the future. He hopes that AAA game environments will become cheaper to make in due time—with a shift to neural rendering. DLSS 10 could interface with game engine technology at a higher level, with a possible outcome being the creation of more "immersive and beautiful" experiences.

To call this coming week jam packed with new game releases would be an understatement, as pretty much every day next week will see a big release or two. They may not all be AAA releases, but they're at least AA releases. As such, get ready for a crazy busy week with everything from driving games and parties, to lies and kombat.

The Crew: Motorfest / This week's AAA title / Monday 18 September
The Crew Motorfest features more vehicles than ever before in the franchise, including new brands, new car categories, and dozens of new models. Drive the most exclusive hypercars, such as the Lamborghini Revuelto, discover two generations of Toyota Supra, go electric with the Lotus Evija... and much more!

This coming week, one of the most hyped AAA games of the year will launch and early previews of the game suggests it might just manage to mostly live up to the hype. However, the rest of this week is rather slow, maybe because all of the other publishers know most people will be busy playing their fancy new space game and won't be interested in what else might launch this week, although some appear to be riding on the wave of said space game. That said, there are still some minor releases this week, with at least a couple that might appeal to some of you.

Starfield / This week's AAA title / Wednesday 6 September
Starfield is the first new universe in over 25 years from Bethesda Game Studios, the award-winning creators of The Elder Scrolls V: Skyrim and Fallout 4. In this next generation role-playing game set amongst the stars, create any character you want and explore with unparalleled freedom as you embark on an epic journey to answer humanity's greatest mystery. In the year 2330, humanity has ventured beyond our solar system, settling new planets, and living as a spacefaring people. You will join Constellation - the last group of space explorers seeking rare artifacts throughout the galaxy - and navigate the vast expanse of space in Bethesda Game Studios' biggest and most ambitious game.

Today, Electronic Arts Inc. and Ascendant Studios launched Immortals of Aveum, a single-player, first-person magic shooter powered by the groundbreaking Unreal Engine 5.1 technology and set in an original fantasy universe. Developed by a new independent AAA studio made up of award-winning industry veterans and published under the EA Originals label, Immortals of Aveum puts players in a visceral and cinematic fantasy universe that combines modern characters and a story-driven campaign with intense magic-based action, world exploration and puzzle-solving. Summon your power, stop the Everwar, and save the realms starting now on PlayStation 5, Xbox Series X|S and PC via the EA app, Steam and Epic Games Store worldwide.

Immortals of Aveum tells the story of Jak (Darren Barnet), who discovers that he is a magically-imbued 'Unforeseen' and finds himself reluctantly caught in the middle of the raging Everwar. Recruited under the tutelage of the powerful General Kirkan (Gina Torres) and an elite order of battlemages called the Immortals, Jak must master all three colors of magic - blue, green, and red. With powerful magic-wielders and legions of soldiers on both sides of the Everwar, Jak and the Immortals must uncover the mysteries of Aveum's troubled past, if there's any hope for turning the tides of the Everwar and defeating Sandrakk, the powerful warlord of Rasharn and his mysterious lieutenant, simply known as The Hand.

The month of August keeps delivering when it comes to new game releases and this week's AAA title appears to involve a lot of sand and dust, as well as fallen gods. The rest of the releases to look forward to include everything from wrestling to enjoying the apocalypse, to forest bandits, a musical and being a mechanic in space. Last week we managed to please 58 percent of you, which was a new record, but we don't expect to reach those kinds of numbers this week.

Atlas Fallen / This week's AAA title / Thursday 10 August
Rise from the dust and liberate mankind from the oppression of a corrupted god. Glide the sands of a timeless land, filled with ancient dangers, mysteries and fragments of the past. Hunt legendary monsters, using powerful, shape-shifting weapons and devastating sand-powered abilities in spectacular, super-powered combat. Target and gather the essence of your enemies to shape your own custom playstyle, forging a new era for humanity in a fully cooperative or solo story campaign.

As we enter the month of August, July still has a couple of new gaming titles to offer of which both obviously are launching on the same day. That said, August starts with a bang and brings a highly anticipated AAA title. The rest of this week's releases is as always a mix of games that will hopefully appeal to at least one of you, since the past polls suggest that the TPU readership is a picky crowd to please when it comes to games.

