Gaming News

ROUTINE is an Indie Horror Game Over a Decade in the Making – Developer Interview – IGN First

In the summer of 2012, ROUTINE was revealed at the largest video gaming convention in the world Gamescom, but after well over a decade later it has yet to make it into the hands of players. In the coming weeks, that’s all about to change, and as I sat down with two of the game’s three developers, Aaron Foster, head of art and design and project lead, and fellow artist and designer Jemma Hughes, it was all smiles. “We’ll have gone gold in just a few days,” Aaron told me with a grin. Theirs is a classic indie developer story, a handful of developers setting out to work on a project they were passionate about, learning every difficult lesson along the way. “Routine started as a very simplified, atmospheric, slight-horror game. I...

View full article »

Battlefield 6 Surprise Update Addresses Escalation Feedback With Increased Objective Capture Time

The Battlefield 6 team snuck in a few extra changes alongside the California Resistance Season 1 update today, revealing changes for Escalation, challenges, and player profile kill/death statistics. Last-minute additions to today’s 1.1.2.0 update arrived in the form of a surprise social media post this morning, just a few hours after the gargantuan patch targeted some of the fan feedback EA and Battlefield Studios have received in recent weeks. California Resistance most notably adds new map Eastwood into the mix, but these new bonus adjustments aren’t exactly anything to scoff at, and they’re already live. Topping the list is a change players have been looking to see for one specific Battlefield 6 game mode: Escalation. BF Studios...

View full article »

Dragon Quest HD-2D Remakes Are Discounted Ahead of Black Friday

Ahead of the Black Friday sale event next week, there have been some excellent video game deals already popping up across various retailers. If you're using this opportunity to stock up your library with some new picks to play over the holidays, we've come across plenty of discounts worth your time and money. At the moment, Amazon is offering very nice deals on Dragon Quest I & II HD-2D Remake for Nintendo Switch 2 (which has dropped to $49.99) and Dragon Quest III HD-2D Remake for Nintendo Switch, PS5, and Xbox Series X (all down to $34.99). If these games have been on your shopping list, now is a great time to grab them. Dragon Quest I & II HD-2D Remake usually retails with a price tag of $59.99, but this discount has dropped it...

View full article »

Barkour Preview: A Mostly Doggone Good Stealth Time So Far

Who isn’t a sucker for a dog game? Walking the show floor at the Games Industry Conference in Poznań, Wielkopolska, I immediately did a double take when I saw Barkour, a game about a dog secret agent. He’s not just cute and cuddling, he also has a gun and a grappling hook: I had to take this dog for a walk. You, of course, play as a dog in Barkour. You’re Agent T.H.U.N.D.E.R. (don’t ask me what it stands for, dogs can’t spell anyway), an all-around Good Boy who’s recruited off the streets into a secret dog spy organization, and trained to help them take down nefarious, cat-themed villains. He’s got a pretty robust kit to help him out: his nose can sense enemy locations and interactable items, he can overhear enemy conversations to get...

View full article »

Microsoft Announces Xbox Game Pass November 2025 Wave 2 Lineup

Microsoft has announced the second wave of games coming to Xbox Game Pass in November 2025. In a post on Xbox Wire, Microsoft highlighted today’s addition of Fortnite Crew to Xbox Game Pass Ultimate. Included with Ultimate is access to the current Battle Pass, OG Pass, LEGO Pass, and Music Pass. In addition, you get 1,000 V-Bucks each month while you’re subscribed. Fortnite Crew also includes a bonus benefit: Rocket Pass Premium in Rocket League, which means you get the current Rocket League Season’s Rocket Pass Premium, plus future Seasons’ while you’re still subscribed. Microsoft pointed to the addition of Fortnite Crew among other incentives when it recently raised the price of Xbox Game Pass Ultimate to $30 a month. It also threw...

