Gaming News

Fortnite’s Disneyland Game Rush Is an Incredibly Authentic First Step Into Fortnite For Disney Parks

While we’re still waiting for Disney and Epic Games’ connected universe to arrive in Fortnite, a big step has been taken towards that goal as Disney Parks has arrived in Fortnite for the first time with Disneyland Game Rush. We had the chance to try out this Fortnite Creative island and discovered it to be an incredibly authentic experience that celebrates Disneyland’s 70th anniversary through enjoyable yet forgettable mini-games and environments inspired by beloved attractions such as Haunted Mansion, Star Wars: Rise of the Resistance, and more. Disneyland Game Rush is a limited-time offering in Fortnite that officially launches on November 6. You can simply search for the game title or jump right in by using the island code...

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Call of Duty: Black Ops Story Recap – Every Game Explained

The Call of Duty: Black Ops series has demonstrated a remarkable dedication to long-term storytelling. It’s fair to say that no other first-person shooter franchise has built such a sprawling, interconnected narrative spanning decades. Across seven games, Black Ops has created an intricate web of espionage, betrayal, and conspiracy that continues to evolve. With the release of Call of Duty: Black Ops 7, now is the perfect time to revisit the saga – to see how it all began, how it’s evolved, and how the latest chapter connects to everything that came before. NOTE: It goes without saying that the following article contains major story spoilers for the Black Ops series up to – and including – Call of Duty: Black Ops 6 Call of Duty...

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Battlefield 6 Gets 'Major' Overhaul of Challenges and Assignments, With 'Significant' Reductions to Challenge Requirements Available Now

Battlefield 6 developer BF Studios has announced a “major” overhaul of Challenges and Assignments, with “substantial” adjustments across the board. BF Studios said that these changes, outlined in patch notes below, build on the recent updates that increased the XP earned in official matches and reduced the XP needed for the first 20 attachment ranks. “This update makes significant reductions to challenge requirements, cutting down on time investment while maintaining a focus on skill-driven progression that rewards consistent play,” BF Studios explained. “Challenges and Assignments are tuned around defined playtime targets, and these changes bring their requirements in line with those goals to make them more achievable within a...

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Escape From Tarkov Shares Preorder and Beta Rewards as It Nears 1.0 Launch

Today, November 5, marks 10 years to the day Battlestate Games unveiled its extraction shooter, Escape from Tarkov. And now, 10 days from its 1.0 release, the developer has revealed preorder and beta rewards. Escape from Tarkov is a hardcore MMO mixture of first-person shooter / third-person shooter and role-playing gameplay. Players need to find a way out of the isolated Russian city of Tarkov, survive deadly hazards, and unearth the mysteries of the city. It's been playable in early access form since making its debut in 2016, and it's finally coming to Steam as part of the 1.0 launch on November 15. For anyone thinking of preordering the shooter ahead of its November 15 release — or those who've already preordered it — players can...

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Obsidian Knows Whenever It Announces a New Game Everyone Asks About Fallout: New Vegas 2, but It Loves Making Original IP and Sequels to Them

Obsidian has said it’s well aware that whenever it announces a new game, people ask where Fallout: New Vegas 2 is, but it loves how it’s been able to create new IP and even release sequels to them — and its owner Microsoft sounds like it supports that approach. Fallout Season 2 is set to hit Prime Video this December, and while Bethesda has a new Fallout: New Vegas bundle up its sleeve, there’s no word yet on a Fallout remaster or a Fallout: New Vegas 2 to capitalize on the surge of interest in the franchise. Obsidian is of course the developer of the much-loved 2010 RPG Fallout: New Vegas, so fans often wonder whether it will return to the setting for a sequel, especially given it’s owned by Bethesda parent company Microsoft...

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Valor Mortis Dev Dares Fans to Question the Game's Soulslike Credentials: 'If You Are Not Sure About It, Challenge Us'

Valor Mortis, the first-person action game set in an alt-history version of the Napoleonic wars, was announced earlier this year at Gamescom Opening Night Live. In its announcement and subsequent marketing, the developers have been clear about one big element of Valor Mortis: it’s a soulslike. Sure, it’s a first-person game, which automatically makes it look radically different from any FromSoftware game or even the 2D soulslikes such as Hollow Knight, Nine Sols, and Blasphemous. But speaking to me at the Game Industry Conference in Poznań, Wielkopolska, game director Radosław Ratusznik was hyperaware of the expectations that such a bold declaration would immediately attach to Valor Mortis. And he’s determined to do right by players...

