An anonymous reader quotes a report from BuzzFeed News: Cards Against Humanity, the card game company, purchased ClickHole.com from its owners at G/O Media on Monday for an undisclosed amount in an all-cash deal, BuzzFeed News has learned. ClickHole's employees will become the majority owners of the site. Although terms were not disclosed, the Wall Street Journal reported in November that the sale price was likely to be less than $1 million. The Onion, which created ClickHole, will remain a part of G/O Media. Max Temkin, the cofounder of Cards Against Humanity, told BuzzFeed News that the deal will allow ClickHole to bring on additional staff -- it currently has only five full-time employees -- and explore new revenue streams. He also said the site would operate independently, with financial support from Cards Against Humanity. ClickHole staffers will not be involved in writing any Cards Against Humanity content. "We're giving them funding, and if they ask us, we'll be an advisor," Temkin told BuzzFeed News, saying that the ClickHole team will operate independently, with financial support. "We just want to give them a chance to do their thing. They're really capable -- really smart and innovative. And I don't know if they've had that opportunity before to try all these creative [ideas for the site]."

Steve Etheridge, editor-in-chief of ClickHole, told BuzzFeed News, "we're leaving a place with a very robust editorial infrastructure to essentially go build a new digital media company from scratch. Cards is giving us total freedom to do our thing, but that freedom comes with a lot of new responsibility, and we really just want to get it right. Our goal is to make ClickHole better than ever before."

An anonymous reader quotes a report from Ars Technica: A 21-year-old California man has pleaded guilty to hacking Nintendo's servers multiple times since 2016, using phishing techniques to gain early access to information about the company's plans. Ryan S. Hernandez, who went by RyanRocks online, worked with an unnamed associate to phish employee login credentials for proprietary Nintendo servers, according to an indictment filed in Washington state federal court in December and unsealed over the weekend. Hernandez used that unauthorized access to "download thousands of files, including proprietary developer tools and non-public information" about upcoming Nintendo products and "access pirated and unreleased video games."

That information (and discussion of Nintendo's internal server vulnerabilities) was leaked to the public via Twitter, Discord, and a chat room called "Ryan's Underground Hangout," prosecutors said. At one point, "RyanRocks" drew at least a little infamy in the Nintendo hacking community for allegedly leaking a Nintendo Software Development Kit that had a piece of hidden Remote Access Tool malware added to it. FBI agents confronted Hernandez about his hacking in 2017, according to a prosecution press release, and secured a promise from Hernandez "to stop any further malicious activity." But the hacking continued in 2018 and 2019, according to the indictment, until a June 2019 FBI raid that obtained hard drives with thousands of proprietary Nintendo files. The seized hard drives also included sexually explicit images of minors in a folder labeled "BAD STUFF," according to prosecutors. Hernandez has agreed to pay almost $260,000 to Nintendo as part of a plea agreement. Prosecutors are recommending a jail term of three years for Hernandez's crimes when sentencing is decided in April.

The Electronic Software Association is introducing tighter security measures around press registration for E3, following an incident last year in which sensitive personal information belonging to thousands of journalists, YouTube creators, and Twitch streamers was made public. The Verge reports: A new blog post published today details updates to the conference and its "media registration process," which the company says "received a lot of attention this past summer." "Earning back your trust and support is our top priority," the post reads. "That's why we rebuilt the E3 website with enhanced and layered security measures developed by an outside cybersecurity firm. This included updating our data management processes, including the handling of personally identifiable information, and we will no longer store that data on our site."

Changes to the registration process will also occur this year. The ESA will "collect the minimum information necessary" for attendees registering. The post doesn't state what those specific changes are. Last year's leak, which involved an unprotected file uploaded online and available for anyone to download, led to personal information like home addresses and phone numbers appearing on hateful forums like Kiwi Farms. After data leaked, multiple journalists -- including staff members of The Verge -- received texts and phone calls from complete strangers.

