The next “drop pod” update for Halo Infinite arrives August 9, and it will include a number of features fans have long asked for.

As detailed in a new 343 Industries blog post, the upcoming drop pod (which is 343’s term for smaller, quality-of-life focused updates) will allow for unlocked visors to be used interchangeably between all of the game’s armor cores. That will apply to all visors to be added to the game in the future as well.

In addition, some helmet attachments exclusive to specific Mark VII helmets will be able to be worn on multiple Mark VII helmets. 343 states that not all Mark VII helmet attachments are interchangeable because many were made specifically for certain helmets, but ones that happen to fit well on other helmets will now be usable. A full list of all the helmet and attachment combinations will come with the update’s official patch notes closer to release.

The armor updates will come alongside the much-requested ability to view the game’s multiplayer challenges mid-match from the pause screen. However, challenge progress when viewed from the pause screen will not update in real time, as Halo Infinite currently calculates challenges at the end of a match. 343 says it is working to make it so challenge progress will be displayed as it happens during a match, but that will come at a later date.

On the playlist side of things, a ranked Doubles playlist will be coming along with a social Team Doubles playlist. The two playlists will go live two weeks after the arrival of the August 9 drop pod. 343 also mentions it is laying the groundwork for players to be able to select their matchmaking region for faster search times in the upcoming update, but that the feature itself is “still some time away.”

Halo Infinite recently concluded its first online campaign co-op test, at long last allowing players to explore Zeta Halo with a partner. According to a roadmap released earlier this year, 343 is targeting late August for the feature’s full release. After that, an open beta test for the game’s Forge map creation suite is expected to arrive sometime in September. Halo Infinite is currently in the middle of its second multiplayer season, which is set to end in November.

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Back in 2018, the Belgium Gambling Commission found that loot boxes were a form of gambling and recommended criminal prosecution against developers and publishers who implement them in their games. However, a new study found that Belgium’s ban is functionally not enforced.

As reported by GamesIndustry.biz, a study from loot box scholar Leon Y. Xiao found that the law has been unevenly and ineffectively implemented. The study claims that 82% of the highest-grossing iPhone titles in Belgium have loot box implementation. It goes on to claim that the ban gives parents and policymakers a “false sense of security.” In addition, the study emphasizes that the technical measures undertaken to prevent loot box purchasing in Belgium are easily circumvented by savvy players. Xiao concludes with recommending a less strict, but more thoughtfully enforced, policy.

Belgian’s policy did cause some broad changes in the country. After discussions with Belgian authorities, EA removed virtual currency from FIFA titles in the country. Nintendo ceased support for Animal Crossing: Pocket Camp and Fire Emblem Heroes to prevent prosecution or regulation. However, Xiao’s study argues that the ban allowed “non-compliant games to replace games that have been removed from the national market by more socially responsible companies.”

Other countries have investigated or introduced policy about loot boxes. Brazil opened an investigation of loot boxes last year. The UK recently encouraged the games industry to self-regulate after their own inquiry. Big games like Overwatch 2 and Halo Infinite have abandoned loot boxes monetization, despite including them in in their predecessors. Diablo Immortal prompted ongoing discussions about the connections between free-to-play monetization and gambling.

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Arcade1Up has revealed a Marvel vs. Capcom 2 home arcade cabinet, and fans won’t have to wait long to get their hands on it. Arcade1Up’s Marvel vs. Capcom 2 cabinet releases this fall, and you can sign up now for notifications on preorders, which will be available starting September 8. An exact release date hasn’t bee unveiled, but the cabinet will be available “a few weeks” after the preorder date.

While Arcade1Up has released cabinets themed around beloved classic fighting games in the Street Fighter and Mortal Kombat series, as well as the first Marvel vs. Capcom, the upcoming cabinet is arguably the most exciting yet. Marvel vs. Capcom 2 is widely praised as one of the best fighting games of all time, especially in the competitive fighting game scene.

