Video Game News Roundup – March 22, 2025
Welcome to our daily roundup of the latest video game news! Today’s highlights include:
- Like a Dragon series director sums up why sidequests are essential to a great RPG with a single metaphor: ‘a good main dish alone will not earn you a Michelin star’
- Valve’s DRM was inspired by an exec’s nephew, who ‘used a $500 check I’d sent him for school expenses and bought himself a CD-ROM replicator… he sent me a lovely thank you note’
- All Assassin’s Creed Shadows Tea Ceremony answers
Let’s dive into the details of what’s happening in the world of gaming today.
Like a Dragon series director sums up why sidequests are essential to a great RPG with a single metaphor: ‘a good main dish alone will not earn you a Michelin star’
Source: PC Gamer – March 21, 2025
In a talk at San Francisco’s Game Developer’s Conference on Friday, Like a Dragon series director, Ryosuke Horii, said something simple out loud that I wish more big RPGs truly took to heart: the balance between the “main” narrative and its side stories is what it’s all about. Ask a dozen Like a Dragon fans what they love most about the games, and you’ll likely get a dozen answers: Suplexing bad guys in brawler combat, deploying weirdo human Pokémon in turn-based battles, karaoke, gambling, running your own resort island… but if there is a single most common answer, it’s almost certainly going to be the sidequests.
Read the full article at PC Gamer →
Valve’s DRM was inspired by an exec’s nephew, who ‘used a $500 check I’d sent him for school expenses and bought himself a CD-ROM replicator… he sent me a lovely thank you note’
Source: PC Gamer – March 21, 2025
One of this year’s most interesting GDC talks was delivered by Monica Harrington, a founding member of Valve and the company’s first chief marketing officer, who went over her history with the company that brought us Half-Life and Steam. There’s so much in Harrington’s career and memories to pick out, but a notable anecdote that PC Gamer was also able to follow up on involves when, in the company’s earliest years, Harrington gave her nephew some money and then found out what he’d done with it. “At the time, consumer-level piracy was just becoming a real issue,” said Harrington during her talk.
Read the full article at PC Gamer →
All Assassin’s Creed Shadows Tea Ceremony answers
Source: PC Gamer – March 21, 2025
The Assassin’s Creed Shadows Tea Ceremony quest is one of your first major hurdles, tasking you with infiltrating a gathering of wealthy Sakai individuals to uncover the identity of the Golden Teppo. If you’re not playing in canon mode, you’ll have to correctly respond and interact with the ceremony goers so as not to blow your cover. Not to spoil the fun, but there’s not actually much at stake here. You’d think you’d have to blend in perfectly to avoid being found out, especially since there was a whole quest to learn the proper etiquette and pick the perfect kosode before getting to this moment.
Read the full article at PC Gamer →
The first non-Steam Deck SteamOS handheld is now available for preorder, and Lenovo may be aiming for the ROG Ally X’s throne
Source: PC Gamer – March 21, 2025
If you want a more powerful handheld gaming PC but don’t want to part with SteamOS, Lenovo’s SteamOS-powered Legion Go S is finally up for preorder, with a release date set for May 25. As noted by a Lenovo Legion Go X fan account, the SteamOS version of the Lenovo Legion Go S is now available to preorder at Best Buy. You can get it with either the Z2 Go or Z1 Extreme chip. The former is found in the Legion Go S that we recently reviewed, and the latter is the same found in the older Lenovo Legion Go and ROG Ally X, which is currently our pick for the best handheld gaming PC.
Read the full article at PC Gamer →
A Jensen Huang-signed version of this golden Asus RTX 5090 will be auctioned off to support relief efforts for the California wildfires
Source: PC Gamer – March 21, 2025
Ordinarily, I’d be tempted to be more than a little snarky about a golden RTX 5090, given the real-world pricing of the RTX 50-series as a whole right now. However, what I can’t argue with is auctioning one off for a charitable cause, and one particular card is likely to reach a very high price indeed—because it’s been signed by none other than Nvidia CEO Jensen Huang. As TechPowerUp reports, Huang put his distinctive mark down on an Asus ROG Astral RTX 5090 Dhahab OC Edition card during GTC 2025, and Asus says that the uber-bling card bearing his name will be officially auctioned off to “support relief efforts for the California wildfires in Los Angeles.”
