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Today’s ppotlight deal is a new monitor entry from Dell. It’s their first IPS monitor with 1ms response time and 240Hz refresh rate. It’s even certified G-Sync Compatible. The Oculus Rift is still available directly from the Oculus Store for only $299.99, and there’s an awesome Bethesda Easter Sale going on right now for PC gamers at Green Man Gaming.

The First IPS Monitor With 1ms and 240Hz and G-SYNC: Alienware AW2521HF 25″ 1080p Gaming Monitor for $394.99

This is a new monitor from Dell. The major upgrade for this one compared to last year’s model is the switch over from a TN panel to an IPS panel. In fact, this is the only IPS monitor that Dell makes that has 1ms response time and 240Hz refresh rate, specs that are normally reserved for TN panels. An IPS monitor is superior because it has wider viewing angles and better color.

This AMD FreeSync monitor is also certified NVIDIA “G-Sync Compatible”. That basically means people with GeForce cards can take advantage of the built-in adaptive sync capabilities of the monitor without paying an arm and a leg for a G-Sync monitor. it also futureproofs you, in case you want to swap over to an AMD video card.

• Get it at Dell for $394.99

New Alienware Aurora R9 AMD Ryzen 7 3700X AMD Radeon RX 5700 XT Gaming Desktop PC for $1110

For those of you who haven’t been keeping up with the Intel vs AMD CPU war, AMD has been giving Intel a run for its money with its flagship processors. The new AMD Ryzen 7 3700X 8-core processor is comparable to the Intel Core i7-9700, both in terms of gaming and workstation performance. It’s paired with an RX 5700 XT video card, which is on par with the RTX 2070. If you want to upgrade the RAM or hard drive, I’d suggest doing it on your own. You’ll save money, and the Aurora R9 allows for toolless access without voiding your warranty.

• Use code “50OFF699” to get it at Dell for $1110

Oculus Rift VR Headset (Factory Refurb) at the Oculus Store for $299 (Compatible with Half-Life: Alyx)

Includes 6 Month Oculus Warranty

The Oculus Store has refurbished Oculus Rift VR headsets and they are clearing them out at a great price, $100 less than the Oculus Quest and Rift S. This is the only way to get an Oculus Rift with warranty. I bought my Oculus Rift headset over 3 years ago and still use it to this day. I’ve never had the urge to upgrade to the newer VR headsets, especially at their ridiculous price points. The original Oculus Rift controller is, in my opinion, still the best controller for Beat Saber because it is the lightest and least bulky compared to the rest (even the Rift S controller). It also has exceptional tracking, even with only two sensors. Also, the higher resolution on the newer VR headsets requires an even more demanding computer. My GTX 1070 equipped PC can run the Rift perfectly well, but may not suffice for a VR headset with nearly double the pixel count. Half-Life: Alyx is also compatible with the Oculus Rift.

• Get it from the Oculus Store for $299

Up to 77% Off Bethesda Easter Sale at GMG

Green Man Gaming has dropped the prices of many of Bethesda’s best PC games to the lowest I’ve ever seen. Green Man Gaming is a totally legit reseller and all of these games are downloadable via the Steam platform.

• The Elder Scrolls V: Skyrim Special Edition for $17.60
• Wolfenstein II: The New Colossus for $10.56
• The Evil Within 2 for $8.80
• Doom for $5.28
• The Elder Scrolls V: Skyrim VR for $15.84
• Fallout 4 VR for $15.84
• Doom VFR for $7.92

Online Learning Course Bundles from Stack Social

Want to be more productive at home? Stack Social has plenty of practical courses that can kick start your career. For under $40 per bundle you get dozens of hours of online instruction in programming, game creation, video production, ethical hacking, and more… all from the safety of your home.

• Learn to Code in 2020
• Become a Python Coder
• Build Your Own Android Apps
• Develop Your Own Games
• School of Game Design Lifetime Membership
• Ethical Hacking 101
• Essential Videography Skills
• Change Your Background Without a Green Screen

1 Month of Xbox Game Pass Ultimate for $1 (Includes Xbox Live Gold and Game Pass)

May work for both NEW and EXPIRED accounts

This price is reserved for new and expired accounts. Game Pass Ultimate is basically Xbox Live Gold and Xbox Game Pass combined into one membership. You even get access to Game Pass for PC. Normally you’d be paying $14.99 for one month, but Amazon is offering an additional month for free. Game Pass gives you access to tons of high profile games like Kingdom Hearts 3, NBA 2K20, Ori and the Will of the Wisps, Gears 5, Forza Horizon 3, The Outer Worlds, Grand Theft Auto 5, State of Decay, and more.