Even though more than two decades have passed since its initial launch, people still play Marvel vs. Capcom 2 competitively. Though it won’t be at this weekend’s Evo 2022 tournament, it was a longtime fixture at the event, appearing in the lineup for nine straight years starting with Evo’s inaugural tournament in 2002.

Marvel vs. Capcom Arcade1Up cabinet

The Marvel vs. Capcom 2 competitive scene may even see a spike in interest due to the new cabinet and its support of Wi-Fi multiplayer. You can also play against a friend in local multiplayer, as there are two sets of sticks and buttons on the control panel. The cabinet will include the full lineup of 56 fighters.

Marvel vs. Capcom 2 is undoubtedly the most exciting aspect of the new cabinet, but as usual, the cabinet will be pre-loaded with a bunch of other games. Including Marvel vs. Capcom 2, the lineup features eight games, all eight of which support worldwide online multiplayer:

Marvel vs. CapcomMarvel vs. Capcom 2Marvel Super Heroes vs. Street FighterX-Men vs. Street FighterMarvel Super HeroesX-Men Children of the AtomX-Men Mutant ApocalypseMarvel Superheroes in War of the Gems

The five-foot cabinet (with riser) has brand-new Marvel vs. Capcom 2 art, a light-up marquee, and a 17-inch display. If you’ve never purchased an Arcade1Up cabinet, rest assured that they are very simple to assemble and disassemble, should you ever need to move the cabinet.

This isn’t the first time Arcade1Up has released a cabinet revolving around the Marvel vs. Capcom series, but it is the first one to include the iconic Marvel vs. Capcom 2. The first Marvel vs. Capcom cabinet (discontinued) included five games–Marvel vs. Capcom: Clash of the Heroes, Marvel Super Heroes vs. Street Fighter, Marvel Super Heroes, X-Men vs. Street Fighter, and Marvel Super Heroes in the War of the Gems. So yes, if also own that one, you’re getting some of the same games, but if you love Marvel vs. Capcom 2, the other games in the lineup are probably just nice bonuses.

There’s also an Arcade1Up Marvel vs. Capcom gaming table, which comes with eight games. This one is still available, and right now you can get it for $300 off at Amazon and Best Buy.

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Capcom has released Guile’s theme for Street Fighter 6, a brand-new track called Sharpened Sonic. Though it won’t replace his world-famous theme from Street Fighter II, Guile’s new music is no slouch in the audio department and is a proper banger that draws in elements from his previous themes. You can listen to it below.

This weekend is a big one for Street Fighter 6, as it’ll be featured in a panel today at the Evo 2022 tournament. While Street Fighter V is one of the main titles of the annual fighting game event, Street Fighter 6 will also be on the tournament floor in a playable form for attendees. Fans are also expecting a new character to be revealed, who’ll join the likes of Ryu, Luke, Chun-Li, and Guile.

If you’re interested in viewing all the action from home, you can check out GameSpot’s guide on how to watch Evo 2022. Even Mortal Kombat ko-kreator Ed Boon seems excited to see what Street Fighter 6 has to show off at Evo, as he confirmed that NetherRealm Studios won’t be making any announcements regarding its gory fighting game.

Capcom did mention back in June that Street Fighter 6 news will quiet down as the studio focuses on development, but there’s currently plenty to read about in case you missed its official reveal earlier this year. Guile got a dedicated reveal trailer at Summer Game Fest Live, Capcom confirmed that it will implement rollback netcode for Street Fighter 6’s multiplayer, and more details on combat revealed how the game is evolving for a new generation of players.

You can also read GameSpot’s hands-on Street Fighter 6 preview, which describes the brawler as having strong fundamentals ahead of its 2023 launch on PC, Xbox Series X|S, PS5, and PS4.

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Apex Legends Mobile Season 2 has been going well, in large part due to the battle royale game’s latest playable legend, Rhapsody. Like Fade, Rhapsody is described as a “mobile-first” legend, which means she’s exclusive to the mobile spin-off of Apex Legends–at least for now. As a full-time DJ and part-time hacker, Rhapsody is an incredibly fun support legend, possessing powerful sound-based abilities that disrupt opponents and enhance her allies.

