Year: 2024

The opening of Bally’s casino in Chicago has brought excitement to the city, but this new high. History has shown that the expansion of gaming facilities in Illinois tends to correlate with a surge in individuals seeking treatment for gambling problems. While there hasn’t been an immediate influx of such cases since Bally’s opening, experts anticipate a steady rise in problem gambling cases.

More Bettors Mean Increased Exposure to Gambling Harm

The launch of Bally’s Chicago Casino has seen a strong start, attracting over 80,000 visitors in its first three weeks of operation. However, addiction treatment experts warn that the sudden influx of new gamblers could significantly impact local communities, pushing vulnerable individuals toward gambling harm.

Anita Pindiur, executive director of Way Back Inn, a Maywood treatment center providing recovery programs for various addictions, explains that

Fresh from rebuffing a $11.1 billion takeover offer from MGM Resorts International and prominent land-based and online sportsbook operator Entain is now reportedly attempting to buy a significant portion of Australian sportsbetting giant Tabcorp Holdings Limited for an undisclosed amount.

According to a report from the Bloomberg news service, the London-listed firm behind the United Kingdom’s Ladbokes and Coral-branded estate of land-based bookmakers recently made a non-binding offer for the wagering and media division of its Melbourne-headquartered counterpart so as to give it extra scale in the region.

Domestic dominance:

The news service reported that wagering and media is the second most lucrative branch of Tabcorp Holdings Limited’s overall operation after generating 40% of its revenues for the year to the end of June at approximately $3.98 billion. The Sydney-listed company merged with local rival Tatts Group Limited in 2017 and is now purportedly thought to hold a market share of around 57% courtesy of its estate of over 4,400 land-based sportsbooks spread across Australia.

Rival risk:

Bloomberg reported that Entain, which was previously …

British online and mobile casino software provider iSoftBet has further enhanced its aggregation offering, having partnered with Japanese arcade-style slots provider, Mikado Games Limited.

Under the new deal, a selection of the Asian developer’s Gaming Labs Certified (GLI) RNG games are to join iSoftbet’s aggregation offering of more than 8,000 third-party titles, including the Vietnam-headquartered provider’s skill-based sports games such as Darts Roulette and The Penalty Kid along with its Pachinko slots.

Founded in 2017, Mikado Games has offices in Malta, Vietnam and Japan, and currently has roughly 30 unique titles in its games suite that offer an alternative to narrative-rich options. The developer‘s game categories include puzzle, bingo, sport, shooting, slot and pachinko, and inspired by Japanese anime cartoons.

Market scan:

“iSoftBet’s distinguished aggregation platform adds considerable value to the brand’s name and to our subsequent partnership. We are very satisfied with the agreement and look forward to seeing how our relationship materialises in the months ahead.”

Meridianbet tie-up:

The new …

Gladiator 2’s cast continues to come into focus as a major star has left the movie and more roles have been cast. Deadline reports that Barry Keoghan (Dunkirk, Banshees of Inisherin) has dropped out due to a scheduling conflict. He was due to play Emperor Geta, and that role will now be played by The White Lotus Season 1 actor Fred Hechinger.

Deadline also reported that Gladiator 2 has added new cast members, including May Calamawy (Moon Knight), Lior Raz (Fauda), Derek Jacobi (Gladiator), Peter Mensah (Avatar), and Matt Lucas (Bridesmaids).

They all join a cast that already includes Paul Mescal in the lead role, along with Denzel Washington, Pedro Pascal, Joseph Quinn, and Connie Nielsen.

Jacobi played Gracchus in the 2000 original Gladiator, and he is returning to play that part again. Connie Nielsen is coming back, too, reprising her role as Lucilla.

Calamawy, who starred on Moon Knight, is said to have a major role in Gladiator 2. Director Ridley Scott is reported to have conducted a “thorough search” for the role and conducted multiple auditions before officially signing Calamawy. Other actors reportedly got straight offers.

David Scarpa is wri…

As part of Microsoft’s 20th anniversary Xbox celebrations, the company has partnered with high-end fashion company Gucci for a very expensive Xbox.

Microsoft and Gucci created 100 “Xbox by Gucci” Series X consoles and matching controllers that feature Gucci’s iconic designs. The console itself features a laser-cut monogram motif of the famous GG pattern that serves as both Guccio Gucci’s initials and also the popular gaming phrase Good Game.

The controller has blue and red stripes inspired by the brand’s House Web design. The console and controller come inside a hard carry case with blue and red stripes. An Xbox Game Pass subscription is included as well, because of course it is.

