Gaming News

Infinity Ward, Fromsoftware, and Insomniac are just a few of the hundreds of development teams out there but they and plenty of other top developers regularly take input from publishers like Activision, Bandai Namco, and Sony during the process to help their games reach the finish line.While some franchises and developers tend to be exclusive to specific publishers, there are a number of them that work across the industry with many different publishers. Call of Duty regularly cycles its developers yearly while FromSoftware has partnered with Sony and Bandai Namco for big successful titles like Bloodborne and Elden Ring.Even Insomniac worked with Xbox Game Studios on Sunset Overdrive before Sony put a ring on it and officially made...

In Beacon Pines, the story and decisions made are mapped out on a tree, showing branching paths from single moments that changed the course of the story. For developer Matt Meyer, that was true in real life, too. His path to developing Beacon Pines began with a single, simple, consequential decision made years ago, almost on a whim.“I worked a corporate job for five years or so in Chicago, and sort of just snapped one day,” Meyer says. “It wasn't really the job's fault. It was the traffic. I was in my car an hour and a half every day…I hate traffic so much. So I just snapped one day. I was like, ‘I'm moving,’ and I moved to Austin, and didn't really have a plan.”Sans plan, Meyer was hoping to write music, specifically for games...

Xbox’s flagship shooter is an intergalactic sci-fi saga with narrative foundations that date back billions of years. Despite that far-reaching history, the actual Halo games largely take place within a single decade during the tail end and aftermath of the Human-Covenant War.The mainline Halo games present a sequential storyline, though several spinoffs complicate the series’ chronology. With that in mind, we’ve created this brief rundown of the Halo timeline as explored in video games.This list includes all mainline Halo games and most spinoffs, including the Halo Wars strategy games and Halo: Spartan top-down shooters. The mixed-reality game Halo Recruit, the arcade game Halo: Fireteam Raven, and the marketing ploy/mobile game...

Breathing new life into our favorite classic games is often a double-edged sword. On the one hand, the game has familiarity with audiences, so it will already have a fanbase that will be excited to see it make a return. Still, there is always the risk that the updated version won't live up to the memories we have of the original.Successful or not, year after year, we see more and more developers attempt to breathe life into an older franchise in the hopes of returning it to its previous glory days. Recently we've witnessed Chrono Cross, Destroy All Humans, Alan Wake, and plenty of others make a resurgence thanks to remasters.We also know that there are plenty more on the way as this trend doesn't seem to be stopping anytime soon...

Harvey Smith is best known for his work on Arkane's Dishonored series, but he's now revealed a trio of games he pitched that never entered development.Speaking to NME, Smith said he at one point pitched a Blade Runner game, a fourth entry in the Thief series, and an immersive sim inspired by the 1995 crime drama Heat.Smith is obviously a fan of the immersive sim genre, which is a staple part of most Arkane games. So it's no surprise that the games the designer pitched largely fall under that umbrella. The Thief series is one of the defining examples of the immersive sim genre, and it did eventually get a fourth entry with 2014's Thief developed by Eidos-Montreal.While the interview didn't share many details about the Blade...

The swine of The Nine, Xûr, is now live in Destiny 2 for the weekend until next week's reset. If you're looking to get your some shiny new Exotic armor or weapons for your Guardian, look no further.Each week, Xûr has a random assortment of Exotic armor, one for each Guardian class, as well as a random Exotic Weapon and an Exotic Engram available for purchase. In addition to his Exotic wares, he's got a random collection of Legendary weapons and armor to deck out your Guardians.We've rounded up all the info on Xûr for the week including where to find Xûr, which Exotic weapons and armor are available, as well as which Legendary weapons you should pick up, either for PvE or PvP.Where Is Xûr Today?Xûr's location can be found at...

For ages, real-time strategy has been a genre where the number of things you can physically do per second has a major impact on how effectively you can play. And while there's something to be said for that, Company of Heroes 3 is trying to expand the appeal of its tactical gameplay to those who would rather sit back and think through every move carefully, perhaps with a glass of whiskey in one hand and a mouse in the other. Tactical pause, as they call it, isn't any less harrowing of an experience for your soldiers who are being sent to charge a machine gun emplacement. But it is a much less chaotic and, dare I say, more luxurious experience for a commander.Pausing a single-player mission in Company of Heroes 3 will bring up an...

