The biggest PC gaming stories of the week

Doom Eternal Battlemode 2v1 Slayer Soldier
(Image credit: Bethesda Softworks)

I'm already a hermit, so the shelter-in-place order I'm under hasn't had much of a practical effect on me, but now that I'm not allowed to go places for non-essential reasons, all I want to do is go places for non-essential reasons. Let's distract ourselves (or just me) from the effects of reverse psychology by taking a look at what happened in PC gaming this week:

Gabe Newell: 'We're way closer to The Matrix than people realize'

And it seems like he thinks that's a good thing. The Valve boss also said that "competition in game stores is awesome for everybody" in an interview with Edge.

Twitch streamer Kaceytron has been suspended indefinitely over coronavirus comments

"I realize that it was an insensitive joke and that's not an excuse for it, I accept my punishment," she later tweeted. "I just hope that you all can realize I am human, I'm not infallible, I make mistakes." Her channel is still offline. 

The Steam Game Festival: Spring Edition is live, with free demos for more than 40 games

The demos will go away after the weekend, so check them out while they're around. I enjoyed hugging spirits, and a cat, in Spiritfarer:

The victim of EVE Online's $5,000 gank says he's struggling with the aftermath

After taking an ill-advised trip with a ship full of valuable cargo and losing it all, one veteran EVE player isn't sure he wants to return—but not because he lost his stuff.

The Xbox Series X is basically a monster gaming PC

It looks like Microsoft's next box for games is no slouch. Meanwhile, the PlayStation 5 will have somewhat less impressive specs, but some fancy SSD tech (which we heard about for way too long).

White House warns younger people of coronavirus dangers, praises their videogame skills

If this wasn't the weirdest thing said on TV this week, it's got to be up there.

More things we wrote

Around the office

Doom Eternal released this week, and James liked the hell trip enough to award it a 94%—phew. You can read his review here, or check out the video version below.

Meanwhile, Luke Winkie took a look inside Decentraland, which he describes as "Second Life meets libertarianism," Steven played a horror game about the things retail employees go through every day, and Rachel relaxed with some Stardew Valley ASMR

All of those things are fun to read about, but I think I'll go back to playing A Short Hike when I want to relax this weekend. Take care of yourselves, and look out for our review of Half-Life: Alyx next week. I have a feeling there'll be a lot to talk about, even for those who aren't into VR.

To stay up-to-date on PC Gamer's news and features, you can follow us on Twitter and Facebook, subscribe to our newsletter, listen to our weekly podcast, or just refresh the homepage waiting for whatever happens next.

Tyler Wilde
Editor-in-Chief, US

Tyler grew up in Silicon Valley during the '80s and '90s, playing games like Zork and Arkanoid on early PCs. He was later captivated by Myst, SimCity, Civilization, Command & Conquer, all the shooters they call "boomer shooters" now, and PS1 classic Bushido Blade (that's right: he had Bleem!). Tyler joined PC Gamer in 2011, and today he's focused on the site's news coverage. His hobbies include amateur boxing and adding to his 1,200-plus hours in Rocket League.

Latest in FPS
Starfield's companion robot giving a thumbs-up
Former Bethesda dev who quit Starfield to go solo says it's 'much less stressful as an indie' without daily meetings or 'office politics': it's 'very refreshing to just care about the game'
A crew of prospectors in Wildgate, featuring a robot, a rabbit man, and a small aquatic creature in a combination mech/aquarium.
Blizzard co-founder Mike Morhaime's new company is putting Sea of Thieves-style shenanigans in space with a new crew-based shooter
Team Fortress Spy being shocked
An FPS studio pulled its game from Steam after it got caught linking to malware disguised as a demo, but the dev insists it was actually the victim of a labyrinthine conspiracy
Neighbors Suburban Warfare screenshot a child aims a slingshot at a man from across a cul-de-sac.
A beta of backyard FPS Neighbors: Suburban Warfare is out now, and the balance discussion is hysterical: nerf trash can lids and children
Fragpunk
Somebody finally figured out casual Counter-Strike
Image for
Warhammer 40,000: Darktide’s getting a new roguelite wave defense mode that sounds a whole lot like a souped-up take on Killing Floor
Latest in News
A female Zoi making two hearts with her fingers.
Following 24 hours of Denuvo-based backlash, Inzoi is taking a surprising step and removing it entirely: 'We want to sincerely apologise for not aligning more closely with player expectations'
An image of a Helldiver from Helldivers 2 shooting at a red dragon from Dungeons & Dragons.
'Ok, so dragon builds are a thing now': galaxy-brained Helldivers 2 player incinerates a bile titan with a hover pack and a flamethrower
An ancient, angry stone mech from No Man's Sky's new Relics update
No Man’s Sky lets you unearth ancient, angry mechs in the astro-archaeology filled Relics update
Assassin's Creed Shadows promo image
Ubisoft scores a legendary ratio against Elon Musk on his own platform—which hopefully marks a final end to all the Assassin's Creed Shadows' culture war nonsense
Tzarina Katarin Bokha, the Ice Queen of Kislev
Total War: Warhammer 3 rolls out a cool Kislev overhaul, changes befitting Tzeench’s magic, new projectile units and creakier skeletal horses
An image of a golden first place award from Geoguessr
'We're actually getting GeoGuessr on Steam before GTA 6': the Google Street View puzzler arrives on Valve's platform this April