AMD's next CPU launch is going to be the Gorgon Point family. Don't wet yourself in excitement; they're primarily refreshed Strix Point silicon. At least, that's been the gist of all the leaks and rumors so far, but now we have yet another set of leaks that all but confirm the truth. New results found in the SiSoft Sandra database as well
Security researchers at Threat Fabric have discovered new malware targeting Android devices, which is still "in a development or limited testing phase." However, even in its current form it’s still incredibly potent, enabling attackers to take complete control of a victim’s device including obtaining access to encrypted messages.
This new
Thermaltake has expanded its mid-tower lineup with the S380, a new ATX chassis designed around maximum mesh and high airflow. The case is built to support the latest system architectures, including next-generation back-connector motherboards.
The S380 ships with four pre-installed 120mm fans from Thermaltake's new SF series, of which three are part of a single SF360 ARGB PWM Reverse Fan (a triple-fan unit) mounted on the PSU cover, acting as intake to push focused airflow directly onto the graphics card. A standard SF120 fan is placed at the rear for exhaust. This airflow design supports a 360mm AIO cooler at both the top and front panels.
The interior supports both standard ATX and the new hidden-connector boards from Asus BTF, MSI Project Zero, and Gigabyte Project Stealth. The S380 offers generous component clearance, fitting graphics cards up to 400mm long, CPU coolers up to 180mm tall, and PSUs up to 200mm long.
The chassis is fully modular, allowing panels to be easily detached for access and featuring extensive cable routing channels. It also includes an integrated, adjustable graphics card bracket to eliminate GPU sag. For connectivity, the top-mounted I/O panel includes one USB-C 3.2 Gen 2 port and two USB 3.0 ports. The Thermaltake S380 is priced at €119.90.
KitGuru says: For its price and features, the S380 could be an interesting option in its segment. Of the two colour options, which one would you choose?
The post Thermaltake launches S380 mid-tower with back-connector motherboard support first appeared on KitGuru.Despite being powerful enough to run many current-generation games, Nintendo opted to keep the internal storage for the Switch 2 relatively small to keep costs down. The console ships with just 256GB of storage, which is already presenting an issue, as big games like Final Fantasy 7 Remake Intergrade will eat up almost half of your available storage.
Square Enix has issued a correction for the storage requirements for Final Fantasy 7 Remake on Switch 2. Initially, the install size was believed to be around 90GB, but Square Enix has since revised this to 95GB for the standard edition, and up to 99GB for the deluxe edition due to the extra addon content.
As pointed out by VGC, Final Fantasy Remake isn't the only game posing trouble for Switch 2 storage. Games like Assassin's Creed Shadows, HITMAN: World of Assassination and Cyberpunk 2077: Ultimate Edition all require 60GB of space each. Meanwhile, titles like Star Wars Outlaws and Hogwarts Legacy demand just over 20GB of storage.
Developers are going to have to think carefully and optimise file sizes for the Switch 2 in the years ahead. While the Switch 2 does have expandable storage via an SD Card slot, these are slower than the internal storage and will lead to longer loading times and potentially reduced performance, depending on the game.
Perhaps by the time the Switch 2 OLED rolls around, Nintendo will rethink its storage offering and give users a bit more space to work with.
KitGuru Says: 256GB is not a lot of storage space in the modern gaming landscape, where many AAA titles breach the 100GB barrier. I dread to think how much space a full-fledged Call of Duty title will eat up by the time Microsoft brings the series back to Nintendo consoles.
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OLED gaming monitors have been growing rapidly in popularity amongst PC gamers over the past few years. According to new market analysis, around 12 percent of all 144Hz gaming monitors shipped will be OLED displays by Q4 2025.
A Context Sell market research report obtained by AOC shows that in Q2 2025, 9% of all 144Hz monitors shipped were OLED models. That figure is set to rise to 12% in Q4 2025. This is a rise from 8% volume in Q4 last year. The rise can be attributed to the latest QD-OLED panel technology, combined with reduced prices throughout 2025, making the technology more accessible to the PC gaming masses.