At the start of Season 2, many players–myself included–believed Rhapsody was put into Apex Legends Mobile as early as she was for her ultimate ability, Rowdy’s Rave, which erects a flashing wall of light that blocks an opponent’s sight and scans. It seemed like Rhapsody was a preemptive measure to keep Apex Legends’ scan meta from popping up in Apex Legends Mobile. And although that meta did play a part in Rhapsody’s design, that isn’t the entire basis behind her design.

For context, the scan meta has been a hot topic in the Apex Legends community for years. Several characters have abilities that allow them to scan enemies and reveal their position through solid objects–it’s essentially built-in wallhacking, and there’s no means of countering it. As you might surmise, being able to see your enemy through a wall unopposed is an incredibly useful skill in a first-person shooter, encouraging squads to have at least one legend who can scan–like Bloodhound or Seer–in order to have a better chance at winning.

Dealing with the scan meta has become a complex issue, as scans have evolved with the addition of new characters. Ash‘s ability to reveal the position of a player’s killers is considered a scan, for example, as is Fuse‘s ability to highlight all enemies caught in his ultimate ability, The Motherlode. Even two of the abilities for Apex Legends Season 14‘s new character, Vantage, are considered scans, though neither works through walls like most other scan legends. With no singular definition of what a scan is, a hard counter in the console/PC game for all scans would be grossly overpowered–explaining Respawn’s hesitance to add an “anti-scan legend” to Apex Legends.

But in Apex Legends Mobile, where the only scanning legend as of Season 2 is Bloodhound, Respawn has an opportunity to dissuade that strategy from ever taking prominence by curating what type of scanning legends eventually make it into the game and what strategies are in place to counter them–counters like Rhapsody, the first true anti-scan legend.

“Rhapsody’s ultimate is definitely some nice counterplay to many of the scan-based abilities out there,” Apex Legends Mobile senior gameplay designer Jason Shifter told GameSpot. “We love when players find new ways to play in our game, so when we think of opportunities for new legends, we always look at current, past, and potential future metas. When Rhapsody was created, we wanted to fulfill the power fantasy of controlling sound. So the logical next step was to evaluate how her abilities would fit into the current dynamics and then decide how far to take it.”

The Apex Legends Mobile team likes how Rhapsody has performed so far, embodying their philosophy of creating characters that make players feel powerful and clever. “She landed in the space that we felt was a healthy addition to the current meta,” Shifter said.

The character has surprised Respawn too, as the team has seen data suggesting players are adapting her primarily outdoors-focused ability kit to fight indoors. And despite her role as a support legend, some players are using Rhapsody’s abilities more offensively or to compensate for Apex Legends Mobile’s current lack of recon characters.

“Players also utilize [Rowdy’s Rave] to create a flanking opportunity to get to a more advantageous position,” Apex Legends Mobile lead game designer Chad Wilson said. “We have seen teams coordinating with her to create a high mobility team paired with Octane’s jump pads. We have also noticed players utilizing her [passive] ability to successfully track legends and becoming a low-key ‘tracker’ character. One cool tactic I’ve been seeing more and more is using her ultimate as a diversion tactic. Since players can’t see if you’re behind the wall, they’ll often shoot through it thinking you’re there even when you’re not. It’s the perfect way to get opponents to reveal their locations and catch them off guard when you appear out of nowhere.”

Apex Legends Mobile features three support legends as of Season 2–Loba, Rhapsody, and Lifeline.

I really like Rhapsody too, but I’m biased. I’ve wanted a sound-based legend in Apex Legends for years, though I always imagined they’d be more like an auditory variation of Mirage, tricking opponents with noise as opposed to holograms. It didn’t take the Apex Legends Mobile team years to design and create Rhapsody so I sadly can’t take credit for manifesting her existence, but it did take a while–the process of her creation took months.

