Gaming News

AU Deals: Half Off LEGO Horizon, Personas, Final Fantasies, GTAs, Metal Gears, and More!

If your backlog isn’t looking daunting enough already, a fresh crop of digital deals is here to test your willpower. My haul for today spans iconic collections, cerebral indies, and a few deeply discounted blockbusters that are hard to ignore. Whether you’re chasing nostalgia or keen to experience bold experiments in game design, there’s something worthwhile in every category. This Day in Gaming 🎂 In retro news, I'm celebrating the 32nd birthday of Starwing, aka the PAL version progenitor of the Star Fox series. Interestingly, its N64 sequel was named Lylat Wars, at which point Nintendo Europe said, "Screw it, we'll just use the US naming convention from here on out." Starwing is the shoot 'em up that deserves special acclaim as the...

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Save 50% Off the Anker Zolo 10,000mAh 30W Power Bank with Built-In USB Type-C Cable

For a limited time, Amazon has brought back one of its most popular power bank deals. The Anker Zolo 10,000mAh 30W USB Power Bank is back down to only $12.93 after a 50% off instant discount. This is a great price for an Anker-branded 10,000mAh power bank that can fast charge a Nintendo Switch console at its maximum rate. The Zolo is compact and boasts some uncommon but practical features, like a built-in USB Type-C cable and a digital display. You can also choose from four different colors to customize your look, including pastel blue and pink. Anker Zolo 10,000mAh USB Power Bank for $12.93 There are two reasons why this power bank is a great battery backup for your Nintendo Switch console: capacity and charging rate. A 10,000mAh...

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Star Wars: Hunters Publisher Shutters Studio Founded by Torchlight, Diablo Creator Before It Could Announce Its New Game

Zynga has officially shuttered Echtra Games, the development studio behind Torchlight 3, which had been working on an unannounced cross-platform ARPG in the four years since its acquisition. IGN can confirm the San Francisco-based studio will be shut down by the end of the month. While we don't have an exact number of individuals impacted, LinkedIn has 61 people who list their current job at the studio. Zynga has provided the following statement to IGN: Echtra Games was founded by Max Schaefer, one of the co-founders of Torchlight developer Runic Games. Schaefer left Runic after his fellow co-founders similarly departed the studio, and founded Echtra under investor Perfect World to work on a Torchlight MMO. Over time, the game's...

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Star Wars Jedi Director Developing Dungeons & Dragons Single-Player Action Adventure

A new, single-player Dungeons & Dragons action adventure is on the way from Stig Asmussen, the director behind Star Wars Jedi: Fallen Order, Star Wars Jedi: Survivor and God of War 3. The currently-untitled D&D project was announced today by Hasbro and Wizards of the Coast, and is set to launch on PC and unannounced consoles "at a later date." Asmussen's new studio Giant Skull is on development duties for the upcoming D&D project. Founded last year following Asmussen's departure from Respawn Entertainment, the Los Angeles-based Giant Skull was previously announced as making a new AAA single-player game built using Unreal Engine 5. "Our talented and experienced team at Giant Skull is built on creativity and curiosity," Asmussen said...

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Yu-Gi-Oh! Master Duel’s Road to Worlds Campaign Begins

Yu-Gi-Oh! Master Duel’s annual World Championship is fast approaching, which means the Road to Worlds campaign is underway. There are free log-in rewards, and you can compete in qualifying events for the opportunity to represent your region at the World Championship in Paris. If you don’t know about Yu-Gi-Oh! Master Duel, we can give you a quick rundown. It’s a free-to-play digital version of the popular Yu-Gi-Oh! trading card game, with more than 10,000 cards and including the evolutions the game has made over its more than 25 years of existence. It’s available across nearly all platforms — iOS, Android, PC, PS4/5, Nintendo Switch, Xbox One, and Xbox Series X/S — and has cross-platform play, letting you Duel players of varying skill...

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One Elden Right Nightreign Player Got Their Solo Nightlord Clears In Before the Nerf — Here's How

Elden Ring Nightreign Patch 1.01.1 is live now, taking aim at the single-player experience to hopefully ease up the difficulty on those trying to clear the new FromSoftware game by themselves. One player, however, decided not to wait, and cleared every Nightlord solo before the patch made anything easier. Single-player difficulty in Elden Ring Nightreign has been one of the new game's hot topics, post-launch. Players have expressed frustration over how difficult running the game solo compared to trios has felt. Here's a bit of what our Elden Ring Nightreign review here at IGN had to say about it: All of this built up to Bandai Namco and FromSoftware announcing a patch, arriving today, that took aim at easing the burden of solo...

