Features archive
April 2026
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126 articles
- April 30
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- Robot Watch: The weirdest and wildest things bots did this month including self destructing, playing ping pong, and pooping NFTs
- Fortnite's new partnered Star Wars games were not a great showcase of UEFN
- Invincible Vs may pack a punch for fans of the show, but I wish it had more going on outside its tight versus mode
- I'm having to completely retrain my muscle memory in Deep Rock Galactic: Survivor after 150 hours, because the new class they've added is just a dwarf in a car
- After 3 hours with 007 First Light, IO's weaknesses are on display in a way they haven't been since Hitman: Absolution
- Arc Raiders' weapon durability changes are mystifying—especially when repairing guns is one of the least enjoyable parts of the game
- Heroes of Might and Magic: Olden Era isn't a reimagining or a divisive reinterpretation, it's just a brilliant strategy game
- 'This is the first time where I'm seeing no light at the end of the tunnel': How the memory crisis is hitting PC builders
- April 29
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- Roblox is pulling a DLSS 5, offering yet another example of a tool mistaking itself for an artist
- The Garry's Mod 'successor' is, tragically, more Roblox than anything else
- The best VPN for gaming in 2026: These privacy-protecting virtual networks keep your games lag-free
- Best gaming laptops 2026: We've reviewed the best gaming laptops of this generation and these are our favorites
- Final Fantasy 14's Unreal trials are such a brilliant way to reintroduce old fights for new players and I wish we saw more of this reinvigoration
- Single-channel DRAM is bad news for PC gaming but depending on what CPU you have, it's not actually as awful as you might think
- April 28
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- The Blood of Dawnwalker lets you complete areas in any order, kill any NPCs you like, and still complete the game after failing every quest: 'We're giving even more freedom to players'
- It's hard to say whether Final Fantasy 14's new combat will be a win or a flop, but I'm just happy to see the developer trying something new
- April 27
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- The new Moomin game is lovely, but also illustrates the limits of cozy comfort over the harsher lessons of a children's book
- Steam Controller teardown: simple to open, easy to fix
- Sovereign Tower is a medieval fantasy Dispatch with all the bossiness and flirting you could want
- Crimson Desert is an amazing game, but it wouldn't be nearly as great without its enthusiastic community
- Final Fantasy 14's promised 'public fields' redesign could fix complaints I've had about the MMO for years—here's what I'm hoping for
- Just over 20% of players are halfway through Crimson Desert's story, and I feel like that says a lot about how people are playing the game
- Directive 8020 feels like the horror game Supermassive Games was born to make
- Gothic Remake is committed to the original's immersive open world: 'You don't have a minimap, we very strictly kept that'
- April 26
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- Erik Wolpaw, co-writer of Portal and Portal 2 adores Burnout Paradise and has 1,500 hours in Slay the Spire: 'This is the perfect level of strategy'
- Free Kit Frenzy rids Marathon of most of its stress, but risks tossing out tension and teamwork too
- I can't believe it, a gacha game has finally broken the curse of perpetually god-awful rhythm minigames
- I feel like my screenshots are coming to life through the oil paintings created by ArtbyEri
- I made a giraffe out of monkey butts and an elephant out of trees in this delightfully silly cross between Pictionary and Pentiment's art style
- April 25
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- I played the Lord of the Rings RPG where Frodo can straight-up die and the game just keeps on going
- I finally like Diablo 4 now, and it's because I embraced laziness
- WoW came back from the brink because Blizzard ran it like a live service game—but now that same tactic's threatening everything
- Epic keeps jamming more incredible shotguns into Fortnite, and it might be the best meta ever
- People love buying weapons so much in this gun store sim that I'm making bank even though I only sell brass knuckles
- April 24
- April 23
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- Peter Molyneux has made a proper game again rather than a monetization experiment, and I really hope he finishes it
- Big Tech openly wants to manipulate us with AI. That seems bad to me
- I thought I was playing a cute little city builder about managing a fairytale town in a tree, but it turns out it's a brutal roguelike and now all my gnomes are getting eaten by ghosts
- After 18 years of beating roguelikes, I think I've finally found my kryptonite
- Best graphics cards in 2026: These are the GPUs worth spending money in right now
- PC Gamer magazine's new issue is on sale now: Diablo 4: Lord of Hatred
- April 22
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- 15 years ago, anyone could send PC Gamer magazine text messages. We got some weird ones
- I'm sick of breaking the bank buying AAA releases, so I've hunted down overlooked alternatives to 2026's biggest games
- I was worried Owlcat couldn't pull off Mass Effect-style cinematic action in its big new RPG, but after an hour of blowing stuff up in The Expanse: Osiris Reborn, I'm feeling very reassured
- Data, not guessing: Looking at Nvidia's past GPUs to predict the specs for its future RTX 60-series graphics cards
- At least there's one tech company making me feel sane in an increasingly insane world
- April 21
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- 17 years ago, a free-to-play Battlefield predicted our grim live service present
- Laptop vs desktop: which Alienware Area-51 is right for you?
