Category: Video Games

Sony’s Until Dawn remake for PlayStation 5 and PC is having a rough launch, with not just technical issues but low player numbers too.

The remake of the 2015 horror game — which comes with updated graphics, technical improvements, and minor story changes — launched October 4 with a full price tag of $59.99 and no cheaper upgrade option for those who own the original.

This seemingly wasn’t too appealing for PC players, as Until Dawn has debuted to a peak concurrent player count of just 2,607 players on Steam, according to tracking website SteamDB. Other single-player PlayStation games performed much better when making the jump to PC, with Ghost of Tsushima reaching 77,154 concurrent players, God of War reaching 73,529, and Spider-Man reaching 66,436 on Valve’s platform. Until Dawn’s Steam launch is the worst Sony debut on Steam since the ill-fated Concord and Sackboy: A Big Adventure.

This small player base is reporting myriad issues too. Until Dawn currently has a “mixed” user review rating on Steam with just 69% of reviews being positive. The review deemed most helpful recommends the game but complains about the required PlayStation Network account, poor optimisation, music changes from the original, bugs, and poor controls at times.

Other reviews also comment on ray tracing and DLSS not working alongside graphical issues which “destroy immersion.” Others comment on the full price tag for the originally nine-year-old game and it still launching with issues.

Developer Ballistic Moon, which suffered a “significant” round of lay-offs even before the Until Dawn remake launched, has acknowledged the problems in an post released today, October 8. “We understand that some of you may have encountered some technical issues or bugs, and we’d love to hear from you so we can address these concerns,” it said.

“We are also aware of a couple of recurring issues, such as HDR and AMD FSR frame generation settings not functioning as intended, and issues with save/load. We hear you and we’re actively testing fixes for these issues (and more). We will provide further information with our next patch update.”

Issues are not exclusive to the PC version of the game, however. The tech experts at Digital Foundry noted that the PS5 version has frame pacing or frame ordering issues, 30 frames per second and 1440p output with significant aliasing on high contrast edges, and break up when there’s motion on-screen.

Ballistic Moon has at least said updates are coming, but these may be too little, too late for those who’ve already spent $59.99 on the remake. No release dates or windows have been shared for these fixes.

Until Dawn fans otherwise got a kick out of story changes in the remake (when it all leaked ahead of launch) with some even thinking a sequel is on the way. The universe is expanding elsewhere too, as filming wrapped on the Until Dawn movie adaptation earlier in October.

Ryan Dinsdale is an IGN freelance reporter. He’ll talk about The Witcher all day.

Throne and Liberty, the free-to-play massively multiplayer online role-playing game developed by NCSoft and published by Amazon Games, has seen more than three million players in just a week.

Originally billed as a Lineage sequel, Throne and Liberty is an MMO with PvE and PvP set in a dynamic and seamless world. It suffered numerous delays over the course of a development cycle spanning several years.

Throne and Liberty finally launched on October 1 across PC, PlayStation 5, and Xbox Series X and S, and soon proved a hit on Steam with an impressive player concurrent peak of 336,300. That’s enough to make Throne and Liberty one of the most-played games on Valve’s platform right now. Neither Sony nor Microsoft make player numbers public.

Amazon added that Throne and Liberty players had amassed 24 million hours in the game, with more than 11 million hours watched on Twitch.

“Bringing Throne and Liberty to players around the world has been a huge shared undertaking by our team and our friends at NCSoft, and we’re so pleased to see the results as players join the game,” said Christoph Hartmann, VP, Amazon Games.

“We’re only getting started, and we have a series of updates planned including our first castle siege coming soon.”

Throne and Liberty’s early performance is all the more impressive in light of its ‘mixed’ user review rating on Steam, with most of the negative reviews about server issues and the typical monetization you get from these sorts of F2P MMOs. IGN’s impressions of Throne and Liberty during its beta said the game “is fun but doesn’t do enough to stand out.”

