Figuring out which upcoming Xbox games will be console exclusive hasn't been totally clear so far, but in an interview with GamesRadar+, CCO Matt Booty says fans shouldn't expect all single-player games to be locked down either.

After slowly shipping many of its formerly exclusive games across the multiplatform pond, Xbox recently announced a return to exclusivity. Gears of War: E-Day will only be available on Xbox Series X|S and PC when it launches later this year, as will Clockwork Revolution when it drops sometime next year, with more to come in the future.

But not every game coming out of Xbox Game Studios, Bethesda, and Activision Blizzard will follow suit. Minecraft Dungeons 2 and Grounded 2 are both hitting other systems later this year, and chief strategy officer Matthew Ball tells us that "large live-service titles" will also be multiplatform moving forward as well.

If big multiplatform games are launching everywhere, then some fans might reasonably expect signature single-player games to remain Xbox exclusive. Speaking to GamesRadar+ about Xbox's messy return to exclusives, Matt Booty explains that's not necessarily the case: "I wouldn't overly fixate on single-player. I think that's a good rule of thumb, but it certainly isn't something that's carved in stone."

Asked about how the company decides what's exclusive and what's not, then, Booty says "there are a lot of different games in our portfolio, and we have to think about how different games serve different purposes within it." Ball was a little more frank, saying he knows "this approach is not obvious to all of our players," but the company is apparently "committed to making this clearer."

Right now, Xbox's strategy is to not announce platforms until a game is closer to shipping. Hopefully the firm removes some of that guesswork in the future.

For now, we know marque multiplayer games will try to attract eyeballs from everywhere, so expect future Call of Duties to remain available on rival consoles. The fate of single-player games, such as Hideo Kojima's OD or The Elder Scrolls 6, remains up in the air, however.

With so much in flux, check out every studio Xbox owns and what they're making.

The Steam Machine's price tag is already scarily expensive and downright unaffordable for your everyday player - starting at $1,049 for the cheapest 512GB model without a controller - but that eye-watering price is unlikely to come down anytime soon. Valve and, seemingly, the rest of the industry are bracing for the worst.

As AI data centres continue to swallow up memory chips and storage and a bunch of other components used in consumer devices, prices for PC gamers and hardware manufacturers have skyrocketed. Hence, the RAMageddon we're living through now. On the console side, prices have boomed and Xbox CEO Asha Sharma recently said she expects memory costs to double again before the fall of 2027. Lenovo also predicted we're in a new normal for RAM costs.

Valve isn't anymore optimistic about the RAM crisis calming down, either. Speaking to Bloomberg about the Steam Machine's lengthy development, Valve engineer Yazan Aldehayyat shared a pretty grim outlook about the near future.

"Honestly, it's still getting worse," Aldehayyat says about pricing. "Just in case people are not aware. What people are seeing on retail shelves right now, from our observations, is lagging what we're seeing from a bulk supply by at least three to six months." (Thanks for the spot, PCG!)

AI centres (that don't even exist yet) calling dibs on memory chips (that also don't exist yet) isn't just affecting pricing for the Steam Machine and consoles. Fellow Valve engineer Pierre-Loup Griffais says the crisis is also impacting how many machines the company can even produce: "We're basically building everything we can. We're limited by memory capacity, for sure."

The rest of the interview with the Steam Machine engineers is just as insightful. Valve seemingly isn't too bothered about how many Steam Machines it can sell at the moment since the device is just another avenue to get people into open-source PC gaming and Valve's ecosystem, apparently.

Valve is switching up its Steam Machine error codes to be more helpful, starting with its scary red overheating light

Rockstar Games' open-world adventures almost always try to one-up their predecessors, at least in terms of sheer size, and that's not a pattern one former GTA 5 developer anticipates will change when GTA 6 finally blasts onto the scene.

John Ricchio, a former producer on everything from GTA 5 and Red Dead Redemption to Max Payne 3, was recently asked about whether he'd even want to be part of the studio ahead GTA 6's imminent launch.

"I think the fact that every single time they do a GTA, it's ludicrously bigger than before is like something that I think about," Ricchio says in a chat with YouTuber Kiwi Talkz. "Like, I can only imagine the size of GTA 6. Like it must be monstrous. Or if not monstrous, it's probably way more detailed."

That's an expectation he has based on Rockstar Games' track record so far. As he notes, GTA 5 was "significantly bigger than GTA 4," which itself was much bigger in many ways than the original Red Dead Redemption. "Even between GTA and RDR, they were continually growing the size of the world," he adds. And while the ballooning scope adds extra wrinkles for the development team, "it really does make you feel like you're in a place."

Circling back to the question, Ricchio then laughs and says, "I'm pretty happy that I'm not on GTA 6. Not that it wouldn't be cool to work with those people… but it is really difficult, and it's a hard period of your career when you're working that hard on something." Despite the hard work, seeing how excited people get over his work is "magic" and "so rewarding" for Ricchio.

