July 2025 PCG Article Discussion

[DXCHASE]

Incredible neural implant translates neural activity into speech almost instantly by focussing on sound production instead of word choice

I just can't wait to see BCIs like this in the gaming scene.

www.pcgamer.com

This is a huge step for people with the inabilities this helps. Wouldnt mind being able to control a PC with my brain either.

If you find a PCG article to post, please make that thread.

🫡

 

[Pifanjr]

Incredible neural implant translates neural activity into speech almost instantly by focussing on sound production instead of word choice

I just can't wait to see BCIs like this in the gaming scene.

www.pcgamer.com

This is a huge step for people with the inabilities this helps. Wouldnt mind being able to control a PC with my brain either.



🫡

It's kind of insane to me how far we've come with neural interfaces. Controlling computers with your mind still seems like far fetched sci-fi to me, but it basically exists already.

 

[Zed Clampet]

It's kind of insane to me how far we've come with neural interfaces. Controlling computers with your mind still seems like far fetched sci-fi to me, but it basically exists already.

I hope to live long enough that I'll be just about to fall asleep when some company decides to play an insurance commercial in my head. Or maybe Facebook interrupts my consciousness with a breaking news headline that isn't actually true or even what the story is about.

The point I'm trying to make is that this is great technology for the physically impaired, but for general use purposes, we have a lot of evil people running the tech companies, and we're going to need some very serious regulations/laws before we should start giving them direct access to our brains. It's so bad that I'm not sure we should ever cross that technological line. What if five years later, they pull an Amazon and Netflix movie deal and say, we're sorry. This is just too expensive for us to operate. We're going to have to send you two or three commercials a day....and thus it begins. And you know they will fight like hell to always have the right to record our thoughts "in order to offer us a better experience".

Don't worry about the tech companies. If their censors detect any negativity, they'll play soothing sounds and words to your subconscious. You'll suddenly start feeling calmer and not know why. Then you'll realize that for some reason you are feeling sympathetic to commands sent to "Zuckerberg Remote A2207BCD".

I'm both joking and not joking. I honestly think tech companies are capable of this behavior. Like the Devil at the crossroads, all they need to do is think of something really cool to give you in exchange.

******

Randy Pitchford asks fans if they'd swallow future Borderlands exclusivity deals, almost 10,000 people say just put your damn games on Steam

Which, I have to be honest, you could see coming a mile away.

www.pcgamer.com

This is what 7 years of weekly bribes get you? Less than 10 percent of gamers?

 

[Pifanjr]

I hope to live long enough that I'll be just about to fall asleep when some company decides to play an insurance commercial in my head. Or maybe Facebook interrupts my consciousness with a breaking news headline that isn't actually true or even what the story is about.

The point I'm trying to make is that this is great technology for the physically impaired, but for general use purposes, we have a lot of evil people running the tech companies, and we're going to need some very serious regulations/laws before we should start giving them direct access to our brains. It's so bad that I'm not sure we should ever cross that technological line. What if five years later, they pull an Amazon and Netflix movie deal and say, we're sorry. This is just too expensive for us to operate. We're going to have to send you two or three commercials a day....and thus it begins. And you know they will fight like hell to always have the right to record our thoughts "in order to offer us a better experience".

Don't worry about the tech companies. If their censors detect any negativity, they'll play soothing sounds and words to your subconscious. You'll suddenly start feeling calmer and not know why. Then you'll realize that for some reason you are feeling sympathetic to commands sent to "Zuckerberg Remote A2207BCD".

I'm both joking and not joking. I honestly think tech companies are capable of this behavior. Like the Devil at the crossroads, all they need to do is think of something really cool to give you in exchange.

Considering TVs come with built-in ads nowadays, I think you're absolutely right with your predictions.

Randy Pitchford asks fans if they'd swallow future Borderlands exclusivity deals, almost 10,000 people say just put your damn games on Steam

Which, I have to be honest, you could see coming a mile away.

www.pcgamer.com

This is what 7 years of weekly bribes get you? Less than 10 percent of gamers?

Honestly not that bad. Though I do wonder how much of it is the weekly free games and how much it is kids who grew up on Fortnite.

 

[Zed Clampet]

Honestly not that bad.

The last estimate I saw was that they were sitting at 7 percent market share, which almost can't be enough when 80 percent (I totally just made that number up) of the market shows up every week to help themselves to a "free" game that Epic then has to reimburse the publishers for. If you cut out giving the free games every week (please don't), I'd agree that 7 percent was a respectable share of the market.