OLED displays grant many benefits for gaming, thanks to true blacks, vibrant colours, a near infinite contrast ratio, combined with ultra-low response times and high refresh rates, with some QD-OLED monitors hitting 500Hz, like the new AOC AG276QKD2.
AOC has several other competitive OLED monitors on the market too, like the AG276QZD2, which offers QHD resolution at 240Hz. For those making the jump to 4K, the AG276UZD and AG326UD offer UHD resolution at 240Hz in 27-inch and 32-inch display sizes. For fans of ultrawide displays, there is the AG346UCD, which has 3440×1440 resolution at 175Hz.
KitGuru Says: Have you made the jump to an OLED gaming monitor this year?
The post Market research shows growing popularity of OLED gaming monitors first appeared on KitGuru.In a surprising move, former rivals Unity and Epic Games have announced a major collaboration that will expand opportunities for game developers across both ecosystems. The partnership, revealed today at Unity's annual developer conference, signals a significant step towards a more open platform philosophy.
The core of the collaboration is twofold. First, Unity games will now be publishable within Fortnite, which currently boasts over 500 million registered users. This move gives Unity developers direct access to Epic's massive ecosystem and allows them to participate in the Fortnite Creator Economy.
Second, Unity will bring Unreal Engine support to its new cross-platform commerce platform. This system, which lets developers manage digital catalogs, payment providers, and live operations from a single dashboard, will soon offer a new choice to Unreal Engine creators. Developers using Epic's engine will gain new options for managing pricing, promotions, and web shops across PC, mobile, and the web, with support rolling out early next year.
The CEOs of both companies framed the move as pragmatic and necessary for industry growth. Unity CEO Matt Bromberg emphasized that “choice and open systems create growth for everyone”, while Epic Games Founder Tim Sweeney stated that collaboration is required to build the “open metaverse in a way that's interoperable and fair”.
Discuss on our Facebook page, HERE.
KitGuru says: How do you expect this partnership to affect Fortnite's growth?
The post Unity and Epic Games announce major partnership: Unity games coming to Fortnite first appeared on KitGuru.We may need to brace ourselves for an unexpectedly high price for Valve's upcoming Steam Machine. While the system is marketed as a PC-based console alternative, Valve has said that it intends to price it “like a PC” rather than a console.
While console prices typically come down over the course of a generation, this time, both the Xbox Series X/S and the PS5 have received repeated price increases since launching in 2020. At this point, an Xbox Series X will set you back around $650 and the situation is similar for the PS5. For Sony's PS5 Pro, the situation is even worse, with prices rising to $799, far above the launch price of last-gen's PS4 Pro console.
While Valve has not officially confirmed pricing for its new Steam Machine, Steam Frame VR headset or the new Steam Controller, while speaking with LinusTechTips, a Valve representative did say that the Steam Machine will be “priced like a PC”.
If we look at Valve's current hardware line-up, which includes various Steam Deck LCD and Steam Deck OLED models, pricing for the top-end model there is $650, the equivalent of a current-gen console. The Steam Machine is said to be six times more powerful than the Steam Deck, thanks to its six-core Zen 4 CPU and custom RDNA 3 GPU. Considering all of that, we may well see the Steam Machine launch around or even above the $1000 mark.
Valve will confirm pricing for its new hardware closer to launch. Currently, the Steam Machine, Steam Controller and Steam Frame are all scheduled to launch in Q1 2026, assuming there are no delays.
Discuss on our Facebook page, HERE.
KitGuru Says: As interested as I am in the Steam Machine, if its priced much higher than the PS5 Pro, I won't be pulling the trigger. It may have the capability of a full-fledged PC, but its GPU specs look fairly weak for 4K gaming on paper, and the majority will likely be buying one of these as a console replacement to hook up to a 4K TV.
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Avalanche Studios has officially shut down its UK office in Liverpool. The news follows on from the cancellation of a publishing agreement between Avalanche and Xbox Game Studios for the long in-development game, Contraband.