“Each one of these legends takes a while to create, however, the exact length of time is determined by the number of new mechanics and ensuring there’s enough time to iterate and refine them to ensure our mobile-first legends feel just as good as the other legends in the Apex Games,” Shifter said. “But creating a new legend goes beyond just developing the character mechanics. We also need to create all of the supporting content our players expect for new legends: Perks, [cinematics], their backstory and lore. All of that work combined is easily over 10 months for each mobile-first legend.”

When creating a character like Rhapsody, there’s also the third-person perspective to consider. Apex Legends Mobile supports third-person play, and that means character models and abilities for new characters need to be designed in a way that players understand what they’re doing and what’s happening to them whether they’re playing in first-person or third-person.

“Third-person [mode] plays a huge role,” Apex Legends Mobile creative director Kevin Childress said. “It’s a special Mobile-first feature that we need to celebrate, as it allows players to see themselves playing in the cool world we are building. [Rhapsody’s drone] Rowdy was especially important here to establish third-person visual language and offer players something awesome to look at while running and gunning. We are always asking ourselves, ‘How does it look in third-person? It needs to be awesome there too!’ Not only are we reviewing the abilities–it includes everything from run animations, slides, idles, and even how each legend holds guns in unique ways based on their personalities.”

Pretty much everything to do with Rhapsody features a healthy dose of purple.

Rhapsody also stands out in the Apex Legends universe’s playable roster (composed of 24 faces if you count all the legends across both the PC/console game and mobile game) in terms of both her color scheme and abilities. Whereas many of the playable characters feature muted colors for their default skin, Rhapsody rocks a vibrant purple. Her abilities are also all incredibly flashy and noisy–it’s hard to miss her presence in a match. Apex Legends has featured characters with outgoing personalities and obnoxiously obvious abilities before, but nothing quite like Rhapsody.

“Rhapsody’s hometown is Kómma, which has strong cyberpunk designs and colors–purple being one of them,” Apex Legends Mobile lead artist Bernie Kang told me. “We also wanted her color scheme to stand out amongst the existing legend lineup, so purple was an obvious choice for the team.”

“Rhapsody’s background is about performing concerts in an infamous nightlife city, which is both an auditory and visual experience, so we wanted players to feel like she could drop a massive party anywhere on the battlefield with loud music and dazzling lights,” Apex Legends Mobile lead writer Mike Rosenthal added. “She bombards the senses as a strategy.”

To ensure Rhapsody would be the best she could be, the Apex Legends Mobile team sought consultants while creating her. Written as a Vietnamese woman, the team wanted to ensure Rhapsody was designed accurately, and so Respawn formed a Community Council–which included, among others, the likes of G4TV host Gina Darling, Apex Legends streamer SamanthaKronos, ZA/UM writer Elise Trinh, and Respawn lead environmental artist Leah Augustine–to provide feedback on the character’s look, mannerisms, and lore.

We hosted a Community Council while polishing off our latest @PlayApexMobile Legend Rhapsody—one of the many ways we try to ensure proper representation. Grateful for the feedback from Vietnamese women in our gaming community!
Snippet from Gina on her experience from @G4TV ❤️ pic.twitter.com/5BXsw4L7o0

— Karen (@kalyrical) July 13, 2022

“Getting the cultural background right for a character is essential for us, and the most effective way to do that is to reach out to those with first-hand experience,” Rosenthal said. “Our UXR team organized a council of Vietnamese women from the Apex community to provide insight into how to develop Rhapsody. Vietnamese members at EA gave us guidance as well. We also hired an incredible voice actress with a Vietnamese background [Xanthe Huynh] who really brought the character to life.”

And, of course, the Apex Legends Mobile team works with the Apex Legends team in order to ensure the lore and backstory for the characters of both games can coexist in a way that makes sense. “We share our work and seek feedback during every step of development,” Rosenthal said. “This helps ensure our new characters fit well within the established Apex universe.”

Only Respawn knows whether that means we’ll eventually see Rhapsody cross over into Apex Legends for console/PC, either as a playable legend or a character in a Quest. For now, she’s a musical delight in Apex Legends Mobile and a bulwark against the scan meta.