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'What Connects Soulslike Players Is That They Are All Struggling' — Valor Mortis Dev Says It Won't Have 'Tens of Difficulty Options' So Players Can Ha

Valor Mortis, the first-person soulslike action game set in an alt-history Napoleonic era, is out next year. And with developer One More Level especially pushing the “Soulslike”-ness of the whole thing, it seems only natural that at some point before or after launch there’s going to be a discussion about the game’s difficulty - is it too hard? Is it hard enough? Should it have an easy mode, or something else? The difficulty discussion, of course, is one that crops up every time a new Souls game is released. What makes difficulty fun, and what makes it obnoxious? Should games have easy modes? What sorts of accessibility features are helpful to ensure everyone can play the game and experience its design friction as intended, without...

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Epic Games Celebrates Fortnite Player Spike as The Simpsons Season Launches

Epic Games has celebrated the launch of Fortnite's new The Simpsons mini-season, which it says has welcomed "the biggest number of new and returning Fortnite players since last holiday season." Public player data tracked by Fortnite.gg shows that a peak of 2.6 million players logged on both Saturday and Sunday, firstly to watch the live event that introduced The Simpsons aliens Kang and Kodos to Fortnite's battle royale Island, and secondly to then play on the game's new Springfield map when it came online. The live event saw Fortnite's heroes scooped up in a UFO and transported to Springfield Island, a mash-up of Fortnite and The Simpsons filled with familiar locations and Easter eggs from the long-running animated series. Fan...

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Call of Duty: Black Ops 7 Global Release Times and PC Specs Confirmed

With Call of Duty: Black Ops 7 just around the corner, Activision has laid out exactly when players will be able to jump into the action, and has confirmed everything players need to know about the official PC system requirements and pre-load times. While pre-load goes live at the same time across all platforms on November 10 — 9am PT (scroll down to see when that'll be in your part of the world), launch times vary depending upon where you are, and what platform you're playing on. It's a bit confusing, so we've outlined the release times across key territories below. We also have confirmed PC specs for Black Ops 7, so you can check to see if your PC is up to the task. Confirmed Call of Duty: Black Ops 7 PC specs: System Requirements...

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Bethesda Issues Fallout 4 Mod Warning Ahead of Anniversary Edition Release, Patch Will Make Gameplay and Performance Improvements as Well as Add New C

Bethesda has outlined the patch notes for Fallout 4 ahead of the release of the Creations Menu update and Anniversary Edition. During the recent Fallout Day broadcast, Bethesda announced Fallout 4 Anniversary Edition, due out across PC, PlayStation, and Xbox on November 10, 2025. Fallout 4 Anniversary Edition — designed to coincide with the post-apocalyptic role-playing game’s 10th anniversary — contains the six official add-ons and over 150 pieces of Creation Club content. Creations (user created content) arrive in Fallout 4 via a brand new in-game Creations menu, which will make it easy for players to find and download the new content on PC and console. Now, Bethesda has detailed Fallout 4’s Creation Menu update, due out on...

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Wreckreation Review

It’s been 6,496 days since the original release of Burnout Paradise, not that I’m counting. With the Burnout series clearly consigned to the same storage cupboard EA has been hiding the corpses of Westwood, Black Box, Pandemic, and all the other studios it shut down over the years, I completely understand the motivation for developer Three Fields Entertainment to craft Wreckreation. It’s an unapologetic Burnout Paradise clone in a stack of very clear ways, built for a ravenous audience that's been starved of one of arcade racing’s heaviest hitters for too long. After all, if you want something done, sometimes you need to do it yourself. Unfortunately, the one core component of its spiritual ancestor that Wreckreation couldn’t recapture...

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The $45 Baseus 20,800mAh 145W Power Bank Can Fast Charge Your Steam Deck, Xbox Ally X, or Legion Go

If you're looking for a power bank that can handle the demands of even the latest and most power hungry gaming handhelds at a great price, check out this early Black Friday deal. Amazon is offering the Baseus 20,800mAh Power Bank with 145W of Power Delivery for just $45 shipped after applying coupon code "GHNNKVYZ". You don't need to be a Prime member. Baseus makes good power banks and I recommend them as a less expensive alternative to Anker. Baseus 20,800mAh 145W Power Bank for $45 The Baseus power bank has a 20,800mAh or 77Whr battery capacity. Factoring in a roughly 80% power efficiency rating (which is about standard for power banks), this power bank will charge a Steam Deck (40Whr) or Asus ROG Ally (40Whr) from empty to...

