War Games mode fuses Homeworld's RTS gameplay with roguelike inspiration, charging commanders to take on a randomized series of fleet combat challenges. Claim powerful Artifacts that augment your ships with more power, speed, and, of course, weapons. Based on your results, you'll unlock new fleets to shake up your strategy. This demo, available to all Steam players starting February 5 at 10am PT until February 12 at 10am PT, supports up to three players as they engage waves of hostiles in a series of increasingly challenging encounters. Players can find teammates through Quick Match or create a lobby to team up with friends online.

It's important to note that any Fleets or Artifacts you unlock in the War Games demo will carry over when Homeworld 3 launches. For players not using Steam Cloud Saves, make sure you don't delete your demo files as we'll be sharing info on the exact transfer process later. Each level presents a greater challenge and new modifiers to your next War Games run. This demo will feature four different maps and a slew of things to unlock as you continue to play, including different starting fleets (maybe even an extra special one!) plus new Artifacts and more.

Paradox Interactive, a publisher and developer of deep and strategic games for cerebral players, has announced their collaboration with SquareNite to publish Darfall, a roleplaying strategy game with settlement-building mechanics that will be released in Early Access in 2024 under the Paradox Arc publishing initiative. Darfall is a strategy game where you take control of a hero who must explore and adventure through the land to gain power while simultaneously managing a nascent village in its efforts to expand and grow into a larger town. However, as the sun sets, the dark forces plaguing the land unleash their minions against your base and it is your job as a hero to take a stand in defense of its home. Each night that the forces of evil are thwarted, the more dangerous and numerous the nighttime raids become.

Big Announcement
Hello, Darfall community! It's me Lukas and we have some thrilling news to share that marks a new era in the journey of Darfall. We are incredibly proud and excited to announce our partnership with the renowned game publisher, Paradox! More specifically, their Arc initiative. This collaboration is not just a milestone for us at SquareNite, but also a testament to the potential of Darfall. For us, collaborating with Paradox is a dream realized. Their commitment to crafting quality, strategic games that captivate players for countless hours aligns perfectly with our vision for Darfall.

As fearsome invaders from another world threaten the peace, Azeroth calls for a hero to lead its human defenders in battle…or conquer this realm in the name of the orcish Horde! The very first game in the Warcraft franchise, 1994's Warcraft: Orcs and Humans is now available in the Battle.net Shop. If you've ever wondered what it was like to fight the real-time strategy battles at the dawn of the Warcraft saga, this is your chance to see for yourself how it all began.

This release includes:

• Two dozen missions across two separate campaigns: Help the humans defend their home world against the orcish invaders, or lead the Horde in their relentless conquest.
• Custom games to hone your skills: Select from 21 bonus maps and play against a computer-controlled opponent to learn how to lead your forces more effectively.
• Two-player versus mode: Go head-to-head with another human and prove who is the master strategist in highly customizable multiplayer matches.

Command the battlefield, outflank your enemies, and gain victory, or suffer crushing defeat and be forgotten forever.

The Verge has obtained an internal Microsoft memo that outlines a comprehensive reduction of headcounts across a number of Xbox Game Studios departments. Microsoft's gaming division has fought tooth and nail to complete their takeover of the highly prized (~$69 billion) Activision Blizzard + King group, yet this freshly acquired operation is set suffer the most. Microsoft Gaming CEO—Phil Spencer—was tasked with delivering some unfortunate news to an unlucky 8% of the current workforce: "It's been a little over three months since the Activision, Blizzard, and King teams joined Microsoft. As we move forward in 2024, the leadership of Microsoft Gaming and Activision Blizzard is committed to aligning on a strategy and an execution plan with a sustainable cost structure that will support the whole of our growing business. Together, we've set priorities, identified areas of overlap, and ensured that we're all aligned on the best opportunities for growth."

He continued: "As part of this process, we have made the painful decision to reduce the size of our gaming workforce by approximately 1900 roles out of the 22,000 people on our team. The Gaming Leadership Team and I are committed to navigating this process as thoughtfully as possible. The people who are directly impacted by these reductions have all played an important part in the success of Activision Blizzard, ZeniMax and the Xbox teams, and they should be proud of everything they've accomplished here. We are grateful for all of the creativity, passion and dedication they have brought to our games, our players and our colleagues. We will provide our full support to those who are impacted during the transition, including severance benefits informed by local employment laws. Those whose roles will be impacted will be notified, and we ask that you please treat your departing colleagues with the respect and compassion that is consistent with our values."