As of the latest court documents release of two years ago, they were still losing a lot of money on the store each year. In fact, it was causing the entire company to operate in the red and was one of the reasons for the big layoffs recently. Since then they have stopped the exclusives, which is probably saving them a lot of money, so maybe they are turning a small profit now. I have no way of knowing. But when you are running the most popular game in the world and also the most popular game engine (for big games) in the world and are still losing money because of your store, I think that's pretty bad.

 

[Zloth]

Death Stranding 2 is too damn easy

I blame the Chiral Network.

www.pcgamer.com

I remember the 'connect to network and suddenly everything is solved' factor in the first game. It was pretty harsh at the start of the game. You connect up, and suddenly that hard-to-climb mountain is draped in climbing ropes. By mid-game, though, help started getting rare. Sometimes you would get a bridge to help you over a river, sometimes not. In the final areas, there was barely anything of use. I presume that was simply a reflection of the number of players that got that far along.

 

[Pifanjr]

The last estimate I saw was that they were sitting at 7 percent market share, which almost can't be enough when 80 percent (I totally just made that number up) of the market shows up every week to help themselves to a "free" game that Epic then has to reimburse the publishers for. If you cut out giving the free games every week (please don't), I'd agree that 7 percent was a respectable share of the market.

As of the latest court documents release of two years ago, they were still losing a lot of money on the store each year. In fact, it was causing the entire company to operate in the red and was one of the reasons for the big layoffs recently. Since then they have stopped the exclusives, which is probably saving them a lot of money, so maybe they are turning a small profit now. I have no way of knowing. But when you are running the most popular game in the world and also the most popular game engine (for big games) in the world and are still losing money because of your store, I think that's pretty bad.

They need to invest all of that money they're making into something and trying to keep your audience within your own platform as much as possible seems to be a pretty popular business strategy, so I don't think it was necessarily a bad idea for them to make their own store even if it doesn't work out.

 

[Zed Clampet]

Agree. My biggest complaint is that they didn't really have the money to invest, at least not at the level they were investing, and after losing tons of money ended up letting a bunch of people go, which just makes it look a bit like mismanagement to me.

 

[Zed Clampet]

And suddenly my hype level dropped to below zero.

Subnautica studio leadership gutted by Krafton, which outright says that Subnautica 2 needs 'renewed energy and momentum'

Something stirs beneath the waves.

www.pcgamer.com

Fire all the creators of the original Subnautica and insert someone who's last game was a failure. Then state that the game should be ready as soon as possible.

On the bright side, all the fired people can now form a new studio that isn't under Krafton's thumb.

 

[Pifanjr]

And suddenly my hype level dropped to below zero.

I see what you did there

Guess I can remove Subnautica 2 from my wishlist. If it turns out to be decent against all odds I can always put it back on, but I don't have high hopes anymore either.

 

[Zloth]

Ugh. Yeah, very dubious. I haven't got a clue if it was the original folks trying to do too much or a publisher that expected too much, but either way it means serious trouble for the game.

 

[Zed Clampet]

Quiz time! Can you guess which games these 10 ridiculous patch notes are from?

Put your patch note prowess to the test with a quiz!

www.pcgamer.com

I only got 6 out of 10.

 

[Colif]

Late last month I posted a warning about 19 billion accounts being hacked... seems that was click bait. It was click bait that half the internet fell for, so that's my excuse. Turns out the figure is a aggregate of many reports, and some went back years.
So it wasn't news, it was just a scary headline. I only found out yesterday.

 

[BeardyHat]

Quiz time! Can you guess which games these 10 ridiculous patch notes are from?

Put your patch note prowess to the test with a quiz!

www.pcgamer.com

I only got 6 out of 10.

3/10

 

[neogunhero]

The last estimate I saw was that they were sitting at 7 percent market share, which almost can't be enough when 80 percent (I totally just made that number up) of the market shows up every week to help themselves to a "free" game that Epic then has to reimburse the publishers for. If you cut out giving the free games every week (please don't), I'd agree that 7 percent was a respectable share of the market.

I presume most people are like me, those who redeem the free games every week but rarely ever play anything on the launcher. They are also bagging on getting some real sales from people being on their platform redeeming the free games, but I would assume most people have never spent real money on EGS or at least very little compared to lifetime money spent on Steam, yet have a massive library of games they got for free. I have had EGS since 2020, and have maybe spent a total of $15-30 on it, while on Steam I've spend thousands. Of course I've had Steam a lot longer, since 2010, but it still doesn't seem that people are keen to use another launcher unless there is an incentive to do so.

