I finally gave in this year and made sure Santa is bringing me a PlayStation VR2 because I absolutely need to play Beat Saber. And when you see this discounted PS VR2 with Horizon Call of the Mountain, you're going to want one, too. It's down from 600 to just 349, a whopping 42 percent discount and the best price we've ever seen for it. The PS VR2 is one of the best and most affordable virtual reality headsets out there. It has eye tracking and 3D audio for a realistic gaming experience, and the headset subtly vibrates for haptic feedback.

The Covid-19 pandemic's lockdown and lingering effects, plus the sudden drop in price of powerful PC graphics cards this year, led to an unexpected renaissance in computer gaming. The argument against PC gaming often boils down to: It's cheaper and easier to deal with a video game console than to set up a powerful gaming rig. But many console jockeys paying full price for new games may not be aware of a simple PC gaming fact: You can get lots and lots of the best PC games of recent years for free, no strings attached, and mitigate your system cost. While Xbox and PlayStation stores offer free games each month to subscribers, you have to pay a fee to access and keep them. On the PC side of things, you can regularly access and keep free games from outfits including Epic Game Store, GOG.com, Steam and even Amazon, if you have a Prime subscription.

Gone are the days when free games equated to ropey puzzle games and knock-off clones of games that had a price tag. These days, courtesy of in-app payments and the ease of offering both a sample of a title alongside its full-fat version, there are actually plenty of great games to play without spending a dime. Following the continued success of titles like Fortnite, the level of quality across mobile, PC and consoles has never been higher. Put your card away, and consider this your starting point. At launch, many of us assumed Genshin Impact was a tenuous Zelda: Breath of the Wild copy with impressive anime graphics and not much else.

Welcome to Pushing Buttons, the Guardian's gaming newsletter. If you'd like to receive it in your inbox every week, just pop your email in below – and check your inbox (and spam) for the confirmation email. It is now becoming a running joke that massive games-industry news keeps dropping in the hours after this newsletter gets sent out on a Tuesday. A few months back it was Microsoft buying Activision Blizzard; then the New York Times bought Wordle. Last week it was Sony's rumoured revamp of the PlayStation Plus subscription service, and then the not entirely unexpected news that E3 – the annual games industry showcase in LA – has been completely cancelled, having previously shifted to a digital-only event.

Google will make its video game streaming service Stadia free for two months while many around the world are living under restrictive shutdown policies. People who register new accounts will have access to Stadia Pro games and services, which allows users to play video games via stream on a laptop, tablet, smartphone, or equipped television. People who already subscribe to Stadia Pro will have their monthly subscription fees waived during the free two month period. The free two months will run through June 8, after which all accounts will be required to pay a monthly subscription fee of $10. The free promotion is available in 14 countries, according to a report in Engadget, including the US, UK, Canada, Ireland, France, Germany, Italy, Spain, Netherlands, Belgium, Sweden, Denmark, Norway, and Finland.

With interest soaring in machine learning and its role in all kinds of games, chess will be in the spotlight at the prestigious MIT Sloan Sports Analytics Conference this year, organizers announced today. The chess program is scheduled for Saturday, March 2. Chess.com's

Apple has announced its best apps and games of the year. "Fortnite" mania didn't just dominate traditional gaming consoles and the PC, it also made its mark on mobile games in 2018. As Apple prepares for the end of the year, it's App Store team has named "battle royale" - the popular "you versus the world" format made famous by games like "Fortnite" and "Playerunknown's Battlegrounds" (also known as "PUBG")- as it's gaming trend of the year. "Fortnite" was the top free iPhone game this year, with "PUBG Mobile" finishing fourth. "Fortnite" was similarly the most popular free game on the iPad, though "PUBG" dropped to the thirteenth.

It's a great time to upgrade if you're looking to score a new graphics card for cheap. With Nvidia's high-end GeForce RTX 2070 and GeForce RTX 2080 and 2080 Ti now available, we're starting to see some seriously enticing discounts on graphics cards for lower budgets too--a merciful situation after a year of cryptocurrency-induced price inflation. If you're looking to level up to no-compromises 1080p gaming or push a 1440p monitor screaming past 60fps, we've found deals worth checking out. The most enticing deals come in around the $200 price range, where you'll find graphics cards that deliver superb 1080p gaming experiences. First up: The PowerColor Red Dragon Radeon RX 570, which is on sale for just $160 at NeweggRemove non-product link. This card should deliver a strong 60 frames per second with all or most in-game graphics settings cranked, though as always, that varies game by game.

This year that game is undeniably Fortnite Battle Royale, an online free-for-all that every teen in America suddenly seems to be playing. It's not just kids, though–everyone from rapper Drake to Los Angeles Laker Josh Hart is a fan. That groundswell of support has propelled Fortnite from a simple video game into a cultural sensation, with hundreds of millions of fans worldwide who play the game, wear the gear and even learn the characters' victory dances. "Fortnite is another in a long line of games like World of Warcraft or Guitar Hero or Minecraft that is changing everything underfoot," says Mat Piscatella, a video-game industry analyst with research firm NPD Group. Fortnite's big draw is a madcap multiplayer mode that drops up to 100 players on an island in a last-person-standing showdown.

We haven't seen much in the way of GPU promotions the last few years. Time was, nearly every graphics card purchase came with one or two free games to sweeten the deal. A win-win, really: Companies offload sluggish or end-of-life stock, and soften the blow of a $500 GPU purchase. But there's been no need for AMD and Nvidia to sweeten the deal as long as every card they made was snatched up by crypto miners. Purchase a Radeon RX 580, 570, or Vega graphics card at a participating between now and November 3 and you'll receive codes (eventually) for three upcoming games: Assassin's Creed: Odyssey, the Star Control: Origins reboot, and Rebellion's 1930s-themed shooter Strange Brigade.