Read the full article at PC Gamer →
Microsoft crawls back to Steam ahead of schedule by leaking a screenshot of an app where you can launch Steam games through Xbox
Source: PC Gamer – March 21, 2025
While I do like Game Pass—it’s often a good deal when the lineup’s strong—I think you’ll agree when I say I’ve never enjoyed the experience of using the Xbox app. Microsoft can’t seem to cobble together a user interface that works after perfecting the concept back in the Windows XP days, and it’s been a slow slide downhill ever since. However, the company is trying to walk that back with an upcoming project—it sort of stumbled at the first block by accidentally playing its hands a little early. On a GDC 2025 blog, Microsoft accidentally flaunted an image before taking it down.
Read the full article at PC Gamer →
Assassin’s Creed Shadows immersive mode explained
Source: PC Gamer – March 21, 2025
One of the first choices you’ll make when booting up a new save in Assassin’s Creed Shadows is whether to use immersive mode, alongside the equally confusing canon mode and guided exploration. The name gives you a rough idea, but the goal of immersive mode is to make Shadows a more authentic experience when you’re trundling through its lively towns and stunning vistas. In this article, they go over exactly what the AC Shadows immersive mode actually does so you can decide whether it’s the right option for you. You’ll also find a sample of the Japanese voice acting in this guide, as this is predominantly what you’ll hear if you switch immersive mode on.
Read the full article at PC Gamer →
Pokémania Daily Deals Return: Amazon International Has Restocked Elite Trainer Boxes, Bundles, and More
Source: IGN – March 21, 2025
I didn’t think we’d see a proper Pokémon TCG restock this early in 2025. Honestly, I was betting on summer at best, but here we are with actual product showing up on Amazon and not behind some sketchy paywalled Discord server. While the internet’s currently losing its mind over Prismatic Evolutions and burning money chasing stock alerts for Rival Destinies, the smart play is scooping up the older sets that just hit Amazon Global. We’re talking Scarlet and Violet era stuff, Sword and Shield throwbacks, and boxes that were basically extinct six months ago. Amazon International Solves Pokémon TCG Shortage With Massive Restocks
This is the kind of flood the TCG community needed.
Read the full article at IGN →
Gabe Newell is hooked on Stalker 2 and once he’s got the fourth ending (!)
Source: PC Gamer – March 21, 2025
It’s been one heck of a week for serious Valve news, thanks largely to founder Monica Harrington’s new GDC talk about the company’s early days. So I thought it was perhaps time for a palate cleanser: What’s Gabe Newell up to? Well, when he’s not fighting off sharks in South Africa, or tootling around on one of his mega superyachts, Gabe remains just one of us. Remarkably, he also still monitors his email address and, every so often, replies to someone. Reddit user Walrus6444 recently sent one such message, politely asking: “Dear Mr Gaben, what games do you actually play?”
Read the full article at PC Gamer →
Every Luigi Game on the Nintendo Switch in 2025
Source: IGN – March 21, 2025
As any younger sibling who grew up on Mario platformers knows, Luigi is gaming’s ultimate Player 2. Nintendo’s green-capped member of the Mario Bros. has lived a lifetime in the shadow of his older twin Mario, only stepping out for a taste of solo stardom in his ghostbusting Luigi’s Mansion series. As we move closer to Switch 2, we’re celebrating another console generation of Luigi and Player 2s everywhere with a complete list of every Luigi game on Switch. Play
How Many Luigi Games Are on Switch? There are 17 games on Switch that let you play as Luigi.
Read the full article at IGN →
Get an Imported Xbox Series X Gaming Console From $315, PS5 Slim Disc Edition for $398 at AliExpress
Source: IGN – March 21, 2025
If you’re in the market for a new PlayStation or Xbox console and bottom-line pricing is your utmost priority, check out these deals from AliExpress. You can get a brand new imported Xbox Series X and PlayStation 5 consoles for much lower than you can find a new model elsewhere. These are unopened, retail-boxed, genuine gaming consoles that have been imported from another country (usually Japan, Hong Kong, Canada, or Mexico). Region locking is determined by your account, not by console, so all of these systems will play in the US without any problems. You’ll also be able to select English as your default language just like any console you buy here.
Read the full article at IGN →
Join the Conversation
Which news caught your attention today? Are you more excited about Pokemon or Like a Dragon? Share your thoughts in the comments below!