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Hi-Fi Rush Dev Tango Gameworks 'Remains Dedicated to Distinctive and New IPs,' as It Starts Hiring for New Action Game

Hi-Fi Rush developer Tango Gameworks has unveiled its new-look website and confirmed its working on an "unannounced action game." The site — which shows new branding and a careers page recruiting for new roles for an unannounced project — states Tango Gameworks' core mission is to "create new games and expand intellectual properties" as an "independent development studio based in Tokyo, Japan" under the Krafton umbrella. In May 2024, Microsoft announced it had closed a number of Bethesda studios, including Tango Gameworks and Redfall's Arkane Austin. The news was met with shock and anger by developers and fans alike, especially after Microsoft executive Aaron Greenberg had previously said Hi-Fi Rush was a "breakout hit for [Xbox] and...

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James Bond Game From Hitman Dev Has a New Title, 007 First Light, Official Reveal This Week

Finally, more five years after its first announcement, we're about to get our first real look at IO Interactive's new James Bond game. Initially teased as Project 007, the official title is 007 First Light, and it's set for a reveal sometime this week. In a post to Twitter/X today, developer IO Interactive showed a still image of presumably James Bond in silouette lit faintly by a single beam of light, with text reading "First Light 007" and "Game reveal this week." It included a hashtag "#EarnTheNumber", likely a reference to a fact that the project is an origin story centered around Bond "earning" his 007 number. The post didn't include any further details, but it seems likely we'll see this game at one of the showcases planned for...

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Victory Banner, a WWII RTS/Third-Person Shooter Hybrid, Announced for PC

Introducing Victory Banner, a new World War II-set real-time strategy and third-person shooter hybrid whose gameplay that lets you switch seamlessly between top-down tactics and boots-on-the-ground action. It's in development for PC. In Victory Banner, you'll secure trenches, rescue wounded allies, set up comms, and more. You'll be able to play as sniper, medic, or tank operator – and every soldier has a name and a story, a la XCOM, in an effort to give extra gameplay meaning to each unit. You can command both entire squads and individual units. This unique genre mashup is set in 1941 on Europe's Eastern Front. Two single-player modes are promised: the enemy-dominating Frontline as well as the name-tells-you-everything Stealth mode...

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There's No Stellar Blade Multiplayer Mod, but There Are Signs of Multiplayer in the Game Files

Reports that modders unlocked a secret multiplayer mode in Stellar Blade aren't quite as they seem, claims the player who first posted a split-screen gameplay video that's going viral across social media. While overnight reports popped up that Stellar Blade developer Shift Up had built a defunct multiplayer mode directly into the game, the modder who discovered it and shared a two-player gameplay clip of Stellar Blade in Discord has insisted this is not the case. "I woke up to everyone posting clips that I shared in a Discord completely out of context, I avoided tweeting these for a reason," PhantomSomnus wrote on X/Twitter. PhantomSomnus then explained that "split-screen mode is built into Unreal Engine, [Stellar Blade developer]...

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Elden Ring Nightreign Patch 1.01.1 Nerfs Solo Mode Difficulty, Fixes Bugs, and Makes More Balance Changes

FromSoftware has released Elden Ring Nightreign patch 1.01.1, the game’s first since launch, and with it made single-player mode a lot easier. Update 1.01.1, available now across PC via Steam, PlayStation 4, PlayStation 5, Xbox One, and Xbox Series X and S, adds the effect "Automatic Revival Upon Defeat," which allows revival once per night boss battle to solo expeditions, and increases the amount of runes gained for solo expeditions. That will come as some relief to players who had found solo mode a brutal experience. As explained in IGN's Elden Ring Nightreign review: "Let’s get the most important caveat out of the way first: if you are hoping to tackle Nightreign entirely solo, and are anything less than a hardcore Elden Ring...

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Assassin's Creed: Black Flag Remake Rumors Swirl as Collectible Maker Admits 'There Is Something Going On'

Ubisoft's unannounced but widely-expected Assassin's Creed: Black Flag remake has been referenced again, this time by a collectible statue maker. PureArts, which makes figurines and busts of countless video game characters, recently held a livestream showing off a range of new Assassin's Creed merchandise. Here, PureArts representatives strongly hinted that the remake would surface in the not-too-distant future, and noted that "there is something going on." During the livestream, Assassin's Creed fans noted the absence of Black Flag hero Edward Kenway from PureArts' latest range, prompting a presenter to acknowledge the situation and state that the company was holding off launching a new version of Edward Kenway right now for a...

