Video games, esports, gaming industry, and interactive entertainment
Asset reuse is essential in modern game development, not a sign of corner-cutting, argues creative director Alex Hutchinson. With budgets spiralling and teams stretched thin, clever reuse of existing work could save the industry from collapse.
Kate Morrison 
Randal Linden, who created one of gaming's most technically ambitious ports in 1995, is back to improve the notoriously flawed SNES version of Doom with help from Limited Run Games.
Tom Whitfield 
Zoo Fighter turns the viral story of Punch, an abandoned Japanese macaque, into a simple clicking game with a serious message about animal welfare and sanctuary living.
Jake Nguyen 
Xenonauts 2 will formally leave early access on April 2, 2026, marking the end of a lengthy testing period. The developers pledge post-launch support including modding tools.
Oliver Pemberton 
The cult multiplayer mod that started as a Halloween beta in 2004 has arrived on Steam with overhauled gameplay systems and full compatibility with modern Half-Life.
Tom Whitfield 
The GDC Festival of Gaming 2026 featured dozens of indie games worth tracking. Here are five standouts that caught developer and journalist attention.
Jake Nguyen 
Australian gaming prices are among the highest in the world, but subscription services and smart shopping strategies can ease the burden for budget-conscious players.
Jake Nguyen 
Blizzard's game director has confirmed that Marvel Rivals' success directly influenced Overwatch's dramatic shift to larger, more frequent content drops.
Jake Nguyen 
At GDC 2026, a major investor expressed shock over the game industry's resistance to generative AI, revealing a fundamental clash between tech financiers and creative workers about the technology's future role.
Darren Ong 
Arc Raiders' blockbuster success is a rare win in a graveyard of live-service failures. But behind it lies a cautionary tale about creative freedom, risk, and why most games fail.
Ella Sullivan 
Pokopia players are using the game's building mechanics to recreate landmarks from the beloved but dormant Pokémon Mystery Dungeon series, sparking speculation about a possible narrative connection.
Jimmy O'Brien 
ZA/UM writers reflect on building Disco Elysium in modest Estonian conditions and watch as the game's massive cultural influence spawns a wave of narrative-driven successors.
Aisha Khoury 
Donkey Kong Bananza developers acknowledge they cannot stop speedrunners from breaking the game in clever ways. At GDC 2026, they revealed they now design around sequence breaks instead of trying to prevent them.
Tom Whitfield 
Bungie's decision to increase gunshot volume in Marathon's first major patch backfired spectacularly, turning players against a change meant to improve combat encounters. The controversy reveals deeper questions about the cost of never-ending iterations.
Oliver Pemberton 
Arc Raiders developers have old vehicle prototypes gathering dust, but say any addition would need to fit the game's core design philosophy and player experience.
Mitchell Tan 
At GDC 2026, Nintendo's developers explained how a programmer's experiment with a fist-wielding Goomba led to one of the year's most acclaimed platformers.
Tom Whitfield 
Arc Raiders ditched jump pads and unrestricted grappling for a slower extraction shooter. Developers explain why the heroic movement tech had to go.
Yuki Tamura 
Dead by Daylight's developers claim the horror game has at least another decade ahead. Their candid admission about how the game succeeded reveals something troubling about the industry.
Daniel Kovac 
After years of targeting Kiriko and Mercy players for supporting expensive cosmetics, Overwatch fans now understand the corporate ultimatum that forced those design choices.
Kate Morrison 
Microsoft is partnering with Nvidia, AMD, Intel, and Qualcomm to solve one of PC gaming's most persistent annoyances: the endless wait while your graphics card compiles shaders at launch.
Nina Papadopoulos