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As previously reported, Rockstar and Take-Two are taking every precaution to avoid leaks of the upcoming Grand Theft Auto VI, with the pair having [Only registered and activated users can see links. Click Here To Register...]. According to a new leak published by Polish news site, [Only registered and activated users can see links. Click Here To Register...], video game vendors are claiming that GTA VI will be a digital-only launch. In 2026, it's almost expected for games to be digital-only on PC, but this will apparently be true for both the console and PC versions of the game. Supposedly, the digital-only launch strategy is to avoid the possibility of leaks via retail employees. It should be noted, though, that GTA VI will eventually become available in physical form, but there will be a short delay between the digital-only launch and the physical launch.

In order for games, and other physical products to be available at launch, retailers have to have stock ready ahead of time, and it's [Only registered and activated users can see links. Click Here To Register...] at the game and, for example, post a picture or even footage of the packaging, or even of the gameplay itself, to the internet. Presumably, the thinking is that, by staggering the physical release, retailers won't have access to the game ahead of launch, so they won't be able to leak anything. The retailer claims to not know when the physical release will happen, but unless Take-Two really wants to make physical game buyers hurt for their chance to get at the game, it seems likely that the delay between the digital and physical releases won't be much longer than a few weeks, at most. After numerous delays, GTA VI is currently [Only registered and activated users can see links. Click Here To Register...], so it wouldn't be surprising to see the physical edition launch before Christmas.[Only registered and activated users can see links. Click Here To Register...]

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Highguard, the debut free-to-play PvP "raid shooter" from Wildlight Entertainment, [Only registered and activated users can see links. Click Here To Register...], after much hype, owing to the new studio's veteran leadership. However, that hype was seemingly misplaced, as, despite peaking at over 95,000 concurrent players little over an hour after launch, Highguard has already earned itself a "Mostly Negative" review rating on Steam. According to [Only registered and activated users can see links. Click Here To Register...], 78.2%, or 8,383 players left negative reviews on Steam, with only 2,333 of the 10,716 total reviews praising the game. So far, the studio behind the game has not made any comments about initial performance or player sentiment, but it looks like it might be another case similar to that of [Only registered and activated users can see links. Click Here To Register...], despite its predecessor's loyal player-base and a very recent launch.

Most of the criticism of the game seems to be centered around a lack of direction—the developers seemingly trying too hard to appeal to everyone instead of making a focused experience—poor map and interaction design, discordant pacing and mechanics, and lackluster performance. Some players also took issue with the fact that it was essentially a 3v3 shooter with a sizeable map and tedious mining and looting that don't seem to fit in with the game's stated goal of fast-paced gunplay. Many of these sentiments were echoed by players on r/PS5 on Reddit, where players also expressed frustration about the game's poor image quality, or "fuzziness" and with what seems like a never-ending flood of MOBAs and shooters.[Only registered and activated users can see links. Click Here To Register...] [Only registered and activated users can see links. Click Here To Register...] [Only registered and activated users can see links. Click Here To Register...]

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Sony looks to be planning a State of Play event in February 2026, according to notable insider, [Only registered and activated users can see links. Click Here To Register...]. The leaker goes on to say in a reply that the State of Play is scheduled for the first half of February, specifically the 12th, although he didn't expand on what he expects to launch or show up at the event. The confirmation of the State of Play has expectedly led to a lot of speculation over what may be announced. For one, many are expecting word on that [Only registered and activated users can see links. Click Here To Register...].

The list of 2026 launches that Sony has officially acknowledged is also quite large, including Marvel's Wolverine, Dune: Awakening, Onimusha: Way of the Sword, and Saros, which is currently already available for pre-order—just to name a few. It's likely that there will be some additional gameplay or showcase of these games, as well as the upcoming Marvel Tōkon: Fighting Souls 4v4 fighting game. It has also been [Only registered and activated users can see links. Click Here To Register...] that Rockstar is working on a next-gen Red Dead Redemption 2, and there has been no shortage of speculation about that revisit potentially showing up at the February State of Play.[Only registered and activated users can see links. Click Here To Register...]