 

[neogunhero]

3/10

2/10, "NOT GREAT: I THINK YOU MIGHT NEED A PATCH". The choices of answers were really good and that's what got me.

 

[Pifanjr]

Ugh. Yeah, very dubious. I haven't got a clue if it was the original folks trying to do too much or a publisher that expected too much, but either way it means serious trouble for the game.

I've read a bit more about it and it seems the leadership that was replaced wasn't particularly involved with the actual development of the game and the game is still on track to release this year.

Quiz time! Can you guess which games these 10 ridiculous patch notes are from?

Put your patch note prowess to the test with a quiz!

www.pcgamer.com

I only got 6 out of 10.

I got 6/10 as well.

 

[Johnway]

EA reportedly expects Battlefield 6 to bring in 100 million players, a number that even DICE devs don't think is feasible

A new report says Battlefield 6 development has been more expensive than planned, and the campaign is way behind schedule.

www.pcgamer.com

Why do i get the feeling that EA is looking to put DICE to sword? It seems like its just itching to trim them for what happened. The small amount of alpha footage i've seen of BF6 is nice and will get people playing. But this is EA, they always find a way to drain the life out of dev studios if it means making more money.

 

[Zloth]

Quiz time! Can you guess which games these 10 ridiculous patch notes are from?

Put your patch note prowess to the test with a quiz!

www.pcgamer.com

I only got 6 out of 10.

Also 6/10. I thought I had y'all beat but missed the last two. I should have taken a hint.

P.S. This counts as sharing on social media, right @PCG Chris?

 

[Zed Clampet]

EA reportedly expects Battlefield 6 to bring in 100 million players, a number that even DICE devs don't think is feasible

A new report says Battlefield 6 development has been more expensive than planned, and the campaign is way behind schedule.

www.pcgamer.com

Why do i get the feeling that EA is looking to put DICE to sword? It seems like its just itching to trim them for what happened. The small amount of alpha footage i've seen of BF6 is nice and will get people playing. But this is EA, they always find a way to drain the life out of dev studios if it means making more money.

I don't know what management is up to other than trying to get a temporary stock boost because 100 million players is just a completely irresponsible goal.

 

[Pifanjr]

Fresh zero-day vulnerability in Chrome found to be actively exploited by hackers in the wild

And you're not necessarily safe if you don't use Chrome either.

www.pcgamer.com

Might be worth double checking your Chrome/Chromium browsers are up to date. Mine wasn't.

 

[Johnway]

I don't know what management is up to other than trying to get a temporary stock boost because 100 million players is just a completely irresponsible goal.

I suspect its just maangement/directors mostly just waving unrealistic numbers because their rivals did the same. Like most leadership they're the visionary and they expect everyone else to make it happen. Regardless how unrealistic or impossible the task.

They can reach 100m players by doing the following:

- make it free or dirt cheap
- Widen the player base
- no BS MTX or DLC
- Frequent updates
- Treat its player base with respect as opposed to firewood/cattle
- make a good game.

 

[Zed Clampet]

Former Forza dev says original Motorsport series died in Microsoft's cuts, but Forza Horizon lives on

Developer Fred Russell left the studio in 2016, but presumably still has connections at Turn 10.

www.pcgamer.com

Microsoft can officially do things that, were I to list them, would get me banned from the site. What a load of complete bull**** this entire company is.

This whole thing is going to end with them closing historic game companies like Bethesda and Obsidian. How would this be possible? I'm no longer convinced Microsoft is committed to remaining in the games business at all.

 

[Zloth]

I'm no longer convinced Microsoft is committed to remaining in the games business at all.

I wouldn't go that far - but in the same neighborhood. CoPilot is now THE major focus. If a game can keep its head down (or, better yet, show how it will use CoPilot) and make a steady profit, then fine. Make trouble, real or imagined, and I expect they'll just cut it off rather than deal with it.

In other news, we got another quiz!

Can you guess gaming's weirdest currencies in our latest quiz?

Test your knowledge of fictional financials.

www.pcgamer.com

I've played none of those games and got just 2 out of 10. Half of the monkeys that tried the quiz did better than me. If I hadn't read the article before the quiz, it would have halved my score.

 

[Zed Clampet]

In other news, we got another quiz!

Can you guess gaming's weirdest currencies in our latest quiz?

Test your knowledge of fictional financials.

www.pcgamer.com

I've played none of those games and got just 2 out of 10. Half of the monkeys that tried the quiz did better than me. If I hadn't read the article before the quiz, it would have halved my score.

3/10
I got 3 out of 10, and that's with having played two of the games before (I got both of them wrong)