Black Myth: Wukong launched earlier today, adapting the classic story of Journey to the West to a soulslike action game in the style of Lies of P, Elden Ring, Wo Long: Fallen Dynasty, and Lords of the Fallen. The game, created by Chinese studio Game Science, has been highly anticipated in the years since it was first announced, and that anticipation has paid off with an absolutely enormous player base. Still, the gargantuan player count that it attracted on PC recently decreased by a huge amount, demonstrating the impact of time zones and audience demographics on Steam's charts.

Overwatch 2 hasn't had nearly the impact of its predecessor so far, but that doesn't mean its creators have given up on it. In the years since its launch, Blizzard Entertainment has continued to work on the online shooter, attempting to make it a serious competitor in a genre currently dominated by games like Valorant, Apex Legends, and Rainbow Six Siege. With the launch of World of Warcraft's The War Within expansion in just a few days, the enormously popular MMORPG's 20th anniversary fast approaching, and Warcraft in general coming up on 30 years since its first game, Blizzard is planning to combine two of its most popular series with a special skin.

The soulslike genre doesn't show any signs of slowing down in the near future. Today saw the launch of Black Myth: Wukong and, earlier this summer, Elden Ring: Shadow of the Erdtree continued the success of the original game through a massive and well received expansion. Now, a stylish new addition to the loose category of action RPG game hybrids is drawing closer thanks to further information on The First Berserker: Khazan, a new soulslike with a blood soaked cartoon aesthetic set in the Dungeon & Fighter universe whose launch window was just announced during Gamescom's Opening Night Live.

It was only a short while ago that we got our first glimpse of Civilization 7, the much anticipated latest entry to the long running series. As with any fresh instalment to classics from the strategy genre—games like Homeworld 3, Company of Heroes 3, Total War: Pharaoh, or Age of Empires 4—there's a lot of excitement surrounding the next Civilization, especially regarding when it's set to come out. Gamescom's Opening Night Live has just revealed that date, and, fortunately, it's much sooner than many might have anticipated.

Marvel Rivals has been building a lot of anticipation throughout the year so far. The upcoming multiplayer game has been shown off through both alpha and beta tests, garnering buzz in the process and hopes that it may be a new avenue for the kind of online play currently dominated by games like Overwatch 2, Valorant, and Team Fortress 2. When it would come out and how, exactly, it would handle access to its roster of Marvel superheroes, was an open question, though, which has just been answered thanks to an announcement from Gamescom's Opening Night Live.

With Assassin's Creed Shadows having just been announced, now seems like a good time to catch up on prior entries to the long running Ubisoft open world series. The only problem, though, is that almost everyone has a different opinion on which Assassin's Creed game is best. Some laud Assassin's Creed 4: Black Flag for its pirate focus and naval combat while others recommend the grand adventure of Assassin's Creed Origins or the memorable characters of Assassin's Creed 3, Assassin's Creed 2, and their spin offs. Rather than try to narrow down which of these games to pick up, you can just grab a collection of all of them right now thanks to a Steam bundle that massively discounts the series.

FPS and rhythm games go well together. We've seen this in the past with games like Metal: Hellsinger, which amps up the sense of tension and overall drama of its infernal adventure with a metal soundtrack, and Hi Fi Rush, a bouncy, playable Saturday morning cartoon. We've also seen the combination function well in BPM: Bullets Per Minute and, in the PC VR space, with Pistol Whip. Fortunately, studios are still exploring the potential of this potent genre mash up, most recently with the launch of Robobeat, a roguelike spin on the concept that's drawing in positive reviews on Steam.

Probably the best way to describe Ghost of Tsushima is that it's a samurai romance. Rather than dig into the particulars of its historical setting, creator Sucker Punch Productions simultaneously flattens and enhances the semi mythological image of the Japanese warrior to create something that has intoxicated players looking for an open world game that creates a kind of platonic ideal of the samurai game. The success of Ghost of Tsushima, originally launched on PlayStation back in 2022, has continued with its recent PC version, which, just now, has gone on to beat out games like God of War, Horizon Forbidden West, The Last of Us Part 1, and Spider-Man as the most popular single player PlayStation PC game to date.

Tripwire Interactive has been a mainstay in PC gaming since 2006. Over the years, it's put out beloved games like Red Orchestra: Ostfront 41-45, Red Orchestra 2: Heroes of Stalingrad, Rising Storm, and Maneater. It's also responsible for Killing Floor 2, the multiplayer horror FPS sequel to one of its first games, and a project that's become a modern classic in the genre since it came out in 2016. Last year, though, Tripwire announced that it's making Killing Floor 3, which will likely cause the current iteration's player base to dry up over time. More recently, the company also announced that it would no longer be updating Killing Floor 2 either and, though its servers will remain live, decided to see the classic shooter off in style with a final free weekend.

