Total War: Warhammer 2 screenshot of High Elves fighting Dwarfs

Total War: Warhammer 2 will be getting an absolutely massive update later today: the Mortal Empires combined campaign. As you might deduce from the name alone, the new campaign will be a combination of the maps from Total War: Warhammer 1 and 2, as well as all of the factions and Legendary Lords that inhabit them.

Since every single faction is going to be able to fight against each other, having Total War: Warhammer 2 balanced is going to be of the utmost importance as even a slight power difference can drastically reshape how the entire campaign plays out due to the sheer volume of races. As such, I am very glad to say that Creative Assembly has announced that the Mortal Empires update will be followed by an equally massive patch.

Destiny 2 official artwork without logo

[Update]: Bungie has now released a brief follow-up statement: "As part of our ban review process, we have identified a group of players who were banned in error. Those players have been unbanned. The bans were not related to the third-party applications listed above. We will continue to review the process we use to ensure a fun and fair game."

[Original Story]: If you've been paying attention to the official forums and the Destiny 2 Reddit you've most likely noticed a lot of complaints about people getting automatically banned for using software with an overlay (Mumble, Discord, etc). While the bans were definitely real, nobody really knew what exactly caused them, and if their copy of the game could be next... for seemingly no reason!

As such, I am very glad to say that Bungie has now finally released an official response. According to the message they have only banned 400 people so far, 4 of which were subsequently found to be innocent, and the usage of overlays or performance tools did not in any way cause these bans. Here's the full response:

Assassin’s Creed: Origins screenshot from the "From Sand" trailer

After a lengthy hiatus following the somewhat disappointing Assassin's Creed: Syndicate, the series will be making its hopefully triumphant return with Assassin's Creed: Origins tomorrow. Besides the rather stunning depiction of Ancient Egypt, Origins will be bringing with it a variety of gameplay and quality of life improvements, the most important of which is a shift towards a more tactical combat system. Its no longer going to be a series of 1-on-1 duels, but rather a system that rewards stealth, positioning, and clever usage of gadgets above all else. In other words, getting caught is going to be more of a punishment now, at least if you're not prepared for it.

While the recently posted launch trailer won't offer you much of a look at the gameplay side of things, it will give you a good example of just how gorgeous Origins can be at times. Have a gander, its not a very long video, but it does have some rather interesting scenes:

Overwatch Halloween Terror screenshot of Dragon Symmetra

If you're not a fan of Overwatch's Competitive Play and you only really do it for the shiny golden guns, you might want to start doing your placement matches as Season 6 is set to end later this week. To be more specific, Season 6 will officially end on Saturday, October 28th at 5pm PDT (or Sunday, October 29th at 00:00 UTC). Thankfully there won't be much of a delay between seasons like last year, so you can expect Season 7 to start up three days later on Tuesday, October 31st at 5pm PDT ( or Thursday, November 1st at 00:00 UTC).

With that out of the way, its also important to mention that the seasons and their accompanying Competitive Point (CP) rewards have been changed a little while back. Instead of three months the seasons now 'only' last two, while their final rewards have gone down in order to compensate for their shorter length. On the positive side, you do get a bit more CP with each victory now, so if you tend to play a lot of competitive games you're going to earn more golden guns than you can possibly know what to do with... and yes, I'm speaking from personal experience here.

Nights of Azure 2 screenshot from the combat system

Nights of Azure 2: Bride of the New Moon is Koei-Tecmo's latest action-JRPG set in a demon-infested version of Western Europe somewhere in the 19th century. The story mostly focuses around three main characters, life-long friends that have slowly found themselves on the opposite sides of a conflict that is threatening to tear the entire world apart. And since JRPG protagonists can't get away with just one tragic backstory, our main character will also find herself slowly succumbing to the demonic curse, thus putting an even larger strain on the trio's relationship.