• Get it at the Microsoft Store for $1

Marvel’s The Infinity Gauntlet Digital Comic Collection (Issues #1-#6) for $1.99

Each issue normally sells for $1.99 but with this deal you’re getting all six for $1.99. If you thought the Infinity War movies were good, you should read the spectacular source material. You can choose to download the comics to your Kindle or ComiXology app.

• Get it on Amazon for $1.99

ComiXology Free Trial Extended to 60 Days

This sponsored deal is brought to you by ComiXology

The ComiXology trial period is normally 30 days.  ComiXology is Amazon’s digital comic platform and is the largest digital retailer of American comics. The site hosts 20,000 digital comics, graphic novels, and manga from DC, Marvel, Image, Dark Horse, and more. Here’s your chance to access all of it, totally free, for 30 60 days. If you’re an avid comic reader, you might want to consider continuing on afterwards, since it’s only $5.99/month. You can even sign in with your Amazon account.

• Get a 60-Day Free Trial to ComiXology

3 Months of Amazon Music Unlimited for Free

This deal only works for new Amazon Music Unlimited subscribers, but you don’t have to be a Prime member. Normally you’d be paying $9.99/month for this service (or $7.99/mo for Prime members). Amazon Music Unlimited works alot like the paid ad-free versions of Spotify or Pandora. Get access to millions of songs and playlists that you can stream anywhere.

• Get 3 Free Months of Amazon Music Unlimited

40% Off 3 Months of Audible Membership

Or 30-Day Free Trial for New Subscribers

An Audible membership normally costs $15 per month. With this deal you’re only paying $8.95 per month for the first 3 months The Audible membership gives you access to an extended audiobook library whenever and wherever you want (includes all Harry Potter, Game of Thrones, and Witcher books). Every month you also get one free audiobook of your choice and two free Audible Originals (which you keep forever even when your subscripion ends), and 30% off additional audiobook purchases.

If you have never signed up for Audible before, you can instead get a free 30-day trial and you’ll still get a free audiobook and Audible Originals to keep indefinitely.

• Get 40% Off 3 Months of Audible
• Get 1 Month Free (New Subscribers)

New Licensed Castlevania Apparel at the IGN Store

Do you enjoy Netflix’s original Castlevania animated series? If so, the IGN Store has added a host of officially licensed Castlevania apparel. Sign up for our newsletter and get a 20% off coupon code. Alternatively, save 10% off using coupon code “igndeals10“.

• Check out Castlevania Graphic Tees at the IGN Store
• Animal Crossing Tees
• The Legend of Zelda Tees
• Stranger Things Tees
• Ghostbusters Tees
• Marvel Tees
• DC Tees

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Eric Song is IGN’s deal curator and spends 25% of his pay on stuff he posts.

A new Halo-themed shirt is available to purchase now, and all proceeds will go towards relief efforts for those impacted by the COVID-19 pandemic. This is part of the ongoing efforts from Halo developer 343 Industries to raise funds for the Global Giving crisis response, which aims to help vulnerable areas hit hard by the virus.

The shirt, which bears the message “#WeGotThisSpartans: Hope and Love,” is available now through MetaThreads. It costs $25, and comes with a one-month subscription to Xbox Game Pass Ultimate, and the code will be valid until April 2021.

Between April 8 and 21, 100% of proceeds for the sales of this shirt will go to COVID-19 relief efforts. Orders are expected to ship in 4 to 6 weeks. The charity efforts of 343 Industries have already raised $200,000, and hopefully this shirt will push this figure further.

The next game in the Halo series, Halo Infinite, is due to release for Xbox Series X, Xbox One, and PC later this year.

The developers of the Halo franchise are raising money to help with COVID-19 relief, and their efforts have brought in a lot of money so far.

