Two codenames, ATLite3 and Gainsborough, have appeared in a recent AMD driver. ATLite3 is likely the GPU codename for the PS6's SoC Orion, while Gainsborough may be the Steam Deck 2 SoC and is showing up in shipping manifests, suggesting silicon validation is already underway.
Memory shortages have pushed desktop and handheld PC prices up, keeping entry-level 1080p gaming in the low four figures, so the author tested a gaming laptop instead. A Medion Erazer Scout 15 with an RTX 5050 costs £850, cheaper than a DIY desktop build with monitor, Windows license and basic specs at about £1,100. It packs an Intel Core i5-13420H, 16GB RAM, 1TB SSD and a 144Hz IPS screen, but battery life is poor and fan noise is loud.
The Steam Autumn Sale for 2026 is now live and runs through 10 AM PT on October 8. Resident Evil Requiem, Lego Batman: Legacy of the Dark Knight, and 007 First Light are each 30% off, while Endless Legend 2, Xenonauts 2, and Solasta 2 are half price. Far Cry 6 is down to $6 from its $60 RRP.
On its FY 2026 earnings call, Micron said memory demand will exceed supply in 2027 and 2028, with industry tightness greater than in 2026 and no line of sight to when supply and demand will rebalance. The company said it has already sold most of the memory it expects to produce next year at much higher prices than in 2026, and that new factories coming online in 2028 will not immediately improve availability or lower prices. Rising memory and storage costs have pushed Microsoft, Apple, Valve, Sony and Nintendo to raise hardware prices, while Micron and two other major RAM makers face a class action alleging they fixed supply and prices.
Valve has released another SteamOS update for the Steam Frame, bringing power efficiency improvements that add up to 12% more battery life during streaming and local gameplay. The update also adds an accessibility option to limit eye tracking to a single eye and fixes controller bindings failing to load in certain games. On PC, users must opt into SteamVR 2.18.2 or later to reduce "Error 17" connection issues.
Sony Japan has rolled out an anti-scalper lottery for PS5 Pro orders that requires a Sony account registered in Japan with at least 60 hours of gaming on PS4, PS5, or both. Valve also set reservation requirements for the Steam Frame launch, including a Steam account in good standing and a purchase made before April 27th 2026. The author argues these brand loyalty tests, while aimed at scalpers, make buying hardware at full price a qualification process.
An old 4chan leak has been found to accurately predict parts of Deadlock's new major update, including 3 of 6 heroes and specific map changes, along with a screenshot of an earlier version of the new map. The same leak claims Hopoo is making a 1-to-1 Risk of Rain 2-style PvE mode in Deadlock. Combined with datamined "lootboxes" and corroboration from other leakers, the mode appears set to arrive in the future unless scrapped.
Alinea Analytics estimates Steam generated $1.7 billion in September 2026, up 13% year over year and its best September to date. The firm's head of market analysis, Rhys Elliott, said Steam's Q3 revenue reached $5.5 billion, up 12%, bringing the 2026 total to $16.5 billion so far versus $14.5 billion in the first nine months of 2025, with full-year revenue on track to pass $20 billion for the first time. Among September releases, Wardogs was estimated at $86.9 million on Steam, alongside Onimusha: Way of the Sword, The Blood of Dawnwalker, Bodycam and EA Sports FC27.
Nine brand new 2026 games are discounted in Steam's Autumn Sale, including Resident Evil Requiem, Lego Batman: Legacy of the Dark Knight, and 007 First Light, each down from $69.99 to $48.99. Big Walk is $15.99 (was $19.99) and supports up to 12 players in co-op, while Endless Legend 2 and Xenonauts 2 have both hit 1.0 and are on sale at $24.99 and $19.99 respectively.
XLGAMES announced that a limited-time PC demo for ArcheAge Chronicles will run from October 19 to October 26 on Steam as part of Steam Next Fest: October 2026 Edition. The demo covers the Diamond Shores region and four classes, Warrior, Ranger, Berserker and Mage, and includes player-versus-player for the first time in a public build, while Housing and Trade life skills are held back for Early Access. The game is coming to PlayStation 5, Xbox Series and PC via Steam, with no release date announced yet.