View full article »

'Gen Z Loves AI Slop' — Former Square Enix Exec Claims 'A Lot of AI Sentiment Is Driven by Emotion Rather Than Logic'

The CEO of Genvid — the company behind choose-your-own-adventure interactive series like Silent Hill Ascension — has claimed "consumers generally do not care" about generative AI in games, stating: "Gen Z loves AI slop." Jacob Navok, a former Square Enix director, evidenced his claim by reminding us that the biggest game of the year, Steal a Brainrot, "had 30m concurrents or approximately 80x the Arc Raiders concurrents, and is named after/based on AI slop characters." "For all the anti-AI sentiment we're seeing in various articles, it appears consumers generally do not care," he wrote on X/Twitter (thanks, GamesRadar+). "All the brainrots are just 3D models of AI slop. Gen Z loves AI slop, does not care. The upcoming generation of...

View full article »

ArenaNet Reveals Guild Wars Reforged, a New Refresh of the Classic MMORPG

With the 20th anniversary of Guild Wars this year, developer ArenaNet has prepared a substantial visual and gameplay refresh of the 2005 MMORPG, which launched December 3. In an exclusive reveal with IGN, we got a first look at Guild Wars Reforged, and learned from ArenaNet game director Stephen Clarke-Wilson, along with Brandon Dillon, CEO and co-founder of new studio 2weeks, what's in store for the new and improved Guild Wars. Co-developed by ArenaNet and 2weeks, which is made up of former ArenaNet creatives, Guild Wars Reforged is a modernized edition of the original MMORPG and its expansions. The Reforged edition features an HD overhaul that enhances the in-game visuals, performance, and user interface, along with proper...

View full article »

The Folio Society Reveals Gorgeous Illustrated Edition of Gabrielle Zevin's Tomorrow, and Tomorrow, and Tomorrow

Gabrielle Zevin's novel Tomorrow, and Tomorrow, and Tomorrow has quickly become regarded as a modern classic in the years since its debut. It's not at all surprising to see that book join the ranks of The Folio Society's lavish illustrated editions. With The Folio Society's edition of Tomorrow, and Tomorrow, and Tomorrow now available for preorder, IGN can exclusively debut a new preview of artist Manshen Lo's illustrations. Check them out in the slideshow gallery below: Written by Zevin and originally published in 2022, Tomorrow, and Tomorrow, and Tomorrow is a book that should hold special interest for IGN readers, as it's about a pair of childhood friends and aspiring game designers. Here's the official description of the book...

View full article »

Does Black Ops 7 Signal the End of Single-Player Call of Duty?

Without a shadow of a doubt, Call of Duty is primarily a multiplayer game. Following the meteoric rise of the original Modern Warfare’s PvP, the series has become an industry behemoth, and its success is entirely down to its online modes. And yet, year after year, Activision has dedicated a significant amount of cash to funding elaborate single-player campaigns. As someone who grew up on the likes of Half-Life and Halo, these campaigns are the reason I’ve come back to Call of Duty year in, year out. Sure, it’s been a rocky relationship, but it’s been worth enduring for the really good ones – like last year’s fantastically orchestrated Black Ops 6, with its conveyor belt of exciting mission concepts. But this year is different. Black...

View full article »

Escape From Tarkov Dev Apologizes for 'Rough' 1.0 Release, Promises to 'Fix All of the Incoming Bugs'

Escape from Tarkov game director Nikita Buyanov has apologized to players for the "rough" release of the extraction shooter's 1.0 version and Steam debut, saying the team is "willing to continue fighting" to "finally crack the performance problems." On Steam, Escape from Tarkov currently has a 'mixed' user review rating, with most of the complaints around server issues that are causing long queues, performance problems, and bugs. Writing on Twitter/X, Battlestate's Buyanov thanked players "for this overwhelming interest for the game," adding: "servers get full really fast so we['re] adding more and more servers worldwide to cut matching times more. We are also fixing all of the incoming bugs, and as I said, we will continue to improve...

