2026

Terminally Online (Image credit: Future) This is Terminally Online: PC Gamer’s very own MMO column. Every other week, I’ll be sharing my thoughts on the genre, interviewing fellow MMO-heads like me, taking a deep-dive into mechanics we’ve all taken for granted, and, occasionally, bringing in guest writers to talk about their MMO of choice. Inside…

Ultima is one of PC gaming’s most important cultural touchstones, with Richard ‘Lord British’ Garriot’s roleplaying series blazing trails across numerous genres. The mainline CRPGs received critical acclaim for their rich, dynamic worlds, while spinoffs like Ultima Underworld and Ultima Online were key texts in the evolution of immersive sims and MMOs. Ultima’s influence still…

James Bentley, hardware writer (Image credit: Future) This week I’ve been: Enjoying and bearing the British summertime in equal measure, whilst playing too many deck builders (Here’s looking at you, 2 fights in 2 tight spaces and Moonsigil Atlas). There’s part of me that feels like I’ve somewhat fallen for the sunk cost fallacy of…

Since large-language models like ChatGPT can generate natural language responses that appear human-like in tone, this has led to considerable discussion over whether LLMs might themselves be sentient. At present, there are far more reasons to conclude that AIs are not and will never be conscious. But the idea persists regardless. This is partly because…