Camel toe, as defined in unexpectedly restrained fashion by the Urban Dictionary, is "the appearance of a wedge in a woman's genital region resulting from tight fitting clothes." It is also the cause of a recent bit of unexpected upset in Playerunknown's Battlegrounds, following a surprise change in female character models that appeared on the PUBG test server over the weekend. 

Courtesy of the subreddit: 

I'll be honest, part of me thinks this is a tempest in a t-back, but I also don't have to put up with watching hunky digital avatars running around with banana hammocks flapping all over the place (well, excluding Conan Exiles), so my perspective is admittedly somewhat skewed. And it's certainly fair to ask why the change was made now, nine months after its initial release on Early Access.

Apparently the whole thing was unintentional: "After looking into this, it appears it came as part of the character model we received from an outsourcer when we first started the project," Brendan Greene, the PlayerUnknown who gives the game half of its unwieldy title, said on Twitter. "The file itself has not been changed in two years. It will be updated shortly with changes! Sorry for any offense caused!"

Predictably, a certain subset of PUBG fans are unhappy with the change, but as one game dev unaffiliated with PUBG pointed out, there was no outrage or "screeching," and anyway, that's what test servers are for: To test things, and change them as necessary. "Cameltoes hurt and are similar to a wedgie. Would you like to fight for your life with a wedgie?" they wrote, "No. It makes no sense and is unnecessary. Simple as that."

Steam's November 2017 Hardware Survey shows an 8.23 percent rise in players who use Simplified Chinese since October, bringing the total share of Chinese-readers to a massive 64.35 percent of Steam's survey respondents. English accounted for 17.02 percent, and Russian was the third highest at 5.11 percent. Just one year ago, English was on top with 44.10 percent of respondents and Simplified Chinese only accounted for 8.60 percent.

The dramatic increase of Steam users in China began in 2012, when Valve and Perfect World partnered to publish Dota 2 in the country. Perfect World later published CS:GO in China, and the two games are now the third and second most popular games on Steam in China, respectively. The most popular, however, released this year: SteamSpy estimates that 78 percent of Steam users in China own PlayerUnknown's Battlegrounds.

And that means something interesting could happen next year: Tencent obtained the rights to publish and operate PUBG in China. It's unclear whether Tencent's government-approved version of PUBG will remain on Steam, or release through its WeGame service. In the announcement, Tencent does not mention what platform its version of PUBG will release on, promising more information soon.

There is precedent, though: When Tencent secured Chinese publishing rights to Rocket League (as a free-to-play game), it was taken off sale on Steam in China. "Though new players will no longer be able to purchase the existing version of the game on Steam from this point forward," wrote Psyonix, "the existing community will still have access to the game you paid for in addition to all other currently-available features."

If PUBG follows the same route, Chinese players will be able to keep playing on Steam, though it will no longer be available to purchase. The massive Steam adoption may then slow down, though it's always possible another game will catch on in China sans a government-approved publishing deal. (According to Niko Partners, Steam operates in a grey area in China, as not all games on Steam are approved for sale by China's State Administration of Press, Publication, Radio, Film and Television.)

Despite the results of recent Steam Hardware Surveys, China isn't necessarily home to the most Steam users of any country, at least not yet. The Hardware Survey includes Chinese-speakers outside of China, of course, and Chinese is by far the most-known language in the world. Additionally, the data comes from users who logged in and agreed to the survey during November, and Steam doesn't offer the survey demographics, only the results.

But if China doesn't have the largest share of users, it's at least close. SteamSpy currently has China in second place for user count, with 11.34 percent of the world's Steam users, while the US accounts for 14.67 percent. Yet these estimations, which are based on public user profiles, don't include users who haven't put their location in their Steam profile. SteamSpy recorded over 20 million users as 'Other' on December 8th.

And China has the most active userbase by far according to SteamSpy: 19.48 percent of the world's active Steam population for the past two weeks compared to the US's 14.17 percent. This is backed up by more of Steam's own data. According to the past seven days of Steam records, The United States downloaded 58.6 petabytes worth of data, barely surpassing China's 57.2 PB. SteamSpy estimates that Chinese players own far fewer games on average than American players, so it follows that a petabyte of data in China represents more individual players than a petabyte of data in the US.

If this trend continues, expect to see more games on Steam with Chinese language support—currently, there are over 4,500. It'll also be interesting to see if there's any reverse effect, as well: more Chinese games releasing on Steam with or without English, Russian, and other language support. Tencent-published game Europa, for instance, currently appears on Steam. Alternatively, or at the same time, we could see Tencent work toward becoming a worldwide platform.

A new report from digital research firm Superdata says that the worldwide esports market was valued at $1.5 billion in 2017. Fully half of that came by way of investments from "high-profile sports organizations and brands," the company said in the Esports Courtside: Playmakers of 2017 report, "highlighting a growing confidence in its ability to break into the mainstream." 

