The Hyperkin SupaBoy has been around for more than a decade, but there's finally good news for those in the UK and Europe – it'll be available officially in those regions for the first time this autumn.

It is set for release in two new colourways – Crimson and Prime (a see-through white version), although the concept is the same as before.

The retro gaming handheld is a bit different to most others on the market. Rather than play digital ROMs – games either ripped from original releases or downloaded from the internet – it has a full-sized cartridge slot that's compatible with physical SNES and Super Famicom titles.

This doesn't just keep physical media alive at a time when it's a hot topic, but breathes new life into old carts.

Each SupaBoy sports a 4:3 IPS display to play an inserted game on, although you can also use it as a SNES replacement too. There are two SNES controller ports on the front and an integrated AV output to connect it to a TV.

A rechargeable Li-ion battery can be found in each handheld too, offering up to 10 hours of playtime on a single charge.

The new colours have been chosen in honour of the original Japanese Super Famicom and European Super Nintendo designs. And Hyperkin has revealed that it plans to release further colour options yearly.

"In a time where the existence of physical media is under continued threat, we hear gamers loud and clear," said Hyperkin's product developer, Nathan Perez.

"They want to preserve the excitement and collectible nature of game cartridges and the SupaBoy is dedicated to serving the rapidly growing retro audience who want ownership of their software and play without breaks, delays or need for Wi-Fi."

The new SupaBoy models will ship this fall (autumn) priced at £119.99 / $129.99 / €129.99 apiece.

We all know that Grand Theft Auto VI is going to make absolutely filthy money when it comes out later this year – it'll probably make Spider-Man: Brand New Day's box office records look like child's play. Still, I didn't have a slot on my bingo card for Rockstar successfully monetising the title's gameplay reveal.

That seems to be what it's managed, though, because Netflix just confirmed that an "extended look" at the game will drop on its streaming platform on 27 August, with the strong implication of exclusivity.

Despite that implication, though, the same footage will be up on YouTube six hours after it hits Netflix, as confirmed by Rockstar's own YouTube channel. Still, you'd have to assume that Rockstar is making money from the partnership with Netflix, which is quite something to consider.

Right now you can head to Netflix's site to see the placeholder page where the footage will debut, which confirms that it's basically being treated like a standalone movie in terms of Netflix's catalogue. It even has a list of tags about what the "series" is like: "Slick, Rousing, Adventure, High-Octane, Imaginative, Cars, Action Thriller, Movie".

Some of those are more obviously applicable than others, dare I say. Still, this is obviously a big deal, and it's a significant enough marketing beat to get its own teaser trailer.

This teaser also confirms that the footage will go live on Netflix at 3:00 PM ET, meaning 8:00 PM BST here in the UK – so it's very much in a headline slot for your evening's entertainment here in Europe.

The YouTube version of the extended look will be out six hours later, at 9:00 PM ET or 2:00 AM BST, which is much less sociable. If you're a Netflix subscriber, that's not your problem, of course, but it might mean I end up watching it the next morning, on 28 August.

This also means that we're almost certainly not getting any other new looks at the game before the end of August, so that should put a whole load of rumour-mongering to bed. Strap in for a long month before the footage drops, though, and a whole heaping of hype in the meantime.

GMKtec is no stranger to compact and mini PCs offering a lengthy lineup of Intel and AMD-based models for all budgets. It has recently also launched a true powerhouse workstation that packs Strix Halo processing and 128GB of RAM into a super slim case, showing its ambitions at the top end of the spectrum.

However, the latest announcement is arguably more exciting – not least for those humming and hawing over a Steam Machine purchase. The GMKtec NEO-X1 is a compact gaming PC with the sort of power that makes Valve's PC console look like a kids' toy.

And what's more, while the starting price is a bit more than a 2TB Steam Machine, you might be convinced to extend your budget a tad for the extra goodies.

There are two NEO-X1 models that will be available globally from 17 August. Both run on AMD Ryzen 9 CPUs, with the standard version sporting the 9955HX with the Pro edition boosting that to the 9955HX3D chip.

The standard NEO-X1 also comes with the mobile RTX 5060 Ti GPU (8GB), plus 32GB of DDR5 RAM and a 1TB SSD preinstalled. The NEO-X1 Pro ups the graphics to Nvidia's mobile version of the RTX 5070 (12GB) and doubles the RAM and storage, to 64GB and 2TB respectively.

GMKtec NEO-X1: highly upgradeable

Both variants can be upgraded manually, with two DDR5 RAM slots capable of expansion up to 96GB, and dual PCIe5.0 slots for up to 16TB.

You get Wi-Fi 7 and 2,5G Ethernet for connectivity, while up to six displays can be served through multiple video outputs – HDMI 2.1b, HDMI 2.1, 3 x DisplayPort 2.1b, and DisplayPort 1.4.

There's liquid cooling inside too, plus a three-fan airflow architecture in its 14.6L metal chassis case. This measures 350 x 165mm so is admittedly larger than a Steam Machine, but it's still not full desktop PC sized.

Power comes from an internal 850W power supply.

Naturally, this PC will be capable of pretty much you want to chuck at it – content creation, AI workloads, video and image rendering – but it's primarily designed to be a premium gaming option.

We've not yet had the opportunity to test one ourselves, but are excited by the prospect that, now Steam OS supports Nvidia graphics, it could become a customised Steam Machine V2.0. It's not yet been confirmed, but we're almost certain it comes with Windows 11 preinstalled.

Now down to the price. The GMKtec NEO-X1 will be available for £1,629.99 in the UK, $2,099.99 Stateside. The NEO-X1 Pro will be £2,079.99 / $2,899.99. There's also a £50/$50 early bird discount if you sign up for more information on the company's site.

Considering the 2TB Steam Machine with controller costs £1,208 in the UK, the extra £400 could be a very worthwhile consideration. The power difference is quite pronounced.

It's the difference between playing AAA games in 1440p or 4K with ray tracing, really.

Gaming is in a weird spot right now, with price rises every which way, mass redundancies across multiple studios and publishers, and a reset by Xbox to try to stabilise its financial situation. The current console generation is in a perilous state, let alone the next one.

However, one leak has given us a more positive outlook on what we can expect in the coming year or so. A memo obtained by The Verge suggests that Xbox's next console, Project Helix, could be an endgame machine – and not just because it'll play PC titles.

Acquired by The Verge's resident Microsoft expert, Tom Warren, the leaked memo suggests Helix will be capable of running every game released through Xbox's history.

That won't just include the backward compatible games already available on Xbox Series X/S, but everything – as long as the publishers approve.

It is claimed this will mean the next-gen console will offer a vast library of available games from day one, with compatibility with original Xbox, Xbox 360, Xbox One, and Xbox Series X/S titles. Plus new Helix games too, of course.

Will Xbox Project helix have a disc drive?

The gaming giant is yet to decide whether it will include a disc drive, but at the very least you'll be able to access an archive of digital games released in the last 25 years.

On top of this, while it's possible the internal hardware could be downgraded from the "premium" specs originally planned – thanks to the component crisis and costs – there are still plans for the machine to support PC games. So if Steam was included, for example, the launch lineup for Project Helix would run into many thousands of games available across Xbox and Windows.

The memo itself was allegedly sent to publishers, to convince them to allow their games to work through backward compatibility. It asks them to range their older titles on the Xbox Store, it seems.

This strategy won't be exclusive to Helix. Xbox has already started to release backward compatibility onto PC, with original Xbox games now being playable on PCs and gaming handhelds. It is expected to follow-up with Xbox 360 titles soon.

Of course, this is just a memo for now and plans can certainly change. But if Xbox does manage to get the vast majority of publishers and developers on its side, it makes Helix a compelling prospect – especially if Sony follows tradition with its PlayStation 6 and curbs backward compatibility to the last generation or so.

Xbox might be going through some tricky times, having dramatically cut staffing levels and entire studios from its lineup, and hiking prices of its consoles due to the component crisis, but it does have one shining star in its immediate future – Gears of War: E-Day.

The prequel is looking like it could be one of the best exclusives to release this year and very soon you won't even have to take our word for it – you can play it for free yourself.

That's if you're an Xbox Game Pass Ultimate or PC Game Pass member, that is. An Early Access Open Beta will be available to download and play on Xbox Series X/S or Windows PC from Thursday 6 August.

It will let you play the new Horde Siege PvE mode, which puts a new spin on the old wave survival mode in previous games.

The full game will release on 6 October and will arrive on Game Pass then, too. But if you want to get a taste ahead of time, at least you can.

Also coming to Xbox Game Pass this month are some treats for Premium members, as well as those with Ultimate and PC subscriptions.

Ball x Pit is a game I've played a lot on Steam Deck and love. It combines brick-breaking gameplay with base-building and is a whole lot of fun. That'll be available to Premium members on 12 August.

There's Powerwash Simulator 2 as well, which is already available on Ultimate and PC Game Pass, but will join the Premium lineup on 6 August.

And then there's Cricket 26 – the official game of the Ashes. That will arrive for all members (Premium, Ultimate and PC Game Pass) on 13 August.

And also, Ultimate and PC Game Pass subscribers can download and play the day one release of action RPG Beast of Reincarnation from today.

Here's a list of all the games coming this half of August:

• Heretic + Hexen – 4 August (Premium, Ultimate, PC Game Pass)
• Beast of Reincarnation – 4 August (Ultimate, PC Game Pass)
• Monsters are Coming! – 6 August (Premium, Ultimate, PC Game Pass)
• PowerWash Simulator 2 – 6 August (Premium, Ultimate, PC Game Pass)
• Bounty Star – 11 August (Premium, Ultimate, PC Game Pass)
• Date Everything! – 11 August (Premium, Ultimate, PC Game Pass)
• Grounded 2 (Game Preview) – 11 August (Premium, Ultimate, PC Game Pass)
• Ball x Pit – 12 August (Premium, Ultimate, PC Game Pass)
• Cricket 26 – 13 August (Premium, Ultimate, PC Game Pass)
• Mio: Memories in Orbit – 13 August (Premium, Ultimate, PC Game Pass)
• Sandustry – 13 August (Ultimate, PC Game Pass)
• Egging On – 18 August (Premium, Ultimate, PC Game Pass)

Games that are leaving the service on 15 August are Menace, Atlas Fallen, Aliens: Fireteam Elite, and Firewatch. So make sure you play them beforehand if you've been putting it off.

I have been playing FIFA / EA Sports FC games since their inception in 1993 and recently returned to Ultimate Team in FC 26 to see out the remaining seasons before the next game arrives. But, I'll be honest, while my UT squad is packed with 98 and 99 rated players, including evolutions I've built myself, I've not really been enjoying it.

That's because the gameplay has a number of issues that have resulted in opponents exploiting some poor mechanics, leading to the same tactics being employed time-after-time. There's little variety, with one of three goal types being scored over and again. And other players seem to be happy with that.

The number one issue is AI defending, which seemingly allows counter attacking teams to just run through your backline at will – unless you also adopt similar "rat" tactics. And believe you me, I'd rather spoon out my eyes with a Yop bottle that sit through match after match of counter attack after counter attack.

I try to keep my own team interesting and fluid, with a variety of attack styles and movements, but 70-80% of the time I'll just face the same scenario. And while I can beat them often, it's never easy and mostly unrewarding.

It's not other players' faults necessarily, they've found a cheat code of sorts and are just spamming it to earn better rewards. But boy is it frustrating.

Imagine my joy therefore when I learned that EA Sports FC 27 is to directly address this issue. Indeed, this one simple change would be enough for me to give the game more of my time (and my money) this coming season. However, there are others besides.

So here are my top five features coming with EA Sports FC 27 that could turn the tide for me. And yes, I have been playing the preview build.

1. Defending

To combat the counter attack and, perhaps more importantly, prevent those players from defending with just one controlled player across the lines of defence and midfield, manual defending is being overhauled.

While AI defending will still be a thing in FC 27, you will have much more control over your defensive players. You will be rewarded for taking control yourself.

For example, an AI defender will have shorter reach for interceptions than a manually controlled one, regardless of playstyles. Manually controlled defenders will also have increased jockey speed, while the range of manually-triggered stand tackles will be higher too.

And teammate contain functionality has been tweaked. AI controlled teammates will maintain a greater distance when pressing, so you'll have to take manual control to press harder.

These will hopefully prevent players from camping in their own half, relying on teammate contain to win the ball from you in order to counter attack. It could be a literal gamechanger for me.

2. Tokens

Even tokens were a great addition to FC 26 when they arrived shortly before the World Cup and it's great to see they'll be adopted permanently in FC 27.

Rather than just giving you packs or coins for doing well in competitions and objectives, you also earn tokens that can be redeemed for rewards in a dedicated section of the store.

It also allows those who don't regularly get tier one rewards in UT Champions or Rivals to save up their tokens for bigger packs or players.

3. The Grounds

We're yet to get the full rundown on The Grounds (watch this space) but its seems to be a welcome evolution of Volta or the old FIFA Street games, if you're ancient like me.

It'll allow you to play 1v1 or just have a kickabout with your pals in a more fun, free-flowing format.

I've been a big fan of Rush over the last couple of games, and am hoping this makes as much of an impact.

4. SBCs

Let's face it, Squad Building Challenges are rewarding – especially if you find your club and storage rammed to the rafters with fodder. But the actual technical mechanics of filling in SBCs and redeeming them is often laborious.

The new Ultimate Team system aims to make things much more simple. It'll only show you eligible trade-ins, and you won't need to fill squads – just select the players you want to redeem to fill a points objective.

Hopefully this will save die-hard FUT players hours a week.

5. FUT Gallery

To be honest, I'm not entirely sure I need to see my team in a 3D collectors room environment, but hey, each to their own.

The good part about the FUT Gallery is that it promises additional rewards throughout the game, for collecting sets of players. And you don't even need to keep those players at your club.

I'm always up for rewards that don't cost my hard earned cash.

EA Sports FC 27 will be available from 25 September, with pre-orders getting access seven days early. It will available on PS5, Xbox Series X/S, Nintendo Switch 2 and PC. There will also be versions for Nintendo Switch, PS4 and Xbox One, but they will not carry all of the features and functionality.

