Everyone's favorite charity game bundle store, the Humble Bundle, is back with another good game bundle option. This time it is the WB Games Classic bundle featuring games from Warner Bros. Interactive Entertainment. The games on offer are not necessarily new, but at the asking prices as of the time of this post they more than merit a strong recommendation if you have not played them before or are looking to gift them to friends and family.

For all of $1 USD, you can get Scribblenauts Unlimited, Batman: Arkham Origins, and Middle Earth: Shadow of Mordor GOTY edition. This is a no-brainer by itself, but matching the current average of $4.21 also gets you the excellent Bastion, along with Mad Max, Injustice: Gods Among Us Ultimate Edition, and a 10% discount off the recently released Lego The Incredibles. A tougher sale given memories of the game is at the $12 tier which adds Batman: Arkham Knight and the entire season pass for the game, coupled with a $2 Humble Wallet credit for their monthly subscription plan. Check out the link in the source on the post, and let us know if any of these games garner your recommendation as well.

Alienware has long been synonymous with custom-built gaming PCs and laptops, with appealing, exclusive designs that you can't find anywhere else and that boutique experience in tailoring your own machines. The company, however, seems to have plans to increase its hold in the PC gaming ecosystem by entering the PC components market, where gaming branding opportunities abound. Alienware already has an established foothold in the pre-built PC space, and it could always increase brand awareness even more not only by including Alienware-branded components on their machines, but by extending its presence onto other manufacturers' gaming PCs and components (read RAM, motherboards, graphics cards, standalone cases...).

Of course, Alienware will have to thread carefully, as already-entrenched manufacturers and suppliers have their heels well dug in the market - their brands already have strong market recognition and there are years and years of R&D poured into their solutions already. Frank Azor, Dell XPS General Manager, todl PC Games N that any foray into unknown markets has to be very well weighed in terms of investment and risk/benefit scenarios, while also adding that Alienware's brand identity wouldn't work with a simple rebrand of other company's solutions.

The RTS genre on PC has been left a little out in the cold in recent years; there are still some releases here and there, but the genre that was once the king of PC gaming has taken a dive in popularity. One series that was held in great regard by fans was Command & Conquer, which spanned a multitude of games (including a one-off FPS game in the form of Command & Conquer: Renegade) in both the Red Alert, Generals, and Tiberium universes.

No further work on the series occurred after the release of Command & Conquer 4: Tiberian Twilight, designed to be the finale for that particular universe. The much-changed gameplay, which incorporated MOBA-style elements and more mobile armies instead of the usual static base-building, threw fans of the series off (not to mention the story). The series has since been relegated to mobile or browser gaming, but the pressure on EA to deliver another RTS game on the C&C universe has been mounting. The first step, according to EA Games' Jim Vessella, is celebrating the series' 25-year Anniversary, on which work is already going - apparently through remasters, since Vessella himself says that "we [EA] have been exploring some exciting ideas regarding remastering the classic PC games." That's not a bad idea, granted, and makes business sense - but we're still expecting a new installment, EA.

It was less than a month ago that we reported on GOG.com's Back to School game sale event, and today we got wind of an even larger one. Indeed, GOG.com (previously Good Old Games) is 10 today, and decided it was as good a time as any to celebrate the anniversary with us. First up, the entire website has received a visual makeover which offers a new color palette and also some user experience improvements as it pertains to the game collections and menus.

More important to you, I presume, is the free game(s) available via a vote. As of now, visitors can vote between Shadow Warrior 2, Superhot, and Firewatch for another ~36 hours as of this posting following which the winning game will be available for free for the next 48 hours after voting ends. There are also many, many other games on sale on the website now, and GOG.com has also added in support for their media partners to curate a list of recommended games including Eurogamer, PC Gamer, and GameSpot- a move that reminds us of Steam's own Curator system for game recommendations. The page also now includes a history section showing the website's humble beginnings to what is today the leading store front for DRM-free games. Go ahead and see if you find something you like today!

The whole concept of a Back to School game sale is confusing to many, given kids have less free time with school coursework to handle. Perhaps it is targeted more to parents, who have some time to spare now and also appreciate a good sale that brings monetary savings for games in general. GOG.com (formerly Good Old Games) is a wholly-owned subsidiary of CD Projekt and aims to offer a DRM-free platform for PC gaming. The week-long sale ends 10 pm UTC on September 10 and lists over 500 games discounted by up to 90% on some titles. These also include flash deals (remember those, Steam?) as well as new additions to GOG Connect that offers DRM-free versions of games one may have purchased on Steam before.