"Once only large in core Asian markets like Korea, esports have expanded worldwide and are now top of mind of every publisher, platform, and brand," Superdata wrote. "At $1.5 billion for 2017, global esports revenue will grow 26 percent by 2020 as it attracts an even more mainstream audience. This increase will be fueled by a viewership projected to grow 12 percent each year and a swelling number of third-party investments." 

The report notes the success of crowdfunding in esports, seen primarily in the hefty prize pools put together for Dota 2 and League of Legends, but the really big money is in direct revenues, such as franchise fees, sponsorships, and merchandise sales, which are also predicted to grow. 

The Overwatch League, despite what appeared to be early struggles to get off the ground, gets special mention for having teams based in cities, which "bridges the gap between esports and traditional sports," the report says. "This makes Overwatch more approachable to traditional sports investors." 

At the same time, the report also suggests that there's plenty of room for the opposite approach to esports success, as typified by Playerunknown's Battlegrounds, which got its own nod for breaking 200 million unique viewers in just seven months.  

"PUBG's unprecedented viewership is now 20 times larger than its player base, indicating a growing popularity among non-players as well," the report says. "Overwatch League opens the floodgates for a new kind of esports governance, and PlayerUnknown’s Battlegrounds rides a wave of esports performance with no formal strategy."

As for the people who watch esports, they still prefer Twitch to YouTube, although not by a very large margin, and the vast majority of esports viewers in the US watch both: Twitch for livestreams, and YouTube for "more curated content."

PUBG's Miramar map is live on the PUBG test server, which is available as a separate library entry to anyone who owns the game on Steam. Our resident parachuters Chris and Evan dived in together to see how it compares to Erangel.

Evan: Yow, this is such an upgrade. It's not just the novelty of having a new place to run around—Miramar feels like a map built from the ground up for PUBG. 

Chris: Yeah, even having not put nearly as much time into PUBG as you have, I can't really imagine revisiting Erangel once Miramar is on the main servers. It's not just a refreshing change of scenery (though it is a refreshing change of scenery). Miramar feels like a stronger and better map for PUBG.

Evan: It's inviting and bright, a big contrast from the Soviet dullness of Erangel. It puts me in this wild west mindset that melds nicely with battle royale—I want to get into trouble. The region feels more authentic, too. I spotted some Catholic symbols across Miramar, like the burned-out glass candles left around the mausoleums at Graveyard.

Chris: The setting does feel much more specific, which I think is good. Maybe I've just been playing in these vaguely Eastern European post-apocalyptic landscapes for too long (since Stalker) and it's great to feel an altogether different vibe. Even though presumably everyone is still dead from the apocalypse.

Evan: Speaking of that, it's funny how closely Miramar mirrors the general shape of Chernarus, the stock map for Arma 2 and DayZ.

Chris: It definitely feels like an intentional homage to Brendan Greene's DayZ days (zees).

Evan: So one strategy-affecting change I'm seeing the off-road terrain. It's rugged. Miramar isn't a landscape of halfpipe hills to flip your car off of. Most of the areas we drove across were bumpy and irregular, and we had to move at half speed. I felt way more fragile when driving.

Chris: It feels almost too extreme of a change—I don't think PUBG is a game that needs to be slowed down any further. I like it, though: it'll force players to make real choices in their strategy depending on what vehicle they're driving and where they are. In Erangel I don't ever really deliberate about going off-road. It's honestly not much different than driving on paved surfaces. In Miramar, you might opt for speeding through a big town along a road (and drawing certain gunfire) instead of skirting it over the terrain, simply because going off-road is tougher and slower now.

Evan: The other side effect of that change is that the landscape as a whole has way more nooks and crannies, little dips in elevation to go prone in. Whether you like that will depend a lot on which version of the game you're playing (first- or third-person), and what range you like to fight at, I think.

It's absolutely a more complex map. A lot of the structures I've been inside are less uniform, departing from, say, the monotony of Georgopol's symmetrical rows of copy-and-pasted apartment towers. But that complexity favors tactics like window sniping and hiding in subtle arrangements of cover to get a good shot, neither of which are my favorite moments in PUBG.

Chris: Me neither.

Evan: I'm still getting a read on how the structure of this new map affects the rhythm of migration, looting, and combat. Miramar has a few islands—two SW, and two off the east coast that aren't connected by bridge. But they're extraordinarily small. I like that boats are deemphasized (I mean, it's a desert), but I also like the way Erangel's southern island operated as a secondary region to the main zone. Don't expect to get ambushed on any bridges, because there aren't any bottlenecks here.

Chris: It'll be interesting to see what become the most favored landing spots. Right now it seems like Erangel was at the start, where if you want some quick action you land in a big town and otherwise you pick a more remote location. As the map gets more familiar to players we'll start to see what people gravitate towards. But it definitely feels more crowded in terms of buildings and looting than the first map. Remote spots still feel close to everything else.