We're living through an era of price hikes right now, and gaming consoles are acting as some of the most obvious and visible examples of how the memory crisis is affecting consumer prices. While Xbox relentlessly raises the price of its own consoles, and PlayStation broadly keeps step, Nintendo has been taking things slightly more slowly.

It announced earlier this summer that it would be raising the price of the Switch 2, but it gave us all plenty of time to get ready by confirming that the price hikes would only come into force on 1 September.

In case you weren't concentrating, though, we're now in early August, which means you don't have all that much longer to grab a Switch 2 for its launch price. In fact, here in the UK you can even get a bit off the regular price – Amazon has it at 3% off, which isn't nothing.

The real point here is that anyone thinking about buying a Switch 2 would almost certainly be well advised to do so now, or at least before this month is out. I'm normally a big fan of advising people to wait until their budget allows for a splurge like this, but the fact is that I don't think it's ever going to be this price again.

In the US, we know that the console will go from $449.99 to $499.99, while Europe will see it go from €469.99 to €499.99. We actually don't yet have a confirmed new price for the UK, but you can fairly reasonably conclude that it'll go up by at least £30 and possibly as much as £50.

The real worry, though, is that this won't be the final price. Nintendo announced these changes a few months ago, in May. Even since then, the price of memory has continued to go up, and giants like Xbox have indicated that every indication is that we can expect it to continue rising through all of 2027.

That means the new price of the Switch 2 might realistically only hold for a number of months before it, too, has to be revised upwards to account for the new cost of bulk memory orders for Nintendo.

Sure, we might also get a Switch 2 OLED at some point, but that console is likely to be even pricier still, thanks to a fancier display, and it all starts to add up to a really grim scene eventually.

I love the Switch 2, and its flexibility is why it's my default console for massive RPGs that I can play over a series of weeks, and I want as many people as possible to experience what it has to offer. Right now, I think that means buying it sooner rather than later, though.

The Nintendo Switch 2 is a little beast – and with a price rise coming at the start of September, right now it remains a total steal compared to any new PlayStation 5 or Xbox Series X/S console you could care to buy. If you're a big fan of RPGs, you might not realise that the Switch 2 has almost immediately become a powerhouse for the genre.

Thanks to total backwards-compatibility with original Switch software, it already has hundreds of games to explore, but this summer has also been absolutely massive for native Switch 2 RPGs. Some are ports, and some are new launches, but all of them play more smoothly and responsively on the newer hardware.

So, if you're looking to pick up a massive game that offers up dozens and dozens of hours of playtime, the Switch 2 is a perfect console at the moment. I've brought together this list of five huge RPGs that launched this summer, all of which I've played, to give me the experience to vouch for them. Each one includes a trailer so you can get a taste of the game, but also an indication of how many hours it might take to complete, based on stats from Howlongtobeat, one of my favourite gaming resources.

Xenoblade Chronicles 2 – Nintendo Switch 2 Edition

• How long to beat: 96 hours

The second mainline Xenoblade Chronicles game just got its long-awaited Switch 2 upgrade (with the third one arriving later this year), and it makes a simply massive difference to how it looks. This gargantuan game always had really excellent art direction (if you're on board with its more anime-inflected character designs), but never had the sharpness to really come across well on Switch 1.

Now that's finally fixed, and the game that many people feel has the best version of Xenoblade's real-time combat ever can finally be enjoyed without squinting to see shimmering distant objects or environmental details. Its story, meanwhile, is slightly more of an acquired taste.

I'm not saying it's a pure positive that the game is so massive, either, but with most people taking dozens upon dozens of hours to beat the game and a chunk of its side content, Xenoblade Chronicles 2 undoubtedly offers a massive amount of value.

Final Fantasy X/X-2 HD Remaster

• How long to beat: 78 hours

I didn't play many Final Fantasy games growing up, thanks to the consoles I owned, but I've been slowly putting that right in my adulthood, thanks in no small part to ports and remasters. Final Fantasy X came out all the way back in 2001, staggeringly, but this re-release has itself now been ported many times.

It was available on Switch 1 and perfectly serviceable, but this new Switch 2 version is a marked improvement when it comes to clarity. The biggest upgrade, really, is in the quality of character models, which are much sharper, but because the foundations of this game are so old, don't expect a total remaster.

One great tweak compared to the previous version is the addition of Turbo mode, letting you massively speed up the game so that you can grind without as much of a time sacrifice. Given there are two games to enjoy here, that's a boon to let you experience their excellent stories a bit more briskly.

Warhammer 40,000: Rogue Trader

• How long to beat: 107 hours

One of the Switch 2's secret weapons is its mouse mode, letting you use one of your Joy-Cons as a mouse on any surface. Fewer games support it than I'd like, but it's always nice when they do, and Warhammer 40,000: Rogue Trader is a great example of how it could be huge for isometric RPGs.

Plenty of these have shown how controllers can work in the genre, but they're never quite as good as a mouse, and being able to use it in Rogue Trader is now a real pleasure after some patches to make it smoother and more performant. The game launched in a bad state last year, but Owlcat has finally got it more stable recently, making this the first point when I'd actually recommend it.

The game's huge, like every Owlcat RPG I've sampled, and I don't know if I'll ever have time to actually complete it, but this dark and humorous story set in the grim future is a must-try if you like the world of 40K and enjoy tactical battles.

Digimon Story: Time Stranger

• How long to beat: 60 hours

While you wait for Pokémon Winds and Waves, you might have an itch for more monster-collecting action, and the franchise's long-time rival Digimon is actually well-positioned right now. This game is very different to a Pokémon title, but it shares the sense of fun when you discover new monsters and evolve them into even more fun and fantastic shapes.

With a mystery story at its heart that involves a heaped serving of both time travel and cyberspace, the storytelling in Time Stranger is far more grown-up and mature than most Pokémon fare, and its mechanics have more in common with a Persona game. You'll pursue questlines and train up a massive roster of monsters, breeding and combining them to discover whole new genealogies.

The game looks lovely thanks to a Switch 2 version that has a smooth 60fps-targetting performance mode, and is a great pick if you want a family-friendly RPG that has loads of content to get through.

Xenoblade Chronicles – Nintendo Switch 2 Edition

• How long to beat: 77 hours

We already tackled the second game in the series at the top of this piece, but given it only came out a couple of months ago, it feels fair to also include the first Xenoblade Chronicles here. This game launched what's now a huge franchise for Nintendo, and it's hard to argue that it's ever looked better than it now does on Switch 2.

I played the whole game through when it came out, and while I didn't quite get as high as the 77-hour average painted by Howlongtobeat, I wasn't far off. This is a massive RPG that tells a sprawling story about the enduring power of bitterness, and the restorative potential of reconciliation.

Its world is really fun to explore, and the core conceit of continents that are actually themselves giant monsters doesn't really get old. If you want to see the roots of a modern-day mega-franchise, this is a great place to start on your Switch 2.

It is no exaggeration to suggest something's gone wrong with gaming. At least when it comes to consoles.

The ongoing RAM crisis has proved disastrous for the industry as a whole and console gaming more specifically. Not only have Valve's ambitious Steam Machine plans been wrecked by rising component costs, but now the full impact of Xbox's price rises are known – and they're not pretty. Especially for those in the UK and Europe.

After originally announcing the new US prices, which came into affect on Saturday 1 August, it seems Brit's are faced with even heavier hikes. The same with buyers in the EU.

A 1TB Xbox Series X with a disc drive now costs a staggering £669.99 / €799.99 – a rise of £170 / €200 respectively, in comparison with its launch price. For those without a calculator handy, that's around 30%.

Those in the US got off lighter, with less than a 25% rise.

Even the underpowered Xbox Series S – released six years ago to be a much more affordable route into "next-generation" gaming – has received a shocking markup. The standard 512GB version is now almost expensive as the Series X was at launch.

And the 1TB Xbox Series S is a mind-bending £519.99 / €599.99 / $599.99.

The new Xbox Series X and Series S prices (as of 1 August 2026)

• Xbox Series S (512GB): £429.99 / €499.99 / $499.99
• Xbox Series S (1TB): £519.99 / €599.99 / $599.99
• Xbox Series X (1TB, disc-free): £619.99 / €749.99 / $749.99
• Xbox Series X (1TB, disc): £669.99 / €799.99 / $799.99

Where does this leave console gaming?

Of course, Xbox isn't the only console maker to inflate its prices in the face of RAMageddon. Sony also heavily increased its PS5 prices earlier this year, with the standard PS5 costing today £569.99 / €649.99 / $649.99.

A PS5 Pro will set you back £789.99 / €899.99 / $899.99.

While Valve's all-new Steam Machine starts at £879 / €1,039 / $1,049 – and that's without a controller.

Let's not even get into how much Project Helix or the PS6 might cost, if the components market doesn't settle down again.

Then there's Sony's decision to ditch discs from the start of 2028 – with Xbox likely to follow suit. That has resulted in a big backlash from console gamers. And staff across some of the best and biggest game studios have either already lost or face losing their jobs this year. It's a mess.

It all leaves the console scene in a very perilous place. While PC gamers have hardly been unaffected over the last few months, especially when it comes to upgrading their systems.

It's hard to see where we can go from here. Although it can be argued that, with more than 120 million Xbox Series and PS5 consoles out there already – not including the number of Nintendo Switch owners there are – there's still an enormous market for games, if not the machines themselves.

And of course, there's still cloud gaming – of which Xbox is trialling a free, ad-supported version as things stand. Maybe that's the future after all. It's certainly a way to circumnavigate rising hardware costs if you can serve the best games to devices people already own.

That's if there's anyone left to make the games, of course.

When MSI took the wraps off its latest gaming handheld at the Computex show in Taiwan, I was one of the first people to get my hands on it and see what sort of power it was packing. The new Intel G3 Extreme chipset meant it was a given that it would have an eye-watering price, but we had to wait weeks to have that confirmed.

Now, the handheld is actually here, and the MSI Claw 8 EX AI+ is indeed quite the beast. I've been gaming on it for a week to see how it holds up in regular use, but also to check whether it can make that sky-high price seem a little less crazy.

Price and Availability

The MSI Claw 8 EX AI+ has had a slightly confusing regional roll-out. In the USA, it's available now, having launched in late June – so you can order it through a few storefronts.

Here in the UK, however, there's still no clear and precise date, but you can pre-order it through Scan Computers now. It's listed on Amazon, but the shipping date remains a vague window.

That brings us to the price. The Claw 8 EX AI+ comes in at £1,399 in the UK and a massive $1,799 in the US. No matter how you slice it, that's a big chunk of change for a gaming handheld.

Design and Specs

I didn't expect MSI to make as many revisions between generations of the MSI Claw 8, but here we are, and the good news is that it's clearly been listening to feedback.

The most recent Claw 8 designs were frankly not great – the handhelds were huge, but didn't pair that bulk with great ergonomics, making them a trial to hold for long periods.

With the Claw 8 EX, that's been solved neatly, with much more rounded grips to keep hold of and more of a palm-friendly shape overall. That said, this is still a seriously large and tall handheld, so there's no doubt that those with smaller hands should probably seek one out to try before they buy.

The handheld also comes in a new default colour, a dark purple with just a hint of shine to it, and again, I think it's a great change. The two tones of the older Claws didn't do it for me, but this looks smart. It's also got RGB lighting around each analogue stick, something that doesn't move me much anymore. Those sticks are Hall-effect for drift resistance, as are the triggers.

In terms of inputs, there are all the traditional controller buttons, as well as some shortcuts on either side of the screen. These let you access pause menus but also MSI's software overlay to change power settings or access different games. Atop the machine, there's a power button with fingerprint reading, two USB-C ports, a microSD slot for expanded storage, a 3.5mm jack and the volume keys.

The back of the handheld has two extra macro-enabled buttons that you can easily programme to your chosen controls, along with a big MSI crest and quite a lot of air intake – the venting mostly happens out of the top of the machine.

The real star of the show, though, and the most eye-catching part, is that screen. It's an 8-inch 1920 x 1200 resolution touchscreen IPS display, with refresh rates of 48 to 120Hz and VRR compatibility to make it super smooth. It's vibrant and lovely to look at, although some might ask how this price doesn't bring an OLED panel instead. Still, it's an expansive panel, even if the way it protrudes at the bottom gives it a bit of a chin.

In terms of specs, the huge inclusion here is Intel's new portable chip, the Arc G3 Extreme – basically the most powerful handheld gaming chip on the market right now. It's a total beast, and probably a big part of why the Claw 8 EX is so expensive.

You also get a 1TB internal SSD for storage, a chunky 32GB of RAM, and an 80WHr battery, all of which are at the very top end of what any competitor can offer. It means that the specs list of the Claw 8 EX is basically best-in-class.

The whole thing, meanwhile, runs Windows, but with all the flexibility that you might want. Xbox's new handheld experience runs really nicely, for instance, but you can also get anything else you like running, including Steam and GOG. Some apps are more likely than others to be recognised by MSI's software, which can make for some awkward swaps between handheld and desktop modes, but the amount of options on offer is terrific.

Performance

The MSI Claw 8 EX lives or dies by its power – that much is obvious from the intersection between its price and its specs list. If you're going to ask this much for a handheld, it needs to deliver seriously eye-opening performance.

Luckily, that's almost exactly how I'd describe its gaming prowess. This handheld offers up the sort of graphical capabilities that I thought would be beyond a portable machine for a good while yet. Intel's G3 chip is a monster, especially in this Extreme configuration, and I have the benchmarks to underline that fact.

Cyberpunk 2077 remains about as demanding as a game can come, even years on from its hyper-ambitious release, and even if I didn't tweak a thing in the settings, it comes out of the gate supremely smoothly on the Claw 8 EX. Its default configuration goes for "Ray-tracing Low", and averages 47.75fps in the benchmark test, which is already pretty great.