Only 100 are being made, and they sell for $10,000 each. You can find them for sale in Gucci’s stores starting on November 17 in New York, Beverly Hills, Mexico City, Milan, London, Berlin, Beijing, and Tokyo.

In other Xbox news, the company’s 20th anniversary event is coming up this Monday, November 15. No game announcements are expected, but Microsoft will look back at the past two decades of Xbox and celebrate the franchise’s accomplishments.

The next big Xbox game …

The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention released the study titled, “What happens in Vegas, stays in your lungs: an assessment of fine particulate matter in casinos that prohibit and allow smoking in Las Vegas, Nevada, USA,” which compares the air quality in the non-smoking Park MGM casino, to other casinos that permit smoking.

New Study Advocates for Complete Ban on Smoking in Casinos

The Park MGM casino has been smoke-free since reopening in September 2020, following a six-month shutdown of the Las Vegas Strip due to the COVID-19 pandemic. The study released by The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention claims to be the first of its kind, examining air quality and comparing results with other similar casinos that permit smoking.

Authors of the study, Michael A. Tynan, Martin A. Cohen, and Jeffrey R. Harris used a real-time personal aerosol monitor to assess particulate matter with a diameter of less than 2.5 µm (PM2.5), a surrogate for secondhand smoke. Each of the ca…

In a victory for Las Vegas hospitality workers, the Culinary Workers Union announced a groundbreaking tentative deal with Caesars Entertainment, potentially averting a city-wide strike.

Historic Caesars Deal Ushers in New Era of Workers’ Rights in Las Vegas

The deal, described as “historic” by union leaders, includes substantial wage increases in the first year, along with enhanced healthcare and pension benefits. One of the most noteworthy aspects of the agreement is the reduction in workload for housekeepers, marking the first such change in three decades. Additionally, the union successfully negotiated language enabling them to support non-union workers on the Las Vegas Strip, a move seen as a crucial win for workers’ rights.

The news of the Caesars deal has sent ripples of hope through the city, with many workers celebrating the breakthrough. However, the threat of a strike still looms large as negotiations with MGM Resorts International and

Glen Powell Reveals If We Can Expect An ‘Anyone But You’ Sequel

Glen Powell has found the perfect wingman. 

The Hit Man star recently shared some highlights from the set of his upcoming movie, Twisters, posting snaps with costars Daisy Edgar-Jones, Brandon Perea and, most importantly, his dog Hot Brisket. 

“Shortly after being adopted, @hotbrisket joined the cast of ‘Twisters’ and was quickly called ‘the Lassie of his generation,” Glen joked in a July 8 Instagram post. “Rumors are swirling of him leading a Homeward Bound reboot that would crown him as ‘Hollywood’s King of the Animal Kingdom.’”

But while the post included adorable photos of his puppy—who he debuted last year—with some of the Twisters cast, it was the last slide in his photo dump that had jaws dropping. 

The 35-year-old’s last photo in his latest gallery was a mirror selfie, showing him wrapped in only a towel placed very low at his waist. Glen held up his pup with one hand and his cell phone with the other, mean-mugging the camera and showing off his toned body. <…

Assassin’s Creed Shadows has returned to the dual protagonist system that we last saw in Syndicate, letting us play as two characters—rather than having us just pick either a male or female protagonist as in Odyssey and Valhalla—with different playstyles. This immediately prompted a backlash, not because people don’t want to have two protagonists, but because one of them happened to be a Black man. 

Yasuke is an enigmatic historical figure who lived in Japan in the 16th century and is the first African to be officially recorded in the country. He arrived in Japan with Christian missionaries, after which he became an attendant of Oda Nobunaga. We don’t know a lot about Yasuke, but as an outsider who went on to serve one of the most powerful men in Japan, his story is naturally intriguing, and perfect for Assassin’s Creed, which uses history as a springboard to tell its own stories. 

When Ubisoft was researching its latest game, “Yasuke kept surfacing,” executive producer Marc-Alexis Côté told Stephen Totilo in a Game File interview. “We’ve got a super-mysterious historical character from which not much is known about. And for us, it …

Spending $200 or more on a single drive might seem to be a daft thing to do when there are some great Prime Day SSD deals to be found. But these two offers are a bit special because you’re looking at 4 TB of NVMe storage, for a price that’s as low as $0.05 per GB. Yes, that’s right—just five cents per gigabyte. The mind boggles.

• We’re curating all the best Prime Day PC gaming deals right here.

What I’ve got here is a nice choice of big-but-not-super-fast and big-and-super-fast, and there’s only a $21 difference between the two. So just go for the latter, yes? Well, it’s not quite as simple as that.