Greetings, Viceroys! We're excited to be back with a new Against the Storm update! With the dust settling from the 1.0 release, we have been able to spend some more time working on new features and improvements. Let's start with a huge thank you to you, our community! Whether you just started playing with the 1.0 release or have been with us throughout Early Access, we are grateful for putting your trust in us and investing your time in Against the Storm. We appreciate all your suggestions, reports, and reviews. They help us a lot! It's been a great launch, and we're excited about what the future holds.

DEVELOPER NOTES
The latest update isn't as spectacular as we hoped it to be, as we spent most of our time after launch helping community members who were experiencing issues with the PC Game Pass save system (plus we had a short holiday break where we ate tons of pierogies!). But now that things have settled down a bit, it's time to bring you some new features and improvements! We're talking new custom trader portraits, new event icons, new orders, new decorations, and a whole bunch of UX changes!

Paradox Interactive and Double Eleven have announced Prison Architect 2, the 3D successor to their prison management simulator. The game offers deeper simulation, greater player control, an inhabitant behavior system and creative options to define the next generation of management gameplay. Prison Architect 2 launches on March 26 on Steam, Xbox Series X|S, and PlayStation 5 for a suggested retail price of $39.99 / £34.99 / €39.99. Enterprising Architects can pre-order Prison Architect 2 on PC today.

Prison Architect 2 offers advanced simulation systems, enabling players to construct intricate compounds with a high degree of creative freedom in a 3D environment. From building elaborate structures to managing inmates' needs while maintaining the facility's financial stability, Prison Architect 2 expands gameplay and creative tools across the board, for an engaging sandbox experience. The game also introduces a connection system between the prisoners, who will make friends or enemies with each other, impacting who they will hang out, partner or fight with. Prison Architect 2 brings prison construction and management gameplay to a new level by entering the third dimension and bringing deeper simulation than ever before.

According to the latest round of reports, AMD has decided not to include China in the initial global launch of its upcoming Radeon RX 7600 XT graphics card. The RX 7600 XT, featuring 16 GB of memory and based on AMD's next-generation RDNA 3 architecture, was expected to launch soon at a price of around $300. However, the company is currently re-evaluating its Chinese GPU launch strategy due to the runaway success of its existing Radeon RX 6750 Golden Rabbit Edition (GRE) series in the region. The RX 6750 GRE cards with 10 GB and 12 GB configurations retail between $269-$289 in China, offering exceptional value compared to rival NVIDIA RTX models. AMD seems hesitant to risk undercutting sales of its popular RX 6750 GPUs by launching the newer 7600 XT.

While the RX 7600 XT promises more raw performance thanks to advanced RDNA 3 architecture, 6750 GRE, with its RDNA 2 design, seemingly remains efficient enough for most Chinese mainstream gamers. With the RX 6750 GRE still selling strongly in China, AMD has postponed the RX 7600 XT introduction for this key market. Final launch timelines for the 7600 XT in China and globally remain unconfirmed by AMD at time of writing. The company appears to be treading cautiously amidst the shifting competitive landscape.

Gearbox Publishing and Blackbird Interactive have officially unveiled the system requirements for Homeworld 3, the highly anticipated next installment in the GOTY-winning sci-fi RTS series, launching in 2024. Blackbird Interactive continues its work to optimize the game to ensure the fidelity, scale and immersiveness of Homeworld 3's gameplay can be experienced across a wide array of PCs.

Players with the latest graphics cards and processors can enjoy the game in 4K with all of the settings turned up while players with older components can still experience Homeworld 3's hallmark 3D strategy experience with dynamic space battles and incredible visuals.

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.

Paradox Interactive (Paradox) and Harebrained Schemes (HBS)—developers of the Shadowrun trilogy, BATTLETECH and The Lamplighters League—have decided to part ways on 1 January 2024. The separation is the result of a mutual agreement, stemming from each party's strategic and creative priorities. Paradox will retain ownership of The Lamplighters League and other games developed by the studio. HBS will seek new publishing, partnership, and investment opportunities.