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Following its latest earnings call, Square Enix is reportedly looking to sell stakes in some of its development studios in an effort to devote more resources to select titles.

According to games industry analyst David Gibson, the publisher will be reviewing its portfolio to see which studios it will want to retain full ownership of or offer stakes to other interested companies. As Gibson explained, Square Enix views this strategy as a way to devote “resources mainly to Japan titles” and could see interest from Sony, Tencent, and Nexon.

3) Phase 2 you say? Rising development costs of making games means with 100% owned studios, they need to be selective and concentrate resources, which limits expansion

— David Gibson (@gibbogame) August 5, 2022

7) Phase 2 = So SE is looking to sell stakes in its studios to others to improve capital efficiency. Right when others like Sony etc are buyers. I would expect Sony, Tencent, Nexon etc would be interested.

— David Gibson (@gibbogame) August 5, 2022

Some of the studios that Square Enix currently has under its belt include the four Creative Business Units responsible for Final Fantasy, Kingdom Hearts, and smaller titles, Luminous Productions, which is currently developing Forspoken, and Tokyo RPG Factory. As Gibson noted, Square Enix’s strategy is unusual as it has zero debt and more than enough operating cash to fund game development.

“Post the [Crystal Dynamics / Eidos Montreal] sale, the company will have [$1.4 billion] in cash and zero debt.” Gibson explained. “Which is plenty to fund expanded game investment and not sell down stakes in its studios.”

The earnings call also addressed the recent sale of Square Enix’s Western studios Eidos Montreal and Crystal Dynamics to Embracer Group. According to Gibson, these studios “cannibalized” sales from the rest of the group in general.

That sale was “Phase 1” of Square Enix’s plan, while Phase 2 will include the portfolio review. The publisher has also confirmed plans to invest in blockchain and NFT technologies, ideas that are at odds with the themes of one of its best-selling games, Final Fantasy VII.

1) Crystal Dynamics/Eidos (CD/E) sale was driven by concerns that the titles cannibalized sales of the rest of the group and so it could improve capital efficiency

— David Gibson (@gibbogame) August 5, 2022

Square Enix has plenty of games lined up for the future, which could make its proposition attractive to potential investors. An overhaul of Tactics Ogre is on the way, Forspoken will release next year, and Harvestella looks delicious. Beyond those games, the company’s heavyweight Final Fantasy franchise will see the launch of Final Fantasy XVI in Summer 2023 and Final Fantasy Rebirth in Winter 2023.

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The past few years have seen Intel and AMD delivering new processors in a staggered manner. In the sub-45W category, Intel’s incumbency has allowed it to deliver products for both the notebook and ultra-compact form factor (UCFF) within a few months of each other. On the other hand, AMD’s focus has been on the high-margin notebook market, with the chips filtering down to the desktop market a year or so down the road. In this context, AMD’s Cezanne (most SKUs based on the Zen 3 microarchitecture) and Intel’s Tiger Lake went head-to-head last year in the notebook market, while Rembrandt (based on Zen3+) and Alder Lake-P are tussling it out this year. In the desktop space, Cezanne-based mini-PCs started making an appearance a few months back, coinciding with the first wave of Alder Lake-P systems. ASRock Industrial launched the NUC BOX-1200 series (Alder Lake-P) and the 4X4 BOX-5000 series (Cezanne) within a few weeks of each other. The company sent over the flagship models in both lineups for review, giving us a chance to evaluate the performance and value proposition of the NUC BOX-1260P and 4X4 BOX-5800U. Read on to find out how Alder Lake-P and Cezanne stack up against each other in the mini-PC space, and a look into what helps ASRock Industrial introduce mini-PCs based on the latest processors well ahead of its competitors.

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Xur’s back in the Solar System in Destiny 2, offering a slate of new Exotics and Legendary weapons and armor for your perusal. We’re nearing the end of both the Solstice event and Season of the Haunted in Destiny 2, which means it’s time to gear up for a new season and a new raid. Here’s where you can find Xur and what Exotics he’s selling this weekend.