Shortly after the cancellation of the publishing deal, Avalanche Studios said that it was pausing development to “evaluate the project's future”. That evaluation appears to have come to an end now, with the Avalanche Studio in Liverpool officially shutting its doors today.
In its announcement today, Avalanche said: “We can now confirm that this process has concluded, that the studio has closed and that we have parted ways with 31 people”.
Avalanche has still not publicly stated that Contraband is fully cancelled. However, with the team behind it now gone, it seems unlikely that the project will be revived. At the very least, development would likely need to be rebooted under a new creative team.
Discuss on our Facebook page, HERE.
KitGuru Says: The recent shake-up at Xbox Game Studios has had far reaching implications, even impacting teams not directly under the Microsoft umbrella like Avalanche and Crytal Dynamics.
The post Avalanche officially closes UK studio following Contraband cancelation first appeared on KitGuru.Nvidia recently released new drivers for Call of Duty: Black Ops 7, but it has now been forced to issue an emergency hotfix. The company confirmed that a significant performance regression in several games was caused not by its own software, but by Microsoft’s recent Windows 11 October 2025 update.
Nvidia's Hotfix Display Driver version 581.94 was released specifically to mitigate performance issues caused by installing the KB5066835 update (via Videocardz). This patch, which affects various Windows 11 versions, was causing lower frame rates and stuttering across multiple titles. Although Microsoft's official “Known Issues” list does not mention the problem, user reports immediately suggested smoother performance in games like Black Ops 7 and Battlefield 6 after installing the hotfix.
The 581.94 hotfix is an emergency beta release based on the existing Game Ready Driver 581.80. Users who are not currently experiencing performance problems with the affected Windows update are generally advised to wait for the formal WHQL driver release for maximum system stability. However, if you want to download it right away, you can get it HERE.
Discuss on our Facebook page, HERE.
KitGuru says: Did you update your Windows with the KB5066835 package? Have you noticed any performance degradation?
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Intel's next truly interesting processor release—sorry, Arrow Lake Refresh—is going to be the launch of its Panther Lake mobile processors. As it turns out, we now know exactly when that's happening: not Q4 '25 as rumored, but indeed Q1 '26, at the Consumer Electronics Show in lovely Las Vegas. We know that because Intel itself said so. In
New navigation features are beginning to roll out to Google Maps that are coming just in time as millions of people hit the road for holiday travel. The company says that these new features are designed to help users save time and be better prepared by providing useful information about EV charging stations and local trips.
One of the pain
The days of desperately scrolling through fan wikis and/or skimming episode summaries to remember who shot whom in the Season 2 finale could very well be coming to an end. Amazon Prime Video has unveiled a new feature called Video Recaps that leverages AI to produce cinematic, full-fledged video recaps for television series. This tool tacks
We don't know who still needs to hear this, but don't ever pay full price for a set of earbuds or headphones (or speakers, for that matter). Not even if it's a brand new time that just came out because it's only a matter of time before the MSRP becomes an afterthought. Need proof? Apple's newfangled AirPods Pro 3 with Live Translation and
A tech entrepreneur’s profound nostalgia for the golden age 8-bit arcade gaming has resulted in a highly personalized Rolls-Royce Black Badge Ghost Gamer commission. Unveiled as the marque’s first (only?) vehicle dedicated entirely to vintage video game culture, this one-of-one creation is not your usual gold-plated, diamond-crusted creation;
A couple weeks ago, fully reclined horizontally on a couch at Valve HQ, I watched a video streaming from the web via a virtual browser window floating in the open air of Linux.
When I slipped the Steam Frame off my head, I congratulated a Valve industrial designer who worked on it. I had just spent four days in Galaxy XR with a thick rigid strap and a knob on the back of my head preventing me from even thinking about what I had just done so comfortably in Steam Frame.
"I don't think I've experienced that in a hard shell before," I told the Valve representative.
