Author: Harvey Randall
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‘We’re not using generative AI within WoW’ says franchise director John Hight, though the team’s been using machine learning to cut out busywork
Generative AI in gaming has been a gnarled, thorny subject for the past few years. Recent experiments have raised the hackles of artists and writers alike—though thus far said experiments have mostly proved that it does a bad job of replicating the human touch. As I mentioned last week, I feel like tech like Ubisoft’s…
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After a bumpy entry, Capcom asks players for feedback on Dragon’s Dogma 2 (and if they’d like some proper DLC) via an online survey
Dragon’s Dogma 2, despite being a solid bit of action RPG fun, definitely has its problems. Performance nightmares abound on PC, and while none of the game’s microtransactions make much sense at all (with almost all of them being available in-game) they’re still a fair reason to be put off from the whole thing. All…
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‘Farewell, battle brother’: Helldivers 2 players honour a late soldier with thousands of salutes, Arrowhead Games’ CEO says he’ll work with the dev team on a fitting tribute
A Helldivers 2 player by the name of OkamiCheems has died—and in a touching tribute, a thread posted by his former friend to the game’s subreddit has received an outpouring of support tens of thousands strong. At the time of writing, the post has 43,800 upvotes, and the thread itself is flooded with both heartfelt…
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3 days after Helldivers 2 dev’s CEO denied the existence of heavy machine guns, they now exist: Introducing the LAS-99 Quasar Cannon and the MG-101 Heavy Machine Gun
Earlier this week, the CEO of Helldivers 2 studio Arrowhead Games flatly denied the existence of heavy machine guns—Johan Pilestedt has track record of being tongue-in-cheek, though it’s not clear whether he accidentally blurted out some Super Earth secrets or fired a knowing wink our direction, here. (Image credit: Johan Pilestedt via Twitter) Turns out,…
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Helldivers 2 fan Discord comes under fire for plugging a boosting site, alleged owner pokes their head up to say ‘no one used the code, but we still got paid’ and it’s not gone down well
Half the fun of Helldivers 2 is levelling up—and there’s not exactly an ‘endgame’ to speak of, beyond helping out with galactic war objectives. Nonetheless, a popular fan Discord called Doom Divers, initially a LFG group, partnered with a boosting website named BlazingBoost. That’s as per a now-locked thread on the game’s subreddit and, uh,…
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Larian Studios’ Swen Vincke does see potential uses for AI, but: ‘We’re hiring writers, not having ChatGPT write their dialogues’
AI’s been a fraught conversation in videogames. Heck, it’s even reared its head in Dungeons & Dragons, the ruleset Baldur’s Gate 3 was built on top of—especially after some recent comments by Hasbro’s CEO about “leveraging” all of its previous works. Swen Vincke, the founder and CEO of Larian Studios is a lot more level-headed…
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Arc weapons shouldn’t crash your game anymore in Helldivers 2, so you can zap to your heart’s content
The latest Warbond for Helldivers 2 includes a lot of ways to dispense electric justice—and ways to survive those zaps when they inevitably blow back in your face. Unfortunately, an entirely different problem’s been slaying Helldivers lately: A frozen game client. For almost an entire week, weapons like the Arc Thrower, the Arc Shotgun and…
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Dragon’s Dogma 2 players are hurling their pawns into the briny depths to purge Dragonsplague, a mechanic so deadly and unique I don’t want to spoil it in a headline
Dragon’s Dogma 2 is a game of bizarre, mechanical complexities—it’s at times frustrating, baffling, and weird, but that also gives it a unique flavour. The game isn’t that interested in being convenient, but it is interested in leaving you asking what the hell just happened while you’re surrounded by corpses. I’m about to spoil how,…
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The Dragon’s Dogma 2 microtransactions are real and bafflingly silly, since nearly all of them can be found in the game without too much trouble
I want to say up-front that I am, by no means, defending the choice to slap a bunch of microtransactions onto Dragon’s Dogma 2. I’m also not surprised by the current state of the game’s Steam reviews—sitting at “Mixed” at the time of writing, in the same way that I’m not surprised when kicking beehives…
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PSA: If you’re using a controller like Dragon’s Dogma 2 wants you to, you can turn off ‘sprint’ and ‘interact’ being on the same button for some unholy reason
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Dragon’s Dogma 2, generally speaking, would like you to use a controller. As much as my inner PC gamer curmudgeon might bicker with that mandate, it’s 2024—most players are gonna have a gamepad lying around somewhere, unless you’re the kind of wunderkind to tackle Elden Ring with a mouse and keyboard. In which case, I…