Gaming News

Marvel's Avengers Adds Paid XP Boosts, and Fans are in Uproar

Square Enix and Crystal Dynamics have added the option to pay for XP and resource collection boosts using real money in Marvel's Avengers. The move has been slated by many fans who believe it offers a stark contrast to previous statements made surrounding the game's monetization tactics. Marvel's Avengers' recent addition to Xbox Game Pass is likely to have brought a range of new players to the game. For pre-existing fans, however, news of the game's move to the new platform was shortly followed by the more troubling reality that its in-game marketplace now offers players the option to purchase boost-based 'consumables' using credits that can only be acquired through spending real money. As reported by VGC, the game's new...

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Marvel’s Guardians of the Galaxy's Licensed Soundtrack Is a Vice City-Grade Collection of Hits

Square Enix and Eidos-Montréal have revealed the full licensed track list for Marvel's Guardians of the Galaxy, which will go down well with any 80s and GTA: Vice City fan. The soundtrack features 28 certified bangers from the 1980s, plus two original songs by “Star-Lord Band”, a fictional rock group from which the game's version of Star-Lord takes his name. The full track list can be seen below, as well as listened to on a variety of streaming services. Additionally, Eidos-Montréal has also created two music videos for Star-Lord Band, with an 80s cartoons-inspired video for the single Zero to Hero, as well as a VHS-style video of Star-Lord Band performing the song on stage. The full soundtrack is as follows: Never Gonna Give You...

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Yakuza Creator Toshihiro Nagoshi Confirms Sega Departure Alongside Yakuza: Like a Dragon Sequel Announcement

Yakuza series creator Toshihiro Nagoshi has confirmed that he will be leaving both Ryu Ga Gotoku Studio and SEGA. As part of the restructuring announcement, RGG Studio also confirmed it is currently working on a sequel to Yakuza: Like a Dragon. This news from Ryu Ga Gotoku Studio and Nagoshi follows a report that said Chinese developer and publisher NetEase was in "final negotiations" with Nagoshi to hire him away from SEGA, the company he has been with since 1989. Nagoshi, in a statement, didn't reveal what his next move was, but he did confirm that he was leaving SEGA and RGG Studio. "As I depart from SEGA, I’m also leaving my position as the head of Ryu Ga Gotoku Studio," Nagoshi wrote. "Thank you to the fans who have supported...

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Aussie Deals: Up to 69% Off in Rockstar and 2K Games Sales, and More!

Thank your own personal God—most likely Kratos—it's Friday! My goal is to get you stocked up for two full days of shutting out the so-called real world. If you've never played the BioShock series, you can fix this egregious life-error by scoring the whole shebang for 82% off. Multiple platforms have Sleeping Dogs going for roughly the same percentage discount, too. Finally, don't forget that today's the day to scoop up Far Cry 6, Metroid Dread and an OLED Switch! Notable Sales for Nintendo Switch Purchase Cheaply for PC Exciting Offers for XO/XS Product Savings for PS4/PS5 Sign up to get the best Aussie gaming deals sent straight to your inbox! Adam's an Aussie deals connoisseur who's blasting things in a game with a "4"...

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Nickelodeon All-Star Brawl Review

The idea of a Super Smash Bros.-style platform fighter that brings together some of Nickelodeon’s most beloved cartoons across multiple generations is one that just makes so much sense, and it’s kind of a wonder that it’s taken this long for something like Nickelodeon All-Star Brawl to come around. But despite Nickelodeon All-Star Brawl’s clear inspirations, developer Ludosity has made a notable effort to differentiate its mechanics and the overall flow of combat from Smash Bros., resulting in a fighter that is way faster than any Smash game has been since Melee in 2001. This puts All-Star Brawl in a great spot as an alternative to Smash Ultimate that’s available on practically every platform – but its subpar use of its wealth of source...

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Shenmue: The Animation's First Trailer Revealed During New York Comic Con 2021

The first Shenmue: The Animation trailer is officially here, offering a glimpse of how the pioneering Dreamcast series translates to anime. As expected, it's filled with a lot of solid kung fu action, which should please long-time fans of the series. You can check out the trailer below, which went up shortly after the conclusion of the Shenmue: The Animation panel that took place during New York Comic Con 2021. The panel featured series creator Yu Suzuki as well as director Chikara Sakurai and producer Yu Kiyozono. Along with Sola Entertainment producer Joseph Chou, they discussed how the anime will adapt the game's sprawling story and its unique world. Talking about Shenmue's legacy, Suzuki said that Shenmue's story is "so grand...