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How CD Projekt Red Got Cyberpunk 2077 Running on Switch 2

Nintendo’s big reveal of the Switch 2 back in April came with many surprises, but perhaps the most unexpected of them was that Cyberpunk 2077 was among the launch lineup. While the Switch 2 may be a whole new generation for Nintendo, the console is – much like its predecessor – relatively modest when it comes to hardware horsepower. Cyberpunk 2077, meanwhile, is one of the most technically ambitious video games ever made. Not only that, but the Switch 2 version is the complete package, including the Phantom Liberty expansion that was designed with PS5, Xbox Series, and high-end PC specs in mind. And so all this poses a big question: how has developer CD Projekt Red put Cyberpunk 2077 on Switch 2? Is this a case of forbidden blood magic...

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The Witcher Developer CD Projekt Plans to Stick to its 'Niche' — And That's AAA RPG Open-world Narrative-Driven Games

The co-founder of The Witcher 3 developer CD Projekt Red, Marcin Iwiński, has said the studio has learned to stick to its "niche." That is: "AAA RPG, open-world narrative-driven games." In an interview on the studio's AnsweRed podcast, Iwiński sat down with joint-CEO Adam Badowski to talk about life at the studio, reflecting on its games and admitting that while the team has been tempted to branch out into different styles and genres of games, open-world RPGs is what it's best at. "One more important thing which we learned over the time, and I think Adam will totally agree, [is] [...] we've learned that we have to be razor-sharp focused," Iwiński said. "We cannot do so many things we would love to do — we are tempted to do. We tried...

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Skyrim Grandma Is Playing The Elder Scrolls IV: Oblivion Remastered — and Chat Is Helping Out

Beloved YouTuber Shirley Curry, colloquially known as the Skyrim Grandma, has started playing The Elder Scrolls IV: Oblivion Remastered — and chat is giving her all the help she needs. In a video titled ‘Oblivion Remastered #1 Learning’ posted to her 1.3 million subscriber YouTube channel, the 89-year-old began her journey in Bethesda’s recently released remaster having just left the tutorial area. “Good morning grandkids. This is Oblivion Remastered,” Curry began. “I am out of all that creepy jail and dungeon and sewers and all that mess you have to come through for so long before you ever get to come out of that into the world. This is the first thing that I see.” Curry is struggling somewhat with Oblivion Remastered, asking for...

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Outriders Developer People Can Fly Blames 'Lack of Communication' With Publisher Square Enix for Game Cancellation

People Can Fly, the Polish studio best-known for Outriders and Gears of War Judgment, has confirmed even more jobs are at risk as it cancels two projects: Project Gemini and Project Bifrost. "Today we made a very difficult decision to suspend the development of project Gemini and project Bifrost — the relevant current reports have been released to the market," CEO Sebastian Wojciechowski wrote in a statement. "The suspension of the Gemini project is a consequence of the fact that the Publisher has not presented us with a draft of the subsequent content rider to the Publishing Agreement covering the terms and conditions of further milestone on project Gemini and the lack of communication from the Publisher as to its willingness to...

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AU Deals: New Lowest Evers on Metaphor, Elden Rings, Tekken 8, Monster Hunter Wilds, and More!

The first gaming discounts of June (how is it even June?) have landed with all the subtlety of a final lap blue shell. Whether you’re looking to get stuck into some deeply replayable JRPGs, dominate in sports titles, or finally catch up on generational masterpieces you missed, there’s plenty of value across the digital shelves. Enough of my jibber jabber exposition, though. Let's get scrolling and saving. This Day in Gaming 🎂 In retro news, it’s been eight years since Tekken 7 punched its way onto Aussie consoles, and what a wild ride it was. Bandai Namco brought the heat with slo-mo finishers, explosive Rage Arts, and (for some reason) PlayStation VR support. This turned out to be a glorified training room where you could awkwardly...

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Elden Ring Nightreign Matchmaking Not Working? FromSoftware Has Some Suggestions

FromSoftware has acknowledged matchmaking issues on Elden Ring Nightreign during its first weekend, and offered suggestions to players affected. Today, May 31, FromSoftware tweeted to address players who were struggling to find other players when launching an expedition in the multiplayer Elden Ring spin-off. If you do, try restarting the matchmaking process, FromSoftware suggested. That’s not a great help, admittedly, but at least we know the developer is aware of the problem. “Thank you for your patience and understanding,” it added. FromSoftware followed that social post with another, this time acknowledging issues on PlayStation consoles specifically. Those on PS4 and PS5 who are having difficulty matchmaking should check their...