Nintendo says the Switch has hit 52.5 million sales in its lifetime, already surpassing that of the SNES. From a report: In becoming the company's fifth best-selling console of all-time, the Switch has helped to boost Nintendo -- the company reported a $2.75 billion operating profit, up from the previously predicted $2.38 billion. Previous forecasts had Switch sales for the fiscal year, ending March 31, at 18 million. That number has now jumped to 19.5 million. And, 10.8 million of those were sold during the holiday season alone, leading to a 22.5 percent increase by December of the previous year.

An anonymous reader quotes a report from Ars Technica: As influential as Warcraft III was in the real-time strategy genre, the game's most enduring legacy might be as the basis for genre-defining, fan-made custom game spin-offs like Defense of the Ancients (aka Dota) and Auto Chess in its wake. Now, Blizzard is taking steps to ensure it retains complete ownership of any such custom games that originate from its titles in the future, including those that come out of Warcraft III's recently released Reforged update.

As noted by PC Gamer, a recent update to Blizzard's Acceptable Use Policy expands the legal rights that custom-game makers automatically assign to Blizzard (new language highlighted in bold; old language available on The Internet Archive): "Custom Games are and shall remain the sole and exclusive property of Blizzard. Without limiting the foregoing, you hereby assign to Blizzard all of your rights, title, and interest in and to all Custom Games, including but not limited to any copyrights in the content of any Custom Games." Blizzard's claim on custom-game copyrights is important because, while it's hard to effectively copyright the basic concept of a game, you can copyright the original characters, art, and writing associated with the game itself. "Under Blizzard's new legal language, any similar games created from the base of Reforged would be completely controlled by Blizzard," adds Ars. "While other developers would be able to copy the general gameplay for their own purposes, any derivative games that use the same name, art, or characters would belong to Blizzard."

"While Blizzard doesn't allow custom-game developers to engage in direct 'commercial exploitation' from their creations, those developers are allowed to accept donations to recoup the 'time and resources' involved in creating the game (with some restrictions). Blizzard also retains the right to 'remove Custom Games from its systems and/or require that a Custom Game developer cease any and/or all development and distribution of a Custom Game.'"

Just when you thought nostaliga-mining had already reached its peak: Atari is in talks to build a series of gaming hotels across the country. From a report: The hotels, which will be created in conjunction with innovation and strategy company GSD Group and real estate company True North Studio, promise to be a "one-of-a-kind video game-themed destination." The hotels are planned for Phoenix, Las Vegas, Denver, Chicago, Austin, Seattle, San Francisco, and San Jose, and the first is set to break ground in mid-2020. At first glance, a video game-themed hotel might sound too gimmicky to be anything other than an old company's pipe dream. But there's reason to believe that, if executed well, the Atari Hotel could actually work. As the company reports in its press release, more than $152 billion was spent on games last year alone. And games love to get together and compete.

Long-time Slashdot reader Motor writes: Rocket League — a very popular multiplayer game — will no longer "be patched" for Linux and the Mac after March — say the publisher, Psyonix...

The publishers say it's motivated by the need to support unspecified "new technologies".

Thanks Psyonix.
The announcement says their final patch "will disable online functionality (such as in-game purchases) for players on macOS and Linux, but offline features including Local Matches, and splitscreen play will still be accessible."

"Players on Mac can try running Rocket League on Windows with Apple's Boot Camp tool," explains a support page, while adding in the next sentence that "Boot Camp is not something Psyonix officially supports." And if you play Rocket League on Linux, "you can try Steam's Proton app or Wine. These tools are not officially supported by Psyonix."

The support page also includes instructions on how to request a refund.

Id software has released a new trailer for their upcoming Doom sequel set on a demon-infested planet Earth in the year 2151. And GameSpot has uploaded a 10-minute clip of gameplay while Collider released 15 minutes.

Collider writes: Doom Eternal takes everything that was gloriously batshit about Doom 2016, throws it in a Lamborghini full of Slayer albums and catapults it into the sun. This game is out of its goddamn mind in the best possible way, and I literally cannot wait to get my hands on the full version... The Fortress of Doom is massive. I wasn't able to access every area, and could only guess at the function of some of the areas I did see. One section had the original Doom Marine costume on display in a glass case, and the game's director, Hugo Martin confirmed that the skin is an unlockable. Moreover, he indicated that there are several unlockable player skins in the game, including one he was clearly excited about but couldn't reveal, saying that it was still in the licensing approval stage...

