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Nintendo Switch Pro Will Support Nvidia's DLSS, Another New Report Claims

nintendo switch

Reports and rumours about the Nintendo Switch Pro have really started heating up these last few weeks. Production on the upgraded Switch model is said to begin this June, with the console featuring an OLED screen, 4K support, and more. Something else that multiple reports have claimed is that the system will support Nvidia's DLSS (Deep Learning Super Sampling), and a new report from Bloomberg doubles down on that.

The report states that anonymous sources with knowledge of the console's development have revealed that the Switch Pro (or whatever Nintendo ends up calling the upgrade) will feature support for Nvidia's rendering technology in the platform's bid for 4K resolution visuals. DLSS support is unlikely to be added retroactively to existing titles, and instead will be focused on upcoming games. The system will use a new Nvidia chipset, which will also bring an improved CPU and better memory.

Such an upgrade would, of course, also probably lead to a costlier console. Bloomberg Intelligence's analyst Matthew Kanterman, for instance, predicts that it will cost between $349 and $399. Nintendo have refused to provide a comment on any of these details so far.

Recent reports, meanwhile, have also suggested that the Switch Pro might also receive some exclusive games down the road. Nintendo are also reportedly expecting record hardware and software sales for the Switch this year owing to the expected launch of the upgraded Switch version.

Cyberpunk 2077 Lead Gameplay Designer Leaves After Nearly 8 Years

Cyberpunk 2077_V

In a recent tweet, Cyberpunk 2077 lead gameplay designer Andrzej Zawadzki has announced his departure from CD Projekt RED. Zawadzki said that after nearly eight years, "My time at CDPR has come to an end. It's time for the new adventure. To every person I've met on the way – thank you. It was an honor and pleasure."

Having started at the company as a QA tester, Zawadzki would eventually work on The Witcher 3: Wild Hunt and its two expansions, Hearts of Stone and Blood and Wine. In 2016, he became junior gameplay designer for Cyberpunk 2077 and took on the senior gameplay designer role in March 2020 as per his LinkedIn profile. As for what this "new adventure" could be, Zawadzki didn't provide any further details.

Cyberpunk 2077 released in December 2020 after numerous delays and despite selling over 13 million units in roughly two weeks, it faced significant backlash for console performance issues. CD Projekt RED has since been working on updates to rectify the same with update 1.2 out later this month. Head here to learn more about some of its features, like a slider for steering sensitivity and a more delayed response from Night City PD.

Risk of Rain 2 Has Sold Over 4 Million Copies on Steam

Risk of Rain 2

Hopoo Games' Risk of Rain 2 has had quite the journey since coming to Steam Early Access in March 2019. Following its launch to strong critical praise, the roguelite title has gone on to sell over four million copies on Steam alone. The developer also revealed that 88 percent of all players have played for more than an hour while 57 percent played for over 10 hours.

While the developer has confirmed the first paid expansion to be coming in late 2021, it does have some new content coming very soon. The Anniversary Update will be out on March 25th for PC, and serves to round out all of the items and content that were cut from the 1.0 launch. There are 88 lore entries to discover and a new Survivor, the Bandit, to play as. Even better is the fact that modded versions of the Bandit will remain separate accessible.

The Anniversary Update will be coming to other platforms later but the current plan is to release the first expansion on all platforms simultaneously. Hopoo has also expanded its development team for working on Risk of Rain 2 and "future games to come." Stay tuned for more details in the coming months.

Fallout 76's 2021 Roadmap Has Been Revealed

Fallout 76 Season 1

Fallout 76 is one of those interesting stories that shows how well a live service model can potentially work (which is nice to think about considering how many of those crash and burn). Originally launching in a pretty subpar state, overall the game has been built up over time, even apparently becoming one of the most played games on Xbox. Now it's time for the DLC roadmap for this year to be rolled out.

Bethesda has detailed the next 4 seasons of the game, each one being divided into the season they are planned to hit: Spring, Summer, Fall, and Winter. The update will include a lot of items, including things like improving camping and crafting, The Appalachian Brotherhood of Steel expansion that will include new NPCs and quests, new evolutions of Private Vaults, and more. You can check full details via the official Twitter below.