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Destiny 2 Will Lose The Forsaken Expansion to the Vault

Bungie has announced that the Destiny 2 Forsaken campaign will enter the Destiny Content Vault early next year. Players can still access the content until February 22, at which point the campaign as well as the Tangled Shore desination will leave the game. This is the same day as the launch of Year 5 of Destiny 2, which includes The Witch Queen expansion. Bungie says Forsaken's departure also makes way for new features including weapon crafting, a Legendary difficulty campaign option, a new weapon type, and more. If you haven't played the Forsaken campaign, it will be available for free to all Destiny players beginning on December 7. Bungie created the Destiny Content Vault last year as a way to begin recycling content from Destiny...

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Sora's In Smash and Metroid Dread Is Amazing - NVC 581

Welcooome to Nintendo Voice Chat! Your new host Seth Macy is joined by Sam Claiborn, Kat Bailey, and Kate MacPherson to talk about a huge week for Nintendo! First up, the final Super Smash Bros. Ultimate character is Sora from Kingdom Hearts, and the panel reacts to the final trailer, and Ultimate as a whole. Then, Metroid Dread is out this week, and it's amazing! Hear all about IGN's Metroid Dread review, and how happy we are to have a new 2D Metroid after all these years. Plus, hear about the Switch OLED, which launches alongside Metroid Dread this week. Timecodes! 00:00:02 - Intro 00:01:42 - Sora Comes to Smash 00:16:02 - Metroid Dread Review 00:29:39 - Animal Crossing Nintendo Direct 00:36:50 - What We’ve Been Playing 00:46:34 -...

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Diablo 4 Has a New Director

Activision Blizzard is currently facing serious ongoing allegations of harassment and mistreatment of marginalized workers. To learn more, please visit our timeline as well as our in-depth report on the subject. Joe Shely, who has worked on World of Warcraft and DIablo 3, has taken over as director of Diablo 4. In today's Diablo 4 quarterly update, Shely said he is honored to continue the vision of the next Diablo as its director. The previous director, Luis Barriga, was let go from Activision Blizzard in August amid allegations of harassment and abuse within Blizzard. Barriga had been with Blizzard since 2006, and was let go alongside level designer Jesse McCree and WoW designer Jonatan LeCraft. In today's post, Shely briefly...

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Koichi Sugiyama, the Pioneering Dragon Quest Composer Known For His Controversial Views, Has Died

Koichi Sugiyama, the composer who defined a generation of RPGs with his music but was also known for his controversial views on LGBTQ+ people and Japan's action in World War II, has died. He was 90 years old. Like Nobuo Uematsu and a handful of other pioneering composers, Koichi Sugiyama helped define music on the Famicom in the mid-1980s. Known primarily for his work on Dragon Quest, he started as a director at Fuji TV and later worked on projects including Science Ninja Team Gatchaman: The Movie. Sugiyama joined Enix after sending the studio a postcard expressing his appreciation for a PC shogi game they had created. His work on the first Dragon Quest was considered revolutionary for the time. In a look back on the series, 1UP...

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Hackers Have Started to Invade the Battlefield 2042 Beta

After months of confidence from the Battlefield development team on Easy Anti-Cheat, images and videos have already started to circulate online of hacking during the Battlefield 2042 Beta. Although the hacks are not as sophisticated as those that struck the Call of Duty: Vanguard Beta a couple of weeks ago, footage online shows wallhacks, aimbot, and several other cheats. So far, we’ve identified three individual cheat providers providing cheats for Battlefield 2042. One cheat provider from China offers their cheats for just $2 per day, giving cheaters the opportunity to cheat during the whole Battlefield 2042 Beta for just $8. There are a few silver linings in the hacker problem though. I spoke with content creator MavriqGG, who...

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Eidos Montréal Adopts a Four-Day Work Week

Eidos Montreal, the Square Enix-owned studio that developed Deus Ex: Human Revolution and is working on the Guardians of the Galaxy game, is switching to a four-day work week. The change also applies to Eidos-Sherbrooke, Eidos Montreal's support studio. The studio announced the change in a blog post, where Head of Studio David Anfossi said the move will help create a sustainable work environment. "The idea is not to condense the working hours into 4 days, but rather to review our ways of doing things and our quality time invested, with the aim of working better," Anfossi said. "Above all, we want to increase the productivity and well-being of our employees." The four-day, 32 hour work week will not impact any employee's salaries...

