Destiny 2’sInto the Light update has brought back a fan-favorite shader from the original Destiny: Superblack. This shader gives your weapons and armor a jet-black appearance with no additional colors. Emissive materials will glow white, but everything else is colored black, making this the perfect shader if you’re using multiple armor pieces with misaligned color channels. But as with all shaders, you’ll need to unlock Superblack first before you can use it, and doing so is more difficult than one might expect....

Quick Links The various mines and dungeons ofStardew Valleyare valuable sources of materials and loot. As you explore these areas, however, you’ll need to be wary of the different enemies that roam here. While slimes and bugs may provide little challenge, deeper areas will have more fearsome monsters roaming about. To improve your chances of surviving, you can consume various items, or you can equip different pieces of gear. These can increase your stats, such as defense, speed, luck, and more....

Summary Madden 24is a lot of fun, especially if you play online, because the competition can be so varied, and it makes for more exciting games than you get from the computer. However, if you are losing constantly, it can be frustrating. While even the best players will fall to the mercy of the football gods from time to time, there are some things you can do to minimize the risk of your opponent coming out ahead....

It’s time to pick up the pace withDragon’s Dogma 2. I loved exploring Vermund, specifically because that’s what Dragon’s Dogma 2 wants you to do. The actual quests are so-so, the characters aren’t particularly engaging, and – wait, why am I enjoying this game again? Oh yeah, exploring. Theemergent storytellingin Dragon’s Dogma 2 is second to none. Every fight against even the most basic enemy can be fatal if you switch off for a second, and you always run the risk ofgetting third-partied by a roaming Cyclops or Minotaur....

Summary When it comes to the most valuable cards inMagic: The Gatheringright now, chances are you’ll have heard of the Black Lotus. It’s gained a very well-earned reputation for being one of the most expensive cards in the collectibles market, routinely selling for hundreds of thousands of dollars, with two high profile examples beinga Black Lotus that sold back in 2023 for $540,000, and a signed version that was bought by MTG celebrity enthusiast Post Malone for $800,000....

Who doesn’t love Super Mario? Entertaining us since his debut in 1985, the Super Mario World characters are still as beloved as ever. With such an enduring legacy, older fans now get to watch as young fans are captivated by Mario and friends’ fun-filled adventures in the Mushroom Kingdom. For young fans looking to bring a touch of the colorful Super Mario world into their everyday wardrobe, there is no shortage of Super Mario-themed clothing to choose from for back-to-school shopping or a simple but stylish Nintendo fashion statement....

Summary Nintendowon’t be attending Gamescom this year, skipping one of the largest industry events of the summer. This comes amidst rumours that Nintendo is preparing to announce its next console, often referred to as the Switch 2. Recent reports suggest thatit will be with us in early 2025, although we now know that it won’t be revealed at Gamescom this August. The news was just reported byVGCafter Nintendo issued a statement to the German news site,Games Wirtschaft....

Summary The Spanish version of thePaper Mario: The Thousand-Year Door remakeremoves a reference toSuper Smash Bros. Meleethat was in the original game. One of the best things about the Mario RPG games is how they’re not afraid to get a little self-referential and have fun with the fact that they’re part of the widerNintendouniverse. We saw this inSuper Mario RPGandhow it randomly had Link and Samus show up during the adventure, and we see it in Paper Mario: The Thousand-Year Dooras well thanks to the fan-favourite Fire Emblem Toad....

Summary There are now more than 1,000Pokemonfor The Pokemon Company to choose from whenever it decides which ones it’s going to feature in its next merch lines. Whether there are 1,000 or 10,000 Pokemon, the likes of Pikachu and the Kanto starters will never be overlooked. However, as new stars such as Scorbunny and Wooloo are given their share of the spotlight, older favorites have to make room. That’s the only explanation I can come up with for Gengar still not having its ownFunko Pop....

Last weekend,Remedysurprise dropped Night Springs,Alan Wake 2’s first expansion. The story-focused DLC is composed of three episodes, all of which draw on the series’ Twilight Zone-inspired in-universe TV show called, you guessed it: Night Springs. What Happened To Single-Player DLC? Over the past decade, this kind of DLC has mostly fallen out of fashion. Rockstar put out multiple single-player expansions forGrand Theft Auto 4but, withGTA 5, it instead put all of that energy into the game’s live service component,GTA Online....

Summary Congratulations gamers, you won this one. After a weekend of severe online backlash, widespread review bombing, and targeted developer harassment, Sony has finally backed down on its decision to enforce mandatory PSN account linking for Helldivers 2 players on PC. This is a win-win for almost everybody. The gamers win because they successfully revolted against Sony until they got their way, Sony wins because it gets to act like it listens and cares about its players, and Arrowhead Game Studios wins because itgets to act like it was on our side all along, fighting back against big bad Sony for gamer rights....

Summary Star Warsis an absolutely massive franchise, spanning hundreds of projects ranging from movies and video games to comics and short novels. It can be difficult to fit all of those projectsinto one established canon, which is why older titles such as the beloved Star Wars FPS Republic Commando can fall by the wayside a little bit. Star Wars: The Bad Batch has been doing its best to reestablish the title as canon following Disney’s purchase of the franchise back in 2012, though Republic Commando fans are probably wishing right now that it didn’t bother....

Summary It’s rough out there right now if you’re aStarfieldfan. We know that more content is on the wayin the Shattered Space DLCcoming at some point this year, but with a third of 2024 already gone, we’re still yet to hear any news about it. It’s left some fans in a state of limbo, with a handful of small updates to get them by until Starfield’s next big content drop....