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The Best MicroSD Cards for Handheld Gaming PCs: We Dove Into the Specs (So You Don’t Have to)

We’re in a golden age of portable gaming. Nintendo is still the king of the mountain with the Switch 2, but the market is also just lousy with handheld gaming PCs that you can play wherever you want. The fact that there are so many to pick from is a good problem to have, but once you’ve committed and freed yourself from the shackles of your TV, you’ll find you’re still bound by storage limits. How you deal with those limits depends on what you’re after. If it’s more space for the likes of Battlefield 6, you’re better off cracking open your console – if you’re comfortable doing so – and upgrading your internal storage to a higher capacity M.2 NVMe SSD than you are popping in a MicroSD card. Proper SSDs are simply better at loading games...

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Humble Choice for November 2025 Is Now Live

A new Humble Choice lineup becomes available on the first Tuesday of each month. That means November’s Humble Choice is now available for $14.99. This month, members get eight PC games with a total MSRP of $254, including Total War: Warhammer 3, Etrian Odyssey HD, and more. Read on for the full list and all the details. Humble Choice November 2025 Game Lineup All eight PC games are delivered in the form of Steam codes. It’s a solid lineup of titles, representing a wide variety of genres. That means there’s something for everyone, and some off-the-beaten-path games you might not normally buy, but now you get them without having to pay anywhere near full price. Here’s the full list of games included in the November 2025 Humble Choice...

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ROUTINE: Introducing the C.A.T. Ultraview Module – IGN First

What if the 1980's became the jumping off point for the future? Like how this year's Fantastic Four movie was a '50's version of the future? Enter ROUTINE, an upcoming first-person sci-fi horror game set on a lunar base. Like all good horror games, silence and loneliness are your worst enemies, and that's true in ROUTINE – except for the part where you discover a foe who thinks the primary threat is, in fact, you. Piece together the events that took place prior to your arrival, and try to survive. ROUTINE is our IGN First "cover story" game for November, ahead of its December 4 release for PC (Steam and Xbox on PC) and Xbox (Xbox Series X|S, Xbox One, and Xbox Cloud) – including Xbox Game Pass on day one. This first exclusive video...

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City of Balls Was the Original Title — And Somehow, Ball X Pit Got Even Weirder From There

Ball X Pit is the latest obsession to grip gamers, a chaotic roguelite that mashes together the mechanics of games like Peggle, Diablo and Vampire Survivors to make something that's impossible to characterize, but is dangerously playable. Somehow it's the work of one man, Kenny Sun, a game developer from Brooklyn, NY who loves games like Vampire Survivors, Deep Rock Galactic Survivor and Blotch Arrow. We spoke to Sun to first of all, confirm how the hell we say the Ball x Pit out loud, and then to talk about how he created this moreish Frankenstein's monster of a game. "It’s Ball Pit. Just Ball Pit. There’s no X," explains Sun. "It’s mostly a tribute to anime like Phantom Hunter. Also, X can mean fusion, which ties into the game’s...

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Fortnite Now Polling Fans Over Unpopular Pet Restrictions, Which Require You to Rebuy Sidekicks Just to Change Their Fur Color

Fortnite developer Epic Games has issued a fresh user survey polling players over its pet-like Sidekicks — and in particular, the need to rebuy each creature to get another version, after your basic design choices are made permanent. Currently, Fortnite forces fans to lock in their Sidekick's body color, shape and style upon first use, and warns players that their decision cannot be changed again. For now, just one Sidekick animal is available — banana dog hybrid Peels, which you get two of within Fortnite's current The Simpsons battle pass. Upon first equipping the pooch, you must decide from three banana skin colors (yellow, yellow-green, or mottled), an ear shape (pointy, less pointy, flat) and a body style (slender, or thicc)...

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Microsoft Announces Xbox Game Pass November 2025 Wave 1 Lineup

Microsoft has announced the Xbox Game Pass November 2025 Wave 1 lineup of games, headlined by Call of Duty: Black Ops 7. As a Microsoft-owned video game, Black Ops 7 launches straight into Game Pass day one when it comes out on November 14. That’s across cloud, console, and PC for Game Pass Ultimate and PC Game Pass subscribers only. But there are a number of games hitting Game Pass before Treyarch and Raven’s first-person shooter arrives. On November 5, Dead Static Drive (Cloud, Console, and PC) arrives on Game Pass Ultimate and PC Game Pass as another day one release. As per Xbox Wire, Dead Static Drive is “Grand Theft Cthulhu.” "An indie survival-horror game following a nightmarish road trip across a 1980s Americana, Dead Static...