Valve released an update for Team Fortress 2 that launches the Scream Fortress XVIII Halloween event, running through November 7th, 2026. The event adds 5 community maps, the Haunted Hoard Case with 23 community-created cosmetic items, 5 community taunts and 21 new Unusual effects, and all players who launch the game receive a Soul Gargoyle. The update also reworks the Zombie mode with a new Zombie Spawn Picker and new abilities for several Zombie classes, alongside numerous community-reported fixes.
Valve launched the Steam Autumn Sale on October 1, running until October 8, with over 25,000 games and DLC packages on sale according to the store's own filter. The article rounds up games priced at $15 or less, most under $10, including Hitman World of Assassination at $3, Left 4 Dead at $2, and Red Dead Redemption II and Warhammer 40K: Space Marine 2 at $15 each.
Unshine Arcade is out now on Steam for $10, with a demo that lets you play a fair chunk. The crunchy pixel roguelite shooter is set in an abandoned arcade, where you win tickets through a strange arcade game to unlock areas, boost abilities, and uncover secrets including discs and cheat codes.
Steam Frame has a maximum eyeglasses width of 140mm, and my roughly 146mm-wide glasses make the headset unusable with or without the included spacer. I've used PlayStation VR and Meta Quest with glasses successfully, but Frame's interior is smaller. Valve has partnered with Zenni to offer prescription lenses that can be installed to avoid needing glasses.
Steam's annual Autumn sale is now live, offering discounts on both new releases and older classics through Oct. 8. Recommended deals include Persona 3 Reload at 70% off, Final Fantasy VII Remake Intergrade at 75% off, and Cyberpunk 2077 at 70% off. Valve also has more sales planned for October, including the food-focused Cooking Fest and Steam Next Fest with hundreds of playable demos.
The Steam Autumn Sale runs October 1-7 with discounts on games, bundles, and DLC. Deals include Rez Infinite at $7.49 (normally $25), Death Stranding 2: On the Beach at $56 (normally $70), and Tactical Breach Wizards at $11 (normally $20). October also brings Cooking Fest, Next Fest, and Steam Scream V Fest.
During the 2026 Steam Autumn Sale, SteamDB data shows more than 44,000 games are priced at $5 or less. The sale runs for one week and ends on October 8. Players can narrow the list with filters including genre, feature tags, release dates, minimum user rating, or number of reviews.
The continuation of the dragon & chicken's journey is done by the lovely @thetiffopotamus, with animations by @thanhuki! Head to the Points Shop for more of this dynamic duo: https://store.steampowered.com/points/shop/app/5308810
It's fall, y'all! At least up here in the northern hemisphere - as the temperatures drop and the leaves turn crispy, what better way to celebrate than with discounts on tons of games?
You can save on PC games during Steam sales and beyond by keeping a large Steam wishlist and using price-tracking sites like IsThereAnyDeal to compare deals across vetted retailers. Bundle storefronts such as Fanatical, Humble, Green Man Gaming and Digiphile often offer steep discounts, while the Epic Games Store regularly gives away two titles a week and one a day during its end-of-year celebrations. Playnite can help you organize games across Steam, GOG, Epic and Itch.
This episode of the podcast covers on-site impressions from Meta Connect and a discussion of Meta VR Glasses. It also touches on the lively Steam Frame community. The episode was recorded live on 2026-09-30.
A new video from the YouTube channel Moore's Law is Dead claims that a rumoured AMD APU codenamed Gainsborough is likely to be the chip inside Valve's next-gen Steam Deck 2. The chip is said to be built on TSMC's N3P node and to use AMD's Zen 6 and RDNA 5 architectures, with MLID saying the silicon itself should be ready late next year or early 2028.
In Deadlock's first proper development update, Valve said the invite-only game is still too unfinished to release publicly and that the team shifted to working on many things in parallel this year. The City Never Sleeps update added a redesigned map and items, while progression and hero and hideout customizations are still in development so Valve can adjust them based on feedback before full release. Valve also mentioned more speculative work such as large item redesigns and alternative game modes that expand the game's scope, possibly including the rumored PvE mode from former Risk of Rain developers.