Doom Eternal, like its predecessor, is a fast game, pitting you against hordes of powerful enemies that force you to constantly be on the move and quick-swapping weapons to inflict maximum damage while avoiding death. You have a few tools at your disposal to earn guaranteed life, ammo, and armor, which are the over-the-top glory kills, the terrifying chainsaw, and the brand-new flame belcher respectively. Glory kills are special instant-death maneuvers you can unleash on enemies after staggering them, and the addition of a retractable arm blade has heightened the graphic absurdity of them to such a degree that I was giggling like an idiot every time I pulled one off.

I spent the next three hours murdering my way across three massive levels that were incredibly varied in terms of design, beginning in a blasted post-apocalyptic city, then moving to a vast overgrown temple, and finally ending up in a heavily-fortified arctic base... Each stage had a completely different feel -- the city was very ground-based, with dark subway tunnels and skeletal office buildings. The temple was spread out across what felt like miles, with an unexpected amount of verticality and traversal thanks to the new climbing mechanic. Yep, Doom Guy can now cling to certain walls, as well as swing from poles to extend his jump and gain access to distant ledges. The climbing controls are a bit funky, like Spider-Man with a rotator cuff injury, but the traversal puzzles are fun and satisfying, and allow for some truly massive environments...

Martin promised that players will continue to be introduced to new enemies and environments right up until the end of the 22+ hour campaign. He describes Doom Eternal as a thinking person's action game, and that the team's goal was to create a combat puzzle worth your time.
DOOM Eternal is scheduled to be released on March 20th.

An anonymous reader quotes a report from The Hollywood Reporter: Ahead of the Game Developer's Conference (GDC) -- which is dedicated to the art and science of making video games and set to take place March 16-20 at the Moscone Center in San Francisco -- the results of the organization's eighth annual State of Industry report were released Friday. Surveying nearly 4,000 video game developers with the intent of highlighting industry trends and forecasts for the future of gaming, this year's report indicates an increasing interest in the games industry to unionize. This was also a major topic of conversation in 2019, amid reports of gaming professionals working extended overtime hours and tolerating poor working conditions. Among the survey participants, 54 percent said that game industry workers should unionize (a 7 percent increase from last year), 21 percent answered "maybe" and 9 percent said they weren't sure. When the same group was asked whether they thought game industry workers would unionize, only 23 percent said "yes," while 43 percent said "maybe."

Just days after EA announced that its mobile Tetris games will shut down on April 21st, new Tetris developer N3twork released an officially licensed version of the popular puzzle game for both Android and iOS. From a report: The new N3twork app isn't the 100-player Tetris Royale app that the developer is also working on; rather, it's an extremely basic mobile Tetris game. "We're launching Tetris with a traditional solo gameplay mode, but we want fans to know that we've got so much more in store for them, and this is just the foundation of an incredible Tetris app experience we're building at N3twork," commented CEO Neil Young. Unlike EA's old app, there's a single mode (for classic Tetris) and a handful of alternative skins. There are also ads, although a single-time $4.99 purchase will remove those. It's not exactly a groundbreaking iteration of the series, but if you just want to play some Tetris on your commute, it'll get the job done.

A European court has sided with Nintendo's ongoing practice to not let users cancel digital preorders. The Verge reports: According to Norwegian gaming site PressFire, the consumer authorities of Norway and Germany sued Nintendo for not letting users cancel digital preorders purchased from the eShop. The case went to court at the end of last year. This week, the court ruled in favor of Nintendo, meaning it can continue the practice for now. PressFire reports that the German consumer authority has appealed the ruling.