"Paradox has refocused its strategy towards its core niches within strategy and management games with endless qualities," said Charlotta Nilsson, COO of Paradox. "We and HBS' leadership have been discussing what would happen after the release of The Lamplighters League, but a new project or sequel in the same genre was not in line with our portfolio plans. Hence, we believe that a separation would be the best way forward. We're very happy that this talented, gifted studio has the chance to continue and can't wait to see what they will make next."

October appears to be yet a busy month with many new game releases and this coming week is jam packed with new releases, even though none of them can exactly be called a AAA release. That said, we do have a couple of big releases nonetheless, the major one being a new take on a classic console game. The rest of this week's releases range from strategy puzzles to action-adventures and a touch of hell, to dungeons and hot wheels, to finally finishing the week with some horror.

Sonic Superstars / This week's major release / Tuesday 17 October
Adventure through the mystical Northstar Islands in this all-new take on classic 2D Sonic high-speed action platforming. Play as Sonic, Tails, Knuckles, and Amy and harness all-new Emerald powers to move and attack in dynamic new ways. Navigate gorgeous, never-before-seen environments solo or with up to 3 other players and stop Dr. Eggman, Fang, and a mysterious new adversary from converting the islands' giant animals into Badniks before it's too late!

Welcome to the launch of The Lamplighters League! It goes without saying, maybe, but this is a special day for us, and we are so excited to be sharing this game with you. Games like this take a long time to bring to life from the first pitches to the final product you can finally play today. At each stage there are unique challenges—especially when bringing to life a brand new game world and working out new twists for an established and complex genre like turn-based tactics. It can be grueling, especially when the build isn't feeling fun, or a production deadline is looming. Or, worse, when those two things are happening at once.

It can also be incredibly rewarding. There was a moment during development where we were, in fact, facing down the fact that infiltration just wasn't fun and there was a big deadline coming up fast. We needed to rethink things, and we needed to do it quickly. Under that pressure the team prototyped and implemented the real time takedowns in just a few weeks. I jumped up in the air the first time I saw the shock from a mine travel through the water on the ground to take out an unaware enemy. It was a big victory right when we needed it as a team.

Dear Citizens, see the screenshots below and have a first look at the city in Frostpunk 2! It is the sequel to the highly acclaimed, BAFTA-nominated society survival game. The age of steam has passed and now, oil leads the way as humanity's newest salvation. However, with new threats on the horizon, the future of the city looks even grimmer than before.

THE FROST NEVER ENDS
The game takes place 30 years after the apocalyptic blizzard that has taken place in Frostpunk. Earth is still overwhelmed by the never-ending frost and harsh, icy climate. You play as the leader of a resource-hungry metropolis where expansion and internal conflicts are an unavoidable reality. It's up to you to make decisions about your City's future and face their consequences.

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.

Data center infrastructure is a complex matter. It requires shelter, cooling, and dedicated power generators that keep the servers running at full capacity and uptime. However, as these data centers can consume MegaWatts of power, it is becoming increasingly more work for hyperscalers like Meta, Google, Amazon, Microsoft, and others to ensure proper power supply to their data centers. Today, according to the job listing by Microsoft, we learn that the Redmond giant is preparing its infrastructure for nuclear power to reduce data centers' dependency on the outside grid. According to the job listing, Microsoft is seeking a "Principal Program Manager, Nuclear Technology, who will be responsible for maturing and implementing a global Small Modular Reactor (SMR) and microreactor energy strategy."

The SMR and microreactor systems are smaller-scale than traditional nuclear reactors that many power plants are using today and are more manageable due to their sheer size. The power plants based on the aforementioned technology can reside right next to the data center. We are sure that Microsoft had calculated the return on investment (ROI) of creating its power grid, as its electricity consumption will only increase in the coming years as the infrastructure expands. P. Todd Noe, director of nuclear technologies engineering at Microsoft, shared a note regarding the listing, stating: "This is not just a job, it is a challenge. By joining us, you will be part of a global movement that is transforming the way we produce and consume energy. You will also have the chance to grow your skills, advance your career, and make an impact on millions of lives." Below, you can see an example SMR from NuScale.