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Is Marathon the Best Chance Extraction Shooters Have To Break Into the Mainstream?

Late last month, mega publisher EA fired 300 workers, including around 100 at developer Respawn. The studio, founded by ex-Call of Duty developers, is responsible for Apex Legends and the Star Wars Jedi games, and was reportedly working on a third game in its beloved Titanfall series before its staff roster was cut. Now cancelled, the rumours suggest that this Titanfall project was an extraction shooter – a difficult-by-design PvPvE genre that currently only enjoys niche popularity. But an extraction shooter set in the world of Titanfall and Apex Legends could have been the genre’s ticket to the big leagues. So if not EA, who will take the “Tarkov-like” beyond its enthusiastic niche and into the mainstream? The answer may be just months...

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Maxroll's Elden Ring Nightreign Guides and Database

Elden Ring Nightreign is upon us! Time to choose your Nightfarer and set out into Limveld in hopes of defeating the Nightlord before you’re lost to the rains. We’ve teamed up with Maxroll to bring you a variety of guides to help you get started, introduce you to each of the Nightfarers and help you navigate the dangers of Limveld. Getting Started in Nightreign Maxroll’s Nightreign beginner's guide goes over everything you need to get started: an introduction to each of the 8 playable characters, an explanation of the game's central hub, nagivating Limveld, the basics of combat, and how to handle the Nightlords, before wrapping everything up with a bit of information on Nightreign's metaprogression systems. For more help starting...

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Roblox's Grow a Garden Towers Above Even the Biggest Steam Games — but You Probably Have No Idea What It Is

Roblox farming simulator Grow a Garden is attracting millions of players across PC, mobile, and console devices, eclipsing numbers achieved by some of the most popular games on any platform – so what exactly is it? If you load up Roblox at any time on any day in the next week, there’s a good chance around 2 million people will be playing Grow a Garden in some capacity. That’s according to the official user tracker found on all Roblox experiences, which plants the colorful free-to-play game firmly atop trending charts in a variety of categories. These are numbers that see the free-to-play game leaving other Roblox projects in its dust, with the second-most-popular “Playing Now” experience, Brookhaven RP, showing 590,000 players at the...

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The Elder Scrolls, Fallout, Doom QA Workers Union Reaches Tentative Contract With Microsoft After Nearly Two Years

Today, over 300 unionized quality assurance workers at ZeniMax Media, who work on everything from The Elder Scrolls to Doom, have announced they have reached a tentative deal with parent company Microsoft on their first contract since forming their union two years ago. ZeniMax Workers United, which is unionized under Communications Workers of America (CWA), said the agreement includes "substantial across-the-board wage increases," minimum salaries, protections against arbitrary dismissal, grievance procedures, protections around use of artificial intelligence that could impact workers, and a crediting policy to ensure QA workers are appropriately credited in games they work on. ZeniMax Media owns publisher Bethesda Softworks and...

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Ubisoft Just Dropped An Image of Splinter Cell Star Sam Fisher With No Context — What Does it Mean?

Ubisoft's heading into the weekend dropping a big tease about Splinter Cell. As for what it's teasing, who knows? The Splinter Cell series has been sadly dormant for years now, the last game being 2013's Splinter Cell: Blacklist. Since then, we've heard very little until Ubisoft remembered Splinter Cell existed by adding Steam achievements to a 12-year-old game just a couple of weeks ago. If we're honest, today's tease doesn't provide much more information — we've got a close-up of Sam Fisher's face and a hashtag, Splinter Cell — but interestingly, the alt description is a little more revealing. "Close-up of Sam Fisher from Splinter Cell: Chaos Theory, showing a stern expression with focused eyes, short dark hair, and a rugged beard...

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MultiVersus Players Say Goodbye: 'This Game Will Always Hold a Special Place in My Heart'

MultiVersus, the 2024 free-to-play crossover fighting game, will shortly go offline for good. Player First Games announced that MultiVersus Season 5 will be its last back in January, confirming the brawler would close down permanently at 5pm PDT (12 noon EDT), on May 30, 2025. It was reportedly seen as a major failure for Warner Bros. Discovery; in a financial call from November 2024, the company admitted MultiVersus performed far worse than expected, resulting in a $100 million writedown for its games business. That brought the total loss of the business to $300 million after the disappointing launch of Suicide Squad: Kill the Justice League in January. Just a month after this announcement, Warner Bros. announced it was canceling its...

