A horrific rape and incest video game has sparked fury by encouraging players to be'women's worst nightmare'. The game, titled'No Mercy', centres around a protagonist who rapes his family members including his aunt and his own mother. Players of the vile game are instructed to'never take no for an answer' in their ambition to'subdue' and'own' women. Despite its horrendous themes, the game does not have an official age rating and was available for sale on Steam, the most popular digital game store. The game's developer, Zerat Games, published the game on Steam in March where children as young as 13 can make an account.

First announced back in 2023, NVIDIA is finally releasing a playable demo for Half-Life 2 RTX. If you own the original game on Steam (and if you don't, what's your excuse?), you can download the preview on March 18. The showcase will allow players to see how Orbifold Studios has reimagined Ravenholm and Nova Prospekt with ray tracing. NVIDIA says the full release will arrive "at a later date." Ahead of the demo's release, NVIDIA is also releasing RTX Remix, the modding toolkit Orbifold used to remaster HL2, to the public.

Among Us VR has proven itself to be a major hit since first being released back in 2022. Now, developers Innersloth and Schell Games have announced they are rejiggering the virtual reality title for traditional PC players. Among Us 3D is playable without a headset and will be available via Steam in the near future. This title keeps the core gameplay loop from the original, but shifts to a first-person perspective. It's basically a new way to keep sabotaging your friends and family.

Launched as if from a trebuchet at the end of April, Manor Lords is the latest in a string of explosively successful video games that have been released this year. Indeed, the rise of this unassuming-looking city-builder is arguably more impressive than the enormous launch of Helldivers 2, or the breakout Poker phenomenon Balatro. Developed largely by one person and releasing in an incomplete state, Manor Lords shifted a million copies in its first 24 hours on sale. The scale of Manor Lords' success is remarkable, but contrary to appearances, it hasn't emerged from nowhere. Momentum around the game has been building for years, part of a broader surge in popularity for city-building games in general.

Microsoft agreed Wednesday to make the hit video game Call of Duty available on Nintendo for 10 years should its $69 billion purchase of game maker Activision Blizzard go through -- an apparent attempt to fend off objections from rival Sony. The blockbuster merger is facing close scrutiny from regulators in the U.S., Europe and elsewhere. Microsoft, maker of the Xbox game console, faces resistance from Sony, which makes the competing PlayStation console and has raised concerns with antitrust watchdogs about losing access to what it calls a "must-have" game title. Phil Spencer, the head of Xbox, tweeted that Microsoft "entered into a 10-year commitment" to bring Call of Duty to Nintendo. Microsoft President Brad Smith tweeted his thanks to Nintendo, which makes the Switch game console, saying the same offer was available for Sony.

A few weeks ago we got some solid indications that international mega-publisher Ubisoft would be slinking back to Steam, the de facto default for PC game stores. Lo and behold, le fils prodigue revient: as of yesterday, Ubisoft has posted Assassin's Creed Valhalla to Valve's ubiquitous storefront with a December 6th release date. It will follow with Anno 1800 and Roller Champions at some point. Ubisoft is the latest huge publisher to venture out on its own with its a PC-based game launcher, then return to Steam's profitable fold. Ubisoft's brand of bloatware was called Uplay, which became the exclusive home of the publisher's major franchises in 2019, and was rechristened Ubisoft Connect in 2020.

Ubisoft will start bringing its games to Steam again, nearly four years after it turned its attention to the Epic Games Store and its own Connect launcher. First up is one of the publisher's biggest games of the last few years, Assassin's Creed Valhalla, which will be available on Steam on December 6th. City builder Anno 1800 and the free-to-play Roller Champions will hit Steam at a later date. "We're constantly evaluating how to bring our games to different audiences wherever they are, while providing a consistent player ecosystem through Ubisoft Connect," a Ubisoft spokesperson told Eurogamer. "Assassin's Creed Valhalla, Anno 1800 and Roller Champions are among the Ubisoft titles that will be releasing on Steam." Assassin's Creed Valhalla will land on Steam just as Ubisoft releases the game's last content update.

It was bound to happen. AI-generated art pieces are popping up in competitions, despite much controversy, and they're likely already flooding your social media feeds in some way or form. The big promise behind the ability to generate detailed images with just a few prompts and clicks, after all, is the so-called democratization of creation. And on Steam, PC gaming's most popular platform, the barrier for selling games is already pretty low. Enter This Girl Does Not Exist, a recent Steam game with simple puzzle gameplay that nonetheless signals a massive change that will soon hit the gaming industry.

In January 2020, players of Nintendo's The Legend of Zelda: Ocarina of Time stumbled on a buried spaceship: a fully functional "Arwing" fighter from another classic Nintendo game, Star Fox 64. The Arwing was added as a programmer's shortcut to, essentially, teach a dragon how to fly. Once the dragon was airborne, the ship was hidden away in Ocarina of Time's source code, where hackers unearthed it 22 years later. "It's amazing to me that it was there all this time – it just took a lot of digging to find it," says Billy Basso, a game developer from Chicago. "It's completely inessential, but it helps people bond with how games are made, the creators behind them and the time and place. It connects you to history in a way."

Downloading games is far more convenient than buying them on a disc these days but if you play on consoles, buying a physical copy often costs substantially less – especially a few weeks or months after a game comes out. Use a price comparison website such as Best-Game-Price.co.uk, which lists lots of different retailers, and you will often be able to save £10 or more, even on new full-price games. Ebay regularly has random discount code promotions that can be applied to physical games. Plus, you have got something to put on your shelf that you can resell later or lend to a friend. That said, when the PlayStation Store, Nintendo eShop or Xbox Store have digital sales, the discounts can be great. All the digital storefronts have rolling sales most of the time.