Greetings my future pharaohs! We asked some of your favorite content creators: "If you could customize your Total War: PHARAOH campaign, what would you do with it?" Find out what they said in our Campaign Customization explanation, or watch the video below! Spoiler alert - some of these guys are insane. Keep an eye on our channels over the next couple of weeks as we reveal more about our Hittite faction leaders Suppiluliuma and Kurunta! In the meantime, head over to the Total War Discord server to join the discussion with other Total War fans.

DEFINE YOUR DESTINY WITH CAMPAIGN CUSTOMIZATION
Looking for a helping hand? Or the ultimate challenge? Campaign Customization gives you the freedom to play however you like. It was the 18th US President Ulysses S. Grant who famously said that "War never changes". But that's not quite the case in Total War: Pharaoh. That's because when fighting for the mantle of Pharaoh, no two battles need ever be the same. Do you think you'd be getting a fairer crack of the whip if you had more resources? Or if the AI had different personalities? Or if your starting positions had been different? With Total War: Pharaoh's Campaign Customization features, all of these elements and more are yours to dictate.

Greetings all! We're super excited to announce that Total War: Pharaoh releases digitally on 11th October 2023 at 3PM BST / 10AM EDT / 10PM CST! If you pre-order Total War: Pharoah now, you will be able to take part in an exclusive Early Access Weekend before the game is released, as well as getting your hands on two awesome cosmetic packs for the full game.

WHAT IS TOTAL WAR: PHARAOH?
Total War: Pharaoh is the newest entry in the award-winning grand strategy series from the developers at Creative Assembly. Experience Ancient Egypt during the vibrant and tumultuous era of the Bronze Age Collapse and master dynamic real-time battles and turn-based empire management to rise above your adversaries and become Egypt's last great Pharaoh.

Paradox Interactive and Nimble Giant Entertainment have announced that their upcoming grand strategy game Star Trek: Infinite, under license from Paramount Consumer Products, will launch on Mac and PC on October 12, 2023. Players can now pre-order either the base game or Digital Deluxe Edition, granting them access to bonuses like skins, ships, and special voiceover. Star Trek: Infinite takes players on an interstellar saga with its emergent gameplay and complex choices, as they face the powers of the Alpha and Beta Quadrants.

More News on the Horizon!
Starting next week, we—Nimble Giant Entertainment—will be publishing the first in a series of Developer Diaries that will dig deeper into the game and its development journey, so be sure to come back for those. With this week's news, we will also be opening up our Discord server, which you can join through the URL below. Our announcements are great for anyone who has been hungry for news about Star Trek: Infinite, because we bring you our gameplay features trailer, a load of new screenshots that are live on the store page, and have now opened up pre-purchasing, allowing you to unlock bonus content on release.

In a major step to support India's industrial sector, NVIDIA and Reliance Industries today announced a collaboration to develop India's own foundation large language model trained on the nation's diverse languages and tailored for generative AI applications to serve the world's most populous nation. The companies will work together to build AI infrastructure that is over an order of magnitude more powerful than the fastest supercomputer in India today. NVIDIA will provide access to the most advanced NVIDIA GH200 Grace Hopper Superchip and NVIDIA DGX Cloud, an AI supercomputing service in the cloud. GH200 marks a fundamental shift in computing architecture that provides exceptional performance and massive memory bandwidth.

The NVIDIA-powered AI infrastructure is the foundation of the new frontier into AI for Reliance Jio Infocomm, Reliance Industries' telecom arm. The global AI revolution is transforming industries and daily life. To serve India's vast potential in AI, Reliance will create AI applications and services for their 450 million Jio customers and provide energy-efficient AI infrastructure to scientists, developers and startups across India.

Hello Everyone! First up, thank you all for all the feedback following the announcement of House Ecaz. We're very happy with how the faction is coming together and we can't wait to hear your thoughts on Arrakis' newest arrival when the game launches out of Early Access later this month, which conveniently leads us to our next announcement...

We are very proud to share that Dune: Spice Wars launches out of Early Access and into 1.0 on the 14th of September! With release now within spitting distance, we thought it would be a good time to address some of the burning questions we've been getting of late and give some details on what to expect from this major milestone in D:SW's development! So read on for the official Dune: Spice Wars 1.0 F.A.Q...