Turn on XeSS, though, to get frame generation, and things leap forward, giving 76.14fps on the XeSS Auto setting with all other presets the same. That's a major boost, but there's still more headroom. If you go with XeSS Ultra Performance, you can get 104.63fps, or if you want to get super stable image quality, XeSS Ultra Quality gets you 67.87fps.

That last option, Ray-tracing Low with XeSS Ultra Quality, is probably how I'd play the game, but those who want zero input latency can always opt for turning off XeSS and going with the Steam Deck preset to get a similar outcome of 66.8 with slightly fewer graphical bells and whistles.

Whichever way you cut it, those are phenomenal numbers for a gaming handheld, and they put plenty of gaming laptops from recent years to shame when it comes to unplugged power. All of these are at the screen's native resolution, too, so you have scope to turn that down for even more performance.

Of course, numbers are all well and good, but testing the handheld on a range of other games, from Doom: The Dark Ages to Assassin's Creed: Black Flag Resynced, I've been consistently impressed with how easily I've been able to get challenging games running smoothly on the hardware.

That performance is particularly staggering because ray tracing is often enabled – a feature that is generally beyond the ken of other expensive gaming handhelds without major resolution compromises. It honestly feels like a big leap forward in real terms.

It goes without saying that you can expect older or simpler games to run phenomenally, and battery life is thankfully also really impressive. I've been getting between two and three hours of gaming when cranked up to high settings on a demanding game, but in lower-power situations you could get way more – even up towards double digits.

That's remarkable, and underlines just how good Intel's power management options are, paired with MSI's implementation. I observed when this chipset launched that its efficiency could be just as important as its power, and that's how it feels in the hands some time later.

All of this looks excellent on that VRR IPS display, with the Variable Refresh Rate bit being key, since it eliminates most stutters to keep games feeling super smooth if they're in that generous VRR window (which they should be). That said, I'll say again that at this stonking price, you really would expect and hope for an OLED display for inkier blacks and better colours.

This superb power does come at a cost in terms of heat, though – while the Claw 8 EX never got uncomfortably hot in my testing, there's no denying that it gets pretty warm. It also has enough fan noise that you'll want headphones for any high-powered gaming to avoid distraction.

Verdict

The MSI Claw 8 EX AI+ is a genuinely remarkable gaming handheld and very arguably the best ever released by a mainstream brand in terms of raw power and performance. MSI has improved its design work massively, and the sheer brunt of Intel's newest portable chip is jaw-dropping to experiment with.

It's unfortunate that it comes with a price tag that makes it a luxury reserved for those who need the best of the best. In most ways, that's far from MSI's fault, of course, with the current economics just pushing back against it so hard, but it doesn't really change the arithmetic from a prospective customer's point of view.

So, buy the MSI Claw 8 EX AI+ if your budget is chunky, and you insist on performance that puts other handhelds to shame. But for many of us, it might make sense to sit out a year or two to see if Intel's chip starts to trickle into more affordable devices.

Also consider

The gaming handheld market is getting harder and harder to navigate as price hikes bite – so in many cases the best alternatives are second-hand.

That said, in some territories, you can now get the ROG Xbox Ally for a reasonable price, and while it's not as powerful as this MSI machine, it's very good for being miles cheaper.

Still my favourite PC gaming handheld, meanwhile, is the Lenovo Legion Go S (SteamOS). It's the perfect size, and while it again can't hold a candle to MSI's power, as an indie game machine, it's hard to fault, with all the convenience of SteamOS.

There are some things in life that you just have to have, no matter how impractical they may be. This sofa designed to look like a PlayStation controller is exactly that - and I have to have one.

This design comes from Muddycap (shared by Yanko Design) and fits nicely into Muddycap's other chair design: it's impractical, but lust worthy. The same designer has a chair that's shaped like a pigeon as well as a set of keys, which looks about as comfortable as the Iron Throne.

Based around the classic DualShock PlayStation controller, there's space for two gamers in the centre, leaving the rest of this sofa to the iconic design.

Sadly it's just a 3D model, which makes it even more frustrating as I won't be able to buy one, but you can see how - thanks to the D-pad on one side and the buttons on the other - that this sofa could expand its skills beyond just looking great.

With so much space taken up by the design, it's begging for a pull-out fridge or snack drawer to the sides, or maybe just a charging dock for controllers at each end.

If there's one criticism of this as an actual gaming chair, I'm not sure it would be slouchy enough for me. I'm either almost horizontal as I become the sofa during long sessions, or I'm standing in the middle of the room when things get more fraught.

This is a far cry from the best gaming chairs, which give you full adjustability, lumbar support and arm rests, so this sofa is less of a Call of Duty chair and more of a Mario Kart chair, you know, where precision might be less important.

While I'm going through a crisis trying to figure out how I can commission a furniture builder to make me this sofa, PlayStation is enjoying its own crisis after announcing that PlayStation will stop physical disc releases from 2028.

That's going to put a nail in the used game market and while PlayStation would probably rather sell you the game at a higher price, for those seeking out games they missed well after release, getting it second hand has always been a way to snap up a bargain.

While PlayStation and its gaming community wrangles with that hot potato, I'm going to measure up my lounge and see exactly where I might fit a PlayStation controller sofa.

The handheld gaming PC market has become increasingly crowded over the past couple of years, but ONEXPLAYER is aiming well above the likes of the Steam Deck OLED, Asus ROG Ally X and Lenovo Legion Go 2.

Its latest X2 Mini Pro is built around AMD's Ryzen AI Max+ 388 processor, one of the company's powerful Strix Halo chips, pairing an 8-core, 16-thread CPU with Radeon 8050S graphics. That's desktop-class silicon squeezed into an 8.8-inch handheld, backed by up to 64GB of LPDDR5X RAM and 2TB of SSD storage.

There's a 144Hz OLED touchscreen with a 2.5K resolution, detachable controllers inspired by the Nintendo Switch, an optional magnetic keyboard cover that turns it into a compact Windows tablet. Plus there's support for an external liquid cooling dock for those wanting to squeeze every last frame from demanding games.

The entry-level model starts at around $2,399 with 48GB of memory and a 1TB SSD, while the fully loaded version with 64GB and 2TB storage reaches roughly $2,799. That's several times the cost of a Steam Deck OLED, and enough to buy multiple Nintendo Switch 2 consoles instead.

For most gamers, that's likely to be a step too far. But ONEXPLAYER clearly isn't chasing the mainstream. Instead, it's targeting enthusiasts who want the fastest handheld PC currently available and are prepared to pay desktop-PC money to get it.

Whether the X2 Mini Pro can justify that price in real-world gaming remains to be seen, but on paper it's shaping up to be one of the most powerful handhelds we've ever seen.

Steam Machine owners disappointed by the demise of Dbrand's gorgeous Companion Cube case have been handed a second chance – provided they have access to a 3D printer and a little patience.

Just weeks after Valve pulled the plug on Dbrand's officially planned shell over licensing issues, maker Jaron has released a fully printable alternative through the Printables community.

Rather than copying Dbrand's files, the creator says the model was built entirely from scratch using publicly available images as reference, complete with detailed assembly instructions and a list of the extra screws, magnets and components required.

The result is remarkably close to the design that captured PC gamers' imaginations before it was cancelled. It transforms Valve's compact gaming PC into the instantly recognisable Weighted Companion Cube from Portal, complete with layered panels and contrasting colour sections that can be produced on a standard single-extruder printer using filament swaps. It's not exactly a beginner project, but it looks well within reach for experienced makers.

The Companion Cube isn't the only project breathing new life into Valve's latest hardware. The growing modding community has also begun releasing replacement faceplates, alternative shells and even entirely new small-form-factor PC builds inspired by the Steam Machine's design.

"The Orange Box", is a greta example. This is a far more powerful custom gaming PC housed inside a SilverStone chassis but styled around Valve's ecosystem. Alongside printable accessories and cosmetic upgrades, these projects suggest the Steam Machine could end up becoming just as interesting for modders as it is for gamers.

If nothing else, it's proof that cancelling an official accessory doesn't necessarily kill the idea. As long as the maker community keeps designing clever alternatives, some of gaming's best concepts can still find a way into players' homes, one layer of filament at a time.

Xbox is testing a way to provide cloud gaming access for free, without the need for Game Pass membership. It is ad-supported and allows Xbox gamers to access their own library of games on different devices at no extra cost.

Initially available to Xbox Insiders with an Xbox account, the service is currently limited. It allows play in one hour sessions and you'll have to sit through adverts before each game starts, but the core experience is then uninterrupted.

Any Xbox gamer can join the Insider program to be part of the test, you just need to download the Xbox Insider Hub on your Xbox Series X/S, Xbox One or Windows PC and follow the sign-up instructions.

As this is not part of Xbox Game Pass, you won't have access to games outside those you've already purchased and own. You might also find that some of your games are unsupported, but Xbox is adding new games to the list all the time, so you might find additional titles become available over time.

Xbox free cloud gaming test – other details

It's also worth remembering that this is just a viability test for now – there's no guarantee that Xbox will continue to offer the service in future. However, it believes that there is a need for a free service for users who cannot easily access a console or PC.

It could also help Xbox One owners who are yet to upgrade play enhanced Xbox Series X/S games on their consoles.

The adverts that will be shown have been carefully vetted, the company claims, to ensure they meet the correct standards. They will also be "what players expect on each platform".

If you are an Xbox Insider and do not currently subscribe to an Xbox Game Pass tier that includes cloud gaming, you should be able to help test the ad-supported service now. It'll be available for a "limited period", although it's currently unclear how long that will be.

Amazon has followed Netflix by adding games to its Prime Video service, but it's raced ahead in quality and quantity. That's because the new "Games" tab on the Prime Video app gives you direct access to its ever-growing library of Luna games.

That means you will be able to play the likes of the multiple award-winning Dispatch, Indiana Jones and the Great Circle, EA Sports FC 26, and the Harry Potterverse RPG Hogwart's Legacy for free, straight from Prime Video itself.

Luna is Amazon's cloud gaming service, which gives all Amazon Prime members access to a catalogue of console and PC quality games to stream over the internet. The game is run on remote hardware with the video feed streamed to your TV, while the controller codes are sent in the opposite direction.

There's a small amount of lag (latency) in comparison with playing directly on a PS5, for example, but everything is still very playable. All you need is a Bluetooth controller connected wirelessly and away you go.

Some of the games can even be played using a mobile phone or tablet as the controller, including an expanding selection of party games for family and friends to enjoy together.

That includes the new season of Courtroom Chaos, with Arnold Schwazenegger as the judge.

Other games available on the platform include some of Amazon's own properties, such as the most recent Tomb Raider trilogy. Fallout 4 is also available, to complement the TV series on Prime Video.

The Games tab is now available on Fire TV models in the UK and US, with a wider rollout coming "in the months ahead".

Hopefully that will include Prime Video apps on TVs and streaming devices from other manufacturers. As things stand, you can play Luna games through a browser on most devices by heading to the dedicated website.

I'm a child of Nintendo, and even if I won't always defend every generation of the franchise, it's always fun to remind myself that I've played Pokémon right since its very first games. The games have been long-term companions, but that doesn't mean I'm not open to new options.

Those of my generation have long known about a rivalry between Pokémon and Digimon, but the reality is that the former clearly won the war. It's a way bigger deal and has way more cultural capital – but that doesn't mean that Digimon's been left behind. Rather, it's just branched out in different ways.

I saw a decent amount of praise for Digimon Story Time Stranger when it came out last year, but didn't have a chance to play it – until now. A Switch 2 version of the game came out this month, and that's given me the opportunity to see what this parallel monster-collecting game has to offer.

I've been really pleasantly surprised by the setup of Time Stranger, which is actually way more like a Persona game than it is a Pokémon one. You're dropped into a funky sci-fi plot set in Tokyo and involving time travel without being too complicated, and soon introduced to Digimon, which are basically monsters that come into the real world from a parallel virtual one.

What I didn't realise is that Time Stranger, a bit like the Persona games, doesn't have linear evolution for its monsters. When you level up a Pokémon far enough, it'll evolve, but other than a few exceptions like Eevee, it'll always do so into the same new Pokémon. Not so in the world of Digimon – most monsters have a few forms they can turn into, turning the whole list of them into a sort of web that you can explore over time.

That one twist is enough to hook me – in Pokémon, unless you're aiming at competitive play, there's never a good reason to keep a Pokémon non-evolved, but in Time Stranger I'm already holding off to earn more stats and unlock new, more interesting-looking evolutions.

All of that sits outside of the core gameplay, too, which involves running around exploring environments and fighting turn-based battles. This uses a fairly familiar rock-paper-scissors system alongside some elemental twists, but it's really simple to learn, with a battle-speed toggle that makes less important fights far quicker.

I always like it when time-savers like that are available from the get-go, and after about three hours of gameplay I'm clearly just hitting the game's main stride, with new areas to access and the story developing at a decent clip. Another major advantage over Pokémon? It's got actual voice acting, even if some of it's a little over-the-top.

The game hits Switch 2 with both a quality mode that aims for 30fps at higher resolutions, and a 60fps at 1080p option. Neither really sticks to its target all that well, but I've found the 60fps mode much more enjoyable, so that's what I've been going with.

If you're in the market for an RPG that'll scratch a lot of that Pokémon itch while we wait for Winds and Waves, I think this is the best option out there right now, especially when you play on the Switch 2, so be sure to check out the free demo on the eShop to give yourself a taste of what it has to offer.

Xbox is currently undergoing a reset which has resulted in a vast amount of jobs being lost across the business. It is also dramatically changing strategy – nigh-on reversing a decade of decisions to refocus the company and brand. And it seems that some of the endeavours are working.

It has been revealed that, in the US at least, sales of the Xbox Series X and Series S consoles have "more than doubled" year-on-year.

In comparison, hardware sales for PlayStation and Nintendo have dipped – with the latter falling by 79%.

To be fair, that's understandable. The Nintendo Switch 2 launched in June 2025 so the company reported a massive spike in sales as pre-orders were shipped and launch stock sold out quickly. The sales for June 2026 were always likely to be much lower.