Fallout 76 is available now on PlayStation 4, Xbox One, and PC. The game is also available on Xbox Game Pass, where it recently got support for FPS Boost for those playing on Xbox Series X/S via backwards compatibility.

Xbox Game Pass Subscribers Play More Games, And Spend More On Them, Says Microsoft

xbox game pass

Xbox Game Pass was already quite the deal, and now with the purchase of Bethesda by Microsoft, it's about the get even more loaded with content. Ever since the service launched, Microsoft has shifted to it being the focus of the Xbox brand, even now getting third party titles from major publishers day and date with the retail release. It also seems that those that use it also are using it a lot.

As reported by Forbes, Microsoft's Sarah Bond broke down some of the stats about Game Pass users. She said that roughly speaking, Game Pass subscribers spend 30% more time playing games, play 40% more genres. and spend 20% more on gaming in general. That last part probably may be a surprise, since Game Pass is a monthly subscription service and nothing else, but as she says, unlike a service like Netflix, Game Pass has a constant cycle of monetization from previous games, microtranscations, etc.

"When you subscribe to a channel that enables you to watch a video, like Netflix," she says, "that's kind of the end of the monetization cycle that you have with that piece of content. In gaming it's the opposite: there are items that you can buy in the game, there are extensions you can buy, there's a next franchise you can purchase, there are other genres that you can leap to.

"There are 200 million people who buy a console, and there are 3 billion people who play games. Today, a lot of those people don't have the option to play many of these amazing experiences and iconic games that you see. When you really look at what we're doing with Game Pass is we're making that possible by linking that to subscription, and putting our streaming into subscription. We're able to make the economics of all that work."

At the beginning of the year, it was announced that Xbox Game Pass had surpassed over 18 million subscribers. As of now the service is available on Xbox Series X/S, Xbox One, and PC, with Xbox Cloud Streaming also being available for Android devices.

DOOM Eternal Will Get More Updates Later In The Year

doom eternal the ancient gods

It was just over 1 year ago that DOOM Eternal launched. It was the high-octane sequel to the 2016 reboot of the iconic shooter series, and just saw its story wrapped up with a second DLC expansion pack, The Ancient Gods – Part 2. It's been quite a life span for the game, one of much shooting and gore and rage, but it seems the ride is not entirely over.

On the official id Software Twitter account, Executive Producer Marty Stratton and the game's Director Hugo Martin thanked fans. They reiterated that Ancient Gods was the end of the Doom Slayer that begin back in 2016 with DOOM. While that means there probably is not anymore major expansions planned, Stratton did promise that more updates will come later in the year. What that ends up being is anyone's guess- whether he's referring to the new Master Levels coming up or more Battlemode content remains to be seen.

DOOM Eternal is available now on PlayStation 4, Xbox One, PC and Stadia. It has also been announced to be coming to PS5 and Xbox Series X/S, but as of now, no date or time frame is attached to those versions.

Atomic Heart Shows Off Photo Mode In Latest Gameplay Trailer

atomic heart

Atomic Heart was a game that was revealed and then seemed to vanish off the face of the Earth for a good while. It has since resurfaced and developer Mundfish has been hyping up the game with next gen console versions as well as trailers to show off the game's interesting look. Now we get another trailer that's up close and personal, and I do mean, very up close and personal.

A new gameplay trailer was released via IGN, which you can see in full below, that showed off the game's photo mode. In it you see what appears to be a very action-packed scene that has been frozen in place for a still photo image. You then get to see it zoom out and take a good look at all the carnage.

Atomic Heart is set to release at some point for PlayStation 5, PlayStation 4, Xbox Series X/S, Xbox One and PC, though as of yet there is no time frame for the release. We do, however, know the game's PC requirements, which you can see in full through here.

Microsoft Confirms Dropping Of Xbox Live Name For Online Network

xbox logo

Earlier today there were murmurs that Microsoft was on the verge of rebranding one of its most iconic services, Xbox Live. The name has always been the name of Microsoft's online features going all the way back to the original Xbox when the service launched way back in 2002. But everything changes, and now it's due for a name change, but it does not seem as if anything functionally is changing with it, at least as of now.

