Video Game News Roundup – March 11, 2025
Welcome to our daily roundup of the latest video game news! Today’s highlights include:
- New modder tool makes it easier than ever to swap AMD’s FSR 4 scaling for Nvidia’s DLSS or Intel’s XeSS and vice versa
- Naughty Dog’s next game is definitely steering clear of controversy: ‘Let’s do something that people won’t care as much about. Let’s make a game about faith and religion’
- We need to decide on a genre name for Vampire Survivors-like games before a really terrible one sticks
Let’s dive into the details of what’s happening in the world of gaming today.
New modder tool makes it easier than ever to swap AMD’s FSR 4 scaling for Nvidia’s DLSS or Intel’s XeSS and vice versa
Source: PC Gamer – March 11, 2025
Upscaling technologies like Nvidia’s DLSS and AMD’s FSR have rapidly become almost essential for playing modern games at decent frame rates with the eye candy turned on. Problem is, support for the various upscalers varies from game to game. But now there’s a new tool that makes it easier than ever to inject your upscaler of choice into your favourite game. AMD’s ML-infused FSR 4 upscaling in Cyberpunk? You betcha, though with caveats. Give it up for OptiScaler, a new tool that allows you to swap in almost any upscaling technology. Its basic requirement is that the game in question already supports either DLSS 2 or higher, FSR 2 or higher or XeSS.
Read the full article at PC Gamer →
Naughty Dog’s next game is definitely steering clear of controversy: ‘Let’s do something that people won’t care as much about. Let’s make a game about faith and religion’
Source: PC Gamer – March 11, 2025
Naughty Dog’s Neil Druckmann has revealed some more details about the studio’s next game Intergalactic: The Heretic Prophet (which, incidentally, is a dreadful name and one I’m surprised the creators of The Last of Us are satisfied with) and if you were hoping its sci-fi setting might mean a lighter, more frivolous adventure than the The Last of Us, you might want to think again. Speaking to Civil War and Ex Machina director Alex Garland on the Creator to Creator podcast (via Eurogamer), Druckmann revealed that the game will be diving deep into the not-remotely emotionally charged waters of faith and religion.
Read the full article at PC Gamer →
We need to decide on a genre name for Vampire Survivors-like games before a really terrible one sticks
Source: PC Gamer – March 11, 2025
The genre that has spiraled out from the surprise success of Vampire Survivors is one of my favourites to cover—whether I’m mining for gold, hitting people with swordfish, or building weapons out of brains and chimpanzee spines. The genre keeps growing and mutating, becoming ever more diverse and bursting with creative new ideas. It’s been a joy to watch it grow. Just one question: what the hell is the genre called? Vampire Survivors’ explosive success may have gotten the ball rolling, but the genre can’t just live under its name forever.
Whenever I write up my impressions of one of these games I end up having to name-drop Vampire Survivors in the opening paragraph just to explain what I’m talking about, because somehow over two years on from that game’s release and the explosion of mimics that followed, we still haven’t figured out a widely accepted name for this genre.
Read the full article at PC Gamer →
The Last of Us Season 2: Three Reasons Spores Need to Return
Source: IGN – March 11, 2025
Warning: This piece contains spoilers for The Last of Us Part II game. The second season of The Last of Us is premiering on April 13, 2025, and we just got another look at the series in a new trailer over the weekend. But amidst all the excitement for the acclaimed game adaptation’s next entry, something stood out to us in the latest trailer: the confirmation that spores will be included. This might seem like a small detail to the uninitiated, but it was actually one of the show’s biggest deviations from the source material. Instead of spores, the first season primarily used tendrils emerging from infected individuals as the way the cordyceps infection spreads.
Read the full article at IGN →
Battlefield 6 Leaks Have Me Very Excited About EA’s Upcoming Shooter
Source: Kotaku – March 11, 2025
The next Battlefield game—referred to unofficially as Battlefield 6—is currently holding an early beta and despite players having to sign an NDA to participate, footage has leaked online. Encouragingly, the reactions are overwhelmingly positive as players seem excited about new features, details, and the return to the modern combat seen in past entries.