"I don't think it's been done before," he replied, holding Steam Frame's cushioned battery in one hand. "Starting from this and going along the strap, that's why we eliminated all sorts of knobs or mechanism in the back that could protrude and prevent the user from laying back."
A great many people consuming the news of Valve's announcement find themselves curious but unconvinced the private company will land at a compelling price for the LCD-based standalone VR system. Many wanted a Quest killer and some wanted a high-end successor for their wired PC VR system. Half-Life 3 hasn't been announced and Valve isn't working on VR games right now. So without trying Steam Frame themselves, or knowing the price, we're seeing people reporting potent withdrawal symptoms from extended use of copium.
UploadVRIan HamiltonOver the course of our recent discussion about Steam Frame, David and I found ourselves in a circular loop with our audience, essentially trying to sort out whether people could be both disappointed in Valve's choices and sequestering funds anyway for hardware purchases sometime next year.
While we won't have a review of Steam Frame for you until sometime next year, meanwhile, Bigscreen claimed high sales numbers on Valve's announcement day, likely from buyers who were waiting to see what Valve decided before committing to the Beyond 2 for their wired PC VR setup.
VR headsets really didn't go into bed before the Vision Pro, and there's no hard-backed strap design sold by Apple.
I've probably worn Apple's headset as many hours in bed as I have seated, with standing active use representing a very small fraction of my time in Vision Pro. Yes, I miss Beat Saber and Walkabout Mini Golf and Half-Life: Alyx, but I recently got access to those with ALVR streaming and PlayStation VR2 controllers.
What keeps me in Vision Pro for so many hours is that the headset multitasks iPad apps in a way no iPad can while going places no iPad goes. Because I had so many surfaces around me I could use, I spent hundreds of hours in an Apple VR headset and only the tiniest sliver of that time found me interacting with fully immersive VR games.
When calculating the value of Steam Frame, your equation is deeply flawed if it assumes VR use solely in standing or seated scenarios. If you can't imagine the headset's grayscale passthrough as a tunnel through reality taking you from sitting on the couch to reclined in bed, so you can continue playing your favorite Steam game for another two hours, then you have no frame of reference to calculate whether Valve's upcoming headset will add value to your life.
Valve sent out the first developer kits for Steam Frame in ski goggle cases. Its rear battery pack and cushion can travel inside the facial interface.
Any VR headset made 2014 to 2025 that used your Steam library required external equipment making it difficult to even imagine why you might want to fall asleep in the falling snow on the helipad from the opening level of Metal Gear Solid.
I had that environment on Quest set as my home from SideQuest before Meta replaced it with its new immersive home space. I've found that when trying to relax in a place like that with the front-heavy Quest, the battery strains the soft strap's ability to hold the headset to your eyes. Even without the battery on the front of the face in Vision Pro, using Apple's Dual Loop Band, I found the headset too loose to be held comfortably by its soft strap when turning on my side in bed. I've already shared my impressions of Apple’s new Dual Knit Band, but if there are any Vision Pro M2 and M5 owners with the strap in our audience I'd invite them to share more widely their experience with whether that balanced soft strap allows them to wear it in more places.
When I was at the San Francisco airport earlier this year returning to New York from my demo of Bigscreen Beyond 2, I spotted another Vision Pro owner in the terminal. He was carrying the large white bag strapped to his rolling luggage that Apple sold when the headset first launched. Meanwhile, I had the much more portable grey Belkin bag Apple started selling some time after, with my headset stored vertically and a flip out cover built in to protect the lenses.
Instead of strapped around my luggage, my bag goes over the shoulder with a pocket for a folding keyboard or, in recent weeks, you could find the Muse pen a useful companion ready to pop out and move windows or sketch something.
Why am I spending so much time telling you about the places a $3,500 headset goes? Because we all know Valve’s standalone makes trade-offs to come under the price of the $1,000 Index, but until you wear one you can't believe that all of these choices result in a headset you might be interested in wearing on a 6 hour flight. When that happens, whatever the price, it will literally be measured as a fraction of what Apple charges to take Vision Pro into those same places.