As reported by The Verge, Microsoft has confirmed that Xbox Live will be officially dropped as a naming convention for their online network. Now, it may be somewhat confusing, but this does not mean the end of the Xbox Live paywall. This is simply a renaming of the online infrastructure. The subscription service of Xbox Live Gold will still continue, though it's unclear if that too will get a name change of some kind in the future. As a Microsoft spokesperson said to the Verge, "Xbox network' refers to the underlying Xbox online service, which was updated in the Microsoft Services Agreement. The update from 'Xbox Live' to 'Xbox network' is intended to distinguish the underlying service from Xbox Live Gold memberships."

Xbox Live introduced paid online to console play back in 2002 and since then both Sony and Nintendo have followed suite. There have been rumors that paid online will be going away in the Xbox ecosystem, but that has not materialized. Whether this is a first step in that is anyone's guess, though as of right now, it seems nothing fundamental will actually change.

Fall Guys: Ultimate Knockout Season 4 is Live, Adds 7 New Futuristic Rounds

fall guys season 4

Enter the world of 4041 as Season 4 for Fall Guys: Ultimate Knockout goes live. Taking place in the future, which embraces retro sci-fi and synthwave, the season adds new rounds, new features and plenty of new costumes. Check out the launch trailer below.

There are seven new rounds this time, from the 60-play Skyline Stumble with its lasers and gravity zones to low-gravity basketball of Basketfall. The new Squads Mode also allows for four players to team up and claim victory if one of the members happens to win. Squad Race also offers a new round type as various squads race to earn points with the lowest scoring ones being eliminated.

Other new features include Daily Challenges to net Fame bundles and Crown Shards. The latter is a new currency with 60 shards forming a Crown. Shards can be obtained in Squads along with the Challenges. For more details, check out the full patch notes here.

UPDATE NOTES:

Character Improvements:

  • Sturdier Beans We're improved our Fall Guys to be more sturdy when taking hits both from other players. No more ragdolling just because another bean brushed you in mid-air!
  • Fixed some ragdolling and excessive jumping issues in some rounds, for example unrelenting ragdolling on Hex-A-Gone after colliding with another Fall Guy
  • Fixed errors related to ledge-climbing in some levels like Wall Guys, such as Sweat animations failing to play, and inability to climb a ledge when a flipper is present.
  • Increased physics performance for distant players, leading to an overall smoother experience
  • Improved character behaviour when carrying objects around
  • Post-elimination flow: you can now quit at any time after being eliminated, no more waiting for the next round to load

UI Improvements:

  • Fixed text displaying that 40 players are needed to start a game on playlists with restricted numbers (I.E Hex-a-Gone Trials)
  • Fixed 16/15 eliminated showing on Thin Ice
  • Fixed the Qualified element not reducing in value when a player becomes eliminated during Slime Climb

Resident Evil Village Coming to Stadia, New Showcase Announced for April

resident evil village

A new Resident Evil showcase is set for April where Capcom will offer new details and also discuss the open beta for Resident Evil Re:Verse. The company has also announced that Resident Evil Village will be coming to Google Stadia on the same day as other platforms. Those who pre-order or purchase the game before May 21st, 12 AM PT will receive a free Stadia Premiere Edition.

This will include a copy of the game, Chromecast Ultra and a Stadia Controller, all for the price of $59.99 (or $69.99 for the Deluxe Edition). Stadia Pro members also have reason to celebrate as Resident Evil 7: Biohazard Gold Edition will be free on April 1st. It includes the base game along with the DLC, including the End of Zoe and Not a Hero story DLCs.

Resident Evil Village is out on May 7th for Xbox One, PS4, PS5, PC, Xbox Series X/S and now Stadia as well. New details were revealed in a recent PlayStation Japan livestream, like the number of weapons being greater than in Resident Evil 7. Stay tuned for more details on the title (like the upcoming second demo), along with other Resident Evil 25th Anniversary developments, in the coming days.