View full article »

'The World Is Just Not Ready for AI in Video Games' — Shroud Accuses The Game Awards of Being 'Rigged' Following Arc Raiders GOTY Snub

Shroud has accused The Game Awards of being “rigged” following its Game of The Year Arc Raiders snub. The Game Awards confirmed the nominations for 2025 this week, with Sandfall’s Clair Obscur: Expedition 33 receiving 12 noms — the most in the Awards’ history. Embark Studios' Arc Raiders, meanwhile, has just one nomination, in the Best Multiplayer category alongside Battlefield 6, Elden Ring: Nightreign, Peak, and Split Fiction. Game of the Year Clair Obscur: Expedition 33 Death Stranding 2: On the Beach Donkey Kong Bananza Hades 2 Hollow Knight: Silksong Kingdom Come: Deliverance 2 Ahead of the announcement, Canadian Michael ‘Shroud’ Grzesiek, who specializes in competitive multiplayer first-person shooters, had called on his fans...

View full article »

Interplay Co-Founder and 'Trailblazing' Developer Rebecca Heineman Dies Aged 62

Rebecca Heineman, known best for co-founding original Fallout developer Interplay alongside Brain Fargo, Jay Patel, and Troy Worrell in the early 1980s, has died aged 62. The news was shared by her friend Heidi McDonald, who wrote on BlueSky that "my trailblazing game industry bad-ass friend Rebecca Heineman has passed away. F**k cancer. Friends, let's not forget her." On a GoFundMe page set up by Heineman shortly after her diagnosis, she described herself as "the very first video game champion, creator of Bard’s Tale 3, Dragon Wars, and one of the founders of Interplay Productions and MacPlay. Creator of Sailor Ranko the webcomic and software archivist." The fund remains open to support Heineman's family. In her final message...

View full article »

Assassin's Creed Actor Didn't Realize He'd Recorded Desmond's Death Scene Until Checking Twitter — And Says The Character Is Technically Still Alive

Desmond's death in Assassin's Creed 3 was ambiguous enough that voice actor Nolan North didn't realize he'd just recorded the character's last gasp — and now, North has said that the series' original modern day protagonist is "technically" still alive. North played Desmond in five games until the character's big sacrifice at the end of 2012's Assassin's Creed 3. But despite stepping up to save the world — and collapsing in the process — Desmond's death scene apparently only clicked with North after he checked Twitter following the game's launch. "That technically was Desmond's death scene, and I didn't know it," North told Fall Damage. "I found out on Twitter. 'Are you upset Desmond's dead?' And I'm thinking, what? Because there's no...

View full article »

Fired Subnautica 2 Founders Claim Krafton CEO Used ChatGPT to 'Brainstorm Ways to Avoid Paying' $250m Bonus And Discussed a 'Takeover' Over Company Sl

As the messy breakdown between Krafton and Subnautica 2 developer and subsidiary Unknown Worlds goes to court this week, an explosive new legal filing claims that Krafton's CEO discussed a takeover of the studio in Slack messages, and allegedly even turned to ChatGPT "to help him brainstorm ways to avoid paying the earnout." Unknown Worlds' entire leadership was fired amid a messy public falling out over a $250 million bonus from parent company, Krafton. For months now, most coverage about the sequel has concerned the painful breakdown between Unknown Worlds' founders and Krafton, which acquired Unknown Worlds in October 2021. Over the summer, reports came to light that Subnautica 2's early access release was delayed to 2026 just...

View full article »

How Moonlighter 2 Is Emerging as a Top Roguelike and Shopkeeping Hybrid

Back in the decidedly murky days of May 2018, a game called Moonlighter arrived and delivered something no other title was attempting at the time. Blending shop management with classic fantasy roguelike dungeon-crawling, Moonlighter had players plundering dangerous dungeons for loot and glory before hauling those spoils home to stock and sell in their very own shop. It was a genuinely fresh concept, and it’s easy to see how Moonlighter won over players around the world. Now, more than seven years later, Moonlighter 2 (or, to use its full name, Moonlighter 2: The Endless Vault) has finally arrived, and it fully realises the promise of the original in ways that already make it feel essential for PC gamers. A Shift to 3D That Goes Far...