Quick list

• Silicon Power UD90 | $209 @ Amazon (save $31)
• Silicon Power XS70 | $230 @ Newegg (save $40)

Prime Day 4 TB SSDs

The cheaper offer is for a Silicon Power UD90 SSD. It’s hard to tell exactly what NAND flash and controller chip is used in this model because Silicon Power uses a variety of suppliers for it…

NetherRealm Studios says it’s planning to patch a Mortal Kombat 1 bug this week which was leading to certain players gaining a significant advantage over their opponent. The issue allows Player 1  to execute combos that were impossible to pull off for Player 2. 

It was first brought to light by mrAPchem on YouTube, who demonstrated a handful of combos on characters Sub-Zero and Kitana. While Player 1 was able to pull them off on both the left and right side of the screen, the same combos as Player 2 would whiff, missing the opponent by a hair and dropping the whole thing.

It’s unclear whether the issue boils down to a difference in hitboxes or gravity between each player, but it certainly throws a spanner in any competitive scenario, where a level playing field is an absolute necessity. Thankfully, mrAPchem’s video spread like wildfire and caught the attention of NetherRealm and Ed Boon within a couple of days.

“Once again, THANK YOU for all your feedback with MK1. You are helping us make the game better every day,” Boon tweeted shortly after the video blew up. “The Player1 advantage bug has been fixed, and an update is being prepped for release very …

Sometimes, game leaks are dramatic, unpleasant things—like the disturbing Insomniac hacks that happened late last year, revealing developer’s private information due to a ransomware group. More often than not, however, they occur for simple, hindsight-stupid reasons, as recently-leaked documents from Google reveal.

A recent report by 404Media states that Google—which has owned YouTube since it bought the site in 2006—experienced a dearth of privacy hiccups from “2013 to 2018”. The site obtained a copy of an “internal database which tracks six years worth of potential privacy and security issues.” Google’s later statement provided to 404Media implies that the database was indeed accurate.

Among “thousands” of other incidents, the report indicates that a “Google employee accessed private videos in Nintendo’s YouTube account, and leaked information ahead of Nintendo’s planned announcements.” 404Media later linked this entry to a leak posted on the Nintendo subreddit in 2017.

The post itself shares a phone picture of a webpage carrying the “admin” prefix, indicating that the page was accessed on Google’s internal systems. The game in question is t…

Big damage numbers are fun, sure, but slapping a bunch of damage-over-time effects on your foes and watching them wilt has its allure too. Remnant 2’s new archetype, the Ritualist, will let you do just that, and it’ll be arriving alongside the game’s first DLC next week.

The full trailer dropped on the game’s official YouTube channel yesterday, giving us a look at the archetype’s main traits and abilities. Its “Prime Perk”, Vile, introduces a status effect called “Infected”, which boosts the status effect damage received by your target and turns them into an exploding biohazard when they die, spreading everything they had to their mates within 15 metres.

The archetype’s skills look interesting, too: Eruption causes nearby enemies to… well, erupt, dealing bonus damage based on how many status effects they’ve plagued by. Death Wish turns you into a blaze of glory, draining three times your health over the course of 20 seconds—but, you also gain a bunch of lifesteal and a massive boost to your damage. 

My favourite by far is Miasma, a big AoE which sets your enemies on fire, melts them with acid, shocks them, and makes them bleed all at …

The recent closures of Arkane Austin (Dishonoured, Prey) and Tango Gameworks (Hi-Fi Rush) have sent ripples throughout the gaming industry. Arkane has a beloved library of games, but recently flubbed on Redfall—while Tango seems unceremoniously shuttered after the comparative success of its most recent title. 

Microsoft’s messaging on exactly why Tango Gameworks was shut down is…. Well, it’s mixed to say the least. In the initial internal email, Xbox’s Matt Booty signalled a desire to focus on “blockbuster” hits and Bethesda games. Then, in a later town hall, Booty argued that Xbox as a brand needed to develop smaller games that would win the company more awards. As many have pointed out over the past week, that’s pretty much what Hi-Fi Rush was. 

Said statement even prompted Tango’s Game Project Manager Kazuaki Egashira to tweet out a devastatingly simple “Not enough?” with a picture of the various awards Hi-Fi Rush had gathered.

There’s a bit of nuance to be found there, in fairness. Hi-Fi Rush certainly wasn’t ‘small indie’ in terms of its cost, as per the developers themselves—and it had a larger team towards the t…

The team behind the Skyrim Together Reborn multiplayer mod has turned its attention to something new: HogWarp, a multiplayer mod for Hogwarts Legacy.

Hogwarts Legacy is a big, sprawling game, and its setting and story—a tale of kids attending a massive, ancient magic school—is a natural fit for some sort of multiplayer component. Yet it’s strictly a singleplayer game.