For Amazon Games, Throne and Liberty’s success comes as it continues to support its own developed MMO, New World, and Smilegate’s action role-playing game Lost Ark, which it published in 2022. Amazon is also publishing Crystal Dynamics’ next Tomb Raider game, and has a The Lord of the Rings MMORPG in the works, among other projects.

In August, Hartmann told IGN the Lord of the rings MMO was “still early,” and the next Tomb Raider a “huge, huge task.”

Wesley is the UK News Editor for IGN. Find him on Twitter at @wyp100. You can reach Wesley at wesley_yinpoole@ign.com or confidentially at wyp100@proton.me.

For October Prime Day, Amazon is offering an excellent deal on the best gaming SSD. Right now you can get the blazing fast Samsung 990 Pro 2TB PCIe 4.0 M.2 solid state drive (SSD) for only $139.99. This is the lowest price we’ve seen this year and $10 less than the previous Prime Day deal back in July. 4TB and 1TB models are also on sale. The 990 Pro is still considered one of the fastest PCIe 4.0 SSDs on the market. It’s also compatible with the PlayStation 5 console right out of the box, especially since it’s pre-equipped with a low-profile heatsink.

Prime Day Deal: Samsung 990 Pro PS5 SSD with Heatsink

The 990 Pro is the successor to the venerable 980 Pro and is Samsung’s flagship SSD. The 990 Pro has been updated with Samsung’s newest Pascal controller and 7th gen TLC NAND flash chips which are manufactured in-house. It boasts sequential speeds of 7,450MB/s read and 6,900MB/s write and random speeds of 1400K read and 1550K IOPS write, which is up to 50% faster per watt than the 980 Pro. This is absolutely the best boot drive you can get for your gaming PC, especially since 2TB is currently the best compromise between capacity and price point.

For console gamers, the Samsung 990 Pro also happens to be one of the best SSDs for the PlayStation 5. In fact, performance-wise, it’s overkill since the stock PS5 SSD only has speeds of up to 5,600MB/s. This 990 Pro comes pre-equipped with a low-profile aluminum heatsink that’s guaranteed to fit in both the PS5 and PS5 Slim consoles. It also back by a 5 year warranty; by the time your warranty runs out, you might have already moved onto the PS6.

If you want to compare this deal with other PlayStation 5 compatible options, here’s a list of our favorite PS5 SSDs. If you’re looking for deals on other PS5 accessories, check out the best PS5 deals going on right now (we update it often). If you don’t yet own a PS5 console, you’re in luck. The PS5 Slim is currently on sale for Prime Day, and Sony recently announced a more powerful PS5 Pro that is currently up for preorder and ships out next month. For all other deals, head over to our Prime Day megapost to see our cherry-picked list of the best deals we’ve found.

Are October Prime Day Deals as good as Black Friday?

Although Black Friday is still the overall best time to buy just about anything every year, October Prime Day is just as good as Black Friday for many different items. Amazon’s own devices that are currently on sale likely won’t go much lower in price. The same goes for most of the deals we’ve featured on this list, which are at some of their lowest prices of the year so far. If you are unsure whether or not you’re getting a good deal on anything, you can reference specific products on the CamelCamelCamel website to see historical Amazon pricing.

More Prime Day Deals on Console Storage Upgrades

Eric Song is the IGN commerce manager in charge of finding the best gaming and tech deals every day. When Eric isn’t hunting for deals for other people at work, he’s hunting for deals for himself during his free time.

Here’s your chance to get one of the best Micro SD cards for your Steam Deck or Nintendo Switch. As part of the October Prime Day Event, Amazon is offering a 1TB TeamGroup Pro Plus Micro SDXC card for only $59.99. Besides being compatible with gaming handhelds, the Pro Plus has a faster speed rating than most Micro SDXC cards in this price range and would make an excellent card for 4K action cameras and DSLRs.

1TB TeamGroup Pro Plus Micro SDXC Card for $59.99