- Combing through a house full of a dead loved one's possessions to figure out who they were feels like the anti-Unpacking
- Petit Planet is exactly the Animal Crossing clone it looked like, but after 15 hours of it I'm shocked by how many new ideas it has too
- After 15 years and 323 hours, I've finally beaten Fallout: New Vegas, and this game doesn't need mods as much as you think it does
- April 20
- April 19
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- What is the best licensed music to make its way into videogames?
- Dave Oshry, CEO of New Blood Interactive, will never uninstall Doom from his PC, and has over 488 hours in Fallout 76: 'It's the best cryptid hunting game'
- The coolest in-game art is in Arthur Morgan's journal in Red Dead Redemption 2, and no you can't convince me otherwise
- April 18
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- Help! The Millennium Bug made all the robots in my mansion go berserk, and only Homer Simpson can save the day
- Dedicated nature watchers are combing every millisecond of GTA 6 trailer footage to exhaustively catalogue all of its animals
- I've already raced through Pragmata 3 times, and it's cemented Capcom's mastery of the modern action game speedrun
- I found out the hard way that Linux is not a dad-friendly gaming OS, and maybe neither is the PC
- April 17
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- After the death of Dragon Age, it's a megaton bummer to go back and hear BioWare's founders talk about the series' bright future
- Battlefield 6 'seasons' should be big moments, but they're not, and it's because EA keeps drip-feeding us like hamsters in a cage
- I've found a Dark Messiah-inspired action sandbox where you can make banana spike traps and possess enemies to walk off cliffs, and I need it now
- Some takes don't age: Back in 2009, a creative director warned about the risks of 'obsessively self-referencing' existing hit games
- April 16
- April 15
- April 14
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- After 4 hours of pirate survival in Windrose, I'm reinstalling Sea of Thieves
- A floating magical skull goes to war with his own headless body in this necromantic roguelike that combines Vampire Survivors-like combat with Teamfight Tactics-inspired army building
- Marathon isn't going to be the big hit Sony wants because it's just too much of a sicko game
- You can now add 'playing pool' to the list of Lovecraftian horrors that will drive you insane, thanks to this bizarre roguelike that's got me shooting dead fish and vomiting upgrades
- Why the new OLED display really makes Alienware Area-51 laptops shine
- Find Your Words uses a way of communicating I've never experienced in a game before
- April 13
- April 12
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- Life is Strange's soundtrack is full of licensed bangers, and still hits even 11 years later
- Question time: Do you care about fashion in MMOs, or do you just chuck any old gear on and call it a day?
- Cosplay is not consent, and I wish we'd stop feeling so entitled to shoving our phones in people's faces without asking them first
- DayZ creator Dean 'Rocket' Hall has over 2,000 hours in Kerbal Space Program and played the original XCOM at Mount Everest base camp: 'I think when I die, I will still be playing that game'
- April 11
- April 10
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- Esoteric Ebb creator reckons most players only saw half the game, and that's fine by him: 'You've got to miss stuff in order to feel like the world is bigger'
- Treasure Beach is a scavenger game where you can sell what you find hidden in the sand to stingy shoppers—and let me warn you, it isn't easy
- During a memory crisis do you really need fast memory for PC gaming? No, no you do not
- Look, 16 GB of RAM is absolutely fine for PC gaming in 2026. Though there are some caveats to that...