View full article »

Clair Obscur: Expedition 33 Collects 12 The Game Awards Nominations, the Most in the Awards' History

Somehow, the end of the year has returned, and it's time once again for a parade of award nominations and shows, including this year's The Game Awards. Ahead of its early December show, The Game Awards has released a list of this year's nominees, revealing that everyone really, really, really liked Clair Obscur: Expedition 33. Expedition 33 has gathered up a whopping 12 nominations, the most ever collected by a single game in The Game Awards' history. In addition to Game of the Year, it's also up for Best Direction, Best Narrative, Best Art Direction, Best Score and Music, Best Audio, Best Independent Game, Best Debut Independent Game, Best RPG, and three of its actors are nominated for Best Performance. A number of other games also...

View full article »

Battlefield 6 Update 1.1.2.0 Patch Notes Include Aim Assist Tweaks and Bloom Adjustments as Season 1 Continues

Battlefield 6 is roaring ahead, with update 1.1.2.0 patch notes revealing that open beta aim assist settings are back, as are more weapon dispersion and bloom tweaks, as EA and Battlefield Studios roll out the next new Season 1 map: Eastwood. The latest Battlefield 6 and REDSEC patch notes, which cover every change in tomorrow’s update, were listed in a new post on the project’s website. It comes with a breakdown for all of the new weapons and features included with the long-promised mid-season update, as well as a shortlist of other major changes, including additional clarity for challenges, a “major polish pass” for gadgets, improved latency and stick response for controllers, a healthy dose of bug fixes, and much, much more. Aim...

View full article »

'Fake News': Resident Evil Requiem Developers Dismiss Much-Discussed Fan Image of Leon With an Eyepatch

Resident Evil Requiem's producer has attempted to address the persistent speculation that fan-favorite character Leon S. Kennedy will appear in the game, by branding a particular image as "fake news." Capcom continues to promote the upcoming Resident Evil Requiem as a new entry in the series starring fresh protagonist Grace Ashcroft, though has never explicitly stated that she is the sole playable character. Indeed, when IGN sat down with Capcom at Gamescom 2025 in August, we were told that its staff members would not discuss any internet rumors of certain other characters appearing. But now, in an interview with Stevivor, producer Masato Kumazawa has at least acknowleged the ongoing speculation — and confirmed one particular image is...

View full article »

Assassin's Creed Publisher Ubisoft Says 'Many New Games Are Struggling' As Players Turn Away From Traditional Releases In Favor of Subscriptions, Live

Ubisoft has warned of falling company revenues and said it's seen that "many new games are struggling to stand out" as players turn away from traditional full-price releases. Projects that would previously have stood out are now finding it tough to "achieve the sales they may once had had," Ubisoft wrote in a new UK financial filing (thanks, CityAM), which blames a wider change in taste among players. Explaining that the "traditional 'full game model' of selling a single £50-60 [$65-$80] game to a consumer as a one-time purchase" was continuing to "become less ubiquitous", Ubisoft said players were now opting to spend their time and money in other ways, such as "subscription services, long-running Games As A Service titles, Free to...

View full article »

Borderlands 4 Hits a New Low Price, Including Switch 2 Preorders

Black Friday is creeping up on us. For those keeping an eye on the calendar, the big sale event kicks off next week on November 28, but there are already plenty of great deals to look through. This is especially true of video games, with select releases seeing some nice discounts so far. Borderlands 4 is among them at Amazon, as it's hit a new low price for PS5, Xbox Series X, and even preorders on Nintendo Switch 2. Borderlands 4 Hits a New Low Price According to price tracker camelcamelcamel, this is the lowest price yet for the PlayStation 5 and Xbox Series X versions of Borderlands 4. It's also a first-time price drop for the Switch 2 preorders, which is worth taking advantage of if you've been looking to own it for the...