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The intriguing "GFX13" identifier has turned up again, after [Only registered and activated users can see links. Click Here To Register...] of [Only registered and activated users can see links. Click Here To Register...]. Late last Friday (January 23), Kepler_L2 highlighted a public-facing LLVM Project update that defines initial support of Team Red's "gfx1310 target." One team member comment points to this new property being identical—as a temporary arrangement—to the RDNA 4 generation's "GFX12" and "GFX1250" IDs. Prior to 2026, a bunch of AMD patch notes mentioned early "GFX13" commitments, alongside next-gen [Only registered and activated users can see links. Click Here To Register...] graphics architectures.

It is believed that last week's LLVM 23 compiler release only refers to "RDNA 5," leading to speculation about a forthcoming theoretical "Radeon RX 10000" discrete graphics card family. This next wave is not expected to launch any time soon; industry observers posit a vague mid-2027 launch window—maybe coinciding with unleashings of [Only registered and activated users can see links. Click Here To Register...], although present-day market conditions could spoil Microsoft and Sony's best laid plans. Phoronix's founder and Editor-in-Chief, Michael Larabel, is looking forward to the August/September arrival of AMD's LLVM 23.1 stable release—by that time "GFX13" support could have advanced to another stage of development, thus providing further insights.[Only registered and activated users can see links. Click Here To Register...] [Only registered and activated users can see links. Click Here To Register...] [Only registered and activated users can see links. Click Here To Register...] [Only registered and activated users can see links. Click Here To Register...]

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Lots of games offer intense, competitive, squad-based action, but I can't think of any besides [Only registered and activated users can see links. Click Here To Register...] where I can sling spells and bullets from the back of a majestic, galloping bear as I charge in to destroy an enemy fortress. Highguard turned a lot of heads with its flashy reveal at the end of the Game Awards last month, but many were left wanting to know more about this mysterious debut from [Only registered and activated users can see links. Click Here To Register...], a new studio of Apex Legends, Titanfall, and Call of Duty veterans.

The developers are first to admit that the intervening month has been quiet, but are confident that the game they've toiled over in secret for four years will speak for itself on release today. I spent a whole day playing the game and interviewing its lead developers and studio founders last week, and I am here to tell you exactly what we're all about to play with Highguard.[Only registered and activated users can see links. Click Here To Register...] [Only registered and activated users can see links. Click Here To Register...] [Only registered and activated users can see links. Click Here To Register...] [Only registered and activated users can see links. Click Here To Register...]
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Last week, AMD revealed further (post-CES) [Only registered and activated users can see links. Click Here To Register...] details—namely an officially confirmed [Only registered and activated users can see links. Click Here To Register...]. This 8-core 3D V-Cache-augmented gaming desktop processor's arrival has not been timed to perfection; as evidenced by a [Only registered and activated users can see links. Click Here To Register...]. The ongoing computer memory supply crisis has caused many "rethinks" at affected manufacturers, with a handful of key players dipping back into older product lines. Extraordinary circumstances have led to the resurgence of DDR4 memory products—currently, this older—still viable—standard has experienced price hikes, albeit not to the extent of newer DDR5 sticks. In China, AMD and involved hardware partners have taken the unusual step of bundling the brand-new Ryzen 7 9850X3D OEM(?) model with a 32 GB (2 x 16 GB) DDR5 kit, and a CPU air cooler.

Photos of a boxed retail example were uploaded to JustBuy's Bilibili blog, showing a likely region-exclusive package that is advertised as including Team Red's newest member of "Granite Ridge" processor family, V-Color Manta XFinity+ OLED DDR5 memory, and a white Cooler Master [Only registered and activated users can see links. Click Here To Register...] Pro tower cooler. The exact specifications of V-Color's bundled-in kit were not visible, or described by the JoyBuy previewer—apparently this partnership-produced combo was unveiled during a recent Cooler Master event in China. In a joking assumption, UNIKO's Hardware proposed lowly 4800 CL58 credentials—clearly riffing on the AMD marketing team's reported claim that "DDR5-6000 to DDR5-4800 memory yields less than a 1% drop of FPS." Several PC hardware news outlets have assumed that V-Color has supplied Manta XFinity+ OLED DDR5-6000 CL26 kits, leading to a total price estimate of sub-$1100 for the snazzy Cooler Master ($79.99) x AMD ($499 MSRP) x V-Color (~$509) box and contents.[Only registered and activated users can see links. Click Here To Register...] [Only registered and activated users can see links. Click Here To Register...] [Only registered and activated users can see links. Click Here To Register...] [Only registered and activated users can see links. Click Here To Register...]