Descend into the slimy heart of the IGN UK podcast this week, as Joe is confusingly repulsed by Scorn, Matt and Cardy have conflicting feelings on the new Monkey Island, and everyone really likes Andor.We also have a special little tease for a live show we hope to be putting on in the not-too-distant future...IGN UK Podcast #663: Professor Layton and the Sludge-Guts of DoomGot a game for us to play or some feedback you'd like read out on the show? Why not email us: [email protected] UK Podcast #662: So Many Streams IGN UK Podcast #661: House of the Rings of Power IGN UK Podcast #660: Bat Family Ties IGN UK Podcast #659: Live from a Cologne Roof at Midnight IGN UK Podcast #658: Better Call She-HulkContinue reading...

Solium Infernum was a literally hellish multiplayer strategy game that became a cult classic in 2009 – and League of Geeks aims to bring it back next year in a reimagined form.Announced as part of EGX, the new Solium Infernum takes the fundamentals of the indie original – a grand strategy game about warring, conniving archfiends in Hell – but builds in 3D visuals, more defined heroes (well, villains), adds accessibility and UI improvements, and more. The game is being described as a "reimagining", rather than a remake or remaster.In a hands-off demo, League of Geeks co-founder Trent Kusters tells me that his team are huge fans of the original game (going so far as to say the studio's debut, Armello was inspired in part by it), and...

Mortal Kombat's co-creator has explained how he came up with the game's iconic logo – and how it almost got trashed for looking like a seahorse.On Twitter, John Tobias unveiled the original hand-drawn logo he created for the first Mortal Kombat game… and delved into its background.“Here’s a recently discovered image of the very first drawing of #MortalKombat’s dragon icon,” he revealed. “I designed the icon as both a symbol of our game and its fictional tournament.”Tobias’ original pencil drawing was digitized by both Tobias himself and Mortal Kombat artist John Vogel, who traced over the digitized image with pixels. Why a dragon? Well, Tobias explained that was all because of the game’s original name.“The inspiration to use a...

Thank your own personal deity—possibly The Sustainer of Heavenly Principles—it's Friday! I'm going to assume you've called in sick and are already living the four-day-weekend dream. Such a vast amount of free time requires games, which is where today's bargains come in. Until next we meet, stay safe, save often and see you Monday.Notable Sales for Nintendo SwitchPurchase Cheaply for PCExciting Offers for XO/XSProduct Savings for PS4/PS5Adam Mathew is our Aussie deals wrangler. He plays at ludicrous difficulties on YouTube.Continue reading...

Ah, Call of Duty – one of my favorite signs of autumn. Just as mornings are broken by the sound of Canadian geese migrating to warmer climates, the tranquility of my living room is interrupted each fall by the coming of the Call of Duty beta period. Modern Warfare II (no, the new one, you're thinking of Modern Warfare 2) is the latest arrival – the 19th mainline game, if you’re keeping score – and it brings with it a return to a modern setting after last year's… return to World War 2. Much like another fall favorite that returns each year, the pumpkin spice latte, Call of Duty is familiar, reliable, and doesn't have any real surprises in store. In other words, it's nice to have it back, but outside of the obvious visual differences...

In an industry notorious for being wildly secretive around how well its own products do, we love some real good, crunchy data. And with an overhaul to Steam Stats today, Valve is giving us exactly that.It's called Steam Charts now, replacing Steam Stats, and like the old version, it still shows off the most popular games on the platform. But unlike Stats, Charts has the tools to drill down into what's making that popularity happen.For context, the old Stats page mostly focused on top games by player count from moment to moment, with Valve regularly providing separate best-seller lists by genre and other factors. Charts puts all this in one spot.The main page shows the top-selling games on Steam right now, as well as the...

Thirty minutes after I started playing, my impressions could be summed up with one word: "hard." I've finished most of Team Ninja's recent games like the Nioh series and Stranger of Paradise: Final Fantasy Origin, but I couldn't help but be astounded by this title's difficulty when I first picked it up. Let me state right here, though, that while this isn't a simple game, you'll instantly be drawn in by the dizzying high-speed action on display once you get used to how it works. Wo Long: Fallen Dynasty adds new systems to its masocore base to create impressive Chinese martial arts-themed combat. While the game had me wailing and groaning at first, by the time I was three hours in, my brain was pumping out so much dopamine that I...

Dark Souls 3's PC servers are back offline despite being restored by FromSoftware just four weeks ago.The Dark Souls Twitter account announced the news (below), saying that the Steam servers were down once again. No explanation of what the issue is or how long it will be an issue were given, but the developer did say it was actively investigating and trying to solve the problem."At this time, there is a confirmed issue with Dark Souls 3 online play via the Steam platform," FromSoftware said. "We are investigating the source of the problem and will inform you as soon as more details become available."Fans were also thanked for their patience but, given the regularity of online problems encountered in the Dark Souls series, it's...