More interestingly, perhaps, is that PS5 sales dipped by 19% YOY. But then, Sony did recently raise its console prices significantly. And the Xbox Series X/S equivalent price hike is yet to come into affect.

It'll occur in just over a week, on 1 August, so consumers could be snapping up the consoles before that happens.

The sales figures are also relative. Mat Piscatella of data firm Circana revealed on Bluesky that while Xbox performed better than many expected last month, it still sold fewer consoles that its rivals. The Nintendo Switch 2 continued to be the best-selling option, in both units and dollars earned, with the PS5 in second.

Uncertainty in the games business

Whatever the trends, the games market is still looking uncertain at present. When it comes to the next generation, at least.

Xbox has admitted that its Project Helix plans might have to change in the light of the ongoing components crisis. Its hope to launch a "premium" PC/console hybrid might have to be scaled back to remain affordable.

Meanwhile, Sony is said to have delayed the PS6 for similar reasons, and we all know what happened with the Steam Machine. While it seems to have found a market, it is undeniably overpriced for what you get.

And so it seems we'll see this current console generation continue for the foreseeable, which is good news for those who already own a PS5, Nintendo Switch or Xbox Series X/S. At least the games are still coming thick and fast.

Meta is giving away free Xbox Game Pass membership with its own Meta Horizon+ subscription. That will give every Meta Quest owner who signs up a library of more than 50 Xbox games to stream on a virtual display in their headset, with 10 hours of cloud gaming access per month.

It's a similar deal to the one Discord started offering its Nitro subscribers in May. You don't have to pay any extra, but you will currently need an Xbox controller to play the games.

That's until Meta pushes a forthcoming update to the Touch Controllers for the Quest 3 and Quest 3S. They will soon be able to emulate an Xbox controller too, with the firmware patch rolling out "in the coming weeks".

The games in the new free Xbox Game Pass Starter Edition include the likes of Fallout 4, Fallout 76, Overcooked 2, Grounded and DayZ. They don't give you a full, immersive VR experience but you can play them on a huge virtual screen inside the headset – up to the equivalent of a 26-foot display.

You can even choose to play them from within an Xbox-themed virtual space.

Of course, a Meta Horizon+ subscription doesn't just include Game Pass, it also gives you access to more than 100 virtual games you can download and play on a Quest.

A subscription costs $59.99 / £59.99 per year or $7.99 / £7.99 per month, with the first month free for new members. That's a lot of gaming for the usual price of just one console title.

You'll just need to own a compatible headset and away you go. We're also hoping to hear plans on new Meta Quest devices during Meta Connect in September.

Whatever happens T3 will keep you informed all the way.

There's a big old genre of gaming that I've never quite got to grips with, despite a lot of trying, and that's skating games. I've never been a real-life skater, but the fashion and attitude has always been attractive, and that's meant I've tried over and over to get into giants of the genre like Tony Hawk's Pro Skater, without ever really finding my jam.

Little did I know that the way I'd finally get my satisfaction was to swap skating on a board for literally tricking an entire train – the barmy premise of Denshattack!, which is out now on basically all platforms. It sees you take on the role of a train driver in a world where trains can do things you'd basically never believe outside of an anime.

Luckily, anime is very much the aesthetic here, as you make your way through a sci-fi future Japan full of abandoned train tracks. This is a world where rebels pilot trains in a sport called Denshattack, and do so much like skaters, pulling off wild tricks, rail grinds and more.

You drop into a course with a set objective, whether it's to make it to the end of a more linear one or to get a certain amount of combo points in an open-ended arena, and from there it's all about free-styling your way to success. With a variety of button presses, you can jump, drift around corners, and pull off tricks in the air, and chaining these moves together is your best path to profit and speed.

Each track also has a range of secrets to find, from collectables to interactions with the passing world (using your train's horn to startle some birds, for instance). These give you stretch goals to keep an eye out for as you race, and they're consistently fun to achieve.

The aesthetic is also great, all cel-shaded and stylish, with really colourful stages that zip past with an impressive sense of speed. Back in the days of the Switch 1, I think this is a textbook example of a game that might have been really compromised either by blurry visuals or a lower frame rate, but on the Switch 2 it's been a buttery-smooth joy both in docked and handheld mode.

I didn't expect it to get its hooks into me, but a few hours in I'm really loving the core design choices at play. The game's welcoming if you just want to experience its pulpy story and don't have that much manual skill to get high scores, but the skill ceiling is incredibly high for those who want to find it.

This is one of those games that you have to see in motion to really appreciate, and I'm confident that watching the trailer I embedded further up this story will go a long way towards clarifying whether it's for you. Don't be put off by the story, either – it's littered with skip buttons if you just want to get to the train-skating.

That's what I've been doing, honestly, and I've had a stellar time doing it. Weird games are the way forward, I think, and this is a great example of a low-cost game that deserves to build up a cult audience.

Xbox might be shifting back to a tried and tested exclusives model in the coming year, but one remaining consequence of its foray into cross-platform is that Master Chief will soon arrive on PlayStation 5 for the first time.

Halo: Campaign Evolved will officially release in just a week's time, on 28 July and it marks a real shift for the series. There's just one thing – it will only be available to purchase on PlayStation, while Xbox Series X/S and PC owners can get it for free with Xbox Game Pass Ultimate or PC Game Pass membership.

Rebuilt from the ground up, the remake of Halo: Combat Evolved (originally released for the first Xbox) retains the same gameplay and mission structure, but with dramatically improved graphics. It also features some control changes, such as when driving the Warthog.

The campaign mode is the real star – as the tweaked title suggests – although you still get four-player online co-op. There are new missions too, as well as a healthy serving of additional weapons, vehicles and enemies.

Those who pre-ordered the Premium Edition will actually get to play the game in early access from Thursday, 23 July, but if you're an Xbox Game Pass Ultimate subscriber, you don't have much longer to wait.

The additional Xbox Game Pass games for July 2026

Shift at Midnight is another day one release for Ultimate and PC Game Pass members that's arriving soon – tomorrow, in fact. While Hell is Us will be added for all members, including Premium, from Thursday.

Mistfall Hunter is coming at the end of the month, on 30 July, as a new release also. And Corsair Cove will be available for PC only the day after.

Xbox has announced a couple of games coming next month, too. Both Heretic + Hexen and Beast of Reincarnation will be available from 4 August. The latter is yet another day one release.

Sadly, there are eight games being removed from the service at the end of July, with the pixel-perfect platformer Celeste being a particular favourite. I advise you download and play it in the days you have left.

The Steam Machine was never intended to be one of the most expensive games consoles of all time. It was meant to be an affordable entry point to PC gaming in the living room.

However, AI came along and munched on available RAM chips like locusts in a wheat field, and Valve's good intentions ended up going awry. So, instead of a cheap and cheerful PC console, we got an overly-priced, under-spec'ed mini PC (albeit one that's cute).

That's not to say it's been a flop. Even starting at over $1,000, Valve is struggling to make enough units to meet demand. It is thought to have sold up to 15,000 Steam Machines so far and many on the lengthy waiting list are still awaiting.

If you're still undecided though, or are waiting for a price drop in future, we might have some bad news. There's every indication that the price will actually go up at some point.

As quoted by Jason Schreier at Bloomberg, one of the engineers that worked on Steam Machine, Yazan Aldehayyat believes the scarcity of components and the knock-on effect on prices isn't going to get better anytime soon: "Honestly, it’s still getting worse," he said.

The products and stock currently being sold are old, he suggested, and are soon to run out: "What people are seeing on retail shelves right now, from our observations, is lagging what we’re seeing from a bulk supply by at least three to six months."

The likely result of further price hikes for RAM and storage is that Valve will be facing higher costs to make more Steam Machines. And as a small company, those costs are likely to be passed on to the customer – just as they are now.

Aldehayyat's colleague, Pierre-Loup Griffais recently admitted that the existing elevated price the Steam Machine "ends up matching pretty closely" to the cost of its components. A sombre thought.

It could be why Valve has seemingly switched tact in recent times, from wanting its own console in some gamers' hands to wanting Steam OS in everyone's. It has recently started to release a version of its excellent front end and gaming platform for PCs of all shapes and sizes.

And so, if you want a more powerful Steam Machine, that's entirely possible. You just won't be buying it from Valve.

As a lover and collector of retro gaming tomfoolery, I've been a big fan of the HyperMegaTech Super Pocket handhelds since they first emerged in 2023, but few of them have ticked my boxes as much as the latest.

The Super Pocket – Rare Edition has the same specs as the other six in the collection (that are currently available) but with one important distinction. Rare has been inarguably one of the finest game development studios for four decades, and so the games library found here demands attention.

There's Banjo Kazooie, which is the headline inclusion (of course), and some of its console greats from the 8-bit, 16-bit era and Game Boy era, such as Battletoads and Conker's Pocket Tales. But what really helped transform me back to my own childhood, and even help me realise a long-standing ambition, are the ZX Spectrum games.

One in particular, in fact.

Rare started out life as Ultimate Play the Game and it ruled the scene in the 80s. Its games were inventive, highly addictive and often took the Speccy's limited hardware to whole new levels. And considering its earliest games had a file size lower than an average email today, they still hold up well.

Jetpac is the one that I remember most fondly – not least because I never managed to complete it first time around. I likely never got past the third or fourth level, in fact.

It ran on a 16K Spectrum, so was accessible to all owners (I had a 48K model that was also custom upgraded to eke a bit more from it), and its simple platforming premise made it a quick, fun experience. Still does.

It's why it was the first game I loaded on the new Super Pocket and I can now finally say I have bested it. Well, I've beaten the eight levels before it loops back and ups the difficulty, but that's pretty much my original childhood target.

Now I have to finally finish Knight Lore, which is also present, and I can retire happy. Until the Rare collection 2 arrives, that is.

What is the Super Pocket?

Unlike many retro game handhelds, the Super Pocket is a cartridge-based handheld that comes with a collection of preinstalled games. You cannot add your own roms or emulators, but each of the included titles has been optimised to work perfectly on its 2.8-inch 4:3 IPS display and using the Game Boy-style controls.

It is made by Blaze, the company behind the Evercade products, so while you can't add downloaded games, you can purchase Evercade cartridges and use them with the Super Pocket, too – thanks to the cartridge slot around the rear.

That opens up a vast library of additional games that you can purchase and collect.

There are several Super Pocket models available – all for £50 or under. Other particular favourites include the Atari Edition (of which I have the special edition version with fake wood panelling on the front) and the Neo Geo Edition, which includes 14 classic games.

As they are all officially licensed, much like the cartridges, there's no worrying about "illegal" roms or setting up different emulators. You can add shaders to the display, to make it look like there are scanlines to mimic the CRT TVs of the period, but things are keep simple. It truly is a pick-up and play device.

Now please excuse me, there's a Knight that needs Loreing – or something. Ahem.

It's not every day that Aston Martin unveils an entirely new car, let alone one that hasn't been teased and leaked for months beforehand, but today it's announcing an SUV to potentially complement the DBX – except there's a major asterisk to that.

You see, this is what's being politely called a "digital-only" launch, which is a euphemistic way of saying that the newly announced Dreadnought will only exist in Call of Duty: Modern Warfare 4 when it comes out later this year.

Unsurprisingly, for a car that's going to be featured in the world of a military shooter, it's a military-grade SUV that's intended to get people around big maps quickly, and was designed "without the restraints of the physical world".

That was apparently a great bit of fun for Aston's designers, although it's not like the end result is the maddest-looking car you've ever seen. It apparently sports "advanced armour technologies", which is almost certainly a way of saying that it'll be able to take quite a lot of punishment in-game before it gives up on you.

If there's one bit of the car that is hard to argue with, I'd say it's that paint job, which is indeed peak Aston Martin, using the brand's iconic Chiltern Green colour to really rich effect.

In design terms, you can tell that the lack of real-world shackles did indeed let Aston Martin go a little crazy – it's a wild-looking slice of car, raised up on enormous tyres and with a really interesting, sleek look despite its size.

Right now, it's a little unclear whether the car will be featured in the game's singleplayer campaign, but we do know that it'll be in the big new map being added for the DMZ extraction shooter mode and the returning Warzone battle royale mode. In each case, players will be able to use it to get around the map nice and quickly.

I'm expecting to learn quite a lot more about Modern Warfare 4 in the next few weeks, too. Lord knows that Xbox (which has now owned COD for quite a while) will be desperate for a big win in terms of the game's sales. It won't be on Game Pass, as we know, but with the last couple of COD entries having failed to capture the zeitgeist, and Battlefield 6 having a fairly stellar time, this is a big entry for the biggest traditional shooter brand in the land.

Sony has announced the latest lineup of games coming to the PS Plus game catalogue and, in a break from the norm, they will be staggered over the next couple of weeks in the UK, US and Japan.

That's a release strategy more akin to Xbox Game Pass than PS Plus in the past, but we're sure PS5 fans won't be whinging as the excellent Avatar: Frontiers of Pandora will be leading the way.

It'll be available for PS Plus Extra and Premium members from 21 July in all regions, and is one of the best first-person action adventure games I've played in many a year. It's also arguably one of the best movie tie-ins ever made.

The other games being added might be available a little sooner or later, with the dates jumping around a bit depending on where you live.

Rise of the Ronin, for example, is available for PS5 in the UK, US and Japan now, but in other regions from 21 July.

Firefighting Simulator: Ignite, also PS5-only, will be available everywhere from 21 July, while Mighty Morphin Power Rangers: Rita’s Rewind will be added for PS5 and PS4 from 28 July in UK, US and Japan, 21 July everywhere else.

That's the same day another of my favourite first-person games arrives, too. Dying Light (the PS4 version) will be joined by Citizen Sleep 2: Starward Vector (PS5), as well as Snow Bros. Wonderland.

Things are a bit more regular when it comes to the new (old) games being added to the classic catalogue for PS Premium members. Psi-Ops: The Mindgate Conspiracy and Indigo Prophecy (AKA Fahrenheit in the UK) will be available globally on 21 July.