After the disastrous 2021 launch of Battlefield 2042 and the poor sales of Battlefield V in 2018, the long-running FPS war franchise was in rough shape.
Read the full article at Kotaku →
Pokémon Go Scroll Cup Great League Edition best team recommendations
Source: Polygon – March 11, 2025
The Scroll Cup: Great League Edition is a limited-time cup in the Pokémon Go Battle League that only allows three types of Pokémon to enter: dark-, fighting-, and water-type Pokémon. These types appear to be inspired by the Legendary Kubfu’s evolution, Urshifu, which can be fighting-/dark-type or fighting-/water-type depending on its form. With so many popular Pokémon not falling under these three typings, you’re going to have to think carefully when building the best team for the Scroll Cup. To help you along the way, we’ve put together a list of the top Pokémon and their optimal movesets. Scroll Cup: Great League Edition restrictions
Only three types of Pokémon are allowed to enter the Scroll Cup: dark-, fighting-, and water-type Pokémon.
Read the full article at Polygon →
‘Don’t you know what he did?’: The truth comes out in The Last of Us Season 2 trailer
Source: PC Gamer – March 10, 2025
Ready to get cold and bleak and sad? That’s the vibe in The Last of Us Season 2 trailer, which jumps us ahead a few years after Season 1 into a future that doesn’t look all that rosy. Sad dad Joel and tough teen Ellie have apparently grown apart while living in Wyoming, but it’s not just their relationship that’s under strain: the funky fungal infection has reached full freakout.
Fans of the game will be excited to see a stalker in the trailer: a fast and deadly variety of infected that only appeared a few times in the original game but more heavily in the sequel, and wasn’t part of Season 1 of the show.
Read the full article at PC Gamer →
After suing a Disco Elysium writer to prevent him from making his own game, a tech CEO who’s allegedly banned from the Disco Elysium subreddit is trying to crowdfund a spiritual successor
Source: PC Gamer – March 11, 2025
Disco Elysium-like “psychogeographic RPG” Hopetown has announced a Kickstarter campaign launch date of March 17, as well as the addition of new talent from the team that made Disco Elysium. But for a variety of reasons—including that the studio head is allegedly banned from the game’s subreddit—I would not recommend backing the project. The developer’s founder is mired in the creative and legal battles that have emerged following the stranger than fiction balkanization of Disco’s developers—despite not having been involved with Disco Elysium’s development in the first place—and what’s been shown of Hopetown so far doesn’t make it look like it will live up to the legacy it’s attempting to claim.
Read the full article at PC Gamer →
Should Age of Empires and Quake be in the ‘World Video Game Hall of Fame’? You can vote for them to be inducted this year
Source: PC Gamer – March 11, 2025
The Strong National Museum of Play has announced their annual candidates for induction into the World Video Game Hall of Fame. This year the complete list of nominees includes Age of Empires, Angry Birds, Call of Duty 4: Modern Warfare (2007), Defender, Frogger, Goldeneye 007, Golden Tee, Harvest Moon, Mattel Football, NBA 2K, Quake, and Tamagotchi. It’s a packed field in what is always a packed competition. Deciding between just the games you can play on a PC is hard: Age of Empires, Call of Duty 4 (2007), and Quake are hugely influential swings. How do you pick between foundational FPS Quake, a foundational RTS Age of Empires, and the Call of Duty entry that introduced the now-ubiquitous idea that you should level up and get perks in every kind of game that’s not an RPG?
Read the full article at PC Gamer →
The Best Max Deals for March 2025
Source: IGN – March 11, 2025
Max is home to some incredibly high-quality films and shows, including House of the Dragon, Succession, The Penguin, The White Lotus, and The Last of Us, which has season 2 coming this year on Sunday, April 13. If you’ve been hoping to start up an account to dig into that library, we’re here to help. We’re keeping track of the best price right now for Max subscriptions, along with any deals as they appear. This includes bundle deals like the Max, Hulu, and Disney+ bundle, which is one you absolutely don’t want to miss out on. This mega bundle starts at just $16.99/month, which is an astonishing price to have three very popular streaming services right in the palm of your hand.