Valve released a large City Never Sleeps update for Deadlock, its still-unreleased MOBA, overhauling the map, adding six new heroes and greatly expanding voice lines. According to SteamDB, the game reached 228,086 concurrent players on Steam yesterday, its highest figure ever. The update also gives themed identities to lanes and districts on the New York-inspired map The Cursed Apple, each with its own PvE Haunts.
Valve released Deadlock's large City Never Sleeps update, adding six new characters unlocked by community vote, UI reworks, more voicelines, and a sweeping visual update to the map. The Hidden King and Arch Mother bases are unchanged, while three lanes and four new districts were reworked, including the industrial York, the central Broadway hub, and Greenwich. The four districts are the Theatre, Chinatown, Haunted Lot, and Plaza.
Valve announced it will change how games get discovered on Steam during sales and promotions, moving from a manually curated calendar of fixed front-page slots to dynamic, personalized recommendations based on user preferences and purchase history. Valve said preliminary experiments produced up to 10 times as many games appearing per day in the Discounts & Events section, with measurable increases in store page visits and wishlist additions. Valve has paused curated placements in Weekend Deals, Midweek Deals and Daily Deals, and the change is set to roll out in early 2027.
At Logitech G Play 2026 in Warsaw, Poland, a Counter-Strike 2 tournament with a $100,000 prize pool pitted Canadian team Luminosity Gaming against French team 3DMax. Sitting in the bleachers rather than the VIP and press area, the author felt a sense of belonging despite not understanding the Polish commentary. The second game went into two overtimes, and Afro's AWP clutch became an unforgettable moment.
Dressmaker is out now on Steam and climbing the Steam charts, with players praising its detailed dressmaking mechanics like twisting fabric to see how it behaves under certain lighting. Steam reviews say it brings back childhood fashion-game nostalgia, and one reviewer writes, "I am a straight, white man and this is my game of the year so far."
Valve announced that Steam's Discounts and Events page will use dynamic and personalized recommendations, giving more discounted games and sale events a chance to appear on the homepage and elsewhere instead of being limited to a small, fixed number of slots. Valve said a manually managed calendar no longer fits diverse player tastes, and while no hard rollout date is set, it expects to begin the process in early 2027. The change affects what players see rather than what they pay, and the author notes it could give indie developers more visibility.
The Witcher 3: Wild Hunt — Remastered launched today, pushing the 11-year-old open-world RPG past 120,000 concurrent players on Steam, a new record above its original launch peak of under 100,000. The free upgrade for existing owners includes visual improvements, gameplay tweaks, overhauled UI systems and a photo mode, with over 70 changes listed in the patch notes plus platform-specific updates for PS5 and Switch. Running the game at ultra settings on PC now requires a GeForce RTX 5080 and 24GB of RAM, and some AMD graphics card owners have reported issues due to missing driver support.
Valve's Deadlock update increased pre-match conversations between new and existing heroes from over 700 to 1500, and added a voice line viewer to the game. The update also brings over 10,000 non-ping voice lines, five new heroes, and new environments.
Valve is updating Steam's Discount & Events section, moving from manual, calendar-based placements to a more dynamic and personalised system to improve discoverability. Valve said the shift lets it display ten times more games daily and has produced increases in store page visits, wishlists and cart additions, with the new system to be fully implemented in early 2027 and new tools coming for developers. Hooded Horse CEO Tim Bender said the section, once weighted toward best-selling games, is now showing indie titles with under a hundred to a few thousand reviews, with some small games going from near-zero visits to a few thousand.
Valve released a large update for its in-development MOBA hero shooter Deadlock, reworking the map and adding six new heroes, new mobs, objectives, an updated HUD, healthbars and Shop, plus engine code moved to the latest version of Source 2. Deadlock peaked at over 220,000 concurrent players overnight, breaking its own record and making it the sixth most-played game on Steam last night. The game remains in early development with access limited to friend invites from Valve's playtesters, and there is still no release date or beta window.