Video games are hard to make. You might have heard that somewhere before.Most people recognize that video games do not simply burst, fully-QA'd, from eggs laid carefully by an executive who then adjusts his T-shirt and blazer and steps onstage at E3 to announce their triumphant existence. But depending on how Extremely Online you are, you might not really have a good concept of exactly what they look like before they show up on your platform of choice, or even before we see them in shiny reveal trailers.That's one small part of what's made the discussion around the Grand Theft Auto 6 leaks so tricky to navigate. Everyone has a different perspective on how much your average gamer knows about what in-development games look like, or...

Square Enix announced that it has delayed the release of the Valkyrie Profile: Lenneth remaster to December 22. It will no longer launch alongside the release of Valkyrie Elysium on PlayStation.“As we celebrate the upcoming launch of Valkyrie Elysium, we, unfortunately, need a bit more time for Valkryie Profile: Lenneth to improve the quality of the title and have decided to move the release date to December 22, 2022,” Square Enix says on Twitter.The remaster is a bonus for those who pre-ordered the Valkyrie Elysium Digital Deluxe Edition on PlayStation 4 and 5. It’s being ported from the PlayStation Portable version and includes new quality of life features such as rewind, quick save, and visual preset functionality. In Japan...

This past weekend Rockstar was the victim of an unprecedented leak: 90 videos of in-development Grand Theft Auto 6 gameplay were published online after a hacker “illegally accessed and downloaded confidential information from [Rockstar’s] systems,” according to the company.The leak already sits among the most consequential in gaming history for several reasons, chief among them the value of the targeted project: Grand Theft Auto 6 is the follow-up to the most profitable entertainment release of all time. For many, the leak is a fun, unexpected peek at one of the most anticipated video games of all time. To Rockstar, Take-Two, and their investors, however, the hack and subsequent leak are unexpected, potentially expensive roadblocks...

Microsoft CEO Satya Nadella is still confident that the company’s acquisition of Activision Blizzard will be approved, and said, "if this is about competition, let us have competition.”In an interview with Bloomberg, Nadella says, “Of course, any acquisition of this size will go through scrutiny, but we feel very, very confident that we’ll come out.”A key concern, particularly for the Competition and Markets Authority (CMA) in the UK, has been that the merger could be anti-competitive for the gaming industry as a whole. However, Nadella points out that Microsoft’s main competitor, Sony, has also acquired studios, including big ones like Bungie.Nadella continues, “So if this is about competition, let us have competition.”...

North Africa in Company of Heroes 3 isn't just a different campaign structure and a sandy color palette. Compared to Italy, where the might of the US and British forces keep your offensive churning along, the Deutsch Afrika Korps often has to make a big difference with smaller, undersupplied forces and whatever they can find lying around – sometimes literally. In this brand new exclusive mission, Desert Route Raid, we went hands-on to see the kinds of challenges the dunes can throw your way.Running Out of TimeThis scenario, which takes place some time after the pivotal Battle of Tobruk, opens with Erwin Rommel detailing a high risk, high reward opportunity to hit British fuel supplies. There's no base building in this one. And worse...

Tiny Tina’s Wonderlands developer Gearbox says the Borderlands spin-off is now the start of a new franchise all of its own.Gearbox Software has called the Borderlands spin-off a “major victory” after a solid launch, with CEO Randy Pitchford saying that Gearbox now sees this as a new franchise, with “future experiences already under development.”“Wonderlands shattered all of our target expectations, both critically and commercially,” said Pitchford during the Embracer Group’s annual general meeting, “and I'm thrilled to report that in addition to great financial rewards from this victory that will be coming our way in the coming quarters, we have established a firm beachhead, and we now clearly have a new franchise on our hands.”...

The Splinter Cell remake will be rewritten to be more relevant to a “modern-day audience”.A job listing for a scriptwriter spotted by PSU has revealed some details about the upcoming Splinter Cell game, and it looks as though it’s going to get a rewrite and update the original.“Using the first Splinter Cell game as our foundation we are rewriting and updating the story for a modern-day audience,” it reads. “We want to keep the spirit and themes of the original game while exploring our characters and the world to make them more authentic and believable.”Splinter Cell was originally released back in 2002 and introduced Sam Fisher – an NSA black ops agent who is investigating the disappearance of two CIA officers. As the story...

Grand Theft Auto 6 gameplay was leaked via a hacker. So now what? What do we think of the return to Vice City? What, if anything, will change about Rockstar's plan to show us the game on their terms. We discuss that as well as Diablo 4's upcoming endgame beta, hands-on impressions from the surprise demo of Wo Long: Fallen Dynasty, and more!Subscribe on any of your favorite podcast feeds, or to our YouTube channel. For more awesome content, check out our recent interview with Todd Howard, who answered all of our Starfield questions after the big reveal at the Xbox Showcase:For more next-gen coverage, make sure to check out our Xbox Series X review, our Xbox Series S review, and our PS5 review.Ryan McCaffrey is IGN's executive...

