Daily Briefing: Friday 16th July

Valve reveal the Steam Deck

Following a spate of rumours in May, Valve have officially announced the Steam Deck - a portable gaming PC with a similar form factor to the Nintendo Switch. Set to release sometime this holiday period, the Steam Deck comes in three models with varying amounts of internal storage - the 65GB model costs $399, the 256GB model costs $529, and the 512GB costs $649. All three models support expandable storage via a Micro SD card, while the two more expensive models also leverage faster NVMe SSDs.

• While the Steam Deck is obviously aimed at a very specific audience, it could potentially be a pretty big deal provided it has a decent launch. Having your entire Steam library be playable on the go is certainly an attractive prospect, while the fact that it's effectively a tiny PC means that you can install Microsoft Windows and access third-party applications like the Epic Game Store and Xbox Game Pass. Roll on December(ish).

Resident Evil's multiplayer spin-off delayed into next year

RE:Verse was originally slated to release this month but, as Capcom confirmed this week, will now be delayed by more than six months "so that the team can continue working to deliver a smooth gameplay experience." Capcom thanked fans for their patience and assured them that more information will be shared "at a later time", and also reminded anyone who purchased a physical version of Resident Evil Village to keep track of the enclosed RE:Verse download code.

• RE:Verse sounds equal parts intriguing and baffling as far as multiplayer experiences go - with players being tasked to collect various virus samples littered around the map in order to upgrade their weapons and abilities - but you have to wonder whether Capcom have already missed their chance. Considering anyone who purchased Village gets free access to RE:Verse, the initial belief was that the multiplayer title was to launch alongside the main game a few months ago - will there be much interest come next year?

Phil Spencer is worried about game preservation despite being one of the guys destroying it

Speaking on a recent episode of the Kinda Funny Gamecast, the Xbox boss said that he does "worry a little bit about losing our artform and the history of it." He went on to say that he wishes "as an industry we'd come together to help preserve the history of what gaming is about, so we don't lose the ability to go back." Spencer rounded off his comments by saying that he believes cloud gaming is one of Microsoft's main tools for preserving gaming history.

• The thing is, Spencer has kind of missed the point that subscription services like Xbox Game Pass, for all their positive points, are absolutely eradicating the idea of game preservation. You don't own any games playable through Xbox Game Pass and you'll lose access to them the very instant your subscription lapses, and cloud streaming is somehow even less substantial. Something like Valve's Steam Deck, however, is a much more tangible victory for game preservation - as it enables wider access to legacy Steam titles.

Hackers have started leaking stolen EA data

Back in June EA suffered a cyberattack that left the attackers in possession of a reported 780GB of stolen data, including source code for FIFA 21 and EA's Frostbite engine. This week the hackers released a 1.3GB chunk of that stolen information to the public, and warned that there will be more to come "if [EA] don't contact us or don't pay us."

• EA don't seem to be too worried about this, however, saying in a statement only that they are "aware of the recent posts" and are "analysing the files released." EA have emphasised that they don't believe that any of the stolen information "poses any concern for player privacy", nor do they believe that the hackers pose "any material risk to our games, our business, or our players." So, provided EA aren't putting on a brave face, this is a story about a determined group of incredibly naïve hackers who think EA will give them money.