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The biggest PC gaming stories of the week

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This week: content streaming, crunch, and KFC.

Even in these pre-E3 doldrums there's loads of news happening in PC gaming. Let's get right into it.

 • Sony and Microsoft team up to develop 'game and content-streaming services'

Streaming technology could transform the entire games industry, so the fact that Sony and Microsoft are sharing resources is big news. I can see a world where, instead of buying games, we subscribe to publishers and stream their products to any device we like. What would that mean for PC gaming?

 • Denuvo piracy protection is getting cracked faster and faster

The anti-piracy arms race continues. If solutions like Denuvo fail to stand up we could see creators adopt more draconian approaches. Rage 2 didn't last a day.

 •  Red Dead Redemption 2 PC appears on a programmer's LinkedIn page

If/when this comes out we're going to have to rewrite our analysis of the best horses on PC.

 •  Dota Underlords trademarked by Valve

An Artifact rebrand? An action RPG? Another, different card game? A new game from Valve is always exciting news.

 •  Wolfenstein studio 'actively working' to eliminate crunch

It can only be positive that workplace practices are being openly discussed. Having said that, a healthy work environment should be the norm rather than a badge of honour. 

 • This old BBC video about making the first GTA is a treasure 

Love to see reporters wade into covering videogames without quite knowing enough to pull it off. I've never heard of a studio referred to as a 'plant' before.

•  Apex Legends and KFC had an argument

Speaking of crunch, this ended up being a very effective bit of marketing for KFC when a Respawn dev politely countered a meme tweet.

 •  Here's the PC Gaming Show 2019 lineup so far

It's happening! We've got loads of exciting reveals planned.

More things that happened this week

•  Total War: Three Kingdoms

Tweet of the week

I'm using my power as this week's curator to introduce a temporary new segment celebrating this very good Twitter that plays games to address the simple but very important question: can you pet the dog?

Around the (virtual) office

E3 preparations are well under way. Spreadsheets are filling up with appointments as we brace ourselves for the massive amount of news that will land in just a few weeks. In the meantime we've opened another big spreadsheet to house the Top 100, our annual list of the best PC games you should play right now. There are almost 50 games vying for a place in the list that didn't make the cut in 2018—some are new games, others are over 20 years old. Many hours of team discussion lie ahead.

Meanwhile Lauren Morton preparation for Destiny 2's Season of Opulence.

Also Evan has handily reminded me to play Sunless Skies, especially ahead of Top 100 discussions. I might wire my PC up to the TV this weekend and play this cool interactive book about space boats.

And that's a wrap. Thanks as ever for reading and have a great weekend. May your drops be exotic and K/D ratios ever favourable.

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Tom Senior
Tom Senior

Part of the UK team, Tom was with PC Gamer at the very beginning of the website's launch—first as a news writer, and then as online editor until his departure in 2020. His specialties are strategy games, action RPGs, hack ‘n slash games, digital card games… basically anything that he can fit on a hard drive. His final boss form is Deckard Cain.