When the Norwegian Consumer Council first formally criticized Nintendo's policy in 2018, it said that Nintendo's policy conflicts with the EU's Consumer Rights Directive, which requires that consumers must be able to cancel online purchases and receive refunds. Nintendo's no-refunds policy is also in place for the U.S. -- in fact, Nintendo states that all sales of digital purchases on the Wii U, Nintendo 3DS, and Nintendo Switch are final -- and Nintendo is the only console maker that doesn't let customers cancel a digital preorder, which the Norwegian Consumer Council noted in its 2018 complaint.

After almost seven years, Nintendo has won a patent case that involved the original Wii. On Tuesday, the company announced that a federal court in Dallas ruled in its favor against iLife Technologies, overturning an earlier 2017 decision that would have forced Nintendo to pay out $10.1 million in damages. Engadget reports: The original suit, which was brought against Nintendo of America in 2013, alleged that the company used iLife's technology to create the Wii's motion-sensing controller. The patent that was at the center of the case described a technology designed to detect when a person falls and monitor babies for symptoms of sudden infant death syndrome. iLife had initially sought $144 million in total damages and an injunction against Nintendo. In this latest ruling, however, the court decided that iLife's claim wasn't specific enough.

With Half-Life: Alyx launching in March 2020, Valve is offering gamers the opportunity to play every Half-Life game on Steam for free. "This is basically a two-month-long trial; you won't get to keep these games," notes The Verge. "Every game is compatible with Windows, Linux, and macOS (though all of these games are 32-bit apps, which means they don't work on macOS 10.15 Catalina)." From the report: This promotion includes the original Half-Life (the Source version of the game with added physics to make it feel more modern to play, not the beautiful remaster Black Mesa) and its expansions, Half-Life: Blue Shift and Half-Life: Opposing Force. Also available for free is Half-Life 2 and its two episodic expansions. (According to Valve, Half-Life: Alyx takes place before the events of Half-Life 2.) Valve's Half-Life 2: Lost Coast, its tech demo for HDR lightning, isn't included in this promotion. You can view all the Half-Life games on Steam and start downloading them here.

MojoKid writes: Today AMD launched its latest midrange graphics card based on the company's all new Navi architecture. The AMD Radeon RX 5600 XT slots in under $300 ($279 MSRP) and is based on the same Navi 10 GPU as AMD's current high-end Radeon RX 5700 series cards. AMD's Radeon RX 5600 XT is outfitted with 36 compute units, with a total of 2,304 stream processors and is essentially a Radeon 5700 spec GPU with 2GB less GDDR 6 memory (6GB total) and a narrower 192-bit interface, versus Radeon RX 5700's 8GB, 256-bit config. HotHardware took a Sapphire Pulse Radeon RX 5600 XT around the benchmark track and this card has a BIOS switch on-board that toggles between performance and silent/quiet modes. In performance mode, the card has a 160W power target, 14Gbps memory data rate, a Boost Clock of 1,750MHz and a Game Clock of 1,615MHz. In silent/quiet mode, things are a bit more tame with a 135W power target, 12Gbps memory, and 1,620 MHz/1,460MHz Boost and Game Clocks, respectively. In the gaming benchmarks, the new Radeon RX 5600 XT is generally faster than NVIDIA's GeForce RTX 2060 overall, with the exception of a few titles that are more NVIDIA-optimized and in VR. Though it lacks the capability for hardware-accelerated ray tracing, the new AMD Radeon RX 5600 XT weighs in $20-30 less than NVIDIA's closest competitor and offers similar if not better performance.

Claire Murdoch, mental health director of England's National Health Service (NHS), has reignited the loot box controversy with a report claiming they push young people into "under the radar" gambling. PC Gamer reports: "Frankly no company should be setting kids up for addiction by teaching them to gamble on the content of these loot boxes", she said. "No firm should sell to children loot box games with this element of chance, so yes those sales should end." Loot boxes aren't currently regulated by England's Gambling Commission because their contents can't be monetized. The report calls this a "loophole" because, "Despite this, third party websites selling gaming accounts and rare items are commonplace and easy to find on places such as eBay across the internet."