It's been a while since a major publisher decided to work on a game that competes with Call of Duty. Now, though, Assassin's Creed Shadows, Star Wars Outlaws, and Prince of Persia: The Lost Crown creator and publisher Ubisoft is about to put out its multiplayer FPS XDefiant this coming Tuesday, with a fast paced design ethos that resembles Call of Duty. Considering it's also going to be a free to play game, we've been curious to see how it will approach monetization and, with the launch date quickly approaching, Ubisoft has provided details meant to answer just that question.

After spending a while in Early Access on Steam, Fabledom has launched its 1.0 version, offering a fairy tale inspired city builder to players who might have had their fill of the grittier form of the genre seen in the recent Manor Lords or upcoming Frostpunk 2. Unlike those games, Fabledom looks to sources of inspiration like the fantasy tinged The Settlers or, more recently, Against the Storm, combining these influences with a bubbly cartoon aesthetic. Its execution of this premise seems to be working, with positive reviews and a healthy player base forming around the game in the days since its 1.0 launch on Steam.

There is no other game quite like Devil Daggers. Created by Sorath and originally launched in 2016, Devil Daggers is a contest of skill and perseverance, its steadily increasing difficulty calling to mind Gears of War's horde mode, its bullet hell design offering an FPS game spin on shmups like Ikaruga or Battle Garegga, and its infernal visuals taking notes from Doom or Quake. It's a tremendous work, endlessly compelling and, best of all, available for just under $3 USD right now.

Back in 2015, Grim Fandango Remastered came out, making it easier than it had been since the original version's 1998 launch to play one of the most beloved adventure games ever made. Still, even with the attention given to the classic LucasArts launch — one as well regarded as the studio's The Secret of Monkey Island, Day of the Tentacle, and Maniac Mansion — the remaster didn't provide players with every one of the updates they were looking for. Fortunately, almost a decade later, fans of the game have just put out a new mod that finishes remastering the remaster for free.

One of the most compelling RPG games to launch so far this year is the final version of Dread Delusion. Inspired by earlier, pre Oblivion and Skyrim entries to The Elder Scrolls series, like 1996's Daggerfall and 2002's Morrowind, Dread Delusion offers audiences a fantasy world that avoids the typical elves and wizards, Western European medieval aesthetics to provide something truly, well, fantastic instead. Since it left Early Access on Steam earlier this week, the game's enjoyed a positive reception. Unfortunately, though, its player count has struggled to reach the same heights as its reviews so far.

Sometimes, a horror game blows up on Twitch and YouTube and reaches a massive audience. In the past, we've seen this happen with Five Nights At Freddy's, Poppy Playtime, Slender, and, most recently, Content Warning. Alongside these hits is Amanda the Adventurer, which came out on Steam last year and has managed to rack up an astounding 1.5 billion views on YouTube related to it thanks to the fervent attention fans of the horror game have provided. Now, the small studio behind the first game is looking to continue its success with the announcement of a sequel, Amanda the Adventurer 2, slated to come out this year.

Management and tycoon games, from Tropico 6 to Planet Zoo, are a good time. As entries to the genre like Jurassic World Evolution 2 show, they can be an even better time when part of the player's management duties involves taking care of strange creatures. Galacticare is a game that understands this, offering a combination of the healthcare simulation aspects of Two Point Hospital and the sci fi creativity of Stellaris. It's looked like a smart idea since we first saw it announced last year, and now we're happy to see it's just received a launch date that's much closer than we anticipated.

Just after he worked on the first Metal Gear, writer and director Hideo Kojima put out a cyberpunk adventure game called Snatcher. Heavily inspired by movies like Blade Runner and The Terminator, Snatcher never made a big splash outside of Japan — mostly because its English version hasn't been ported to modern videogame platforms — but its influence is felt in experimental, tech focused entries to the science fiction adventure game genre like Eliza, Orwell, République, and, notably, today's launch of Cyber Manhunt 2: New World.

Just Cause 4 may not be as well regarded as Just Cause 2 and Just Cause 3, but it's still a fantastic option for anyone looking to spend a while flinging themselves across a sandbox world and blowing up nearly everything they see. Though it has a story and curated mission design not unlike Grand Theft Auto 5 or Saints Row 4, Just Cause 4 is also, like the similarly anarchic Red Faction: Guerilla, at its best when players let those aspects of the game take a back seat and revel in the chaotic potential of its more free form design instead. Anyone looking to do just that is in luck as the game is currently on a massive discount on Steam.

When is Homeworld 3 coming out? The latest installment of the beloved sci fi strategy series, Homeworld 3, is just on the horizon, providing the first full sequel since Homeworld: Deserts of Kharak launched in 2016 and the first numbered entry since Homeworld 2 from 2003. The long wait for its arrival is about to pay off, as what looks to be one of the most involved and feature rich takes on the RTS series to date is out in a very short time.

Sweet Transit has been on our radar for quite a while now. By combining the appeal of building and management games like Factorio and Cities Skylines 2 with the train focus of Railroad Tycoon 3 or Train Simulator, Sweet Transit scratches a very particular itch. Now, after years of waiting, it's finally chugging on out of the Early Access station and has launched its 1.0 version on Steam, with news of its next big update already detailed.