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The 10 Best Assassin's Creed Games

The Assassin’s Creed franchise has spanned the globe since it debuted in 2007, and entries have taken players from Renaissance Italy to Ancient Greece to the American Revolution. Along the way, the series has changed dramatically, from sequels that made good on the promise of past entries to entirely new takes on character progression. So which games are the best out of Ubisoft’s long-running series? IGN’s biggest Assassin’s Creed fans came together to agree, argue, and eventually cull together our favorites. It’s worth noting this list pulls from the mainline Assassin’s Creed series of console releases, so no mobile or handheld entries were considered as they vary greatly in scope and design. Without further ado, here are our top 10...

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PS5 Game Trials, GTA Trilogy Remaster Hopes, and Konami Rumors - Beyond Episode 720

On this week's episode of IGN's PlayStation show, Podcast Beyond!, host Jonathon Dornbush is joined by Brian Altano and Matt Kim to discuss all the latest in the world of PlayStation, including the PS5 game trials being tested in the UK and how we'd like to see it expand, the continuous leaks for a GTA Trilogy remaster release (which we aren't expecting to be GTA remakes), and what we'd like to see from GTA 3, GTA Vice City, and GTA San Andreas' collective return on PS4 and PS5, plus the rumors that Konami is looking at major revivals for Castlevania, Metal Gear Solid, and Silent Hill. We discuss what we want from new Konami games, how new Castlevania's could learn from classics like Aria of Sorrow, the potential for an MGS 3 remake...

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Battlefield 2042 Beta Build Is Already 'a Few Months Old'

The beta for Battlefield 2042 has already kicked off for EA play members and pre-order customers. However, according to its developer, DICE, the build that it's running on is an older version of the game that's already a few months old. As spotted by VGC, one of EA's lead community managers recently tweeted about the build that players are currently experiencing during 2042's open beta. "Our Open Beta is now a few months old," reads the tweet. "We polish and enhance it to make sure that it's representative of the game we've built, but naturally we're making daily improvements, changes, and enhancements all the time." While the studio continues to learn and receive feedback across its open beta period, DICE general manager Oskar...

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DC Fandome 2021: How to Watch and What to Expect

Last year, DC FanDome premiered as a virtual celebration for fans of the DC multiverse. It was filled with exciting announcements that included the first teaser trailer for Zack Snyder's Justice League and a full cast reveal for James Gunn's The Suicide Squad. Returning this year as DC FanDome 2021, looks at upcoming DC comics, movies, shows, and games have already been teased. Fans can expect a new trailer for The Batman movie, fresh looks at shows like Batwoman, The Flash, and Superman & Lois, reveals of Gotham Knights and Suicide Squad: Kill the Justice League, and more. Here's everything you need to know to tune in so you don't miss it. When is DC FanDome 2021? DC FanDome 2021 returns on Saturday, October 16, 2021, starting at 10...

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Call of Duty: Warzone Season 6 Will Be the Last Set on the Current Map

Activision Blizzard is currently facing serious ongoing allegations of harassment and mistreatment of marginalized workers. To learn more, please visit our timeline as well as our in-depth report on the subject. Raven Software has confirmed that Warzone's sixth season will be the last set on the existing Verdansk map, as the game looks ahead toward the release of its brand new Pacific-based map. Season 6 has brought a number of changes to Warzone's current map, Verdansk – including WW2 bunkers that presage the introduction of Call of Duty: Vanguard later this year. As shared in a tweet by CharlieIntel (below), Raven Software has confirmed that this will be the last time Verdansk is used before it is set to be removed from the game...

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eFootball 2022 Review in Progress

eFootball – Konami’s rebrand of the long-running Pro Evolution Soccer series – could have signaled a bright new beginning for football games. Shifting to the more modern Unreal Engine 4 and ditching annual full-priced games for a free-to-play model with promises of sizeable content additions and a “pay for what you want” structure felt like steps in the right direction, moving away from the frustrations that come with annualised sports games. Instead, it’s hard to think of a rockier start to life it could have had. Launching as essentially a demo with very limited modes, stuttering gameplay, laughable crowd models, and more than a few bugs and glitches, it’s very hard to recommend eFootball in its current form. So I won’t. All we can do...