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Warhammer Survivors Is a New Twist on Indie Smash Hit Vampire Survivors — and It's Developed in Partnership With Poncle

There are a lot of promising upcoming Warhammer video games, but this is one I did not expect to add to my list: Warhammer Survivors. It’s a Warhammer twist on indie smash hit, Vampire Survivors, and was developed in partnership with poncle (Luca Galante), the creator of the much-loved fast-paced rogue-like. Indeed, Warhammer Survivors uses poncle’s Vampire Survivors engine. Warhammer Survivors lets you play as characters from both Warhammer 40,000 (the grimdark far future one) and Warhammer: Age of Sigmar (the fantasy one), and, this being a Survivors game, tasks you with destroying endless swarms of enemies in ‘pixel-vomit’ gameplay. It’s due out in 2026, developed and published by Auroch Digital (Warhammer 40,000: Boltgun)...

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Fortnite Chapter Seven Teases Kill Bill Crossover, Points to USA Setting

Fortnite is already teasing what's next for the game, even as it enjoys a positive response to its just-launched The Simpsons-themed mini-season. Following its current foray into Springfield, which is set to conclude on November 29, Fortnite is expected to fully transition to its seventh Island home — an era that Epic Games is already teasing as "Chapter Seven." An official "Chapter Seven" teaser shared by Fortnite content creator NickEh30 includes real-world coordinates for the Hollywood sign, and the following text: "Now Playing / Zero Hour / Chapter Seven / Fortnite After Dark With Q&U." "Q&U" was quickly linked by fans to the acronym used by Hollywood's Quentin Tarantino and Uma Thurman for their work as director and lead actor...

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Dragon Quest Creator Yuji Horii Becomes First Video Game Creator Awarded Order of the Rising Sun by Japanese Government

In the autumn honors list, the Japanese government has given Dragon Quest creator Yuji Horii the Order of the Rising Sun. This is one of the highest awards the government of Japan can bestow on citizens. It is awarded to those who have made significant contributions in their field, and Horii is the first game creator to receive it. "I think it's a great honor, I'm surprised." Horii responded in a video interview with TBS. “I’ve been making games for quite a long time now, about 40 years, but I didn’t do it alone. It's all thanks to the staff who helped create the games alongside me, and to all the players who have continuously supported us." Yuji Horii’s first game was 1983’s Love Match Tennis, which he entered into a game contest...

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'It Never Quite Came Together, and It Was Never Finished' — Rockstar Co-Founder Dan Houser Discusses Canceled GTA 5 Single-Player Trevor DLC for First

Grand Theft Auto fans have known for some time that Rockstar Games worked on a single-player DLC for GTA 5 that would have seen Trevor assume the role of a secret agent. Last year, voice actor Steven Ogg said Rockstar originally planned to make a story expansion focused on his character, Trevor, with it thought to have fallen by the wayside as the developer focused on the cash cow that was GTA Online. Ogg was joined by Michael actor Ned Luke and Franklin actor Shawn Fonteno in a Questions and Answers session with Streamily. The trio shed light on what they claimed was scrapped downloadable content for GTA 5 that starred Trevor as a Federal Investigation Bureau agent. "Originally they were gonna do continuing stories of Michael...

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Here’s Why Where Winds Meet Is Not Your Typical Wuxia MMO

Where Winds Meet is an unusual entry in the MMO genre. Developed by Chinese studio Everstone, it stands apart in several ways. This ambitious project combines single-player storytelling with MMO features and a richly realised Wuxia setting. Here’s why it’s unlike anything else you’ve played. A Surprising Single-Player MMORPG Hybrid One of the biggest surprises about Where Winds Meet is that you can play it entirely solo. Despite being an MMO, it offers a full single-player campaign. The game is free-to-play, yet it feels substantial. Players can enjoy hours of story content without spending a penny. You take on the role of a mysterious sword master in 10th-century China. The story-driven campaign unfolds across an expansive open...

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U.S. Patent Office Boss Orders Reexamination of Nintendo's Controversial 'Summon Character and Let It Fight' Pokémon Patent, Which IP Lawyer Claims 'F

The director of the United States Patent and Trademark Office has ordered a reexamination of Nintendo's controversial 'summon character and let it fight' Pokémon patent after it was heavily criticized by IP lawyers. In September, IP lawyers criticized the U.S. patent system and the USPTO after Nintendo was awarded a Pokémon patent that revolves around summoning a character and letting it fight. Games Fray reported that Patent No. 12,403,397, dubbed the '397 patent, was granted by the USPTO "without any objection” to Nintendo, which is embroiled in ongoing litigation with Pocketpair's Palworld. While the patent sums up how Pokémon games work in that you summon Pokémon to battle other Pokémon in the hope of adding them to your...