Physical media has been in the news a lot lately, not least when it comes to gaming. PlayStation has announced that it is ditching discs for a digital-only future, Xbox is likely to follow suit, and some games are being released as download codes in boxes – including GTA 6.

But ask PC gamers about it and they'll point out that bar some special releases, they've had to make do with digital downloads for years. Steam is the biggest storefront for PC game purchases and there are no physical copies to be found. Well, until now...

One gamer has built an ingenious cartridge system for PC that can play Steam games from custom SSD-based cartridges.

Taking to the PC Master Race Reddit (via Tom's Hardware), Jibril-sama detailed how they turned cheap SATA SSD cards into game cartridges, and built a dock to read and play them automatically.

The SATA dock is plugged into a PC, while the custom software detects when an SSD cartridge is mounted. An execute script then loads the game.

The builder even custom built the cartridge casings using 3D printing and added cover art.

"Got a couple of used 2.5-inch SSDs for cheap so I decided to make a game cartridge system," the Redditor revealed.

“Games are actually on those SSDs with a script to auto-navigate Steam to the game's page. Auto-starting the game right away is also possible."

Each SSD used cost Jibril-sama just €7 (less than £6), so the project is affordable. Whether it could be replicated by others is unclear at present. There are also question marks over Steam updates and patches for each game, which will be tricky to keep on top of.

However, they can be manually installed once each SSD is plugged in and the creator doesn't seem too concerned as the cartridges are for "games that I want to replay once in a while".

They also look good on a shelf, we expect.

Two renowned games controller manufacturers surprised many at CES in January, with both 8BitDo and GameSir each announcing similar accessories for those running emulation software on their phones.

But while GameSir managed to get its Pocket Taco to market speedily, it's taken a while for its rival to catch up. And so, if you wanted to turn your iPhone or Android device into a Game Boy, you really only had the one option.

Until this week, that is. It looks like 8BitDo is finally ready to take orders for its FlipPad which, like the Pocket Taco, adds physical Game Boy style controls to a mobile phone.

The 8BitDo FlipPad works differently to the Taco in that it connects via USB-C rather than Bluetooth. That could potentially provide a lower latency experience – ideal for the twitch-friendly controls of classic platformers. It can also flip down when you need to use the full screen, without needing to remove the add-on.

According to Russ at Retro Game Corps (via NotebookCheck), the 8BitDo FlipPad will be available to pre-order this week, from Wednesday 15 July. It'll then ship from 30 July.

And a pleasant surprise is that it is claimed to cost just $30 (around £22). That's cheaper than the Pocket Taco, although you can also see that drop at times during big sales periods.

There are no further details yet – not even on the pre-order page location – but we'll keep you informed as and when there's more.

Obvious to some but not all, you'll have to provide your own emulators and games (roms), and it's advised you stick to games that can be played on the top-half of your phone's screen. You'll also need to consider that there is no thumbstick, so games that work with a D-pad will work best – such as Game Boy, Game Boy Color, SNES, Mega Drive/Genesis, etc.

Indeed, considering the only colour option expected to be released for now is based on the Game Boy DMG, that's clearly the main intention anyway.

Xbox is in the news for all the wrong reasons at the moment, with 1,600 employees sadly losing their jobs in the last few days, with the same number again poised for redundancy next year too.

It ends a decade of investment by Microsoft into studio and publisher acquisitions, and in Xbox Game Pass – the subscription service thought to be the future of the brand. The gambles simply didn’t work out.

But that doesn’t mean it is ready to give up on Game Pass just yet. And with this month’s lineup of free games, it seems to be business as usual. The addition of Tony Hawk’s Pro Skater 1 + 2 on 21 July is a true highlight, as it becomes available to Xbox Game Pass Premium members, as well as Ultimate and PC Game Pass.

It is without a shadow of doubt one of the greatest remakes of all time, with two essential skateboarding games updated with modern graphics and control systems.

It’ll also be joined by Gears of War: Reloaded (now for Premium members), Tamashika, Ascend to Zero, PBA Pro Bowling 2026, Quarantine Zone: The Last Check, Mavrix by Matt Jones, FixForce, and The Planet Crafter. While Fogpiercer is coming to PC.

There’s just one caveat… the list of games leaving Game Pass is arguably even better.

Sadly, if.you haven’t played the excellent Dungeons of Hinterberg yet, you only have a week left to do so. The same with Powerwash Simulator and Shadow of the Tomb Raider Definitive Edition.

They lead a lineup of 10 games being removed on 15 July, which seems like more than usual. Let’s hope this doesn’t become a trend.

Still, regardless of Xbox’s current issues and the great “reset” it’s undertaking, taking to the half-pipe in Mr Hawk’s Converse All-Stars should take your mind off it for a while.

The games console scene is currently going through its biggest most troubling times since the 80s. PlayStation has announced it is ditching physical media releases, sparking much anger, Valve's Steam Machine has underwhelmed with its performance for the price, and Nintendo is withdrawing the Switch family of consoles in Europe.

But they all seem minor inconveniences in comparison with what's going on over at Xbox.

A company-wide reset has resulted in studio closures and mass layoffs across the brand – with 1,600 losing their jobs immediately and another 1,600 redundancies expected to follow next year. It has left Xbox's game makers on tenterhooks at best, unemployed at worst.

Asha Sharma, who took over as CEO earlier this year admitted that the gaming giant was in shambles, with the last decade of acquisitions and strategical decisions not paying off. It is simply losing money on the likes of Xbox Game Pass and many of the studios it bought, and is thus restructuring for a complete reset.

Some might wonder where that leaves Project Helix – the company's next Xbox machine, which was originally announced as a premium PC/console hybrid. But while that's facing its own challenges due to the ongoing components crisis, it seems it's business as usual for the hardware division.

In fact, that's the part of Xbox that will now be given more attention.

According to T3's sister site Windows Central and its sources, Helix is "safe and on track".

The hardware division has been hit by the layoffs the least, while the team working on Project Helix have been tasked to find ways around the RAM and storage pricing issues that are plaguing every corner of tech right now.

According to the site, they are tackling "margin pressure" through "aggressive innovation". This will hopefully reduce costs yet keep the core ideals of the next-gen console – maintaining its premium capabilities through workarounds, rather than reducing the spec, as Valve seems to have done with the Steam Machine.

Of course, that might have put Project Helix back by a few months, even a year, but with the latest announcements, it seems the entire company is backing on it to be a success.

That will come as scant compensation to those who have lost their jobs so far, or are worried that they will be in the next round of planned cuts. But Xbox itself might be able to weather the storm.

The only question is, will you still be waiting on the other side?

Although the big news came out last week, not this, it's still a complicated time to talk about a big new videogame. After all, we know now that PlayStation won't produce discs from January 2028 onwards, something that basically ushers in the end of being able to own most games physically – so it's interesting to consider how many more Assassin's Creed titles will ever come out on a disc, for instance.

I've written about a few of the ways in which this is basically a disaster, already, so I won't dwell again, but it does put a slightly sour twist on things when you play a game as detailed and vibrant as the new remake of Black Flag, which I've had for a little over a week and enjoyed hugely.

I've been playing the game on my gaming PC, not as a deliberate gesture of rebuke to PlayStation, but rather because the 5070 Ti inside it simply gives me the best experience out of the options I have access to, and because I've been testing an ultrawide monitor to really make things as "PC gaming" as they can get.

It's been fun to underline just how good that experience can be when everything works straight out of the box, too. Black Flag Resynced is one of the most gorgeous videogames I've ever played, with its version of the Caribbean offering you a new vista practically every time you pass an island.

The game's also a lovely throwback to an era when you could polish off the mainline story of a big game like this in a couple of dozen hours, rather than something like 75 of them, and the speed at which its story clips along has been refreshing to enjoy.

I was a big fan of Assassin's Creed Shadows, and I'll maintain that its version of Japan was more interesting to explore in mechanical terms than the more stylised one offered up by Ghost of Yotei the same year. Now, Black Flag Resynced has confirmed for me that Ubisoft (despite rumblings in industry terms) has clearly reached a point of impressive technical mastery over its Anvil in-house engine.

The game is well-optimised, and I've been getting a pretty smooth 80fps experience with everything maxed out, Nvidia's wizardly frame generation at 2X, and the resolution at a scary 3440 x 1440 because of that ultrawide. The fact that the game ships with that resolution natively supported is a lovely bonus, of course, and ultrawide owners will know it's never a given.

Similarly, I haven't really encountered many bugs or issues – the game really does just feel like a substantial facelift for a beloved entry from years ago. I'm not sure exactly what made Ubisoft choose Black Flag as its first proper remake, but I'm extremely hopeful that we could get revamped versions of the Ezio games now, to really get my nostalgia firing.

Just like with Shadows, the single technological inclusion that has most consistently blown me away is the global illumination – a lighting system that radically transforms how daylight and other conditions look, making them unfathomably more realistic and impactful.

When you pair this with dynamic weather and water simulation, which is really superb, you get the recipe for some incredibly dramatic conditions, from huge seaborne storms to dappled sunshine through palms on islands, and it's amazing to see a game equally good at portraying nature and human settlements.

Gameplay, meanwhile, is just as you'd hope for, which means it's extremely identifiably the same game as before, with the same tools and abilities, but there have been some modernisations to improve how intuitive things are. For example, the post-launch improvements to the parkour model from Shadows are here from the start, including a dedicated jump button and easier exits from climbing.

The naval combat, meanwhile, remains rewarding and surprisingly challenging – if you think that the "brace" command is optional, for instance, you'll soon realise the opposite, and you really can't take on boats much better-equipped than you. By contrast, combat on foot is refreshingly simple, like the old days of the franchise, with far fewer enemies that act as damage sponges, a problem for modern AC games.

It all makes for a bit of a throwback, one that lets you take things at the pace you want (with difficulty options for those who need more challenge). Except, it's a throwback that looks absolutely enviable, and while I've no doubt the game will be a real looker on the PS5 Pro too, I'm glad to be playing it on PC.

2026 is turning into a fairly terrible year for the gaming industry, with the last few weeks in particular feeling like a parade of one depressing announcement after another. Hot on the heels of Sony declaring that it's binning off all physical disc publishing from early 2028, Xbox has now swung the axe that we all knew was hanging over its gaming portfolio.

Alongside some other layoffs around Microsoft's large empire, Xbox is being hit extremely hard, with a total of 3,200 people set to lose their jobs as part of what it's calling its most significant restructuring ever. 1,600 of those professionals will be laid off today, making for an absolutely brutal day.

There's no real way to sweeten that pill, and to its faint credit, the announcement that Xbox has published is frank and self-critical. It also confirms much of the reporting and rumours that have circulated around the gaming giant for years now, including the theory that its Game Pass bet isn't all that close to paying off, and that its acquisitions look extremely suspect in terms of a return on the investment.

In fact, the acquisitive phase that Xbox went through now seems to be definitively over, and the fact that four (or potentially five) of the development studios it bought are now trying to transition back to independence is quite the indictment of both its strategy and its management.

If the likes of Double Fine and Ninja Theory manage to survive, finish their current projects, and go on to greener pastures, then it'll almost be the perfect confirmation that the problem was Xbox and its approach from the beginning.

In theory, those studios will be taking their IP with them, so franchises like Psychonauts and Hellblade needn't loiter in limbo for the rest of time, but it's still far too early to be feeling particularly optimistic about any of this.

That Xbox is now admitting it has too many layers of management, and that those layers are often too disconnected from the projects over which they have power, is more surprising than the facts themselves. It also means that the next generation of Xbox hardware is even more important than it already looked.

With the Xbox One and Xbox Series X/S generations having seen Sony establish a crushing lead in hardware sales, if Xbox is to have any hope of remaining a genuine competitor, it surely needs Project Helix to be a big hit. How might that happen, given the rumours about lofty prices and no disc drive mean it's unlikely to be obviously differentiated from the PlayStation 6?

Well, raw power has some appeal, obviously, but I honestly couldn't plot a way out of this mire from Xbox's point of view, although cost reduction does have a certain depressing logic to it. Microsoft runs a brutal business, and these decisions are often made by spreadsheet, so it's no surprise that a terrible downturn in Xbox's fortunes has brought these layoffs about, whether it's self-inflicted or not.

The question is whether this makes for the leaner and more efficient Xbox that this press release is trying to sketch out, or whether it just makes an ailing division look more anaemic and therefore easier to cut further when things don't turn around. That's the fallacy behind all layoffs, of course, and I'm not in a pay grade that gets to solve such issues.

With the memory crisis showing signs that it'll get worse before it gets better, and Xbox now shrinking its roster of franchises, though, it's hard to avoid the sense that we're going through some sort of end of days in gaming. What the landscape will look like in five years is hard to predict, but it's a little difficult to imagine Xbox having the same presence that it does now.

It's had a glorious run, but Nintendo is to discontinue its Switch family of consoles.

Released over a decade ago, the original Nintendo Switch faced its fair share of criticism – mainly due to a poor launch lineup of games. However, that proved to be short lived with the console and its follow-ups – the Switch Lite and Switch OLED – proving incredibly popular ever since.

Indeed, Nintendo has shipped around 160 million of them since. That's almost 50% more than the hugely popular and successful Wii.

But all things must come to an end, and Nintendo is calling time on the Switch. As revealed on an official support page (via VGC), it will cease providing units to retailers by February next year. Nintendo will also stop selling Switch consoles on its own web store.

This has partly been prompted by new EU regulations that come in effect that month. They state that any electronics with chargeable batteries must make those batteries easy to repair and replace. Manufacturers must adhere to these new rules or face a ban in the European Union.

Nintendo will release a new version of the Switch 2 for the region, with a user-replaceable battery, but it doesn't make sense to release upgraded models of the consoles it succeeded.

As for existing Switch owners, your console will continue to be supported with updates, games and Switch Online for the foreseeable future. The announcement specifically relates to new consoles sold.

It's not exactly clear if this will affect all regions or just EU member states for now, but it seems likely that it's a global decision. The Switch has had a 10-year run, after all.