We, Envision Entertainment, are thrilled to announce that Pioneers of Pagonia will launch into Steam Early Access for PC December 13, 2023 and our first Closed Alpha will take place in September! You can soon get your hands on the game by signing up for the newsletter for a chance to participate in the first closed alpha test due next month. The first public demo will release in early October shortly before Steam Next Fest. Wishlist the game on Steam to get notified! We are super excited to hear what you think and hope you will love Pagonia as much as we do!

About Pioneers of Pagonia
In a world of countless islands populated with scattered villages, you travel and lead your people as a visionary to forge alliances with the inhabitants, after helping each other and gaining their trust. Send out your pioneers to discover untouched soil, find hidden resources and explore secret places. Enjoy the fantastical and inviting world of Pagonia, where your carefully considered decisions cause thousands of bustling inhabitants to satisfy your orders. Every transport of goods, manufacturing process and discovery your people make is comprehensible and presented with lovely animations in this ultimate game world simulation.

Roguelike inspiration meets Real-Time Strategy in Homeworld 3's new co-op mode, War Games. Commanders will need to manage fleet strength across waves of enemies and claim powerful artifacts that augment ships with each completed objective. Based on the results, players will unlock additional artifacts and starting fleets that keep the challenge fresh. Launching February 2024.

War Games, the all-new three player co-op mode extends your game beyond the campaign. Fusing Homeworld's RTS gameplay with roguelike inspiration, commanders take on a randomized series of fleet combat challenges. Claim powerful Artifacts that augment your ships with more power, speed, and, of course, weapons. Based on your results, you'll unlock new fleets to shake up your strategy.

Modern Wolf and Afterschool Studio are today proud to announce the official launch of sci-fi strategy game, Cantata, for PC.
After an action-packed year in Early Access that allowed the community to help shape the game's direction, this tactically rich turn-based epic has finally launched on Steam, immersing players in the unique stories, evocative visuals, and vibrant musical soundscape of a war-torn alien planet.

Fight to expand your hold on the mysterious world of Shoal in the first ever "Grand Tactics" game - combining the large-scale strategic planning of Grand Strategy titles with the turn-based skirmishes of the Tactics genre. Grow your empire with deep strategic gameplay that's easy to learn but takes time to master, capturing regions, building structures, expanding your army, and more. Play as one of three unique factions - the Machines, Aliens, or Humans - and carve out your legacy across nine single player campaigns featuring more than 27 hours of story content; each unfolds as a self-contained sci-fi narrative with its own characters, dialogue, and original artwork.

INTRODUCING THE CANAANITE FACTIONS—Canaan is a region ravaged by wars waged by the larger empires bordering its north and south. However, while often disregarded by Hatti and Egypt, it's best not to underestimate the peoples of Canaan. Be it the humble diplomat or the great raider, a Canaan leader will rise from the embers of both Hatti and Egypt - be it through subterfuge or by further fanning the flames of war. Today, we're taking a look at the two playable Canaanite factions in Total War: PHARAOH. Please note that the game is still in development, and certain things may yet change between now and release.

THE CONTRASTING FIGURES OF IRSU AND BAY PROVIDE VERY DIFFERENT VISIONS FOR THE FUTURE OF EGYPT
Canaan's two leaders could hardly be more different from one another. Starting out in Retjenu, Irsu has no interest in ruling. Instead he yearns only to acquire. Be it resources, money or conflict - if you have something he wants, he will take it. Society's downfall is of no concern to him - he will continue to raze and loot regardless. A prize fighter who brings heavyweight champions to their knees, to most his arrival heralds an oncoming apocalypse.

July 27th, 2023: Two weeks ago, Jagged Alliance 3 burst onto the gaming scene, captivating the hearts of thousands of players eager to embark on the mission to free Grand Chien. Haemimont Games and THQ Nordic are beaming with pride and relief as it seems we have struck the perfect chord. An impressive 86% of Steam-Reviews as of July 27th reflect the positive reception, and the game has garnered critical acclaim with an outstanding 81 on Metacritic.

We've been absolutely delighted to witness hundreds of content creators taking on the challenge of mastering the game and are overwhelmed by the positive feedback pouring in from players across various channels. We want to take a moment to express our sincere gratitude: Thank you to everyone who has already delved into the world of Jagged Alliance 3! For those who haven't yet, we're excited to announce the availability of a free playable demo. This demo will allow players to explore Ernie Island, the starting region of the game.