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Some Elden Ring Nightreign Players Are Fighting Their Muscle Memory From the Original Elden Ring's Controls and Chugging Flasks by Mistake

Elden Ring Nightreign is out, and players are already diving into the shifting lands to fight the Nightlord. If they warmed up a bit on the original Elden Ring, though, they might be finding themselves a little turned around by some control changes. While the controls in Elden Ring Nightreign are mostly the same as the original Elden Ring, a few changes have been made, either to accommodate new abilities or simply move things around a bit. Some of these are just for new moves, or updated versions of old tools. One in particular, though, seems to be causing at least a little confusion: the flask. In FromSoftware's Souls games and Elden Ring, the "flask" is a mainstay of your kit: a refillable potion holder that acts as your main source...

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Elden Ring Nightreign Sells 2 Million Units on the First Day

Elden Ring Nightreign sold 2 million copies on its first day. “Pre-orders and early sales have pushed the game beyond the incredible 2 million units milestone,” publisher Bandai Namco announced. The multiplayer co-op spin-off released overnight and soon shot up the Steam most-played chart, with an impressive 313,593 peak concurrent users. That doesn’t tell the whole story, of course, with both Microsoft and Sony withholding Xbox and PlayStation player numbers. But FromSoftware has now given us an idea of just how big Elden Ring Nightreign is, with the announcement of 2 million copies sold already. Elden Ring was a massive hit, selling 30 million since going on sale in 2022, and it seems unlikely that Nightreign will come close to...

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One Modder Has Already Demonstrated an Elden Ring Nightreign Duos Mod

One should really never the doubt the tenacity of modders. Elden Ring Nightreign is now live, and within 24 hours of its launch, one well-known FromSoftware game modder has already demonstrated a Duos mode mod. Luke Yui, the modder behind popular co-op mods for games like Elden Ring and Armored Core VI, uploaded a short video to their YouTube channel yesterday. It shows off an Elden Ring Nightreign two-player mod, allowing just two Nightfarers to team up rather than forcing the choice between one or three. It's important to note that, as of this writing, this is not a public or playable mod, but a short demonstration from Yui. They noted that the mod runs without connecting to the matchmaking server, so while it's possible to use...

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Activision Quietly Force Adverts into Call of Duty Black Ops 6 and Warzone Loadouts and Players Absolutely Hate It: 'At This Point It Really Feels Lik

With the launch of Call of Duty Season 4, Activision quietly put adverts inside loadouts for Black Ops 6 and Warzone, sparking a backlash in the process. Activision already has a bad reputation for the aggressive monetization of the premium Black Ops 6 and its free-to-play battle royale Warzone, but this latest move may have tipped some players over the edge. Following the launch of Season 4, adverts for weapon bundles can be seen in the build and weapon menus. These are unavoidable for players as they tinker with their loadouts. Elsewhere, Activision has added bundle and Battle Pass advertisements to the Events tab, another controversial change that has caused complaints. Here’s a snippet of the response, sourced from across...

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Elden Ring Nightreign Developer FromSoftware Already Has a Patch in the Works to Make the Brutally Difficult Solo Play Easier

It’s early days for Elden Ring Nightreign, but already developer FromSoftware has announced a patch that will make solo play easier. Patch 1.02, due out next week, will include bug fixes as well as improvements for solo expeditions, FromSoftware announced in a post on social media. Elden Ring Nightreign drops players into the shifting lands of Limveld, exploring and fighting for survival either solo or in groups of three. There is no way to play two-player co-op. We’ve already reported on Elden Ring Nightreign’s ‘mixed’ Steam user review rating, with most of the complaints revolving around a lack of a duos option as well as no voice chat. Playing Elden Ring Nightreign solo is proving to be a particularly difficult experience. As...

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Helldivers 2 Declares Victory: 'The Battle of Super Earth Is Won' — What Next for the Illuminate?

Helldivers 2’s ongoing Galactic War appears to have reached another turning point, with the Federation declaring victory over the Illuminate. “The Illuminate have retreated from Super Earth battlespace,” reads the in-universe message to the game’s community. “The Heart of Democracy has been defended. The Battle of Super Earth is won.” The Illuminate’s invasion certainly took its toll on Super Earth, with only two Mega Cities left standing: Prosperity City and Equality-on-Sea. “Remaining Illuminate forces were last observed making FTL jumps from Super Earth orbit,” the message continues. “The enemy has also vacated New Haven, Pilen V, and Widow's Harbor, burning the surface of those planets as they fled. No stations detect Illuminate...

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