Hopefully, with retailers looking to shift their remaining stock from now until February 2027, it'll mean that big sales periods, like Black Friday, will see Switch units at very affordable prices. So it might mean you can pick one up for a bargain – if you don't own one of the 160 million consoles already out there, of course.

One of the perks many Amazon Prime members forget about – or simply aren't aware of – is the ability to play games on multiple devices through Luna. Amazon Prime includes a free Luna subscription and that means more than 100 games are available to play at no extra cost over the cloud.

There are party games for families and friends to play on a TV, using their mobile phones as controllers, and there are AAA and indie hits you'd normally only see on a console or PC.

The list is regularly updated and this month it includes one of my own personal favourite games of 2025 – the multiple award-winning Dispatch.

An interactive adventure game for adults, Dispatch puts you in the shoes of former superhero Robert Robertson, the "dispatcher" of a group of misfit heroes who fight crime around Night City. You're like a taxi cab controller sending them to trouble spots.

However, the team is made up of ex-supervillains and aren't exactly responsive to being bossed around.

The game is split into two styles and mainly hand animated. There are the interactive adventure parts, where your dialogue choices and actions determine the story, while the dispatching element is like a time-management game, in which you are scored at the end.

It makes for a fascinating blend of play. And it's hugely addictive, with the full game split into multiple episodes that you can't help continuing with long into the night.

In many ways, it's like an interactive version of Invincible – the animated series based on the comic books of Robert Kirkman and Ryan Ottley. It's adult and pulls no punches, but also with a sharp, dark sense of humour.

Voice actors include Aaron Paul (Breaking Bad) as the lead, seasoned video games and animation star Laura Bailey, and Casino Royale, The Last of Us and Westworld's Jeffrey Wright.

How to play Dispatch for free

You can play Dispatch anywhere Luna is available, either on PC or Mac by heading to the official web page and streaming from there, or on any other compatible device.

That includes streamed via Fire TV Sticks and Ember TVs; on iPhone, iPad and Android devices; or many Samsung or LG smart TVs.

You just need a Bluetooth controller for TV play, although you can also play using a mouse (trackpad) and keyboard on a desktop PC / Mac or laptop.

Amazon Luna also includes a wide variety of other great games, such as Death Stranding: Director's Cut, Control: Ultimate Edition, Alan Wake II, and another personal fave, Dave the Diver. EA Sports FC 26 can be played for free as well, right now.

Games stream at 1080p 60fps where possible, although you can drop the resolution down to 720p in the settings if you're worried about data usage. You will need minimum broadband speeds of 10 Mbps for 1080p gaming.

Prime members should also remember that Amazon gives away a big bundle of PC games for free each month, to download and keep. You can claim them on the same Amazon Luna homepage.

When Grand Theft Auto 6 – or GTA VI as it's widely known – went live for pre-order last week, the internet almost came grinding to a halt, such was the huge interest in the upcoming game.

What quickly transpired, however, is that pre-orders of the game, including boxed versions, wouldn't actually ship with any disc inside. And, increasingly, it seems that such a physical version may never transpire.

Indeed, every GTA VI pre-order that arrives on 12 November – ahead of the 19 November go-live date – will contain a download code only, providing ample time for players to download the game instead.

Which raises the question: why bother with a boxed copy at all? You might as well just download it in the first place, right?

Death of the disc

It's also having a waterfall effect, as Sony just revealed that PlayStation would be axing disc formats from January 2028.

That means future PlayStation consoles will be digital download only – a format that, frankly, nobody asked for or actually wants. Such is the huge nature of Grand Theft Auto, however, it seems to have somehow made it acceptable.

Gaming communities and retail stores are up in arms about this announcement – and rightly so. As reported on TechRadar, Game has vouched to "not sit idly by" as Sony removed the physical format and swathes of its business.

It's broader than that, though, as no physical media means no second-hand market. And that just isn't good for gamers. If you're buying GTA VI for £70/$80 and, god forbid, you don't enjoy it – then, as has been the case for decades, you'd likely sell it on at a lower price to another player.

The option for gamers to function in that way has provided less 'risk' in their purchases. Sure, there are demos in abundance to sample games, but the big open-world titles of today might not gel with all players, or quickly lose their appeal. Not knowing is part of the fun of play.

Digital divide

The knock-on effect of that is potentially huge. If a gamer is willing to spend X amount on titles in a given period, only being able to do so at full price – and, as we've so often seen, an elevated price compared to physical – from a digital download store will limit the volume of their purchasing power.

Fewer games getting played, fewer explorations from players and therefore experiments from studios actually creating the games – simply fewer benefits to the industry as a whole.

It's like what's happened (and continues to happen) in cinema: arthouse struggles to find an audience, while huge-budget blockbusters are the only mindless movies that pass time and again. Not that everyone asked for it.

In gaming, just as is pointed out in a savvy Reddit thread, the move to digital only is akin to removing your purchase power altogether: "You are renting permission to play it," remarks the post. It shifts the power in a way that, ultimately, is less beneficial for gamers.

The Nintendo Switch 2 recently celebrated its first birthday, meaning we’ve now had a good year or so to really put Nintendo’s latest hybrid console through its paces.

Just after it launched, I wrote about three games in the console’s initial lineup that really showed off the improved hardware, and in the months since I’ve played a lot more.

Unlike its predecessor, which in its latter years shipped too many limp third-party ports that sometimes even had to turn to the cloud to get a game running, the Switch 2 has come right out of the gate with a host of very impressive efforts that you wouldn’t think twice about playing on the platform. And a number of Nintendo’s own games have been lookers too.

There have been loads of Switch 2 games that have impressed me in its first year, but here are three that have really stood out.

Star Wars Outlaws

It would have been a bit of a shame if the first truly open-world Star Wars game had skipped Nintendo platforms altogether, but luckily Star Wars Outlaws made its way to Switch 2 a year after it first launched. And it’s a bit of a stunner.

The game is understandably scaled back compared to the PS5 and Xbox Series X versions, with a noticeably softer image in handheld and docked mode and less visual detail to pore over. But that’s to be expected.

What’s remarkable is that Ubisoft’s development teams have managed to translate this feat of virtual Star Wars tourism to a handheld platform without it feeling completely compromised.

The game’s signature ray-traced reflections remain intact and Kay Vess can whizz around Tatooine’s vast desert on her speeder bike at a mostly rock solid 30fps. Unless you’re doing side-by-side comparisons with the game running on a PS5, it’s hard not to marvel at how good it all looks.

Star Wars Outlaws launched with some frustrating mandatory stealth sections that made parts of the game a bit of a slog, but thankfully those have long since been removed, allowing you to scoundrel your way through the galaxy in any way to see fit.

Motion controls in the Switch 2 version make the fairly rudimentary gunplay a lot more enjoyable, and the game features some of the best HD Rumble effects I’ve experienced on the console. And the best thing of all? Ubisoft has somehow managed to fit this sprawling Star Wars epic into a 20GB(ish) file. May the storage space be with you.

Indiana Jones and the Great Circle

Indiana Jones and the Great Circle started its life as one of the crown jewels in this generation’s Xbox lineup, before instantly becoming one of the best PS5 games when it eventually made its way to Sony’s console. A couple of years later, MachineGames completed a hat-trick of excellency with its miraculous Switch 2 version of the game.

I’m happy to report that Indy’s whip-cracking original adventure is no less thrilling on Nintendo’s hybrid. In fact, I might have enjoyed the brilliant tutorial section – a deeply nostalgic playable recreation of Raiders of the Lost Ark’s opening scene – even more on Switch 2 than I did on my PS5 Pro, largely owing to the novelty of playing through it in bed.

In relentlessly high-speed first-person games, the 30fps target we get here might be a non-starter, but it’s less of an issue in this one, with Indy spending as much time puzzling as he does knocking out Nazis. And I found the slapstick brawling to be just as much fun at half the frame rate.

A lot of the graphical features, including ray-tracing, survive the transition to Switch 2, and while the game’s stunning environments are rendered at a much lower resolution than on more powerful hardware, DLSS is mostly very good at maintaining the detail.

MachineGames pulled out all the stops with its Switch 2 version of Indiana Jones and the Great Circle, implementing gyro and even mouse control options. Do I wish it also had Wii-style motion-controlled whipping? Of course, but you can’t have it all.

Pokémon Pokopia

At first glance, this ingenious Pokémon-infused hybrid of Minecraft, Animal Crossing and Dragon Quest Builders doesn’t look like a game you’d use to highlight the Switch 2’s power. But as well as being a delightful game about restoring a mysterious post-apocalyptic world with the help of endearingly upbeat monsters, Pokémon Pokopia is also quietly a technical showpiece for the console.

While its visuals won’t immediately wow you like Cyberpunk 2077’s, the cute and colourful art style really pops, complimented by a lighting system that really brings your blocky Poké-paradises to life.

Once you’ve really started to fill out your Pokédex and build up some towns, Pokémon Pokopia quickly becomes a very visually busy game, so it’s a testament to the developers that I very rarely noticed frame drops whether playing in docked or handheld mode.

The handheld resolution is slightly blurrier in motion, but I’m happy to make that tradeoff for the rock solid performance.

Pokémon Pokopia may also be the best advert yet for the Switch 2’s mouse controls. Playing this way makes it a lot easier to build and terraform with precision, while techniques like Rock Smash are more intuitive when you can directly point at the blocks you want to pound.

I do still wish using the Joy-Con as a mouse was more comfortable, but I’m very glad it’s an option when I sit down to rebuild my grateful Pokémon’s broken home.

Sony's announcement yesterday signals the end of physical game media – when it comes to current and next-gen consoles, anyway. Xbox is also rumoured to be following suit.

It means that from 2028, we'll no longer be able to buy games on disc for PlayStation consoles – PS5 and, most likely, PS6. If Xbox does indeed also ditch the disc, Project Helix will be digital-only too.

However, one much-loved gaming giant is bucking the trend. Sega is embracing physical games for a special release, and anyone with a Mega Drive / Genesis or an FPGA homage (such as the Mega Sg) will appreciate the gesture.

That's because it will be releasing two "Legacy Cartridges" in collaboration with iam8bit, to celebrate the 35th anniversary of its famous blue mascot.

Sonic the Hedgehog and Sonic the Hedgehog 2 will come on playable Mega Drive / Genesis-compatible cartridges, with additional collectable bumph in "nostalgic" packaging.

There will also be a surprise cartridge "infused with Chaos Emerald energy" with one in eight orders.

How much do the Sonic the Hedgehog cartridge reissues cost?

Each bundle costs $99.99 and is available to pre-order now. The first wave of orders will be shipped in Q3 this year, the second in Q4, while all remaining pre-orders will be sent to customers in Q1 2027.

The sets look superb for retro gaming enthusiasts for sure, but are also a reminder of what we are set to lose when PlayStation puts a nail in the coffin of its physical releases. Digital copies are just not the same, and certainly not collectable.

And, as it also showed recently with the announcement that 100s of movies are being removed from PS5 owners libraries, they're not permanently yours either – no matter how much you pay for them.

Still, at least there's the likes of iam8bit and Sega, plus Evercade with its expanding cartridge library to keep the retro flag flying.

Sony has announced the games coming to all PlayStation Plus members next Tuesday, and they are lead by a bit of a surprise inclusion.

Xbox recently made a big decision on Call of Duty when it comes to Game Pass Ultimate, but PS5 and even PS4 owners will be getting one of the best entries in the series at no extra cost.

In preparation for this year's Modern Warfare 4, PS Plus subscribers will get the cross-gen bundle of Call of Duty: Modern Warfare III.

Comprising a four to five hour single-player campaign, multiplayer and a Zombies mode, the game sees Captain Price return to track and take on Vladimir Makarov. It's also notable for introducing open world areas to its campaign missions, and giving you more freedom on routes and gameplay styles.

What's interesting is that Xbox – owner of Activision Blizzard – recently announced the decision to stop adding Call of Duty games to its Xbox Game Pass Ultimate service, in order to cut the monthly price.

Admittedly, that comes into effect with COD: Modern Warfare 4 and beyond, but it's a strange look putting another big release on the rival PS Plus platform soon after – even if it's already available on Game Pass.

I'm sure PlayStation fans won't care though.

It'll be available for PS4, PS5 and PS5 Pro from Tuesday 7 July, as will For the King II and CrossCode – two additional PS Plus games for the month. All members can redeem them – Essential, Extra and Premium.

They'll be available to grab until Monday 3 August.

PlayStation Plus pricing and membership tiers

There are three tiers of PS Plus membership. You will need to subscribe to one of them if you want to play multiplayer games online. However, each also offers additional benefits.

PS Plus Essential is the cheapest. Priced at £6.99 / €8.99 / $9.99 / AU$11.95 per month it gives you online play, plus three or four free games at the start of each month.

PS Plus Extra sits in the middle. It costs £10.99 / €13.99 / $14.99 / AU$18.95 per month, and adds access to a game catalogue of more than 300 full games to download.

PS Plus Premium is the most expensive tier and has all of the above and more. It is priced at £13.49 / €16.99 / $17.99 per month, and includes game demos, and an additional catalogue of classic games. There's cloud streaming too, for many games. That works across PS5 and the PS Portal handheld.

Note: in some regions – including Australia – PS Plus Premium is replaced with PS Plus Deluxe for AU$21.95 per month. This is the same as Premium, but without the cloud streaming.

Well, what a time it is to announce this one. Hot on the heels of news that GTA 6 won't have a disc in its "physical version", we're now learning that all PlayStation consoles will stop getting physical game disc releases from January 2028 onwards.

PlayStation announced the move in a surprisingly short blog post, with little deeper explanation of its thinking beyond touching on market trends (which are hard to ignore). It's blunt: "Physical game disc production for all new games releasing on PlayStation consoles will be discontinued starting January 2028".

In its own continuing words, "This is a natural direction for Sony Interactive Entertainment to adapt to consumer trends as the general preference for digital media significantly outpaces physical discs."

Closing the gap

There's no getting away from the fact that around 85% of games sold right now are digital, with physical media ever-shrinking, but this is still an absolutely enormous step, and one that will have major effects on the whole gaming industry.