Current flash deals as of the time of writing include Star Trek Starfleet Academy for $4.99, The Dwarves for $9.99, This Is The Police for $3.79, Prince of Persian: The Sands of Time for $2.49, Tom Clancy's Ghost Recon for $2.49, and Shadowrun Dragonfall Director's Cut for $2.29. Head over to their website for more flash deals, and also deals that last the entire week featuring games both old and new alike.

Straight off the heels of Gamescom 2018, where Dell announced their new gaming monitors and the refresh of their Alienware desktops, the excitement continues at IFA 2018. Dell is unveiling a new suite of innovative devices that elevate the computing experience for the everyday consumer, mobile professional and fast-paced small business owner. The enhanced Inspiron, XPS and Vostro portfolio is built with a combination of beautiful design, superior materials and top performance dedicated to deliver a device for every function and user. In addition, Dell is expanding its monitor leadership with a stunning new Dell 27 USB-C Ultrathin Monitor built with beauty and function.

Dell's commitment to thoughtful design and truly immersive cinematic experiences on the PC continues with this generation of new products. Launched at CES 2018, Dell Cinema is the combination of several cutting-edge technologies all working in concert to give the viewer an immersive, captivating experience on their PCs. Dell Cinema is available across the XPS portfolio and new Inspiron products starting this autumn.

GOG as a platform has been the pioneer in delivering DRM-free games to people all around the world. The basic idea is that ownership in DRM-infused games really isn't; it's more of a time bomb contract that gamers make with a third party that may or may not fulfill their end of the bargain (or may very well end support for a game, disable DRM verification servers in for single player games, and all of that).

As part of its effort to fight against DRM's entrenchment in the industry, and part of GOG's reasoning that the way to garner loyalty is not achieved by not trusting consumers from the get go, GOG launched their FCK DRM initiative, via a blog post on their news section, pointing to their new, information laden website. GOG says that "We strongly believe that if you buy a game, it should be yours, and you can play it the way it's convenient for you, and not how others want you to use it", and that the goal of this initiative is to "educate people and ignite a discussion about DRM".

EA announced last week its new Origin Access Premier program, which launches today and introduces a new access tier which provides unlimited access to imminent-launch games five days before the official release. This program will cost £14.99/$14.99 a month or £89.99/$99.99 a year. Alongside this launch, EA has decided to axe the freebie On the House initiative - a strange correlation, because these programs hardly interfere with one another.

Users who have already gained access to these freebies will keep them, of course, but attempts to enter the "On the House" page are met with a redirect to the Origin Access webpage. However, users who hadn't grabbed the games will be left in the dust (even if just some metaphorical specks of it, since the games can be easily and quite cheaply had), such as Theme Hospital, Medal of Honor: Allied Assault, Dragon Age, Mass Effect or Battlefield series. Read on for EA's remarks on this decision.

CCP games, the company behind the deep and uniquely player-driven spaceship MMO game EVE Online, has confirmed that Unreal Engine 4 is the exclusive development tool for all of CCP Games' currently unannounced projects. CCP's commitment to Unreal stems from the engine's stability, quick prototyping and the solid cross-platform support for both established and new hardware.

CCP's development teams globally are taking advantage of the powerful and easy-to-use functionality of UE4, from fluid integration of third-party systems with plug-ins and modules to improved networking and cross-platform support. CCP's game developers have jumped on board the exclusive use of UE4, specifically its Unreal Editor that leads the way in terms of lighting and rendering solutions, world composition, landscape sculpting and Blueprint prototyping.

It has been a long five years since Aliens: Colonial Marines launched as a hot mess. Being critically panned by gamers and critics alike. One of the reasons behind the negative reception was the game's poor AI. The Xenomorphs had a tendency to run straight into gunfire. Or worse yet, would stand around or group up making them easy targets. Suffice to say the Xenomorphs were far from scary. A typographical error has been discovered as the reason behind some of those issues.

As noted on the ResetERA forums, a post by jamesdickinson963 on the ACM Overhaul ModDB page traced the problem to a spelling error in a single line of code within the game's ini file. The code shown below has "teather" instead of the proper "tether". This simple mistake in theory, results in the "zone tether" failing to load the AI parameters attached to the broken bit of code.