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Over a Decade After Release, Obsidian's Pillars of Eternity Gets Surprise Patch to Add Turn-Based Mode

Pillars of Eternity is the surprise recipient of a patch to add turn-based mode, developer Obsidian has announced. Fresh from releasing Avowed, Grounded 2, and The Outer Worlds 2 this year, the Microsoft-owned studio has gone back to its isometric, party-based fantasy RPG over a decade after it came out with a fresh update. Obsidian announced a new public beta for Pillars of Eternity opens on November 5 for players on Steam and Xbox PC, which adds the turn-based mode. The reveal comes alongside a message from game director Josh Sawyer (last seen directing Pentiment), with his thoughts on what turn-based mode means for Pillars of Eternity. “Fans who enjoyed experimenting with turn-based mode in Pillars of Eternity II: Deadfire will...

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Hollow Knight: Silksong PSA: You're Missing a Bench in Bilewater

Hey. Hey you. Yes, you. The one playing Hollow Knight: Silksong. I just wanted to let you know, before you go any further, that you're missing a bench in Bilewater. Just in case that helps. If you're not to Bilewater yet, this PSA is still for you. You will get there, and you will want to know this. I am going to spoil what's in Bilewater in this piece, so if you don't want to know that information, leave and come back when you've gotten sufficiently angry at Bilewater. Bilewater is notorious. It is a massive, disgusting zone on the other side of the already frustrating Sinner's Road that you can stumble into fairly early on in Act 1 of Silksong, and which is required if you ever want to see the game's Act 3. There are many reasons...

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Battlefield 6 Map Debate Reaches New Level as Players Meticulously Measure 70+ Maps from BF3, BF2042, and More

FPS fans have spent months obsessing about Battlefield 6 map sizes, so some players finally took the time to measure and compare nearly every map the series has seen in the last 15 years. The Battlefield map size breakdown is a collaborative effort organized by Reddit users ClaraTheRed and PENGUINonPC and includes multiplayer locations featured in Battlefield 3, Battlefield 4, Battlefield: Hardline, Battlefield 1, Battlefield 2042, and, of course, last month’s Battlefield 6. It comes not only with a side-by-side comparison for each game’s map, organized by game mode and player count, but also color-coded horizontal bar graphs, illustrating how EA’s approach to map sizes has changed through the years. ClaraTheRed shared details about...

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GTA 6 Dev Rockstar Accused of Union Busting in Sudden Firing of Dozens of Staff

Rockstar, the developer of Grand Theft Auto VI, reportedly fired between 30 and 40 employees in a move that the Independent Workers’ Union of Great Britain (IWGB) is claiming was "blatant" and "ruthless" union busting. According to Bloomberg, the workers fired this past Thursday were all UK and Canadian employees who were also part of a private trade union chat group on Discord, and were either union members themselves or trying to organize Rockstar. IWGB has issued a press release in response to the firing, claiming that the employees' dismissal was explicitly due to union activities. In response, Rockstar has issued its own statement via a Take-Two spokesperson, countering that the firings were for "gross misconduct, and for no...

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Odds Chronicles Brings Tactical, Tabletop-Style Roguelite RPG Gaming to PC

Introducing Odds Chronicles, a new tactical roguelite RPG that features dice-roll battles set on diorama-like stages. You play in a fallen kingdom as Evryn, a former royal bodyguard in that kingdom in a tabletop-inspired fantasy story. It's in development for PC and due out in 2026. Developed by eSolu and Team Mojo Games, Odds Chronicles renders its tactical diorama battlefields in Unreal Engine 5 and is doing its best to embrace its tabletop inspiriations. "Click to roll or throw the dice yourself, then use every face like a weapon," the developers said. "Generate resources - Strength, Dexterity and Magic - to fuel abilities. Charge powerful skills over time or unleash them immediately. Unused resources fill a bonus gauge, granting...

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Skygard Arena Mini-Review: A Smart, Strategic Twist on MOBAs

MOBAs are a blast… so long as you don’t mind a brutally steep learning curve and the inevitable barrage of messages from players with thousands of hours in the game you just decided to try. Still, the core mechanics make progress deeply satisfying, and Skygard Arena excels at adapting those systems into a turn-based format that offers a more relaxed pace and a surprisingly strong single-player mode. Success depends on mastering your squad of champions—not just controlling them, but learning when and where to use their abilities, finding your favourite synergies, and strengthening them over time. Each champion has unique skills and traits, meaning there’s a lot of experimentation involved in crafting the perfect team composition...

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