Baldur's Gate 3 / This week's AAA title / Thursday 3 August
Gather your party and return to the Forgotten Realms in a tale of fellowship and betrayal, sacrifice and survival, and the lure of absolute power. Mysterious abilities are awakening inside you, drawn from a mind flayer parasite planted in your brain. Resist, and turn darkness against itself. Or embrace corruption, and become ultimate evil. From the creators of Divinity: Original Sin 2 comes a next-generation RPG, set in the world of Dungeons & Dragons.

After a slow week of new releases, we're in for an extremely packed week this coming week, as we have no less than two AAA titles and several other big releases. The first AAA title this coming week is a sequel from Gearbox with the second AAA title having been out on the PlayStation consoles for quite some time, but it's been given some new sparkly features on PC. We also have a space game that we know some of you have been looking forward to, as well as a time travel game and a few other little gems.

Remnant II / This Week's First AAA Title / Tuesday 25 July
Remnant II is the sequel to the best-selling game Remnant: From the Ashes that pits survivors of humanity against new deadly creatures and god-like bosses across terrifying worlds. Play solo or co-op with two other friends to explore the depths of the unknown to stop an evil from destroying reality itself. To succeed, players will need to rely on their own skills and those of their team to overcome the toughest challenges and to stave off humanity's extinction.

As we celebrate the 57th anniversary of Black Panther's comic debut this July, we're thrilled to announce Cliffhanger Games, a new triple-A development studio based in Seattle, is working on an original, third-person, single-player Black Panther game in collaboration with Marvel Games. Our mission is to build an expansive and reactive world that empowers players to experience what it is like to take on the mantle of Wakanda's protector, the Black Panther.

Led by Kevin Stephens (ex-Monolith Productions), Cliffhanger has already brought together accomplished talent with leaders from the critically acclaimed and innovative action-adventure game, Middle-earth: Shadow of Mordor, along with veterans of top franchises including Halo Infinite, God of War, Call of Duty and others. "We're dedicated to delivering fans a definitive and authentic Black Panther experience, giving them more agency and control over their narrative than they have ever experienced in a story-driven video game. Wakanda is a rich Super Hero sandbox, and our mission is to develop an epic world for players who love Black Panther and want to explore the world of Wakanda as much as we do," said Kevin.

This coming week's game releases start off slow, but then ramps up with multiple AA and AAA titles. This week's AAA title is from Capcom and involves Sci-Fi dinosaurs of all things. The rest of this week's new releases involve supernatural adventures, turn-based tactics, a Japanese RPG game remake, bicycles and more.

Exoprimal / This week's AAA title / Friday 14 July
Exoprimal is an online, team-based action game that pits humanity's cutting-edge exosuit technology against history's most ferocious beasts—dinosaurs. Exosuits are grouped into different roles, and players will pilot these exosuits to hold firm against overwhelming dinosaur swarms in online-only, team-based action game modes.

As we are about to enter the second to last week of June, we got another packed week of new releases, with this week's AAA title being an action RTS game that may involve things exploding out of your chest. The rest of next week's release contains a mix of mostly several new FPS games, but also some Mayan action and a different take on the racing game genre.

Aliens: Dark Descent / This week's AAA title / Tuesday 20 June
Drop into the gripping journey of Aliens: Dark Descent, a squad-based, single-player action game in the iconic Alien franchise. Lead your soldiers in real-time to stop a new and terrifying kind of Xenomorph outbreak on Planet Lethe.

Today we announced Clockwork Revolution at the Xbox Games Showcase, a fantastical, first-person action RPG, with dynamic time-bending combat, deep interconnected roleplaying systems, and the ability to create your own unique character from the ground up. The project is led by Game Director Chad Moore and Principal Designer Jason Anderson, who just happen to have created one of the greatest steampunk RPGs of all time—Arcanum.

Settings and Story
Clockwork Revolution takes place in the vibrant Victorian-era metropolis of Avalon, where steam trains fly overhead, wealthy industrialists replace their limbs with ornate clockwork prosthetics, and mechanical servants fulfill their masters' every whim. But this new age of wonders holds a dark secret—it's been carefully constructed by the ruthless Lady Ironwood. Through use of a time travel device, she's changed key moments in Avalon's history, keeping the working class struggling in the slums and factories, while bringing herself immense wealth and power. That's where you come in…