It was Baldur's Gate 3 reveal week. In short, Larian's take on the RPG series looks a lot like Divinity: Original Sin 2, but with a modified turn-based combat system, improved character models, and lots of adapted D&D rules—so, pretty exciting! Here's our in depth look (opens in new tab), and you can watch the full reveal stream here (opens in new tab). And now for all the other things that happened this week:
GDC 2020 has been postponed due to coronavirus concerns (opens in new tab)
As more and more companies announced that they were backing out of the yearly industry convention, it was only a matter of time before its organizers at the Entertainment Software Association would have to give up on hosting GDC in March. Refunds will be issued, and a new event is being planned for sometime in the summer.
Stardew Valley is getting another free content update (opens in new tab)
The 1.5 update is in the works now, according to creator Eric Barone. This was our most popular story of the week, and it isn't like nothing else happened this week, so "more Stardew Valley" is clearly on a lot of wish lists.
Horizon: Zero Dawn for PC appears on Amazon (opens in new tab)
After rumors of its existence last month, a listing for a PC port of PlayStation 4 exclusive Horizon: Zero Dawn has appeared on Amazon France. It's starting to feel likely that there's something to all the whispers.
Players are preventing fall damage in Red Dead Redemption 2 by puking (opens in new tab)
And why not? See this important technique below:
Rainbow Six Siege may go free-to-play someday, but first Ubisoft wants to solve smurfing (opens in new tab)
'Smurfing' is when experienced players fool a game into matching them with beginners, usually by making new accounts. The key to stopping it is to quickly detect a player's relative skill regardless of their win-rate, so that throwing matches won't keep them at the wrong rank and let them stomp new players. It's easier said than done, and if Siege ever goes free-to-play, it's a problem devs want to have solved first.
On paper, the GPU in the Xbox Series X is faster than a GeForce RTX 2080 Super (opens in new tab)
The new consoles will have some impressive custom AMD tech in them, though we'll need to know more before we can tell exactly what kind of processing capabilities they'll offer compared to the typical gaming PC or laptop.
GOG's new refund policy is way more generous than Steam's (opens in new tab)
"We're monitoring the effects of the current update to make sure no one is using this policy to hurt the developers that put their time and heart into making great games," says GOG. "We may refuse refunds in such individual cases. We'd also let you know about any future adjustments in the voluntary Refund Policy in advance."
More things we wrote
- Baldur's Gate 3 Early Access will launch with 6 classes and 5 origin characters (opens in new tab)
- Plague Inc. has been removed from the China App Store (opens in new tab)
- Diablo 4 developer update showcases UI changes and 'darker, more gritty' monsters (opens in new tab)
- How Rob McElhenney's Minecraft movie fell apart (opens in new tab)
- Finally! American Truck Simulator is getting openable truck windows (opens in new tab)
- A Resident Evil 3 Remake demo is coming (opens in new tab)
- A 25-year-old strategy game just got new DLC and a Steam release (opens in new tab)
- Dragons have arrived in Hearthstone Battlegrounds' biggest update yet (opens in new tab)
- Star Wars Battlefront 2's Age of Rebellion update adds more maps, weapons, ewoks (opens in new tab)
- New Rockstar logos have fans speculating about an announcement (opens in new tab)
Around the office
Baldur's Gate 3 will feature turn-based combat rather than the real-time-with-pause combat system from the old games. Andy Kelly thinks that sucks. (opens in new tab) Fraser thinks that rules. People on Twitter are divided (opens in new tab) almost down the middle over which combat system they prefer. Personally, I hate real-time-with-pause and would've lost a ton of interest in Baldur's Gate 3 if it weren't turn-based, so clearly Larian made the right choice—catering to me, the center of all things.
It's fun to argue about combat systems. It's also fun to meet Shirley "Skyrim Grandma" Curry (opens in new tab), who James ran into at PAX. Lucky James!
.@pcgamer reacts to @my_beards meeting Skyrim Grandma @ShirleyScurry at PAX East. pic.twitter.com/DtRqxXGFMPFebruary 28, 2020
Speaking of PAX East, James is over there livestreaming, so follow our Twitch channel (opens in new tab) to see when he's live from Boston. Meanwhile, Chris revisited his brief college experience in The Sims (opens in new tab) and did a bit of sobbing alone in bed (in The Sims), Harry wondered why he's still playing Skyrim (opens in new tab) (to be more like Shirley Curry, probably), and Wes got to play Ori and the Will of the Wisps (opens in new tab), which is looking excellent.
Now that GDC has been postponed, we'll have more time in March to play Ori and the Will of the Wisps, as well as Doom Eternal, Half-Life: Alyx, and Mount and Blade 2. It's an exciting month for releases, and it starts as soon as we get this leap day out of the way.
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