That may not be the case forever, though. HogWarp, like Skyrim Together, is designed to give players the ability to congregate and play together in the famed school of magic. And it’s not just an idle dream: Even though Hogwarts Legacy only went into full release on Friday, the Together Team has already shared a video of a test build in action. There’s not a whole lot going on, but that’s definitely two students running around in one Hogwarts.

Mod maker Yamashi told me in a Discord chat that the focus of the mod is “on co-op and roleplay.” The goal at this point is to enable up to eight people to play together, although that could change depending on how development unfolds.

“Our aim is to figure out how to do the basics such as spawning characters with the player’s appearance, a…

Watch On

Brace yourself: A new wave of hero shooters is rolling in. Dozens of videos of a rumored Valve shooter called Deadlock have leaked over the past couple weeks, and now Sony has revealed Concord, a character-driven PvP shooter releasing this August.

Concord comes from Firewalk Studios, a developer Sony brought into the PlayStation fold last year. In the past, that would’ve meant no PC version for us, but these days Sony is releasing its multiplayer games on PS5 and PC simultaneously—see Helldivers 2—and that’ll be true for Concord.

Fans of Destiny 2’s PvP modes might find something familiar feeling about the gameplay trailer above, which was shown at Sony’s State of Play showcase today. The Firewalk crew is stacked with ex-Bungie developers: Concord game director Ryan Ellis, design director Josh Hammrick, lead gameplay designer Claude Jerome, and lead character designer Jon Weisnewski all worked on Destiny 2.

At first, though, it wasn’t clear that this even was a PvP game: the Concord gameplay trailer was preceded by a lengthy cinematic trailer (embedded below) full of very Guardian’s of the Galaxy-ish movie banter. I assumed we were looking …

Given Remedy’s preoccupation with looping stories in Alan Wake 2, it feels particularly fitting that the game now has a New Game Plus mode. Just as Alan himself is trapped experiencing the same events over and over, now you too can pretend you’re in the Dark Place by turning the year’s best horror game into a lovely endless limbo for yourself.  

As you’d expect, you can carry over all your unlocked weapons and upgrades from your first run—I reckon not having to hunt that stuff down will make a second playthrough very speedy indeed if you want it to be. Or you can properly put your accumulated arsenal through its paces by cranking the difficulty up to the new Nightmare level. 

What’s more exciting, though, is that New Game Plus also introduces new manuscript pages and live-action videos to discover, weaving even more lore into the game’s rich tapestry of surreal horror. It looks like it gives everyone’s favourite Control character Casper Darling more screen time too, and who could say no to that?

And once you’ve finished your playthrough, you’ll be treated to a whole new ending unique to New Game Plus. I haven’t had chance to see it myself yet, b…

XDefiant had previously announced that it will not be using skill-based matchmaking to group players in casual queues, and  is now out to convince players that it won’t allow any pay-to-win features to intrude on the upcoming FPS game. 

XDefiant releases tomorrow, and Ubisoft has a new blog post explaining the decision not to include any pay-to-win routes in the game: “Any gameplay impacting content that is purchasable is also unlockable through challenges to ensure fair play amongst our community.” XDefiant will have its version of battle passes, but clearly, these will be focused on cosmetics. The game offers the usual: character skins, weapon skins, MVP player animations, player cards, and emoji packs.

“Our goal is to provide amazing customization options that reward all of the matches, victories, and even defeats that you put into the game,” Ubisoft says. “As you play that one more match, all of your time and energy will work towards unlocking content either through the Battle Pass or challenges.”

Locking customisations behind a paywall is pretty standard practice for many games, with FPS games seemingly especially keen on the model. It’s not alwa…

Just one day after streaming service Twitch announced that it is laying off 500 employees, Discord has joined the parade: A report from The Verge says the company is cutting 170 employees, representing 17% of its workforce. A Discord representative confirmed with PC Gamer that The Verge’s report is accurate.

Discord is an extremely popular social media platform, but CEO Jason Citron said in a memo sent to employees today that the company’s employee count has increased by five times since 2020, and that “as a result, we took on more projects and became less efficient in how we operated.”

“Today, we are increasingly clear on the need to sharpen our focus and improve the way we work together to bring more agility to our organization,” Citron said. “This is what largely drove the decision to reduce the size of our workforce.

“While difficult, I am confident this will put us in the best position to continue building a strong and profitable business that delivers amazing products for our users and supports our mission for years to come.”

