The PC is one of the most popular gaming platforms in the world, and one that’s constantly changing. Here at The Verge we cover every aspect, including the latest hardware developments from companies like Nvidia and Logitech, massively popular games like Fortnite and Overwatch, and hugely influential digital platforms like Steam and itch.io.
MSI’s April Fools’ prank aims to solve the problem of your cat plopping itself directly atop your keyboard. It showed off an “MEG Cat Holder” that gives your furry friend their very own RGB bed attached to your monitor. As MSI puts it: “Your cat already acts like they own your setup, now they can complete it!”
BeamMP, which lets you play BeamNG.drive’s physics-based vehicle sim with friends, is offline after a hacker infiltrated its infrastructure and shut down its Discord server.
While the BeamMP team says it has “no verified reasons to believe that any end users have been ‘hacked’ as a result of the incident,” the bad actor likely accessed a “database where email addresses and encrypted passwords were stored.”
Benchmark test results from Phoronix show KDE Plasma 6.6 consistently outperforming GNOME 50 on Ubuntu 26.04 while using both AMD and Nvidia graphics cards. While these results could vary based on distro and hardware, gamers might want to opt for KDE over GNOME as the desktop environment for their next Linux gaming PC.
The Ryzen 9 9950X3D2 is a follow-up to last year’s excellent gaming chip, with 16 Zen 5 cores and 208MB of total cachem with the V-Cache split across both chiplets.
However, its upgrades may not do much for gaming alone, with the company’s pitch instead highlighting a 5 - 10 percent performance bump in creative apps like DaVinci Resolve, positioning it as a compromise option between Threadripper CPUs and options like the Ryzen 7 9850X3D.
It’s a delightfully nerdy new handheld gaming podcast from The Full Nerd Network and Retro Game Corps… and I’m the first-ever guest! What’s that in my hand?? The episode airs Saturday at 9am PT (Update: you can watch it embedded below). I bring a future Today I’m Toying With item on the show, too!
A VideoCardz leak has the Arc Pro B70, with 32 Xe2 graphics cores, 32GB of RAM and a 230W TDP, launching next week alongside a B65 with 20 Xe2 cores. It’s not clear if we’ll ever get the B770 gaming variant; Intel deleted a tweet about it in December.
“The reason for that is because, as I have explained very carefully, DLSS 5 fuses controllability of the of geometry and textures and everything about the game with generative AI,” Huang said, according to Tom’s Hardware, and he noted that developers can “fine-tune the generative AI.”
Still, it’s maybe not the best thing to say about the blowback to DLSS 5 right now.
The Asus ROG Strix G16 and G18 are getting a chip bump to the new Intel Core Ultra 9 290HX Plus. Both also have upgraded displays, with the G16 reaching 300Hz and the 240Hz G18 now using Mini LED. Pricing and availability are TBD.
Asus is also teasing a new flagship ROG Strix Scar 18 with RTX 5090 Laptop GPU and 290HX Plus CPU, expected in Q2.
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Nvidia’s also got a whole blog post dedicated to the “real-time neural rendering model that infuses pixels with photoreal lighting and materials.” It’s coming this fall with support from Bethesda, Capcom, Hotta Studio, NetEase, NCSoft, S-Game, Tencent, Ubisoft and Warner Bros. Games to start.
Microsoft’s big GDC announcement turned out to be bringing Xbox mode to every Windows 11 PC, starting next month. It’s the latest encouraging sign after Xbox’s big leadership shakeup, but Microsoft has work to do to earn back users’ trust.
Brick_wall_56:
On the surface, this seems great. I’m a moron who has my PC hooked up to my living room TV with Steam Big Picture mode booting at launch. I yearn for something like this.
But I have absolutely zero faith in Microsoft pulling this off in any way that makes me want to turn it on. There’s not a single MS product I enjoy using at this point, and I have no idea why this would be any different.
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It’s not clear, and Microsoft VP Jason Ronald wouldn’t tell us in person, saying more info about the Game Preservation program is on the way. But his written remarks include the phrase: “we’ll be rolling out new ways to play some of the most iconic games from our past.” What new ways? Well, it appears PC-first development is “compatible with next-gen game preservation.”
We’re in line for Microsoft’s keynote, but look what we spotted at its booth at GDC! “Cross-platform is the future of the Xbox ecosystem,” it writes. “Build for Xbox on PC.” Again, the future of Xbox is W.
It follows a similar suit filed two weeks ago by New York. Both allege that the loot boxes in games like Counter-Strike 2 are essentially gambling, and the class action accuses Valve of “deceptive, casino-style psychological tactics.”
During GDC on Tuesday, Nvidia announced that visionOS 26.4, expected later this spring, will include support for Nvidia’s XR streaming platform CloudXR 6.0, allowing users to play games like X-Plane 12 and iRacing on the Vision Pro. Developers will soon be able to test their games over the cloud, too, with GeForce NOW Playtest.
Microsoft sure seems to be hinting so! And I suspect Tom is right about what that means. (Better W than L, right?) The company will be at GDC on Wednesday with a “Building for the future with Xbox” keynote session.
If you are, Valve has a list of the 50 most-played demos. I only dabbled with a few, but I loved the one for the Vampire Survivors spinoff Vampire Crawlers.
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Any Xbox Insider PC can opt into Microsoft’s new “postgame recaps,” but the Xbox Ally X handheld’s integrated NPU takes it further with Copilot-generated “highlight reels.”
To start, it’ll only work with Among Us, Elden Ring, Fortnite, Forza Horizon 5, Lies of P, Overwatch, and Palworld. Let me know if it’s better than a normal recap?