The highly anticipated horror-survival game Agony will launch on May 29th as developer Madmind Studios and publisher Maximum Games announced the release date for PlayStation 4, Xbox One the all in one entertainment system from Microsoft and PC today. A new teaser trailer revealed with today's launch date showcases the terrifying scenery and cursed creatures awaiting players brave enough to explore Agony's twisted realms.

Agony throws players in the midst of hell where they strive to stay alive and solve the riddle behind the mysterious Red Goddess; architect of this place of sorrow and pain, and the sole entity with knowledge of how escape… but there is more to the story than it seems. Haunted by nightmare creatures, players gain the ability to possess demons and other souls to find their way out of hell.

Telltale Games has hit on hard times lately, following on the restructuring of its staff, which saw some 90 staff members (25% of the studios' workforce) being cut. It may be a case of too fast a growth, with the company branching out in numerous ways, with numerous franchises - with quality arguably having suffered in the process. But the studio is able to deliver memorable, fantastic single-player, narrative-driven experiences, even if they've sometimes stretched a little far off the perfect mark. The first and second season of the studios' take on The Walking Dead series, however, was dead-on.

Telltale has now announced that they'll be giving gamers the chance to "finish Clementine's story". I don't know if I want to know how literal that sentence may be, however; I still remember all the feels from Lee Everett. The company seems to have its thematic circles well though-off, though, and the teaser image is enough to give e some semblance of confidence in their delivery of the game. The axe, the lighting, the thematic resonance in these two teasers is a beautiful thing. here's hoping they hide similarly well-crafted stories. The Walking Dead - The Final Season will be available later this year for gamers in the usual platforms.

As lootboxes have increasingly fallen on the radar of gamers looking for complete experiences that they don't need to invest a kidney to unlock the full content that's being "offered", the ESRB has moved to include a label on all future game releases that features in-game purchases of any kind. The new label will sit next to the age rating, but separate from the other content warning labels - such as graphical violence, nudity, and others. Its aim? To keep users "well-informed" on the content purchases that are included with the full game. Strangely, the label will not discriminate different types of content - so a game that has a dreaded lootbox system such as Star Wars: Battlefront II, or a well-implemented, non-obtrusive one such as Gwent, will see exactly the same label. As the ESRB puts it, any in-game transaction may live inside this label, such as "bonus levels, skins, surprise items (such as item packs, loot boxes, mystery awards), music, virtual coins and other forms of in-game currency, subscriptions, season passes and upgrades (e.g., to disable ads)". Talk about an informed customer decision.

Rockstar Games' Red Dead Redemption 2 has just seen an announced delay on its launch window. Previously slated for a Spring 2018 release, the sequel to Rockstar's famed, highly successful western Red Dead Redemption thus sees a push back from its previously planned calendar release. Gamers who expected to pick up a game that might tide them over through the summer now see their options reduced - tangibly so.

In a blog post this morning, Rockstar attributed the decision towards a "more polish is needed" scenario, which really isn't all that unexpected, considering the scale the game is expected to have. Release dates were something sacred, back in the days; not so much nowadays, as the general consensus seems to be that it's better late and working, than now and broken. To somewhat mend users' broken hearts, Rockstar also released some screenshots alongside the announcement, as if taunting players with that which they now know will take them longer to experience.

CI Games finally released the long-awaited multiplayer update for Sniper: Ghost Warrior 3 last week. Although not mentioned publicly in the patch notes, the Polish publisher also eliminated the Denuvo protection from the game. For those readers who don't keep up with the Warez scene, Russian cracker BALDMAN cracked Sniper: Ghost Warrior 3 one month after its release. Many would agree that there wasn't any point in keeping the anti-tamper tech in the game. But now, with it gone completely, DSOGaming re-tested the game to see whether there were any performance gains without Denuvo.

To make a long story short, the DSOGaming team noticed a significant reduction in the game's loading time. However, they weren't completely certain if the reduction was a product of the removal of Denuvo or game optimizations done by the developer. The previous performance issues still haunted the game, and there were zero improvement in graphics performance. This was expected to a certain degree taking into account that Sniper: Ghost Warrior 3 is a GPU intensive title after all. It might be a different story with games like Watch_Dogs 2 or Assassin's Creed Origins, since they are more demanding on the processor. Now, we just have to wait until Ubisoft removes Denuvo from them.