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NVIDIA and CoreWeave, Inc. today announced an expansion of their long-standing complementary relationship to enable CoreWeave to accelerate the buildout of more than 5 gigawatts of AI factories by 2030 to advance AI adoption at global scale. In addition, NVIDIA has invested $2 billion in CoreWeave Class A common stock at a purchase price of $87.20 per share. The investment reflects NVIDIA's confidence in CoreWeave's business, team and growth strategy as a cloud platform built on NVIDIA infrastructure.

"AI is entering its next frontier and driving the [Only registered and activated users can see links. Click Here To Register...]," said Jensen Huang, founder and CEO of NVIDIA. "CoreWeave's deep AI factory expertise, platform software and unmatched execution velocity are recognized across the industry. Together, we're racing to meet extraordinary demand for NVIDIA AI factories—the foundation of the AI industrial revolution."[Only registered and activated users can see links. Click Here To Register...] [Only registered and activated users can see links. Click Here To Register...] [Only registered and activated users can see links. Click Here To Register...]
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If you're wondering where the big "Battlemage" GPUs are, they are reportedly being shipped, but primarily for the professional visualization sector and AI builders. According to a leak from VideoCardz, Intel's upcoming [Only registered and activated users can see links. Click Here To Register...] are part of this release, using the long-rumored BMG-G31 GPU die that Intel has prepared for the higher-end GPUs. Starting with the higher-end Arc Pro B70, Intel plans a BMG-G31 configuration with 32 Xe2 cores and 32 GB of GDDR6 memory on a 256-bit bus. This will equal to about 4,096 FP32 cores in its full configuration, which is exactly twice the core count of the Arc Pro B60, and twice its memory capacity on a single-GPU version. For its smaller sibling Arc Pro B65, Intel has cut BMG-G31 die to support 2,560 FP32 cores, with 20 Xe2 cores in total. This is the same core configuration as the Arc Pro B60, but this card comes with 32 GB of GDDR6 memory out of the box, 8 GB higher than the Arc Pro B60.

Intel will launch both GPUs in the first quarter of this year. With January almost over, a February or March release seems likely. For local AI LLM development and workstations needing more computational power, Intel is gradually entering this market to address the gap left by AMD and NVIDIA, offering high memory capacities and a good price/performance ratio. However, the situation is different for gaming GPUs. According to VideoCardz, Intel's board partners have received the BMG-G31 dies for testing and integration into customized designs, but only for the Pro SKU. No gaming chips have been shipped. Intel is reportedly delaying the larger Arc B770 gaming GPU to focus on the Pro-Viz segment. As a result, no near-term launch is planned for the gaming version, leaving the release of the B770 uncertain.[Only registered and activated users can see links. Click Here To Register...] [Only registered and activated users can see links. Click Here To Register...]

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Lately and supposedly, the Samsung Foundry has "stabilized" yields of its cutting-edge 2 nm GAA node process (SF2); enough to qualify as being [Only registered and activated users can see links. Click Here To Register...]. Despite rumors of a yield rate hovering around the 50% mark, the South Korean semiconductor specialist seems to be proceeding with high-volume manufacturing of Exynos 2600 application processors. This [Only registered and activated users can see links. Click Here To Register...] is expected to become the foundry service's SF2 "proof of concept," as finalized silicon gets released within upcoming Galaxy S26 and S26+ devices. A fresh Chosun Daily article cites recent research done by KB Securities—with head analyst, Kim Dong-won, projecting a return to profit—in 2027—for the Samsung's chip making business. Prior to the early success of SF2, the megacorp's foundry division has been "recording trillions of won in losses since 2022," but new deals could lead to much better fortunes in the next financial year. KB Securities reckons that "performance is expected to turn a profit next year from a loss of 7 trillion won last year, thanks to an increase in operating rates following the expansion of [Only registered and activated users can see links. Click Here To Register...]."