The relevant comparison for calculating value here isn't the OLED of Vision Pro vs. the LCD of Steam Frame. The comparison to think about is whether you're sitting back comfortably or craning your neck downward at a physical display. Are you looking at the back of a seat rest for six hours or playing your favorite Steam game?
I was only half kidding about those copium withdrawals. If Valve pulls the trigger on Half-Life 3, there's a good chance it will run flat on Steam Frame just like Portal 2 does.
SteamVR supports all PC VR headsets but Valve has really only directly supported three devices in a decade of VR – Vive, Index, Frame. And their developers are not making a VR game right now. But if Valve makes the third game in any of their trilogies? Imagine how the variables in the value equation change if Steam Frame is the most comfortable way to enjoy Half-Life 3 on a flight, train, or in bed on the ceiling.
Wake up, Mr. Freeman.
Continuing our coverage of is-it-an-alien-spacecraft Comet 3I/ATLAS, an armada of space missions (including Hubble, JWST, plus assets orbiting and roving on Mars) have captured the comet's fleeting flyby of Mars before it disappears forever. And no, it's not extraterrestrial: the icy wanderer was likely ejected from its home star’s orbit millions
For a while there (and still, in some cases), finding a modern generation graphics card at MSRP is considered deal. Forget that noise, though, because over the last couple of months, we've seen GPU pricing finally stabilize to the point where popular models can be had for less than MSRP. And so it goes with the GeForce RTX 5070 Ti, and this
NVIDIA is pushing out an out-of-band GPU driver update to resolve an issue introduced with Microsoft's October 2025 update for Windows 11 (KB5066835). According to NVIDIA, the Windows 11 update can hamper performance in some unspecified games, even though it's not listed by Microsoft as one of the known issues. Despite Microsoft being silentNoctua has finally released the all-black chromax.black versions of its G2 cooling products. Both the NH-D15 G2 CPU cooler and the NF-A14x25 G2 140mm fans now arrive in a sleek design.
The new NF-A14x25 G2 fan (Sx2-PP also available) features advanced aerodynamic engineering, including an impeller made from Sterrox liquid-crystal polymer (LCP) and a record-tight 0.7 mm tip clearance. The new design allows the G2 models to maintain a performance-to-noise advantage over their renowned predecessors in both high-impedance scenarios (radiators) and airflow-oriented case cooling. The fans also integrate the etaPERF motor and SupraTorque technology, ensuring rotational stability against back pressure.
The NH-D15 G2 chromax.black inherits the further refined heatsink design, which now has eight heatpipes instead of six. Paired with the new NF-A14x25r G2 PWM fans (available separately as a single unit or pair), the all-black version offers the same cooling efficiency as the original brown model. The full chromax.black treatment includes a black-coated heatsink and black fans, delivering the highly requested subtle aesthetic. The cooler ships with the Torx-based SecuFirm2+ multi-socket mounting system, NT-H2 thermal compound, and a full 6-year manufacturer's warranty. Builders can further customise the look with coloured anti-vibration pads, which are available separately.
The NH-D15 G2 chromax.black is available now for €159.90 in Europe or $189.90 in the US. The standalone NF-A14x25 G2 fans are also available in chromax.black finish starting at €39.90/$44.90 for a single unit and €76.90/$84.90 for a bundle of two. A full 6-year manufacturer's warranty backs all products.
Discuss on our Facebook page, HERE.
KitGuru says: Do you prefer Noctua's chromax.black finish over the typical brown-and-beige colour theme?
The post Noctua launches NH-D15 G2 and NF-A14x25 G2 fans in chromax.black finish first appeared on KitGuru.Mafia: The Old Country released earlier this year to a solid amount of praise – with one of its biggest detractors being the game’s redundant-feeling open world zone. As was promised, the team have now released a new free expansion improving on this aspect, with the Free Ride Update officially available from today.