Xur lands with the daily reset on Friday, so we’ll update this article when he arrives.

Xur is present every weekend in Destiny 2, starting with the daily reset at 10 AM PT / 1 PM ET each Friday. His exact location is always a mystery when he first arrives, as he is not listed on the map, and for novice players, he can be easy to miss. However, there are a set number of locations where he takes up residence, including the Tower Hangar area, on Nessus in Watcher’s Grave, and in the Winding Cove area of the EDZ.

Alongside changes in his location, Xur’s inventory also rotates weekly. That means it’s worth visiting him each time to check out his new weapons and rolls on Exotic and Legendary armor. You can visit him any time between his arrival Friday and the weekly reset at 10 AM PT / 1 PM ET the following Tuesday when Xur departs the Solar System.

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Thanks to a new software development kit, Xbox Series S developers will now be able to create games that use more memory than ever before. The recent upgrade was implemented with the intention of giving developers more control over performance on the next-gen console.

As The Verge reported, this update is specifically for optimizing the Series S, which has lower memory and graphical power than the more expensive Series X. While the Series X has access to 16 GB of RAM, its smaller cousin has around 10 GB. Developers are further constrained to 8 GB, because around 2 GB of that total is used for the operating system. The recently released June Game Development Kit frees up hundreds of additional megabytes of memory. In a video explaining the update, this additional memory “can improve graphics performance in memory constrained conditions.”

As pointed out by the Verge, developers told YouTube hardware experts Digital Foundry that memory constraints were a particular problem in developing and optimizing for the Series S. The previously-mentioned video also states that many of the changes in the June Game Development Kit were the direct result of developer feedback.

This update comes alongside several changes to Xbox development tools and resources. The other significant change is improved performance for graphics allocation, allowing developers to use memory more efficiency without taking a graphics performance hit.

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Destiny 2‘s Iron Banner PvP event swapped the Control mode for Rift during Season of the Haunted, but for Season 18, it’ll be getting more chaotic with the new Eruption mode. Eruption tasks players with earning kill streaks, with each new elimination providing significant power-ups as a match goes on.

Bungie describes Eruption as “Clash with energy boosts based on kill streaks” that starts out with regular team deathmatch rules. One kill earns you one point, but two kills in a row will apply the “Surging” buff to your Guardian. With this effect active, players will begin to glow and each new kill in their streak will generate 10% Super energy and 20% grenade, melee, and class energy. They’ll also earn three points per elimination, and on the fifth kill, will become “Primed.”

If they glow, then they must die

Once Primed, everyone on your team will gain 5% Super and 10% grenade, melee, and class energy, while you’ll gain 12% Super and 5% grenade, melee, and class energy per kill, and three points per kill. The catch here is that you’ll have a 15-second timer applied which will cause you to “erupt” once it reaches zero, resetting your streak and ending the perks for your teammates. And also killing you. For the opposing team, you’ll be visible to them on the map and they’ll gain three points each time they eliminate you.

Your own team can also see you wherever you are on the map, and more than one player can be Primed at a time. Eruption will be unique to the Iron Banner, which only takes place twice a season now. As for Rift, Bungie isn’t abandoning that mode and will add it to the weekly rotator in the Crucible from Season 18. Rift is being tweaked for next season and will have more standard overtime rules when it returns, while Multispark is also expected to make a comeback in a future season.

Bungie says that it also wants to explore 3v3 Rift in the future, which will allow it to use smaller maps like Wormhaven and the slightly asymmetrical Burnout. There’ll also be smaller tweaks to the mode that will make it more competitive and fast-paced. In other Destiny 2 news, the Solstice grind got a little bit easier with this week’s patch and Season 18 will kick off with a Destiny 2 showcase on August 23. You can check out the latest Iron Banter column for why the next raid should be Rise of Iron’s superb Wrath of the Machine.

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