Previously exclusive to PS4, the critically acclaimed JRPG Persona 5 Royal is heading to Nintendo Switch, PS5, Xbox Series X|S, Xbox One, and PC on October 21. The game is now available to preorder in a couple of editions. Below, you’ll find a full rundown about what comes in each edition, how much it costs, and more.Persona 5 Royal Steelbook Launch EditionNintendo SwitchGet it at Amazon - $59.99 Get it at Best Buy - $59.99 Get it at GameStop - $59.99PS5Get it at Amazon - $59.99 Get it at Best Buy - $59.99 Get it at GameStop - $59.99Xbox Series X|S / Xbox OneGet it at Amazon - $59.99 Get it at Best Buy - $59.99 Get it at GameStop - $59.99The launch edition of Persona 5 Royal costs the same as the standard edition...

If you’ve ever pulled a devil trigger or set your clock to witch time, Soulstice wants to take up arms to battle for your heart. And though its developer, Reply Game Studios, follows the recipe as best it can, Soulstice is a great reminder that not all character-action hack-and-slashers are created equal. Combat is the shining point, but it’s plagued with a terrible camera, some buggy performance, and a steep learning curve. And while monsters are inspired and test your reflexes and wit, but the world they occupy is bland and lifeless, even more so than a blasted-out city in the aftermath of a small apocalypse should be.The story of betrayal and intrigue within a holy order of knights is full of pretty predictable twists and turns...

I’ve played plenty of video game golf over the years, from Links 386 Pro on my first family PC (yes, I’m old) to Links 2004 on the original Xbox to Tiger Woods PGA Tour in the Xbox 360 days. A good golf sim has always been as chill and enjoyable with friends as the real-life sport is. But my virtual set of clubs, just like the real-life set sitting in my garage, have been gathering dust for years. So the fact that I was able to jump right into PGA Tour 2K23 and feel at home with both its three-click swing and swing stick control options during my two-hour hands-on session, then, was a testament to developer HB Studios: it’s really easy to pick up and have fun with even if you haven’t played the video game version of the sport in a...

Adapting the classic 1974 horror movie Texas Chain Saw Massacre into an asymmetrical multiplayer game might seem odd on the surface – particularly when the team setup isn’t the same 4v1 we’ve become accustomed to with the popular Dead by Daylight, but instead the even stranger-sounding 4v3 arrangement. It works exceptionally well in practice, though, creating a tactical, tense, team-based multiplayer experience that favors brains over brawn. Whether you’re on the Victim team of four trying to escape, or the serial-killing Family trio trying to cut them down, Texas Chain Saw Massacre’s tweak to the asymmetrical multiplayer format already plays great, and the 4v3 format is a great match for the movie license it’s built around...

Scorn feels as though it teeters on the gunk-covered ledge between “intriguingly disturbing” and “willfully grotesque.” In the hour or so I play of the the game – its completely tutorial-less opening section – I’m introduced to a truly unpleasant biotechnological setting, shown how its many opaque puzzles will link together to form neat chains of wordless storytelling, and gently repulsed by it occasionally pushing beyond its Giger-indebted fleshscape and into less impressive straight body horror.The core of Scorn is in its puzzles. It may play from the perspective of an FPS, and occasionally offers you what look like weapons, but this is a cerebral game at its core. Opening with your mysterious main character literally ripping...

Publisher 2K has warned users against opening emails or clicking links from its support page after confirming it has been hacked.More than just a spoof account sending fake emails, 2K Support itself has been compromised, with the hacker sending seemingly legitimate emails containing malicious links. 2K's support website has gone offline as a result.If users have clicked on these links already, 2K recommends they immediately change passwords saved in web browsers (like Chrome auto-fill), install anti-virus software, enable multi-factor authentication where possible, and check that no email account forwarding settings have been changed.2K Support's Twitter account, which has remained secure, shared the news (above). "Earlier today...

Cloud Imperium Games has now raised more than half a billion dollars for Star Citizen's development, including $100 million since last November.As reported by Eurogamer, the space trading and combat sim - which has been in development for more than a decade - now claims to have amassed $500,111,757 from backers.Star Citizen's initial Kickstarter campaign for $2 million started in October 2012, but this was just the beginning. Cloud Imperium Games has raised more and more money over the years, surpassing $400 million in total just ten months ago.Despite this astonishing amount of money, however, the game is still in an alpha stage of development, with no release date in sight. For context, The Witcher 3: Wild Hunt cost $81...