View full article »

Microsoft Announces Xbox Partner Preview Showcase, Airing This Week

The next Xbox Partner Preview showcase event will be broadcast this week, Microsoft has confirmed. Tune in on Thursday, November 20 at 10am Pacific, 1pm Eastern, or 6pm UK time for another set of new announcements and trailers from Xbox partners, plus some additional Xbox Game Pass confirmations. Games shown during the event will include the highly-anticipated James Bond game 007 First Light from Hitman developer IO Interactive, plus Arthurian fantasy adventure Tides of Annihilation. Reanimal, the new horror game from Light Nightmares creator Tarsier Studios, will also be shown off in new detail. As ever, it's unlikely we'll hear any detail on Xbox's own first-party projects during the show, such as Halo, Fable or Forza: Motorsport...

View full article »

SWAPMEAT Mini-Review: Vile, Repugnant, and a Blast to Play

Gross-out games are a bit of an oddity for me. I usually get the ick from them, and playing them is something I just can’t abide, but for whatever reason, the grossness of SWAPMEAT ends up entertaining me instead. The core idea is simple: it’s a third-person shooter with missions spread across different planets, and to survive, you steal body parts from defeated enemies to gain new abilities, mixing and matching them however you want. The result is that you might wind up with a flying saucer for legs, a ninja for a head, and an eyebeam laser for a torso, plus your guns, helping you cut through the chaos. As you complete side objectives on each world, you level up and steer yourself toward a build focused on an elemental damage type...

View full article »

Magic: The Gathering's New Final Fantasy 7 Game Edition Commander Decks Are Finally Back in Stock

Amazon has finally restocked preorders for Magic: The Gathering's Final Fantasy 7 Game Edition Commander Deck. It's just in time, with the deck and several other new Final Fantasy MTG products set to release in just a couple of weeks on December 5. Costing $99.99, the new version of the "Limit Break" Commander Deck offers the same 100-card deck you can find already, but with a download code for the original Final Fantasy 7 on PC, and a new promo card featuring the iconic shot of Cloud in FF7. The new lineup has been incredibly hard to come by since it was revealed, and preorders sold out within a day. Amazon stocking up with a whole new allocation is great news for fans, and you no longer need to pay inflated prices to third-party...

View full article »

U.S. Congressman Blasts Call of Duty: Black Ops 7's Alleged AI Images: 'We Need Regulations That Prevent Companies from using AI to Eliminate Jobs'

A member of U.S. Congress has now called out Activision Blizzard's use of generative AI in Call of Duty: Black Ops 7, and demanded tighter regulation to "prevent companies from using AI to eliminate jobs." It's not been the smoothest start for Activision's blockbuster shooter franchise. When Call of Duty: Black Ops 7 launched last week, players promptly took to social media to complain about AI-generated images they had found across the game, primarily focusing on calling card images with a Studio Ghibli-esque styling, following a trend of AI-Ghibli images from earlier this year. Now, in a post on X/Twitter, Californian congressman has Ro Khanna slammed the developer's move to AI to "extract greater profits," writing: "We need...

View full article »

Anime Weapons Codes (November 2025)

Last tested and updated on NOVEMBER 17, 2025 - ADDED NEW CODES! Anime Weapons is a Roblox experience where you'll get to explore various worlds that are inspired by popular anime. As you visit each one, you'll complete quests and defeat waves of enemies to continuously earn rewards, including coins, weapons, and avatars. So whether you're just starting and picking your first weapon, or you've been grinding out quests already, these Anime Weapons codes will give you lots of potions, emeralds, reset tokens, and more! Active and Working Anime Weapons Codes Every time Anime Weapons releases a new code, we test it before we upload it to this article, so you can be sure that it's working. Here are all the currently active codes that can...