If you're interested in seeing what all of this looks like in-game, and more importantly what the combat system is all about, you'll find what you seek in the most recent trailer. Have a look, its not a very long video:

Observer screenshot of a bunch of humanoid TV screens with static on them

Observer is a physiological horror game set in a bleak and depressing cyberpunk world constantly beset by plagues, war, and poverty. With the outside world being a hellish nightmare, it shouldn't come as much of a surprise to hear that most of humanity has turned to drugs, virtual reality, or a combination of both. This is where you, an elite neural detective known as an Observer, come into play. Its your job to hack into the minds of the criminally insane in order to relive their darkest memories, all the while trying to maintain a grip on your own fleeting sanity.

If this sounds like the type of horror game you would love to try out, you'll be glad to hear that Observer is now available on Mac and Linux, as well as Windows and consoles. As with pretty much every multi-platform game on Steam, if you own one version you will be given access to all of them, so there's no need to buy Observer again if you own it on PC. If you don't have any version, however, its worth mentioning that Observer will be on a 15% discount on Steam for the next two days.

Total War: Warhammer 2 battle screenshot between the Dark Elves and Vampire Counts

Total War: Warhammer 2's upcoming Mortal Empires campaign represents one of the biggest updates a Total War game has seen so far. The new campaign is essentially a combination of the maps from Total War: Warhammer 1 and 2, as well as all of the Legendary Lords and factions they lead. The end result, as you can imagine, is an absolutely gigantic world full of unique and interesting races to conquer!

If you're wondering just how gigantic the world truly is, wonder no more as Creative Assembly has released a brief video overview of the Mortal Empires campaign. The video doesn't go into much detail, but it should give you a pretty damn good idea of the scale we're talking about here. Have a look:

Wolfenstein 2: The New Colossus flaming metallic dog screenshot

Wolfenstein 2: The New Colossus will be coming to PC and consoles this October 27th. With the release date just around the corner I'm sure many of you are wondering whether your PC can even run it, which is why I'm glad to say that Bethesda has now finally revealed the PC system requirements, as well as all of the extra features that come with the PC version.

If you're interested in learning what sort of settings and graphical options you'll be able to toy around with, you should head on over to the Bethesda blog as its a bit too lengthy to cover in brief. On the other hand, if you're just interested in the system requirements you'll find them right below. Have a look:

Deus Ex: Mankind Divided screenshot of Prague

If you ever wanted to give Deus Ex: Mankind Divided a try, but you didn't feel like dropping €50 for the honor, you'll be glad to hear that its currently free to play on Steam. I unfortunately caught this promotion a bit late so there's only 27 hours left, but it should be more than enough to let you know whether Mankind Divided is the type of game you'd enjoy or not.

Deus Ex: Mankind Divided will also be on a 75% discount until October 27th, which should give you enough time to both play the game and consider whether you want to actually buy it. And naturally, all of your progress will carry over to the full version, so feel free to try it out for as long as you want.

Red Legion Commander from Destiny 2

[Update 2]: Bungie has now released an official response. They have only banned 400 people, and none of them were banned for using an overlay or performance software, but rather for cheating.

[Update 1]: If you're using any software with an overlay (Mumble, Discord, etc.) there is a chance your account could get automatically banned. As such, I'd recommend waiting a couple of days for Bungie to sort this whole mess out.

[Original Story]: After a rather lengthy delay, the PC version of Destiny 2 has now finally appeared via Blizzard's Battle.Net client. Besides the improved visuals and performance, the PC version brings with it an uncapped framerate, support for resolutions up to 4K, and the usual batch of PC-exclusive options to fiddle with.

Whether its any good or not, however, that's a difficult question to answer. From what I've seen online most people agree that Destiny 2 is pretty damn fun, albeit short-lived. Unlike Destiny 1 the sequel barely has any endgame to speak of, and with the rewards being given out entirely at random there is almost no incentive to repeat some of the hardest dungeons out there. So if you're going to grab Destiny 2, make sure you're doing so for a 'one-and-done' type of playthrough or else you might just found yourself sorely disappointed.