Read the full article at IGN →
O’Dessa Review: A Post-Apocalyptic Musical Worth Singing About
Source: IGN – March 11, 2025
O’Dessa streams on Hulu beginning Thursday, March 20. This review is based on a screening at the 2025 SXSW Film and Television Festival. What happens when you mix Streets of Fire and O Brother, Where Art Thou? with the look and vibes of Far Cry 3: Blood Dragon? You get a bold, vibrant, catchy, romantic cyberpunk rock opera with memorable performances and rocking musical numbers seemingly destined for infinite fan edits once it drops on Hulu. One of the best scenes in all of Stranger Things involves Sadie Sink and a great song, but that doesn’t prepare you for just how great her singing voice is in O’Dessa.
Read the full article at IGN →
CoD: Black Ops 6 And Warzone Update Buffs D1.3 Sector And Extends TMNT Event
Source: GameSpot – March 11, 2025
A small update has arrived to Call of Duty: Black Ops 6 And Warzone on March 11, and the patch notes reveal a buff for Season 2 Reloaded’s new D1.3 Sector special weapon. Call of Duty’s TMNT event has also received an extension, so players now have more time to earn those Ninja Turtle rewards. The Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles crossover event was originally scheduled to end on March 13, but players now have until March 20 to complete the TMNT event pass. The season’s new D1.3 Sector special weapon is adjusted for both Black Ops 6 and Warzone. This includes a buff that affects the weapon’s ricochet blade ammo type, which increases the damage from 75 to 100.
Read the full article at GameSpot →
Rebellion CEO says Evil Genius 3 could happen but wonders ‘what else could we do with it other than a base-building game?’
Source: PC Gamer – March 10, 2025
I’ve always had a soft spot for Bond villain simulator Evil Genius, a spiritual successor to the Dungeon Keeper series that amped-up the cackling charm and packed-in more spy cliches than you could shake a vodka martini at. The original game released in 2004 before a Facebook spin-off, then the mobile title Evil Genius: Online, before a surprise sequel, Evil Genius 2: World Domination, appeared in 2021: Our review reckoned that when it’s “on form, it’s one of the best management games out there.” PC Gamer’s Josh Wolens recently had the chance to sit down with Rebellion CEO Jason Kingsley to talk about and go hands-on with the studio’s newest title, Atomfall.
Read the full article at PC Gamer →
CoD: Black Ops 6 – Here’s The First Look At The Next Zombies Map
Source: GameSpot – March 11, 2025
Season 3 of Call of Duty: Black Ops 6 arrives next month, and while we don’t know exactly when the next Zombies map will arrive to the game, the developer has teased a first look at the upcoming location. In a recent Twitter post, Treyarch shared the image of a mansion. The caption included reads, “Personal log. Edward Richtofen recording…”
This tease backs up the recent leaks that suggested that Season 3’s map would take place inside Edward Richtofen’s Liberty Falls mansion. Richtofen was last seen in one of the initial launch trailers for Black Ops 6 Zombies, where we saw him inside the mansion and fighting off a horde of undead with Call of Duty’s iconic Wunderwaffe DG-2 Wonder Weapon.
Read the full article at GameSpot →
The original Verdansk map is returning to Call of Duty: Warzone, to celebrate which we get a soldier crying to Nat King Cole
Source: PC Gamer – March 10, 2025
One of the most divisive aspects of Call of Duty: Warzone has been the replacement of the Verdansk map, which the game launched with in 2020, with the Caldera map in late 2021. Ever since the change a sizeable contingent of players have been unhappy, with many considering Verdansk the heart-and-soul of the game, and no subsequent maps measuring up. Well after just over three years, Verdansk is back! And not for a few weeks: Verdansk returns to Warzone on April 3, and Activision has seriously pushed the boat out with a slow-mo trailer set to Nat King Cole’s rendition of “Unforgettable.”
Read the full article at PC Gamer →
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