One industry insider commented on present-day goings-on with company leadership: "they are accelerating order intake with the goal of turning a profit next year. In addition to the stabilization of yields in advanced processes below [URL="https://www.techpowerup.com/328680/samsungs-second-gen-3-nm-gaa-process-shows-20-yields-missing-production-goals"]3 nm (

Intel apparently has no plans to compete with the high-power iGPUs in AMD's Strix Halo APUs. This is according to Intel's Tom Petersen, who recently spoke to [Only registered and activated users can see links. Click Here To Register...] about the potential for a Panther Lake Halo, as it were, explaining that there are many factors currently preventing Intel from going down that route. While [Only registered and activated users can see links. Click Here To Register...] in the Ryzen AI Max+ 395 and similar, it seems as though that's where Intel will stop for now, with Petersen reportedly saying that that sort of performance segment is "primarily discrete," and that those looking for that sort of performance "would be better served by a small, discrete GPU that's going to be provided by third parties."

He goes on to explain that [Only registered and activated users can see links. Click Here To Register...] aren't as efficient, stating that "AMD's current product is not that competitive either, on a power or a performance-per-watt basis," and that Intel is "focused on integrated graphics performance, primarily for gaming." Much like AMD, Intel produces both integrated and discrete graphics solutions, with the latest Arc GPU rumors pointing to a workstation-grade Battlemage BMG-G31 GPU, which is supposed to arrive later this year in the form of the Arc Pro B70 GPU with 32 GB of VRAM. Currently, the Intel Arc B580 is Intel's most powerful gaming GPU, and that delivers [Only registered and activated users can see links. Click Here To Register...], depending on the specific workload.[Only registered and activated users can see links. Click Here To Register...] [Only registered and activated users can see links. Click Here To Register...]

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AMD's RDNA 3.5 integrated graphics is poised to become one of the company's longest-running iGPUs. A slide generated by AI and shared on the Chinese Weibo forums by Golden Pig Upgrade suggests that AMD plans to use RDNA 3.5 until 2029, making it one of the most enduring versions of RDNA GPUs. Although this slide is not an official roadmap, it provides insight into the company's future plans. Golden Pig Upgrade is known for accurate information from various industry sources, lending credibility to this illustration of AMD's product strategy. According to this roadmap, most consumers buying laptops in the coming years will experience the same integrated graphics capabilities as those found in today's Ryzen AI 300 and 400 series processors.

AMD seems to be reserving architectural updates for high-end "Halo" products, potentially equipping the rumored "[Only registered and activated users can see links. Click Here To Register...]" lineup's premium variants that use separate GPU tiles with the next-generation RDNA 5. However, standard "Medusa Point" chips are expected to maintain the existing RDNA 3.5 architecture. This approach effectively halts progress in integrated graphics for most of AMD's product line, leaving office laptops and midrange machines without significant visual performance improvements until the end of the decade. The only expected advancements in the coming years are at the CPU level, making the future "Zen 6" architecture the main attraction for midrange laptops. AMD's only chance to boost iGPU performance in the near future would be by increasing the number of compute units, either through a larger die area or a more advanced manufacturing process that allows for a denser package. However, with RDNA 5 anticipated for "Medusa Halo" and other products, this seems less likely.[Only registered and activated users can see links. Click Here To Register...]
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[Only registered and activated users can see links. Click Here To Register...] will be launching on February 10th, 2026 for $17.99. The island of Tormentosa beckons you, filled with religious fanatics and terrifying monsters, all inspired by real statues found throughout Spain. Today you can read previews from dozens of global media outlets and creators who were able to play the game early. You'll notice that many found the "blood as your weapon" balancing act to put the "survival" back in "survival horror."

Crisol: Theater of Idols is a first-person horror/action game set in Hispania, a twisted version of Spain. Play as Gabriel, a soldier who uses blood as both weapon and lifeline. Explore the cursed island of Tormentosa, uncover dark secrets, and battle horrifying enemies. Will you survive? Crisol is developed by [Only registered and activated users can see links. Click Here To Register...] and published by [Only registered and activated users can see links. Click Here To Register...].[Only registered and activated users can see links. Click Here To Register...] [Only registered and activated users can see links. Click Here To Register...] [Only registered and activated users can see links. Click Here To Register...] [Only registered and activated users can see links. Click Here To Register...]
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