This week's highs and lows in PC gaming

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Each week, the PC Gamer editors parry their detractors and pull off a sick shinobi hot take.

THE LOWS 

It makes me gloomy even thinking about BioWare now, so much so that I briefly forgot that it had even officially teased the next Dragon Age last year. Origins might be my fave, but I adore all the Dragon Age romps, so I don't really want to imagine an Andromeda or an Anthem happening in Thedas. According to a report this week, a lot of the same problems that plagued both of those games have been affecting Dragon Age's development, too, which still sounds very much up in the air. It might have jetpacks by 2020. Nah, that would be silly. It'll be dragons. We'll be flying dragons.  

Samuel Roberts: Dragon aged

Dragon Age was my low, too. In fact, BioWare's torrid few years of product are my low—in terms of the picture those reports paint of the challenges facing developers at the studio and the cancellation of Dragon Age 4, it doesn't make for pretty reading. It's been over four years since Inquisition, and who knows how long until the next one. Whatever BioWare makes next, it feels like it has to be a success. Fingers crossed. 

James Davenport: Fighting shape

Fortnite isn't in great shape right now. I'm happy to see respawning enter squad play, but like many others, I miss the siphon mechanic. Getting health on kills just felt right. It encouraged aggressive play and gave under-equipped late game players a risky out. I'm not an excellent player myself, so it was a nice reward in crowded, panicked fights. 

For pros, the grappling baller vehicles are a much bigger problem, turning the endgame into a schoolyard game of marbles. For every bug squashed, five more crop up. With the World Cup qualifiers kicking off imminently, I'm thinking it's time Epic pressed pause and did some spring cleaning. Fortnite should be in better shape for one of the biggest esports competitions ever. 

Bo Moore: Bad port

So the headset I've been using for the last year or so has a neat feature that lets you adjust the levels between voice chat and in-game sounds (using a handy physical dial, not an in-menu system). Problem is, I've never been able to get it to work. Welp, turns out it was plugged into a bad USB port. I swapped it over and now the balance dial works perfectly. A victory, for sure—I just wish I'd figured this out a year ago.

Chris Livingston: Saving the day

Has this happened to you? You're playing a game and decide to quit. A prompt comes up telling you if you quit you'll lose any unsaved progress! But there's no option to save the game right there! There's got to be a better way!!!

There is! Give me a goddamn 'save and quit' button. I don't want to lose progress. The game apparently doesn't want me to lose progress. Let's work together by letting me save and quit with one press of a button!

Tom Senior: Space blues

Am I too lazy for Elite? Andy has been playing it this week and I was suddenly overcome with an urge to become a cool space caddy. Elite’s ships are beautifully realised, and sound amazing, but as I guided my craft into the inky darkness, the crushing sense of empty space and opportunity kicked in, and I felt very tired. There’s a whole universe out there but… do I have to?

I turned it off and vowed to try again this weekend, on Sunday morning, with a cup of tea, in pajamas—in other words, FULL DAD. I’m looking forward to the upcoming features directed at new players, and we were studying this excellent career map in PC Gamer Slack earlier this week. With all that help I’m sure I can become a space trucker in no time.

PC Gamer
PC Gamer

The collective PC Gamer editorial team worked together to write this article. PC Gamer is the global authority on PC games—starting in 1993 with the magazine, and then in 2010 with this website you're currently reading. We have writers across the US, UK and Australia, who you can read about here.