The Humble Store has always been the go-to place to get great games at excellent prices. Not to mention the fact that a portion of the proceeds goes towards charity. It's basically a win-win situation for all the parties involved. In this occasion, Rockstar Games have answered the call and put some of their most iconic games up for grabs at the Humble Store. A percentage of the sales will be donated to The Rainforest Alliance.

Donating $1 or more will net you the entry bundle which includes Manhunt, Grand Theft Auto: Vice City, Grand Theft Auto III, and Max Payne. Paying more than the average price of $9.61, at the time of this article, adds titles like Bully: Scholarship Edition, Grand Theft Auto: San Andreas, L.A. Noire, and Max Payne 2: The Fall of Max Payne to your haul as well. And lastly, for $15 or more, you can take home all of the aforementioned games plus L.A. Noire: DLC Bundle, Grand Theft Auto IV, Grand Theft Auto: Episodes from Liberty City, and Max Payne 3 with the Rockstar Pass. As per tradition, the promotion will run for 14 days. So, what are you waiting for?

The fully licensed re-imagining of the 80's bestselling home computer - THEC64 Mini - will be released on the 29 March 2018. Developed by Retro Games Ltd - and distributed by Koch Media - THEC64 Mini is half the size of the original C64 and is a fully functioning home computer that connects directly to your television and comes with two USB ports for the joystick and a keyboard.

Launched in 1982, the C64 home computer went on to dominate the home computer scene throughout the 1980s. Millions of units were sold across the world and have a special place in the hearts of its former owners. 35 years later and it's back as the reimagined THEC64 Mini. Plugging into any modern TV via its HDMI port, users can play any one of the 64 licensed classic pre-installed games. This includes games from developers like Epyx, Gremlin Graphics, Hewson and The Bitmap Brothers boasting titles such as California Games, Speedball 2: Brutal Deluxe, Paradroid and Impossible Mission.

Denuvo 4.8 originally debuted last year in Ubisoft's Assassin's Creed: Origins. The French video game publisher even went as far as implementing VMProtect to add an extra layer of protection to the game. Many speculated that Ubisoft's poor decision made the final product so overdemanding on the processor. However, that's a discussion for another day. At the time of its release, Denuvo 4.8 was deemed impossible to break, but let's be realistic here. The impossible just costs a little more. It only took three months for the impossible to happen. Italian warez group CONSPIR4CY (a.k.a CPY) announced in recent days that they've successfully bypassed Denuvo 4.8 used in Sonic Forces.

Besides Ubisoft and Sega, Denuvo has other high-profile customers in the likes of Electronic Arts, Warner Bros, and Lionsgate Entertainment. So, it's only a matter of time before AAA titles like Football Manager 2018, Injustice 2, Need for Speed Payback, Star Wars Battlefront 2, and Star Ocean: The Last Hope HD Remaster suffer the same fate as Sonic Forces. Upcoming Dragon Ball FighterZ and Final Fantasy XII: The Zodiac Age are probably in line as well. Although, it will be interesting to see how long can Assassin's Creed: Origins fare before someone breaks the game's double protection.

As a result of the increasing external pressure for reform and regulation on the games industry, a group of industry leaders and experts has agreed to come together in a more permanent way, forming the National Committee for Games Policy (NCGP). We made this decision in response to the current crisis regarding the expansion of loot crate economies and concerns about unregulated online gambling, but also as an acceptance of a long in coming decision that we knew would eventually become necessary. Games are not represented or understood in the modern political and judicial world, and that needs to change.

Unlike the IGDA, we are not an association of game developers. We are a coalition of high level industry experts and influencers. Membership in the NCGP is by invite only. We will work on the behalf of games industry professionals of all political leanings. In order to do this, the NCGP has appointed a steering committee with significant political experience on both ends of the spectrum. Where video games, politics, and law intersect, you will be sure to find the NCGP.

Ubisoft has announced on its latest Q2 financials that earnings from microtransactions have exceeded proceeds from digital game sales. Digital revenue increased by a very respectable 69%, but Ubisoft says that Player Recurring Investment (PRI), or the sale of in-game items, DLC, season passes, and subscriptions, increased by a staggering 83% year-over-year, being responsible for €175 million (~$202.6 million) earned during the first two quarters of the year. This amounts to a cool 51% of total digital income, which means that actual digital games sales earned less than DLCs and microtransactions.