Community director Brian Jarrard said on Twitter that Halo 5’s in-game charity campaign has raised more than $200,000 USD as of April 10. The game is currently selling a “Relief and Recovery” Req Pack for the game’s multiplayer mode, which includes various cosmetics and XP boosts. All proceeds are going to directly to the Global Giving’s Coronavirus Relief Fund.

The DLC costs $10 USD, so it has moved a lot of units to reach $200,000 in donations. You can buy the Relief and Recovery REQ pack through Halo 5 or right here on the Xbox Store.

The Relief and Recovery Req pack was just the start of the Halo franchise’s charitable giving for COVID-19 relief. The company is also selling a “Hope and Love” Halo t-shirt for $25 USD, with profits going to the same charity mentioned above.

Halo 5 is not the first game to launch an in-game campaign to raise money for COVID-19 relief efforts. Modern Warfare‘s “Defender” microtransaction has returned to help military veterans during this stressful time.

Gears Tactics, the next game in the Gears of War series, releases on April 28 for PC (and later on Xbox One). The tactical spin-off is set before the first Gears game, but will link up with the narrative in Gears 5, as the main character, Gabe Diaz, is the father of Kait Diaz. Now, in an interview with IGN, Gears Tactics’ narrative director Jean Mah has talked about expanding the world of Gears, and hinted at plans that will take the series beyond its current cast and family bloodlines.

Mah tells IGN that the team at The Coalition (which took over the Gears franchise after Gears of War: Judgment) is aware of the difficulties of continually upping the stakes, and believes that compelling protagonists are the answer. “For our stories to resonate with our players, we need them to be able to not identify, but feel like they can care about and get involved with the main character,” she says. “I think for a lot of stories, the trouble with having giant stakes of saving the world is that: how do you top that every single time? It’s about putting a spin on that giant pile of stakes that you’re trying to deal with, by making it personal to the protagonist.”

At the same time, she says, “sometimes we worry everyone in our universe is related to each other.” But Mah believes that it’s important to keep coming back to touchpoints that connect stories, such as “sharing a history in a certain battle.” Mah says that Del, another character from Gears 4 and 5, still has a story that needs to be told too, and that we could see another huge time jump (as with the 25 year gap between Gears of War 3 and 4) in the future.

“We’re figuring that out next, but Tactics is a great opportunity to tell a brand new story that’s going to fulfill that Gears of War itch, while we figure out and plan what’s going to happen next in the main series,” she told IGN. “So I just feel like we have so many opportunities for our fans and our players to still get engaged in our universe. And we’re not going to stop.”

Elsewhere in the interview, Mah explains that there’s no definitive map of Sera, the planet the games are set on, because the team wants to make sure that it is not bound to one creatively–allowing for “white space” gives them more room for creativity. “It’s fine to have local area maps, but as far as I’m concerned, we will not ever have a globe with continents on it,” Mah said.

Gears 5, the most recent shooter in the Gears series, received a 7/10 in GameSpot’s review. “Gears 5 might suffer from some of the same storytelling missteps as its predecessors, and it might not venture far out of the past, but the new ideas it brings to the series are all good reasons for fans to return,” wrote reviewer Phil Hornshaw.

Like in the original Final Fantasy 7, Materia is an integral part of FF7 Remake‘s combat system. Serving as the game’s spells, abilities, and summons, you can equip these colored orbs to your characters to increase the power of their attack skills, while also giving them a bunch of other benefits.

As a rule of thumb, you should equip as many Materia orbs as you can early on, especially the spell and attack ability ones. For general guidance on how to best build the proper Materia loadout for your party, be sure to check out our in-depth guide covering the subject. Otherwise, read below for a general explainer of Materia and other things you should know about them.

For more guides, check out our FF7 Remake walkthrough and guides roundup. Though, be sure to read our FF7 Remake review.

Materia Types

There are five types of Materia you can equip to your party, which each improve your characters’ abilities in unique ways. You’ll want to use your Materia as much as possible, as doing so levels up each particular orb, thus enhancing its effectiveness or potency–more on that later.