Murdoch called on game publishers to ban games whose loot boxes encourage children to gamble, as well as to introduce spending limits, tell players the odds of receiving each item before they buy a loot box, and "Support parents by increasing their awareness on the risks of in-game spending." As for what those risks are, the report says, "Investigations have found numerous cases of children spending money without their parents' knowledge, including a 16-year-old paying 2,000 British Pounds on a basketball game and a 15-year-old losing 1,000 British Pounds in a shooting game."

A PS5 leak posted on 4Chan, which was later reposted on Reddit, spills a bunch of information on the PlayStation 5 reveal event which is expected to take place in February. According to the leak, the PS5 will be unveiled on February 5 at a PlayStation Meeting event for the media. "The console design, controller, UI/home screen, certain features, console specs, talk from third parties/indie publishers, as well as announcements for PS5 exclusives will be shown," says the leaker.

The leak says the PS5 will support backwards compatibility with games from all 5 PlayStation platforms; PS4 accessories will be compatible on the new console as well; and the specs will rival Microsoft's Xbox Series X console. Furthermore, it states that the PS5 will launch worldwide in October 2020, priced at $499 in the U.S. It'll also be launched with several exclusive titles. You can read the full list of details here.

The NPD group has rounded up sales stats for the last month, but with the flip from 2019 to 2020 it is also listing some of the best sellers over the last ten years. From a report: Grand Theft Auto V is the best selling game across all platforms and outlets tracked from 2010 through the end of 2019, but otherwise the top ten is dominated by the Call of Duty series, with Red Dead Redemption at number 7 and Minecraft at number 10 as the only other titles.

1. Grand Theft Auto V
2. Call of Duty: Black Ops
3. Call of Duty: Black Ops II
4. Call Of Duty: Modern Warfare 3
5. Call of Duty: Black Ops III

Google said today that it's on track to bring more than 120 games to its cloud gaming service Stadia in 2020 and is planning to offer more than 10 Stadia-exclusive games for the first half of the year. From a report: That would be a pretty massive jump from the 26 games and one exclusive that are currently available, and all in a little more than a year after the service's launch, if those projections hold true. Previously, Google had only explicitly confirmed four games for 2020, so this news was much needed to let early adopters know there are a lot more games on the way. Google also announced other updates rolling out to Stadia over the next three months, including 4K gaming on the web, support for more Android phones (it's currently only available on Google's Pixels), wireless gameplay on the web through the Stadia controller (you currently have to plug in a cable), and "further [Google] Assistant functionality" when playing Stadia through a browser. We're asking Google for more details -- and we're particularly curious whether any of the new exclusive games are the kind that are only possible with the power of the cloud. The company said in October that it's building out a few first-party studios to eventually make that a reality.

The source code for acclaimed 2D puzzle platformer VVVVVV has been released by creator Terry Cavanagh to celebrate the title's 10th anniversary. Gamasutra reports: Breaking to news in a blog post, Cavanagh explained the code fro both the desktop and mobile versions of the game can now be grabbed over on Github, and confessed that "even by the standard of self taught indie devs, it's kind of a mess." The desktop code is the version that was ported to C++ by Simon Roth back in 2011 and later updated and maintained by Ethan Lee, while the mobile code is written in Actionscript for Adobe AIR and is based on the original v1.0 flash version of the game.

Microsoft announced that the upcoming Xbox Series X won't launch with exclusive games for at least a year. Instead, any new title playable on the Series X will also be playable on older Xbox One consoles. IGN reports: "As our content comes out over the next year, two years, all of our games, sort of like PC, will play up and down that family of devices," said Xbox Game Studios boss Matt Booty in a recent interview with MCV. "We want to make sure that if someone invests in Xbox between now and [Series X] that they feel that they made a good investment and that we're committed to them with content."

What this means is that Xbox will still have console exclusives on Xbox and PC, but they won't be limited to just the Series X. Upcoming games for the next-gen Microsoft console will also be playable on the Xbox One, Xbox One S, and Xbox One X. This is somewhat of a departure for next-gen hardware. While there are cross-gen games that are usually released within the first two years of a console launch, there are also next-gene exclusive games that are released to incentivize the early adoption of new hardware. But Microsoft seems to be avoiding that strategy with the Series X.