- April 9
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- My first campaign in Europa Universalis 5 may have ruined the entire series for me
- Before Imagine Dragons, brothers Dan and Mac Reynolds always wanted to make videogames—now their first, Last Flag, is about to release
- If you've ever wondered what it would be like if Vampire Survivors was about driving around a medieval castle on wheels, then surprisingly I've got the perfect roguelike for you
- The best part of Overwatch's latest hero trailer is that it keeps the overarching narrative front and centre, right where it should be
- Where does your PC live? There is obviously one correct answer, can you pick it out?
- April 8
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- Trippy, psychedelic alien shooter ChainStaff shows there are still new ways for games to be 'retro'
- The ethically-sourced wizard school life sim I've been waiting for finally has a playable demo and launches this year
- 'Everybody should play every fighting game' says Invincible VS director: 'They're just fun'
- Oh you think you know hidden object games? Then go find a four-leaf clover in the hardest cozy game I've ever seen
- Logitech Superstrike vs Razer Viper V4 Pro: The battle for the competitive crown
- Finally, a cosy game that’s not afraid to kick my teeth in
- 'Humans can't reliably recall colours': Dialed.gg is a simple colour game that made me realise I don't know what pink looks like
- Forza Horizon 6's Japan map is the series' best yet
- April 7
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- A decade ago, Call of Duty sidelined its iconic progression system to dabble in gacha instead, and I was glad I'd forgotten
- Five new Steam games you probably missed (April 7, 2026)
- 11 years after launch, Pillars of Eternity's new turn-based mode feels like the way it's meant to be played
- I watched the first TV show ever based on a game and it made me realize: we've really got it good these days
- April 6
- April 5
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- In 2007, two game music GOATs collaborated on the criminally underrated soundtrack to a similarly underrated D&D RPG
- I tried to become a pro bowler but I skipped one important step: learning how to bowl
- Never doubt the commitment of horse-girl fans: Umamusume cosplayers are having actual races at tracks around the world
- Tarn Adams, co-creator of Dwarf Fortress, has over 1,400 hours in Factorio and is currently obsessed with terraforming games: 'Dwarf Fortress just doesn't accommodate a full-on sci-fi thing'
- After over 150 hours with Crimson Desert, it still makes no damn sense—compels me though
- It's not just Arrow Lake that's been refreshed: Intel's whole approach to the consumer market seems like a new direction
- April 4
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- Thank goodness Magic: The Gathering isn't doing a Harry Potter crossover set
- I bought a PS5 on launch day but I won't be buying a PS6, even though its exclusives aren't coming to PC anymore
- MindsEye is a glitchy, incoherent mess I wouldn't recommend to anyone—and it might also be my favorite game of 2026
- Final Fantasy 14's latest variant dungeon is so good, it deserves better—the MMO needs to figure out its rewards so all this great work isn't wasted
- This Nightdive-remastered 3DO shooter shows why it took Halo to break PC gaming's FPS hegemony
- April 3
- April 2
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- Revisiting the last truly great Call of Duty
- Open world crime game Samson had to be pared back mid-development, which led to its unusual structure: 'It's become more unique'
- The new PC games of April 2026: Pragmata, the next Diablo 4 expansion, and Final Fantasy 14's big month
- Crimson Desert's commitment to cleaning up its clunky controls shines the brightest in how satisfying it feels to fly around Pywel now
- There's just no good reason why WoW's story mode raids aren't available right away—and I'm saying that as someone who cleared normal just fine last month
- Life is Strange: Reunion does its best to give Max and Chloe fans what they want at the expense of almost every other character in the game
- April 1