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Deathloop's Devs Say There's One More Big Secret Left To Discover

Deathloop level designer Julien Eveillé has said that there's still one more major secret in the game that fans are yet to find. There's a lot of ground to cover in Deathloop. The game is spread out across four different areas that can each be accessed during four different time periods. If that's not enough, players' experiences of the story manifest in various ways depending upon the different scenarios you set up along the way. While the internet has been pretty relentless in its efforts to uncover Blackreef's many hidden depths since the game's release last month, tweets from Eveillé suggest that there's still one big secret left for someone to uncover. "I know for a fact the Internet didn't find everything hidden in Deathloop so...

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Far Cry 6 Includes a Puzzling, Unexpected Connection to Far Cry 3

Mainline Far Cry games always tell a new story, with new heroes and villains to get to know. However, Far Cry 6 breaks from tradition by including one direct, unexpected, and slightly puzzling connection to Far Cry 3. This story contains major spoilers for the ending Far Cry 6. Don't read any further if you don't want to know more. While Far Cry 6 very much tells its own story, the ending offers a surprising connection to Far Cry 3 by reintroducing the voice of Vaas (played by original actor Michael Mando). After the credits role, an audio-only scene plays out featuring a conversation between guerrilla fighter Juan Cortez and a character referred to in the captions as 'Smuggler', but who is very clearly the voice of Vaas. The...

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CD Projekt Offers a Glimpse Of The Witcher 3 Running On Steam Deck

CD Projekt Red has offered fans a brief look at how the Witcher 3 will run on Steam Deck, using a number of short clips to show off various aspects of the game running on the new handheld. Showcased in a series of tweets posted on the Witcher 3 Twitter account, fans will be pleased to see that the Witcher 3 appears to run smoothly on Valve's upcoming handheld PC. The clips shared by CD Projekt Red detail a range of scenarios including general exploration and combat. Shot on an external camera and with Twitter video compression, it's difficult to tell exactly what resolution the game is running at, but fans on Twitter are impressed with how the game is looking on the handheld's native 800p screen. From what has been shown by CD...

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Aussie Deals: The Cheapest Metroid Dread Prices, $69 Far Cry 6, and More!

Buckle up, because it's gonna be a big day of gaming tomorrow. If you're hoping to be a guerrilla in the (red) mist, you'll be able to go buy Far Cry 6. Samus fans can see how puzzle-platforming is really done in Metroid Dread. Oh, and the fancy new OLED Switch refresh will be hitting shelves and destroying wallets as well. That being said, I've found the best prices for all of the above (plus my usual selection of random must-owns). Notable Sales for Nintendo Switch Purchase Cheaply for PC Exciting Offers for XO/XS Product Savings for PS4/PS5 Sign up to get the best Aussie gaming deals sent straight to your inbox! Adam's an Aussie deals guy who has already liberated Yara. He used the Blood Dragon weapons. It was...

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Gearbox's Randy Pitchford Steps Down As Gearbox Software President

Gearbox Software has announced that former chief technology officer Steve Jones will now serve as the new president of Gearbox Software following a leadership shuffle. Gearbox Entertainment co-founder Randy Pitchford will still serve as CEO and President of the Gearbox parent company and shift his focus towards film and TV as the president of the newly-formed Gearbox Studios. Was that confusing? Well, buckle up. Basically, the video game development wing of Gearbox responsible for games like Borderlands will now be run by Jones. Meanwhile, Gearbox’s parent company, Gearbox Entertainment (which was acquired by the Embracer Group earlier this year) will still be overseen by Pitchford. Furthermore, Pitchford will serve as president of...

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Valve's Official Steam Teardown Gives Us a Detailed Look At the New Portable Device's Innards

Valve has uploaded an official teardown of its Steam Deck, two months before the portable gaming console is released. The roughly five-minute video is a walkthrough on how to not only open up the Steam Deck but how to replace the thumbsticks and SSD included with the handheld. Despite being an official demo, Valve issues a warning at the beginning noting that, while they cannot stop you from doing so, it is strongly advising you not to open up the Steam Deck for any reason. The main reason Valve is strongly advising you not to pry the Steam Deck open is due to the console's battery — should you puncture the battery while opening it up, there's a chance the battery may catch on fire. Noting that if you damage the battery, the Steam...