Evan: Yeah, exactly—apart from the fringes, where the circle's least-likely to spawn, most parts of are within 500 meters of a city or major compound. On the whole, more areas seem viable. The decision to put the military base in the far NE corner of the map is a little weird to me—it means there's one route in and out of a major landmark. I guess it's at least a change from the racetrack ring of road that circles Erangel's base.

Chris: It might work well during the matches where the circle closes on the southern side, so those who land at the base to get good gear can't just camp on it for the entire round.

Evan: Chris, you were the first person outside of the studio to see Miramar when you went to South Korea to write a cover story about it a couple months ago. Has this thing changed in any noticeable ways since you saw it then?

Chris: Yeah, it's changed a lot. The build I ran around in didn't have any of the big towns, the river at the edge of the map has been turned into an ocean, and there's a lot more polish and finer detail now. It also feels like there's less cover: the early build I saw was heavily dotted with trees, but playing today I feel way more exposed than I did then when running out in the open. I'd say there's still plenty of work to do: I noticed some architectural features that didn't quite fit together in some of the buildings. But it's come a long way since I first saw it in September.

Evan: Yeah, I think the number of manhours put into this piece of geometry is evident from the moment you step on it. 

Chris: What do you think about the new vaulting system, though? I didn't use it much. Maybe I don't think to do it (except in the lobby, where that's all I do) or maybe it's not quite the game-changer I thought it would be. I've done or two jumps through a window because it's closer than the door.

Evan: It's useful in windows—I don't have to circle a house looking for the door, I can just bust through the nearest frame. With PUBG's forgiving fall damage, I can also make a panicked leap out a second or third story and survive. It's handy, and it's going to make sieges less predictable.

Chris: PUBG definitely feels less predictable now. A new map, new weapons, and new vehicles are kinda what PUBG needed for a shot in the arm. It's weird to say a game that draws almost 3 million players a day needed a makeover, but it feels exciting to me again.

Evan: If PUBG's future maps are this intricate and inspired, it'll have a long lifespan. I should note that although I've been getting terrific fps on Miramar, we did have a few server disconnects and crashes, but that's relatively expected in this testing phase. Otherwise there's no reason not to get these 14 gigs on your hard drive right now. 

Last night's Game Awards show featured all kinds of world premieres, new trailers, sponsorships, overlong speeches, enthusiastic swearing, and even a few awards amidst it all. And don't worry if you missed the show, because we've got all the winners for you right here. 

• Game of the Year – The Legend of Zelda: Breath of the Wild
• Best Game Direction – The Legend of Zelda: Breath of the Wild
• Best Narrative – What Remains of Edith Finch
• Best Art Direction – Cuphead
• Best Score/Music – Nier: Automata
• Best Audio Design – Hellblade: Senua's Sacrifice
• Best Performance – Melina Juergens as Senua, Hellblade: Senua's Sacrifice
• Games for Impact – Hellblade: Senua's Sacrifice
• Best Ongoing Game – Overwatch
• Best Mobile Game – Monument Valley 2
• Best Handheld Game – Metroid: Samus Returns
• Best VR/AR Game – Resident Evil 7: Biohazard
• Best Action Game – Wolfenstein 2: The New Colossus
• Best Action/Adventure Game – The Legend of Zelda: Breath of the Wild
• Best RPG – Persona 5
• Best Fighting Game – Injustice 2
• Best Family Game – Super Mario Odyssey
• Best Strategy Game – Mario + Rabbids Kingdom
• Battle Best Sports/Racing Game – Forza Motorsport 7
• Most Anticipated Game Presented by McCafé (ba dap bap bah bah) - The Last of Us Part 2
• Best Independent Game – Cuphead
• Best Student Game – Level Squared
• Trending Gamer – Guy Beahm, Dr. Disrespect
• Best Esports Game – Overwatch
• Best Esports Player, Presented by Omen by HP – Lee sang-hyeok, "Faker"
• Best Esports Team – Cloud9
• Best Debut Indie Game, presented by Schick Hydro – Cuphead
• Best Chinese Game - jx3 HD（《剑网3》重制版 )

You may have noticed, if you were reading closely, that the Best Multiplayer award isn't in the list. That's because, once the dust had begun to settle, people noticed that it hadn't actually been handed out.

A quick look at the Game Awards website late last night confirmed it: Voting on all six eligible games—Playerunknown's Battlegrounds, Fortnite, Call of Duty: WWII, Splatoon 2, Mario Kart 8 Deluxe, and Destiny 2—had closed, but none of them were indicated as the winner.

Game Awards producer and host Geoff Keighley told Polygon that the omission wasn't an oversight, but just a delay—for which he apologized—and said that a winner had in fact been selected. Odd as it all appeared, there's no real surprise which game came out on top: It was PUBG.