• Magic Materia (Green): Setting Magic Materia allows your characters to cast spells, which is an essential tool for weakening enemies, especially some of the game’s most difficult bosses. Magic Materia includes the spells Fire, Ice, Thunder, Healing, Poison, and more.
• Command Materia (Yellow): Setting Command Materia allows you to use abilities that further assist you in battle, such as Assess, Steal, and Chakra, just to name a few. Command Materia generally serve a physical function and help boost your capabilities, either directly or indirectly.
• Support Materia (Blue): Setting Support Materia is a unique process compared to the other types. Support Materia do nothing on their own; they only serve the purpose of enhancing the power of other Materia. They’re also unique in that you can only activate their functionality by attaching them to linked Materia slots in your weapons and armor–again, more on that later. Support Materia are incredibly useful and add additional effects to your attacks or spellcasting.
• Complete Materia (Purple): Setting Complete Materia improves a character’s base attributes, like HP, MP, or Luck. It even gives them unique combat abilities, such as the Deadly Dodge, which allows whoever has it equipped to perform an area-of-effect attack from a forward dodge.
• Summoning Matera (Red): Setting a Summoning Materia invokes a summon creature into battle. They’re exclusively set to a character’s weapon, and upon being equipped, also boost that character’s base attributes. Summons have special Materia slot, so equipping them won’t block you from using another Materia as well. When a summon creature is called into battle, they act as an AI-controlled party member and can be issued attack commands.

How To Equip Materia

At the start of Chapter 2, FF7 Remake explains in detail how to equip Materia, which you’re told is set via the Materia & Equipment screen in the Main Menu. As stated, Materia is fitted onto your weapons and armor, which you’ll notice each have their own set of slots–though, the Bronze Bangles you start with don’t have any. There’s nothing to consider early on about the organization of your Materia across both your weapons or armor. However, this does change a bit later when you’re equipping Support Materia, which requires it to be inserted into linked slots.

There are two variants of Materia sockets on weapons and armor: single, and linked. If you put a Support Materia into one of those link slots and attach a Magic Materia alongside it, then you will activate the effects of the Support Materia with the particular Magic Materia’s element.

Some Materia have different effects when attached to the linked slots of either a weapon or armor. For example, if you have one slot with an Elemental Materia and it’s connected to another slot with Fire on a piece of armor, any time an enemy tries to set you ablaze, the damage taken from the fire attack will be halved. On the other hand, if you equip those Materia into a linked slot on a weapon, your attacks will be imbued with that fire instead.

A final note about equipping Materia: make sure you’re setting up your most frequently used Magic Materia spells to your Battle Commands. It helps ensure you’re able to use your favorite Magic Materia spells during a fight quickly.

How To Unlock More Materia Slots

To get more Materia slots, you can either purchase new armor with additional slots or upgrade your currently equipped weapons via the Weapon Upgrade system, which is a series of skill trees that include nodes that add more Materia slots. For more about how the Weapon Upgrade system works, be sure to check out our Weapon Upgrade guide detailing everything you need to know.

How To Get More Materia

If you’re looking for new Materia, you can always purchase some at items shops or vending machines. You can even get more powerful ones from Chadley, a Shinra intern you’ll meet on the streets of the Sector 7 Slums during Chapter 3. After you complete his side mission, he provides you with a series of challenges you can complete to earn the ability to buy new Materia from him at a discounted price. You can even get Summoning Materia from his special VR missions, which you can complete to add to your growing stockpile as powerful Materia.

A lot of valuable Materia can also be found in the environment–some of which are easy to overlook. Be sure to check our feature detailing most essential Materia you might’ve missed, so you’re always working with the best Materia throughout your journey.

How To Level Your Materia

It’s especially important to know which Materia you want to invest in early because of how battles impact a Materia’s strength. The more you use a Materia during battle, the more experience (AP) it gains, until it eventually levels up–increasing that individual Materia’s damage potency or overall effectiveness. For example, for spells: Blizzard becomes Blizzara, Fire becomes Fira, and Cure becomes Cura–all more powerful versions of their original spells. Leveling a Materia will sometimes unlock new spells or abilities with different effects, as well.

You should take a vested interest in leveling up spell Materia in particular, as they’re some of the most potent attacks in the game, and if you send a single spell into a cluster of enemies, you can sometimes kill two birds with one stone.

Even if you don’t end up using some of your Materia in the end, leveled-up versions are some of the most valuable items in the game, so you’re welcome to sell the ones you’ve stopped using to various shopkeepers to earn a little extra money.