After all, you'd put solid money on a PlayStation 6 coming out sometime around 2028 based on the current trajectory, and some observers would say this basically confirms that it will be digital-only. Unlike the PlayStation 5 Pro, it would also seem likely that it won't have an optional disc drive, since that drive would only be for older PS5 games anyway.

This will mean that, unless there are major changes to how purchasing works on PlayStation consoles at some point, the PlayStation Store will be the only way to get games directly on Sony's consoles, with the physical market becoming entirely code-in-a-box, and no likelihood of used games.

Digital ownership

Given that PlayStation is already fighting a multi-billion-pound lawsuit here in the UK around the prices on the PlayStation Store, it's hard to avoid the suspicion that this is a fairly dire change from the point of view of most consumers. After all, even if you rarely bought used discs, you always had the option to, and that option will now disappear.

On top of that, we're not even a week on from Sony catching major flak for deleting purchased movies from people's PlayStation accounts, underlining just how tenuous the concept of "ownership" is when you don't have a disc in hand.

It's also worth remembering that it's harder to actually capture the scale of the used market from retailers like CEX and marketplaces like eBay – again, there are plenty of buyers who will suffer from being restricted to digital purchases only.

Given the discontent generated by the lack of a disc in GTA 6's box, expect a fairly significant wave of backlash to be generated in the coming days. There's almost certainly nothing that anyone can do to change Sony's mind on this, but that won't stop people from making their unhappiness known, and loudly.

I wrote about a whole load of retro gaming deals during the recent Prime Day week, with the community treated to bucket-loads of bargains. But the most popular by far was the cheap-as-chips offer on the R36S.

This gaming handheld might not be the most powerful or famous, but is capable of emulating up to original PlayStation games and comes with many thousands of classic games on a microSD card. What's not to like at just £30.99?

One retailer is still selling the R36S for its Prime Day price, and so you can still snag the biggest retro gaming deal even after the event has long ended.

The only caveat is that shipping might take a little longer, although the exact same model is also available from another retailer for just £2 more – at £32.99. And this one is Prime-enabled so is eligible for next day delivery.

Stock is running low though, so you'll need to be quick to secure yours.

What is the R36S retro gaming handheld and is it worth it?

The R36S is a decently spec'ed gaming handheld with a 3.5-inch 640 x 480 4:3 display. It runs on the Rockchip RK3326 processor, which has been the bedrock of retro gaming devices for a few years.

That means it is capable of playing all the 8-bit and 16-bit games comfortably – such as NES, SNES, Master System and Mega Drive – as well as original PlayStation titles.

You might even be able to eke a bit of PSP or N64 gaming out of it.

Most suppliers include a card filled with dubiously sourced ROMs (the games) and so it comes largely plug-and-play.

Gaming accessory manufacturer has made a habit of rubbing console manufacturers up the wrong way – with PlayStation and Nintendo in particular having issues with the upstart start-up. However, it seems to have gone too far this time.

Before Valve managed to announce its launch plans and pricing for the Steam Machine, Dbrand cheekily announced its own case for the forthcoming console – one that was based on the Weighted Companion Cube in Valve's Portal.

It looked great, got loads of publicity – including from T3 – and influencers took to YouTube to say just how cool it was. The only issue is Dbrand had missed out one important thing – permission.

At no point during its seven-month development did Dbrand ask Valve if it could make the case.

That has turned out to be a fatal decision, as the Companion Cube is now set for the dustbin. Valve's legal team not only requested the product was removed from the accessory firm's webstore along with all marketing videos and images, but it refused to enter licensing negotiations.

The Steam Machine Companion Cube is no more.

Dbrand has issued a humble statement explaining the situation, and has taken full responsibility: "On 12 November 2025, the day the Steam Machine was announced, we put up a concept render and sign-up page to see if anyone would be interested in a Companion Cube enclosure.

"It went moderately viral, with over fifteen thousand people signing up to be notified in the first day. In the months that followed, we built the idea into something real without ever asking Valve if we could.

"We’re going to regret that decision for a very long time," it says.

"Over the next seven months, we poured our souls into this project. More than a thousand hours went into engineering from our industrial design team. Forty-four sets of injection molding tools were developed, one for each of the cube's sub-components.

"The entire product was redesigned from scratch more than once, just to get the way it cradles the console exactly right. We literally rented out a university campus to film the launch video. By the end, we were losing money on every $99 Poverty Cube sold, but it didn’t matter. This had turned into a passion project for the entire organisation.

"Unfortunately, being proud of the thing we made did not give us the right to make it."

The statement also goes on to say that none of this is Valve's fault, and that the legal team have been "direct, fair, and respectful throughout".

And if you are one of those who pre-ordered your Steam Machine Companion Cube last week, you will receive a full refund by the end of the day today.

That seems to be it for the project sadly, and we're no longer going to be able to put our new (and expensive) Steam Machines in what seems like their natural shell. Still, Dbrand will have a new range of skins to check out soon.

And it'll be hoping we'll do so in droves – after all, it has tooling and many man hours to pay for.

Although the pre-order process is well underway, we still have months to wait before Grand Theft Auto VI actually arrives. It'll be released on PS5 and Xbox Series X/S on Thursday 19 November, and if you're anything like us, we're struggling to contain our excitement.

However, you can get yourself prepared in the meantime. Not only are there plenty of official screenshots and a couple of trailers online, a community project has popped up to give us a virtual tour around Leonida, including Vice City and the other confirmed and rumoured areas of the game.

We're apparently getting the largest open world setting seen in a GTA game yet – at least according to a listing accidentally posted on Amazon's Brazilian site. And you can scroll around it, Google Maps style on an interactive website.

There are pins where it's believed each of the release game screens are taken from, while additional information has been gleaned from leaks and other art.

Of course, Leonida is loosely based on Florida, including its own Keys area, while Vice City is Miami – and there are nods to some real-world photos for comparison.

It's a truly impressive project and if the game does indeed allow you to travel the length and breadth of the map on show, it will indeed be huge. Let's hope so.

Back to the Amazon leak and the listing also revealed (via VGC) that there will be dynamic weather conditions and, perhaps most excitingly, an in-game social network to "watch viral videos, follow influencers, and discover world events".

NPCs will also reportedly have their own lives – navigating their our routines and random events around you.

Hopefully we'll find out a bit more soon, with a third game trailer thought to be on its way. You'll have to make do with the map for now though, and check out the pre-order details if you haven't have managed to place yours yet.

I've been a huge fan in the last few years of Square Enix's push on what it calls 2D-HD. This art style involves 2D sprites superimposed on 3D environments that can be much more intricate than they used to be in truly 2D pixel-based games of yore, and it's already proven that it can look pretty stunning in the right circumstances.

Until this month, all of the 2D-HD games that Square had released had been old-school RPGs with turn-based battle systems, and I've really enjoyed plenty of them. Still, its latest game in the lineup, The Adventures of Elliot, confirms that there was indeed room for a different approach.

This game is more of a traditional action-adventure game, much like the older titles in the Zelda franchise, and it really clearly demonstates that there's still so much life in the art style.

The game sees you play as Elliot, the titular adventurer and all-around good guy, as he's drawn into a fairly classic RPG plot. His local king has a dastardly advisor with his own eye on power, and when he uncovers a way to get it involving time travel, he kicks off the plot in a big way. That plot sees you following him through sort of wormholes to explore the world in multiple different eras.

You travel from pre-history all the way through to the future, seeing how the world grows and decays, and how the place of magic within its society waxes and wanes, too. It's a really fun idea, although it's fair to say that there's a lot more dialogue than I expected from the genre, and some of it can get a tiny bit dull and predictable.

What's much more reliable rewarding, though, is the game's visual style, which really does make the most of its retro aesthetic to propose a way forward for ambitious RPGs. Rather than games that need to cost hundreds of millions to make over the course of half a decade, this game looks beautiful and artistic with a much more limited approach.

Its environments are sweeping and evocative, but they're also not always that high-resolution, and while the game runs really smoothly on the Switch 2, that might well be partly because it's not actually that graphically demanding. I intend this as praise, to be clear – it's really clever management.

The gameplay is also nice and fun, with a very old-school approach to actual movement and combat, but a faster pace thanks to more movement speed. It also remixes things by giving you what are effectively unlockable perks for the various weapons you collect.

These perks can change how you use a weapon quite substantially, for example making it way more profitable to use slower power attacks than quick ones, or vice-versa. They're a fun way of keeping you on your toes and changing up your play-style in small but meaningful ways.

I'm about five hours into the game, so I can't pretend to know exactly how its story will play out, and I'm looking forward to it hopefully throwing me some curveballs (although reviewers have maybe indicated that won't happen much). What I know, though, is that the strong visual presentation of The Adventures of Elliot offer a map of how we could more well-made, well-presented games from big studios, rather than them all chasing photorealism.

Sometimes the old ways can be blended with the new, and 2D-HD certainly proves that retro gaming is as relevant as ever right now.

The PlayStation 5 Pro is expensive. Like, really bloody expensive. But, hot on the heels of Rockstar Games announcing Grand Theft Auto 6, I'm going to take the tumble and actually buy one. Gulp.

Sure, I don't need one, as I already own an original PS5 console. And, to be fair, I use that aplenty thanks to its disc drive – my 4K Blu-ray Club wouldn't have an output source otherwise. So I'll need to buy that pesky separate Sony disc drive, too. And probably a dedicated 4K Blu-ray player.

So, why now? The PS5 Pro launched back in November 2024, so it's kinda getting old already. But we've already seen a price increase since that date – and not a small one, either, as it was a £90 / $100 hike back in April. That's not down to inflation, it's down to market conditions.

When that happened I was further put off rather than thinking "I'd better get in line to buy one". But now, just two months on from that rise, I think yet more bad news could be imminent. Nothing's official yet, mind.

The Xbox impact

Take, as a key example, the recent Xbox boss's comments in revealing significant price rises for Microsoft's console across the board. That's not an isolated issue, it's down to significant memory price increases that affect the whole PC and games industries – and beyond, quite frankly.

So, in my mind, it's not a case of if Sony will be forced to follow suit, but rather when. Currently PS5 Pro sales have significantly dropped – but that's no surprise, as many rushed to buy in April, with a 50% sales drop thereafter being a direct consumer response to the price rise.

But here's what I believe will happen next. As someone who's just ordered GTA VI, which arrives this November, there's now a 'countdown clock' ticking away for the next five months. The game's release is undoubtedly going to be huge – and people are going to want to play it in the best way possible.

The GTA VI effect

Right now, even Sony is leveraging that GTA VI "plays best on PS5". In that official blog post, a number of reasons are given – but a key one, for me, is that the game "leverages the PS5’s ultra-high speed SSD, enabling you to experience ... near-instant load times."

The step up from PS5 to PS5 Pro is sizeable. Current rumours suggest that you'll get a locked frame rate on the Pro version. So it'll "play even better on PS5 Pro" (my words, not Sony's – yet, anyway). And people, myself included, are going to want a slice of that pie.

I think that's eventually going to cause a sudden rush of PS5 Pro purchases. Not right this second, granted, as people need to brush the April price rise off their shoulders and have ample time to forget it ever happened. But once they do and more Pro units continue to sell, the stock dwindles, the production line needs to source more components – and, you guessed it, those will cost more.

Result? The increased production is pushed onto you and I, the consumers. So I cannot see how the PS5 Pro won't be more expensive by the time GTA VI launches this November. I'm sure an official bundled box set will be arranged prior to the holiday period to really capitalise on the game's launch.

The offer of good credit

As it stands, however, promotional bundles are already available. Indeed, EE is currently selling one in the UK market for £808. I can't even find a Pro console on Amazon – which seems to me like a precursor to what's incoming.

Therefore EE's deal above is tempting. In particular as the offer of 9 months interest-free credit is an option, at £89.78 per month to cover the full purchase (longer payment plans are available – but the APR is high, so you'd pay over the odds).

I could hit the 'payday f-it button' right now, have a PS5 Pro in my lounge by next week, and have everything – GTA VI included – paid off and fully my own by next March. There's not going to be a PlayStation 6 to worry about in 2027, so assume an earliest 2028 launch for that – and I'm sure my Pro as a trade-in option will provide a decent discount as and when.

I know, it's bonkers to drop almost £800 / $900 on Sony's best current console. But with Valve's Steam Machine showing where prices are heading and, get this, the Xbox Series S (not X!) now set to cost more than a Switch 2, prices surely aren't going anywhere but up. And I want to be ahead of that curve – even if I'm a little late to the party already.

The Switch 2 is among my most-used gadgets this year – and that's more than a full year after the console initially launched. Can you believe it?

Compared to my PlayStation 5 it gets more of my time. And don't start me on the Xbox Series X, which I've not switched on for probably a couple of years now.

In a welcome turn, however, Nintendo's console has seen a welcome little discount as part of Amazon's sale – so you can get it cheaper than it's been throughout 2026.

Check out the Switch 2 discount deal

Prime Day 2026 – T3's picks of ALL the best deals

If you were to buy one from Amazon within the Prime Day period – i.e. before the end of Friday 26 June – then you'd also have spent over the £80 threshold for an automated £20 voucher to spend next month.

I know a lot of people had been reluctant to pick up a Switch 2 at launch day. One, because it was nigh-on impossible to get stock. Two, because some were doubtful of the games line-up for day one.

I, however, have loved the first-party games coming out – and you won't get those Nintendo gems anywhere else. Mario Kart World still remains epic fun. The unsung Welcome Tour is well worth having, too.

More recently, however, we've been treated to additional all-new gems. From the joyous Yoshi And The Mysterious Book, to Donkey Kong: Bananza, these two titles alone warrant getting hold of Nintendo's console.

Even many of the remakes feel, to me at least, like all-new games. Star Fox is the most recent example, which I can barely believe is based on the 30-year-old original. One of the greatest Zelda games ever is also due at the end of this year, in Ocarina of Time.