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Cricket 22 Announced, Includes Big Bash, The Hundred, and More

Big Ant Studios and Nacon have officially revealed Cricket 22, which will see the series debut on PlayStation 5 and Xbox Series X|S and introduce a number of important new licensed competitions and teams. Following on from 2019’s successful and extensively-supported Cricket 19, Big Ant claims Cricket 22 will deliver “the most robust, substantial game of cricket that fans have ever seen.” Cricket 22 will feature Australia’s T20 Big Bash tournament alongside the Caribbean Premier League, England’s The Hundred, and The Ashes, and it will also include fully-licensed national teams for Australia, England, New Zealand, the West Indies, and Ireland. As with Cricket 19, the men’s and women’s games will be represented throughout all of...

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Grounded: Obsidian Gets Back to its Roots with Hot and Hazy Update

It’s no secret that Grounded, Obsidian’s backyard survival game, is very different from anything the prolific RPG developer has made before -- something the developers themselves have poked fun at in the past. But while the microscopic multiplayer adventure has seen success in its own right, even while still in preview, the upcoming Hot and Hazy update seems poised to give many fans more of what they might expect from Obsidian: lots of stats. With everything from character stats that let you upgrade your avatar’s abilities, to weapon upgrades that increase deadliness, to new armor classes with gameplay consequences, Grounded will get a whole lot nerdier and RPG-like later this month. One of the biggest additions Hot and Hazy adds is a...

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Far Cry 6 Review

The Far Cry series has long experienced something of an identity crisis. Is it a hard–boiled story of survival, or a goofy physics playground with pet bears and flamethrowers? The answer has usually been “a bit of both,” and that’s not necessarily a bad thing. Far Cry 6 doesn’t buck that trend – the flamethrower definitely hasn’t gone anywhere – but the latest installment does manage to smooth over a lot of the bumps that have cropped up in the past few games, and in doing so becomes the best the series has been in years – but it also misses some steps, especially with its updated inventory system, and that creates some new problems along the way. Far Cry 6 once again sees you trapped in a huge open world controlled by a charismatic...

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Yes, Far Cry 6 Has an Early Alternative Ending Easter Egg

Far Cry 4 famously included an Easter Egg ending that allowed you 'finish' the game right from the beginning. Far Cry 5 then repeated the trick and, as you might expect, Far Cry 6 is keeping up the tradition. Spoilers follow for the alternative ending to Far Cry 6. Stop reading if you'd like to find it yourself. Granted, Far Cry 6 does make you work a little harder than previous games to get to its own early ending. Where 4 and 5 placed their alternate endings just after the introduction, the latest installment requires you to play the game's early missions (it took us around an hour and a half) to get to a specific point in the storyline that will allow your character, Dani, to escape a naval blockade around the Yaran island...

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Battlefield 2042 Open Beta Preview

Battlefield has always prioritized a certain degree of multiplayer insanity, but nothing in the series thus far prepared me for a mega-cyclone tearing across the map, wrecking cars, uprooting trees, and sucking up any poor souls who've gotten too close with their parachutes. Between the bullets, the gunships, and the artillery, we also have to watch out for this?Battlefield 2042 aims to take us into the near future, with a world on the brink and a cascading series of environmental catastrophes towering over the petty squabbles of mankind. After a few hours with the beta that’s about to open up, it is clear that DICE has gone absolutely giddy with excess — totally lapping the chaos it experimented with in its previous historical veneers...

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Aussie Deals: Top Tier Ghost Recon Discounts, Freebies, and More!

Fair warning for the faint of heart: this deals list is positively haunted by Ghost Recon. To celebrate the announce of a GR-themed battle royale venture, Ubi has taken a tactical knife to the prices of current and classic entries in the franchise. I've also identified a bit of a backwards compat clearance on Xbox LEGO titles, plus some cheap Mario-centric Switch games are always appreciated! Notable Sales for Nintendo Switch Purchase Cheaply for PC Exciting Offers for XO/XS Product Savings for PS4/PS5 Sign up to get the best Aussie gaming deals sent straight to your inbox! Adam's an Aussie deals operator who played the crotch out of system link GR back in 2001. Recon his thoughts @Grizwords. Continue reading...

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