God of War Ragnarok PSN bypass mod pulled over fear of retaliation from Sony
God of War Ragnarok‘s release on PC has been at the center of controversy over the past several days due to its requirement of a PlayStation Network (PSN) account, despite sporting no online features. Almost immediately after release, a mod that bypassed this requirement went up on Nexus Mods, but the creator has pulled it down, citing fears of retaliation from Sony given the mod’s popularity. The mod’s creator has also pulled down the GitHub page for the mod.
“In short: that was my personal decision to remove the mod since it has become way too popular and people started promoting it on Steam forums, as well thus generating tons of attention,” the creator said in a statement to IGN. “I just wanted to avoid the possible threats from the Sony side, even though the code has never touched any of their products in memory. You never know and it’s really a gray area to me.”
Despite being one of the most critically acclaimed games of 2022, God of War Ragnarok currently sits at a Mostly Positive review status on Steam. The vast majority of the 29% of negative reviews cite the requirement of a PSN account as an issue. Sony originally introduced the requirement for a PSN account with its PC-published games in May, including Helldivers 2. The game was review-bombed, forcing Sony to reserve course on the decision.
More recently, Sony released Ghost of Tsushima on PC, which also requires a PSN account. However, that game has online features through its Legends mode. God of War Ragnarok, on the other hand, doesn’t feature any multiplayer modes or online features. Upcoming releases, such as the remastered version of Until Dawn, will also require a PSN account despite a lack of online features.
Outside of what many see as a useless additional piece of software, the PSN requirements also locks users out of playing Sony-published games. PSN isn’t available is many countries, including most of the continent of Africa. That means some players who were able to buy the original God of War on PC when it released won’t be able to play God of War Ragnarok due to the PSN requirement.
Although it’s tough to find, a version of the NoPSSDK mod is still live on Nexus mods. However, the service warns that, as an archived file, it’s not longer supported on maintained, so use it at your own risk.
Jacob Roach is the lead reporter for PC hardware at Digital Trends. In addition to covering the latest PC components, from…
The Asus ROG Zephyrus G16 with Copilot+ is on sale today
We see a lot of gaming laptop deals in our line of work. With PC graphics and performance evolving on a daily basis, there’s always new gaming tech on the horizon. If you’re the kind of enthusiast who takes power and accuracy very seriously, you’ll want to feast your eyes on the Asus ROG Zephyrus G16 Gaming Laptop.
It’s an absolute workhorse of a gaming laptop, and for a limited time, Best Buy is selling it for $2,050 after a $250 discount. One of our favorite features of this Windows laptop is its Copilot+ compatibility (the feature goes live in late November 2024), a Windows AI suite that joins the ranks of popular tools like ChatGPT and Google AI.
The Meta Quest 3S is official, making mixed-reality even more affordable
At Meta Connect 2024, the company officially announced the anticipated Quest 3S, a $300 VR headset with many of the best features of the more expensive Quest 3 that launched last year. While the Quest 3 is a better headset overall, the budget model can run the same mixed-reality games, apps, and immersive VR titles.
Meta gave the Quest 3S a powerful Qualcomm Snapdragon XR2 Gen 2 chip, the best available in any Meta VR headset. That’s why it can handle big titles like Batman: Arkham Shadow and Asgard’s Wrath 2. If you buy a Quest 3S during the promotional period, Arkham Shadow is free.
It also has Touch Plus controllers without the bulky rings of the Quest 2’s controllers. If you’re upgrading from an older VR headset, you’ll enjoy more freedom of movement without worrying about clashing rings when drawing a virtual bow or putting your guard up in virtual boxing.
Meta rolls out its own version of Advanced Voice Mode at Connect 2024
At Meta Connect 2024 on Wednesday, CEO Mark Zuckerberg took to the stage to discuss his company’s latest advancements in artificial intelligence. In what he describes as “probably the biggest AI news that we have,” Zuckerberg unveiled Natural Voice Interactions, a direct competitor to Google’s Gemini Live and OpenAI’s Advanced Voice Mode.
“I think that voice is going to be a way more natural way of interacting with AI than text,” Zuckerberg commented. “I think it has the potential to be one of [the], if not the most frequent, ways that we all interact with AI.” Zuckerberg also announced that the new feature will begin rolling out to users today across all of Meta’s major apps including Instagram, WhatsApp, Messenger, and Facebook.