Total sales across both Q1 and Q2 came in at €466.2 million (~$539.9 million), up 60% year-over-year, but that's hardly the key point to this story. The key point here is that while a company that heavily focuses on linear, story-driven, single player games has just announced a 25% reduction in its workforce, Ubisoft has just announced tremendous games seemingly on the back of microtransactions and DLC, or, as the company puts it, Player Recurring Investment. We can say what we will regarding the chronicle of an announced death for story-driven single player games, but one fact remains: players love microtransactions, even as there's a universal understanding of loathing towards them.

Telltale Games, best known for its episodic series of videogames focused on single-player experiences, has announced a restructuring within its organization. The move, which aims to "make the company more competitive as a developer and publisher of groundbreaking story-driven gaming experiences with an emphasis on high quality in the years ahead," will see the laying off of 90 staff members (around 25% of its workforce,) effective immediately. Luckily for us gamers, it appears that the restructuring won't affect any previously announced projects, which include a second season for breakout game The Wolf Among Us.

"Our industry has shifted in tremendous ways over the past few years. The realities of the environment we face moving forward demand we evolve, as well, reorienting our organization with a focus on delivering fewer, better games with a smaller team," said Telltale Games CEO Pete Hawley. "I'd like to express our respect for all the contributions that these incredibly talented artists, storytellers and more have made to this company, and that this decision is in no way a reflection on the quality or dedication of their work, " he added. "We have made available our full career assistance services to help our affected colleagues and friends - and their families - navigate this difficult transition as quickly as possible."

ROCCAT is moving deeper into the gaming sphere with its very first in-house developed title, Sick City, a Real Time Tactical Combat game which ROCCAT says "Breaks with both conventional genre and developmental norms." The newly founded "ROCCAT Games Studio" looks to not only create a unique interpretation of action-based tactical combat, but more importantly, deeply integrate player feedback into core development decisions.

ROCCAT presents this close proximity relationship between developer and community as the future of gaming, saying that "No other early access title integrates its players and prospective buyers so thoroughly in production." This means players will have the opportunity to actively participate in decisions that will shape the retail version of Sick City. Features such as new maps, factions, game types, campaigns, even the future of Sick City in eSports - these decisions will be placed in the hands of the player, in what ROCCAT envisions as a truly collaborative project.

Some outlets are reporting that Stardock's Ashes of the Singularity is about to receive the much-referred-to patch that allows for improved performance on AMD's Ryzen line of processors. If you remember, rivers of ink flowed regarding AMD's Ryzen performance in gaming, with its monstrous, high-performance 8-core, 16-threaded design sometimes delivering performance below expectations. At the time, AMD clarified how Ryzen is a distinctive CPU architecture, similar yet fundamentally different from Intel's x86 implementation, promising upcoming patches from game developers that would allow Ryzen's architecture to truly deliver.

After Creative Assembly and Oxide Games vouched to improve Ryzen support, Oxide seems to be the first developer with a patch available (from version 25624 to 26118) that improves performance by up to 30%. Reportedly, it took the developers around 400 work-hours to improve the game code in respect to its execution on AMD hardware.

The folks at PC Perspective have shared a statement from AMD in response to their question as to why AMD's Ryzen processors show lower than expected performance at 1080p resolution (despite posting good high-resolution, high-detail frame rates). Essentially, AMD is reinforcing the need for developers to optimize their games' performance to AMD's CPUs (claiming that these have only been properly tuned to Intel's architecture). AMD also puts weight behind the fact they have sent about 300 developer kits already, so that content creators can get accustomed to AMD's Ryzen, and expect this number to increase to about a thousand developers in the 2017 time-frame. AMD is expecting gaming performance to only increase from its launch-day level. Read AMD's statement after the break.

Razer, the world leader in entertainment devices and software, today announced a new platform to its suite of software products: Razer Cortex, a free software gaming application from which players can discover new game titles at the lowest prices, launch their games while boosting computer performance, back up save games and record in-game footage.

Razer Cortex features include:

• Razer Cortex: Deals - Pay less for more of your favorite games with Razer's unique downloadable game price comparison engine. Game Booster - Enhance your PC's gaming performance with the popular boosting utilities from Razer Game Booster incorporated into Razer Cortex.
• Save Game Manager - Automatically back up save games to the cloud and never lose a save game again.
• Screen Capture Gallery - Immortalize your gaming moments with the touch of a hotkey.