Discord doesn’t appear to be facing any immediate financial difficulties. The Verge report says the company has raised roughl…

Phase 3 launches for Warcraft Classic Season of Discovery today, and players will once again explore a WoW Classic update with no advance community testing. Not having a Public Test Realm (PTR) for Classic means some things will be broken, developers said in a PC Gamer interview—and that’s okay.

Not just okay, Blizzard argued, but good, even.

“I think our whole team has been extremely pleased with not having PTRs,” said Clayton Stone, associate production director. “That was a radical change. Keeping that level of mystery and of discovery for Season of Discovery, with each phase that we roll out, has really created a moment every time for the whole player base to come together and experience something fresh together at the same time.”

Oddly, that means that players in the Classic version of World of Warcraft are sometimes seeing things with less notice or foreknowledge than players of the modern version. That can lead to some hiccups along the way.

“I recognize, and I think our players do, there’s definitely an experimental nature that’s inherent to the whole Season,” Stone said. “Players are also a little bit open to us experimenting, or things not…

Finish your Wordle year with a guaranteed win, however you want to go about it. Keep on scrolling and you’ll find general tips for your daily guesses, as well as a clue just for the December 31 (925) game and of course today’s Wordle answer if you’d rather cut to the chase. Whatever happens, you’re celebrating today.

Oh, that was embarrassing. Not so much the guessing itself, but the way I managed to waste an entire row thanks to a typo. It’s my own fault—my brain was so excited it forgot to properly engage my fingers first, and I had to suffer the sight of a guess I already knew was wrong throw away a whole row. I won’t make that mistake again. Well, not tomorrow, anyway. Maybe.

Wordle today: A hint

Wordle today: A hint for Sunday, December 31

Thinking of tastes and flavours will help you win today’s Wordle. The answer today is the opposite of sweet; a savoury sensation that’s always welcome on chips and fries. 

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Is there a double letter in Wordle today? 

No, there is no double letter in today’s puzzle. 

Wordle help: 3 tips for beating Wordle every day 

Anyone can pick …

Win today’s Wordle in record time: the answer to the February 2 (593) puzzle is ready and waiting just below. Prefer to solve the daily challenge at your own pace? Then take a look at today’s clue, or refresh your Wordle strategy with our general tips and guides.

Two greens, three greens, done. I wouldn’t have leapt at today’s answer under most circumstances, but after taking a moment to thoroughly check the letters I’d already ruled out and what I had left to try, it strangely felt like the most sensible option.

Wordle hint

A Wordle hint for Thursday, February 2

The word you’re looking for today means to consciously avoid doing some sort of job or task you were responsible for or deliberately failing to do it well. You only need to reveal one vowel today. 

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Is there a double letter in today’s Wordle? 

No letters are used twice in today’s puzzle. 

Wordle help: 3 tips for beating Wordle every day 

If you’re new to the daily Wordle puzzle or you just want a refresher after taking a break, I’ll share some quick tips to help you win. There’s nothing quite like a small victory to s…

Keep your Wordle win streak going with our vast range of help. Take a look at our guides and tips, created to make every guess just that little bit better, read a clue written especially for today’s solution, and if you’ve run out of goes and just need someone to tell you the answer to the April 19 (669) game then don’t worry, today’s Wordle solution is waiting just below.

I didn’t have a lot to go on after my second guess had finished flipping over—just one yellow and one green—but they proved just how much you can do with not a lot. The green was exactly where it needed to be, and the yellow just happened to be the sort of letter that had to go there, which formed a natural pair with a letter I hadn’t tried yet. With those three letters fuzzily locked in, today’s Wordle answer just sort of appeared out of thin air. 

Wordle hint

A Wordle hint for Wednesday, April 19

Today’s answer is another word for a heavy, blunt strike producing a dull thud-like sound. This word can also be used when suffering from a headache with similar symptoms. There’s only one vowel to find today.  

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Is there a…

There’s a clue for today’s Wordle waiting just below if you need it, a handcrafted hint to help light the way. And if you don’t, that just leaves you with more time to browse our general tips and guides, there to ensure every guess is as productive as possible. Need something more direct? You’ve got it. The answer for the October 3 (836) Wordle is only a click away.

I rushed into Wordle today on pure instinct alone, and felt a wave of dread wash over me as my thoughtless effort returned four greys and a single green. Well, no turning back now. Somehow my second guess ended up more than pulling its weight, almost filling out the entire row with more green letters—and once they were in place, the Wordle answer soon turned up.

Today’s Wordle hint

Wordle today: A hint for Tuesday, October 3

The answer today refers to something that either happens at the same time as something else, or for a reasonably short period of time. You might play Wordle _____ waiting for the train, for example. 

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Is there a double letter in Wordle today? 

There are no double letters in today’s Wordle. 

Wordle he…