Making the announcement, the team at Hangar 13 officially detailed today’s free update, writing: “Free Ride is a callback to the original Mafia’s Free Ride Extreme, as well as the Free Ride mode we shipped in Mafia: Definitive Edition. It’s a collection of Challenges separate from the main story that give players chances to revisit the world in a more self-guided way.”
Going into more depth, they continued, “This time, we’ve constructed several kinds of repeatable Challenges—including combat, stealth, and different race types—in a variety of new and familiar locations. Completing Challenges will earn you the Dinari in-game currency to spend on the new outfits, charms, weapons, and vehicles unlocked by progressing through this content (as well as on items unlocked via the campaign).”
Beyond this, the update is also said to include “a number of other fresh and exciting features” – though this was not elaborated upon.
Full details on the Free Ride update (including the developers’ thoughts on the addition of first-person driving, visual filters and more) can be found HERE, but for those who already own the game you might want to hop in and discover all the additions/improvements for yourself.
Mafia: The Old Country’s Free Ride Update is available from today.
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KitGuru says: Have you been looking forward to this update? Was it worth the wait? Does this affect your opinions on Mafia: The Old Country? Let us know down below.
The post Mafia: The Old Country ‘Free Ride Update’ officially arrives today first appeared on KitGuru.Following the disappointment that was Battlefield 2042, EA / DICE came back bigger and stronger than ever with the recent release of Battlefield 6. While the game is already a certified success, EA themselves have now claimed Battlefield 6 to be “the best selling shooter game of the year.”
As discovered by Call of Duty leaker CharlieIntel, the main Battlefield 6 page on EA’s website has been updated with a new description.
While in and of itself nothing worthy of note, the updated page states that “There's never been a better time to jump into the best selling shooter game of the year” – the first official confirmation that BF6 has taken the top spot.
For context, it was already reported that Battlefield 6 managed to achieve the biggest launch in franchise history, with the game having sold over 10 million copies since its official launch back in late October.
Of course, we would be remiss not to mention the Call of Duty sized elephant in the room, with Treyarch’s Black Ops 7 having arrived just last week – though to a middling reception on PC at least.
That said, even the worst CODs have historically ended up taking the top spot in the best-sellers list each year, and so we will have to wait and see whether Black Ops 7 winds up outpacing Battlefield 6 by the end of 2025. So far however, Battlefield seems to be leading the pack.
Discuss on our Facebook page HERE.
KitGuru says: Are you still playing/enjoying Battlefield 6? Does it have the potential to be the best entry in the series? Will Black Ops 7 eventually end up outselling BF6? Let us know your thoughts down below.
The post EA labels Battlefield 6 “the best selling shooter game of the year” first appeared on KitGuru.2026 appears to be the year in which last-gen support could finally be winding down, with multiple live-service titles announcing that they will no longer update their games on PS4 / Xbox One come next year. Joining this ever-growing list is Embark Studios’ The Finals – with the PS4 version set to be discontinued this upcoming March.
Making the announcement on Twitter, the team at Embark Studios confirmed that the PS4 version of The Finals (which actually launched AFTER the current-gen versions) will soon be discontinued, writing:
“When Season 10 begins (18th of March, 2026), we'll be retiring THE FINALS on PlayStation 4 and focusing our support on current generation hardware.”
Of course, being an online game, players will be able to continue playing elsewhere, with Embark noting “your progress and purchases will be stored in your Embark ID and will transfer to anywhere you choose to play.”
As mentioned, The Finals is far from the first game to be ceasing last-gen support, with PUBG: Battlegrounds officially moving over to current-gen just last week (and Genshin Impact set to do the same in April of next year).
It will be interesting to see whether The Finals’ switch to current-gen only will allow for more ambitious updates in the future. We will have to wait and find out.
Discuss on our Facebook page HERE.
KitGuru says: Is it time for studios to finally move away fully from last-gen consoles? Which live-service title do you think is next in line? Let us know down below.
The post Last-gen version of The Finals to be “retired” in March 2026 first appeared on KitGuru.
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