All of which is to say: the Switch 2 has heaps of quality on board already, with more to come, and if you've survived the heatwave and fancy treating yourself on payday then I've not seen a better deal on the console this year.

To call the Switch 2's Star Fox "just a remake" of the original 1997 N64 game, Star Fox 64 (well, Lylat Wars as I and so many others knew it – as that was the obscure European release name), would be to do it a disservice.

I've spent the last week-and-a-bit playing Star Fox on Switch 2 and, for me, it's set the nostalgic floodgates wide open – taking me back to school-age memories, yet keeping me in the here and now thanks to the game's complete and total graphical rework. It's added much more, too.

Cut from a new cloth

When a game is knocking on the door of being three decades old, I often ponder: "Was it just good for the time, or good enough to stand the test of time?" Now, I couldn't fire up Lylat Wars, as I no longer possess an original N64 console, but have since gone down YouTube rabbit holes to watch online playthroughs.

The look is night and day, with the Switch 2 version not simply adding a greater draw distance and sharper definition visuals. It's fully reinvested in the Lylat System's worlds, with new objects, visual and sound effects, voice-overs, and even brand new cut-scenes to tie the storyline together. To me it simply feels like a brand new game.

Yes, Fox McCloud's father's voice-over sounds amateurish, but – spoiler alert! – he dies in the opening cut-scene anyway. Set the game's timeline to five years later and we're left with an entertaining ensemble in Fox, Slippy Toad, Falco Lombardi, Peppy Hare and General Pepper – all of whom convey their characters' personalities convincingly.

While the cut-scenes set the backstory, it's the in-game action that really sells Star Fox. Once again, Nintendo has proven its genius – as the core structure of this rail shooter is effectively the same, but doesn't feel dated like you might expect. Indeed, for those who never played the original, it'll feel completely fresh.

Perfect timing

That's why now is such a great time for Star Fox to release for the Switch 2. Nintendo has savvily managed to sit between generations, so whether you were a teenager when the original dropped or are one now and exploring the new release for the first time, it's like digging into an all-new game.

It's more than stood the test of time, too, with great controls – if you can handle the inverted Y-axis (which you can change in settings), which I remember causing quite a stir among friends back in the day – and what is simply fun shooting fare.

There's an essence of arcade shooter about Star Fox, not that it ever enters the difficulty realms of an old-school side-scrolling shooter from the 1980s (that surely inspired its very core in the first place – R-Type, anyone?).

Huge replayability

But while a single run-through won't take an age – indeed, you'll "complete it" in an evening – there's heaps more to this game. And not just throwaway tidbits. Medal-earning challenges, multiple routings through the game's pathway, a true final boss, and incremental difficulty modes. They're addictive enough to keep you returning – which is exactly what I've feverishly been doing in the evenings over this past week.

The Switch 2 brings yet more to the party, too, with a Battle Mode that I'm sure will be the mainstay for many online gamers – as here you can embark on 4v4 dogfights (foxfights?) and squeeze never-ending playtime out of this release. If co-op is more your thing, however, then that's also present and correct for the main storyline.

When the franchise seemed like it might be dead and done – thanks to Star Fox Zero's poor performance upon release a decade ago – the Switch 2's new release shows that's anything but true. It was Zero's much-maligned Wii U controls that were its core criticism, though. With a controller in hand, the Switch 2 game feels much more natural.

Not that you have to play Star Fox with a controller. Another Switch 2 feature, mouse control, has also been added as an option. It gives you a cockpit view and table-top inputs – which, personally, I loathe. The finicky nature and hard-to-see viewpoint feel too removed from the game for me. But I'm sure some will love this setup.

More reimagination than remake

Sure, Nintendo has been leaning more than a little heavily on its stock in remakes to help propel the Switch 2 along. That's felt taxing at times (and I've heard many others say so), when there's been no true new Zelda or Mario game for the latest console.

We did get brand new Donkey Kong game and a joyous side-scrolling Yoshi title, mind, plus I've loved all of the remakes to date. Star Fox, however, looks to elevate the practice from remake to reimagination – and that's great footing ahead of the Switch 2's Ocarina of Time release later this year.

Until then, whether you played Star Fox 64 (or Lylat Wars) or not, I thoroughly recommend grabbing Star Fox for the Switch 2. It's such a fresh take on the classic that it will be new for those who've never played the original, while feeling anew for those who lived through the N64's 90s reign.

Grand Theft Auto VI pre-orders only opened yesterday and we already have a deal on the cover price.

Usually £69.99 in the UK, Amazon has dropped the price of the Playstation 5 version. Order it through Amazon therefore and you'll be paying less than at other retailers.

Admittedly, it's not a massive discount, but you still get 3% off a game that's only been available to pre-order for a day so far. And, as they say, every little helps.

This pre-order is for a physical copy of the standard edition, which will play on both PS5 and PS5 Pro. You do need to be aware though that it doesn't include a disc – you get a download code in the box itself.

There has been a leak suggesting a disc version will be released after launch, around December time, but for now, you'll have to download the game just as you would if you bought it digitally on your console.

You will thought get your pre-order shipped early, with Rockstar claiming the download code in a box versions being sent out on 12 November – a week before the release date. That's to allow you to preload the game so you can play it from day one.

We're keeping an eye out for other GTA 6 deals, which we'll bring you as soon as we spot them. We'll also keep an eye out for PS5 Pro deals, as we suspect that'll be the best way to play the new Grand Theft Auto on release.

So come back to T3 often to find out more.

It's been a rough year for gaming hardware, with prices that just keep on rising, but Xbox's latest round of hikes is arguably the most shocking yet. That isn't because they're unexpected (they're very much not), but rather because they push pretty much all of Xbox's current-generation hardware into territory where you'd be hard-pressed to recommend that anyone at all should buy them.

The announcement was made in typically low-key fashion, in the form of a blog post on Xbox Wire, and there's no sugar-coating it. The post confirmed that on 1 August 2026, Xbox's 512GB consoles will get a $100 rise, while 1TB versions will go up by $150.

The damage that this set of price rises will do is perhaps underlined by the fact that Xbox didn't then do the math for its readers, but here's what the hikes actually look like in practice:

• Xbox Series S (512GB): Up from $399.99 to $499.99
• Xbox Series S (1TB): Up from $449.99 to $599.99
• Xbox Series X Digital (1TB): Up from $599.99 to $749.99
• Xbox Series X (1TB): Up from $649.99 to $799.99y

Those are prices that are almost impossible to swallow, in all honesty, and they're particularly terrible where the Xbox Series S is concerned. Once Nintendo's price rises come into force in September, the Series S will be the same price as the Switch 2, and there's no planet where I'd recommend the former over the latter.

Meanwhile, $750 for an Xbox Series X also looks fairly laughable when compared to the PS5 Pro for $100 more, and again, there's no way I'd point anyone towards Xbox's console when the comparison is made. If you bring the standard PS5 into play at $599 (for now), there's just no competition whatsoever.

Xbox's blog post is full of explanations for the hikes, with the biggest being the rise in memory component costs, as we all know by now – although in this case, Microsoft itself is obviously a big driver of the AI boom that's fuelling the crisis, something that isn't acknowledged.

Perhaps the most important part of the post, though, is the second half of this line: "Unfortunately, console storage and memory prices have increased by more than 2.5x, and we expect another doubling by the fall of 2027."

That's right, folks – this is far from the end of things, and if that doubling comes to pass in the next 12 months, we might get to the point where once mainstream consoles are priced at genuinely luxury levels. People have been speculating about $1,000 PS6s, but at this rate, the Xbox Series X might get to that point well before a new generation of consoles is ready.

That should worry basically anyone interested in console gaming – the market wasn't built up around consoles priced this prohibitively, and there's no way the impacts of unaffordable hardware don't ripple out over time. Xbox is already bleeding badly from a console war that was honestly already lost midway through the Xbox One era, but this could be another dismal turn.

With a scattergun approach to exclusive titles now leading to unpredictability about its biggest franchises, and layoffs happening left, right and centre in studios that it owns, Xbox is in full-blown crisis, whatever it's projecting in press releases.

It probably does need the reset that it claims to be going through, but it's hard to know what'll come out of that process. The Xbox Series S was intended to be a cheap entry point to get people hooked on Game Pass, but when it's $500, and Game Pass is no longer the top priority, where does that leave things?

We might know more in a year or so, as its plans for the next generation continue to leak and be reported on, but right now, there's only really one thing I can say – buying an Xbox just went from an interesting choice to a downright bad idea.

While we don't yet know numbers, if we were to guess how many copies of Grand Theft Auto VI have been pre-ordered so far, we'd estimate "sh*t-loads".

Amazon US, for example, sold out of PS5 copies at one point. And that's even considering that the physical edition doesn't include a disc – it's just a download code in a box.

It's certainly proven contentious. Many will pre-order the game through the PlayStation or Xbox stores on their consoles, of course. But even if you do so online, through the likes of Amazon, Argos, GameStop or Best Buy, you still have to download the game entirely.

And there will be no trading it in again once you've finished, as the code will have been redeemed to your account forever.

• GTA 6 pre-order stockists, prices and details here

However, there might be some better news coming for those who would rather own GTA 6 on a disc. Polish website PPE (via VGC) claims that a disc version could be coming in December – a month after the game is launched (on 19 November).

PPE already got it spot on when it suggested the physical box would be download code only at the pre-order phase, long before we found out.

The leaker has also got retail information right before the launch of other major releases.

Whether this is enough to make you hold off from a pre-order purchase is another thing. After all, there is no physical release for the Grand Theft Auto VI: Ultimate Edition, and according to the people we know who have ordered the game already, that's the version they've opted for.

You can currently only get that on the respective digital stores from PlayStation and Xbox. And considering it contains exclusive in-game items and at least one mission, it seems an attractive option for just a little more cash (£20 extra in the UK, $20 in the US).

Ever since I bought my Lenovo Legion Go S (SteamOS) during the Black Friday sales last year, I've used it on a daily basis. More powerful that the Steam Deck and with a larger, 8-inch display, it is a superb PC gaming handheld that can play just about everything I chuck at it.

And, with the Steam Summer Sale underway, even the games are very affordable.

Now you get another change to experience it for yourself, as the 1TB Z2 Go version is available at a rock-bottom price. John Lewis is selling the Lenovo Legion Go S (SteamOS) for just £449.99 – almost £50 off.

If you consider that the Steam Deck starts at £649 for half the storage and a lower-spec'ed processor, it's a no-brainer really.

The 8-inch touchscreen display on the Lenovo Legion Go S also features a 120Hz refresh rate and supports variable refresh rate (VRR) technology. That means it games will run smoothly even if the frame rate jumps around a bit.

And, just like the Steam Deck, the Legion Go S runs on SteamOS, so it works exactly the same way as Valve's own handheld. You get the same experience and can buy games from the Steam Store in the same way.

I bought the step-up model running on the Z1 Extreme CPU myself, which also comes with increased RAM. And while that Black Friday price is not available this time around, Very.co.uk is offering the variant with a very decent £100 off.

That puts it in the same ballpark as the 1TB OLED Steam Deck, but with a vastly superior processor, screen resolution, refresh rate and RAM. Also, that version of the Steam Deck is hard to find in stock.

Whichever model piques your interest, you can be assured you're in for a whole lot of mobile PC gaming fun. I've certainly not looked back since.

It's been a busy week in the world of PC gaming, which is always going to be the case when Valve has a big announcement to make. It chose this week to finally confirm the pricing for its long-awaited Steam Machine, and to start collecting registrations for its randomised pre-order system.

With the most affordable version (sans Steam Controller) coming in at £879 / $1,049, there's no way to sugarcoat it – the Machine looks pretty overpriced relative to the raw performance on offer. In fact, I'm not the only person questioning it – our news editor Rik is wondering whether he needs to cancel his pre-order registration already.

If you want a flexible PC gaming machine right now, though, there's actually good news. Thanks to Prime Day, there's a really nice saving on the excellent Asus ROG Xbox Ally, which is relatively recently-launched and offers far more bang for your buck if you're happy playing on the go.

The state of the gaming market means that deals like this are likely to be looked back on in 12 months with pure nostalgia – the price rises we've all been seeing seem to be inevitable and have no real counter, so brace yourself for far crazier prices in a few months' time.

For now, though, this deal will get you a really handy gaming machine for portable use. It can also be docked to connect to an external display, although you probably shouldn't expect the world from it in performance terms. On its own two feet, though, it's a great bit of kit, and with support from Xbox it's actually more user-friendly than many pure Windows alternatives.

If you're looking for something a bit more old-school, though, we've also rounded up the best retro gaming deals this Prime Day – check them out here.

When I reviewed the SteelSeries Arctis Nova Pro Elite last year, I named it the best gaming headset I've ever used, but still couldn't give it the pure five-star verdict you'd assume would come with that. The big issue? Its absolutely massive price, which hasn't really come down at all since release – until now.

For the first time, Amazon Prime Day has brought in a tasty discount on the Nova Elite, slashing £50 off its asking price to make it a bit more palatable. That said, it's still a chunky amount of money for a headset, and the fact remains that there's another SteelSeries deal on an older headset that I think is the better pick right now.

Check both those deals out below, and keep reading to see why I think the second is the smarter option.

For many of us, the difference between spending £549 and £199 will be quite enough to make this an open-and-shut case, but if you need some persuasion, here's my pitch. I used the Arctis Nova Pro Wireless as my daily headset for years, from the moment it released until the day I got my hands on the Nova Elite.

Would I go back? Not willingly – the Nova Elite is basically perfect from my point of view, outside of that price. However, did I notice a gigantic upgrade when I moved to the more expensive headset? Not immediately, and only when paying careful attention.

My point is this – the Nova Pro Wireless is still a stunning headset, and represents a massive upgrade over many others you might have used. It was the standard to beat for years, and while it's now been superseded by the Nova Elite and Nova Pro Omni, at this price, it's still hard to ignore.

So, if you've been saving for the Nova Elite, then this is definitely a good time to buy it, with its first proper discount. If you just want a great headset at a great price, though, jump on the Nova Pro Wireless while this discount lasts.