View full article »

While Call of Duty: Black Ops 7 Acknowledges Deliberate AI Use, Ubisoft Pledges to Remove AI Image That 'Slipped Through' To Anno 117's Final Version

Assassin's Creed publisher Ubisoft has said it will act swiftly to remove an image found within Anno 117: Pax Romana that contains AI-generated elements, which it says was not designed to be included in the game's final version. Fans of the city-building Anno franchise quickly spotted a loading screen featured in the series' latest entry that was not of the same quality seen in others, with some telltale signs of AI generation: missing limbs, low-quality features and oddly composited elements. As posted on reddit, and first reported by Kotaku, the game's Steam listing also features a warning that "AI tools were used tp help create some in-game assets." In a statement to IGN, Ubisoft noted that the image had been a "placeholder" and...

View full article »

'Lawyers Are Most Likely Already Watching Everything We Do': Fan Attempt to Revive Doomed PlayStation Live-Service Game Concord Takes Stock After 'Wor

Sony has issued takedown notices for videos showcasing a fan-led project that's bringing doomed PlayStation live-service game Concord back to life. PlayStation's quickly-binned hero shooter Concord was one of the biggest flops in the compay's history. Amid disastrously low player numbers, Sony pulled the game offline just two weeks after launch, with one estimate suggesting it sold just 25,000 copies. It proved a costly failure for Sony, with hundreds of millions of dollars wasted. Its developer, Firewalk Studios, closed shortly thereafter. Despite its brief life, or perhaps because of it, Concord remains of interest — with a dedicated group of players dedicating "months" of work to getting the game back online again...

View full article »

Call of Duty: Black Ops 7 Ashes of the Damned Interactive Map

IGN's Call of Duty: Black Ops 7 Ashes of the Damned map is now available! Our interactive map tracks all crucial locations across Ashes of the Damned, including Perk Machines, Secret Zombies Easter Eggs, Main Quest Objectives, Wall Buys, and even Audio Log collectibles, so you'll know exactly where to go as you attempt to fend off those waves of incoming Zombies. Call of Duty: Black Ops 7 Ashes of the Damned Interactive Map Keep track of your Easter Egg and collectible progress with our handy checklist feature! You can also filter exactly what you're looking for using the left-hand sidebar. The available map filters for our Ashes of the Damned interactive map include: Locations, such as Weapon and Armor Wall Buys, Ammo Caches...

View full article »

The Best Deals Today: Final Fantasy VII Rebirth, Hello Kitty Island Adventure, Borderlands 4, and More

We've rounded up the best deals for Sunday, November 16, below, so don't miss out on these limited-time offers. Final Fantasy VII Rebirth for $30 GameStop has Final Fantasy VII Rebirth available for $30. The second chapter of the Final Fantasy VII remake project brings Cloud Strife and the iconic cast into the world of Gaia for the first time, as they step out of Midgar following an eventful escape. Many new characters join the party, including Yuffie Kisaragi, Cait Sith, and more. With the third entry in the project currently in development, now is the perfect time to catch up and prepare. Dragon Quest III HD-2D Remake for $34.99 Dragon Quest III HD-2D Remake was one of the most enjoyable RPGs of 2024, featuring a gorgeous remade...

View full article »

The Best Deals Today: Ninja Gaiden: Ragebound, NBA 2K26, Apple AirPods 4, and More

We've rounded up the best deals for Saturday, November 15, below, so don't miss out on these limited-time offers. Ninja Gaiden: Ragebound for $32.48 Ninja Gaiden has had an incredible 2025, and today, you can score one of the franchise's most unique entries for $32.48. Ninja Gaiden: Ragebound released in August and was created by The Game Kitchen. In our 9/10 review, we wrote, "Ninja Gaiden: Ragebound looks and sounds incredible, and the fast but thoughtful combat is so satisfying it's hard to put down." NBA 2K26 for $29.99 NBA 2K26 is on sale this weekend for $29.99, which is the lowest price we've seen to date. You can score a copy for Switch, Switch 2, PS5, or Xbox Series X at this price. In our 8/10 review, we wrote, “Ball Over...

View full article »