GTA 6 is on track for "the strongest pre-order campaign ever recorded" and up to $5 billion in sales by "the end of launch week," analysts say

Baldur's Gate 3 and Clair Obscur: Expedition 33 star Jennifer English is pulling out of upcoming fantasy RPG Tides of Annihilation due to personal health reasons, and is handing her role over to another yet-unnamed actor while working as an advisor on the project.

Jennifer English has been involved in some of the best RPGs of recent years, lending her vocal chords to Baldur's Gate 3's Shadowheart, Clair Obscur: Expedition 33's Maelle, Elden Ring's Latenna, and much more. While Tides of Annihilation was hoping to cash in on the genre's lucky charm, things haven't turned out as planned.

"We have some sad news to share, that Jennifer English will be stepping away from her role as the English voice of Gwendolyn, the main protagonist in Tides of Annihilation due to personal health reasons," developer Eclipse Glow Games writes in a social media post. "She will continue to support the project in an advisory role."

"During this transition, Jennifer remained incredibly supportive and, together with other members of our voice cast, helped us identify and connect with talented performers who could carry Gwendolyn forward while staying true to the character," the studio adds. "With Jennifer's support and recommendation, together with recommendations from other members of our voice cast, we've been fortunate to find an incredibly talented performer to carry Gwendolyn forward."

The Tencent-backed Eclipse Glow Games didn't name who will be voicing the game's protagonist moving forward, but we'll apparently find out by the time Tides of Annihilation's Gamescom 2026 demo is in the public's hands: "Players will hear her performance for the first time in the demo this August, as well as in select official updates shared across our channels during the same period."

Over on Instagram, English said she's "really grateful to have been part of Tides of Annihilation since the game's inception and to have worked with such lovely team." The actor also shared a bit more about what motivated her to take a step back from the project: "Recently, I've found myself needing to slow down and reassess the commitments I've taken on. After careful thought, I've realised I need to take time to rest and properly look after my mental and physical health."

Tides of Annihilation doesn't have a release window, but it'll be coming to PC, Xbox Series X|S and PS5 when it's out the oven. The game was originally set to have English star opposite her real-life partner Aliona Baranova in a shattered, twisted fantasy version of London.

While you're here, why not check out the most exciting new games of 2026 and beyond.

Bethesda unceremoniously dropped a cache of news about its upcoming games today as the wait for The Elder Scrolls 6 drags ever closer to 10 years. In a lengthy Twitter post, we learned that Fallout 5 is in pre-production, Fallout 3 and Fallout: New Vegas remasters are in the works, and buried in the middle of the reveal blitz is the next Fallout 76 expansion, titled Raven Rock.

"Fallout 76 continues to be home to millions of players exploring Appalachia together," reads Bethesda's announcement. "With nearly 70 free updates released to date, the journey is far from over.

"In fact, we have a major Fallout 76 expansion planned for next year: Raven Rock, a prequel story to Fallout 3."

Unironically, this is one of the most exciting new Bethesda announcements in a long while. The Fallout 76 team has proven itself capable of telling compelling stories at the scale of mainline Fallout games with substantial narrative expansions like Steel Dawn and Steel Reign, which together tell one of my favorite interpretations of the Brotherhood of any game in the series. I'm thrilled about the potential to see the same development team explore that faction even further in a Fallout 3 prequel story.

We also have a writeup on everything that was announced about the future of Fallout as well as The Elder Scrolls, which is all relatively exciting if you can get past the stink of Xbox's recent layoff bloodbath, which definitely impacted Bethesda proper as well as many other Xbox studios. For what it's worth, the labor union representing Bethesda Game Studios employees in the US and Canada suggested in the wake of the company's announcements that it was simply a distraction from the bad news, and that fans would do well not to "fall for it."

Bethesda says The Elder Scrolls 6 is going great, actually: "We're where we planned to be, loving how it looks, and playing it every day"

While it seems likely that the next-generation of video game consoles will eschew physical discs entirely judging by PlayStation's recent announcement about physical media, other industries are watching the pendulum swing the other way. A new report suggests that physical music CDs are surging in popularity, thanks in part to a new generation of fans.

"In a much-discussed physical-media pivot, CD sales surged 16% to 16.3 million units in the first half of 2026, vastly outpacing vinyl's modest 2.4% growth," according to a new report from Luminate. "Driven by collection building, price accessibility, massive albums such as BTS’ ARIRANG and a strong K-pop release schedule, this revival belies an unexpected development: Approximately half of Gen Z and Millennial CD buyers do not actually own a CD player."

These stats specifically reflect the US market, so take them as you will for the broader industry, but it does all suggest people are once again seeing the value in physical media – particularly as we all grow increasingly understanding of the limitations of digital ownership.

The surge in CD sales is driven by some major K-pop releases, but with that genre stripped out the growth would still be a notable 6.7%. Luminate suggests that these stats indicate "that the CD has been recontextualized from a functional audio format into an affordable collectible. This behavior underscores that for younger generations, the act of buying physical music is as much about aesthetic ownership and direct financial support for the artist as it is listening to the music on the product itself."

Admittedly, the music market and the game industry are very different. While buying a CD is a way of more directly supporting your favorite artist than simply streaming their music, most digital game sales generate just as much revenue as their physical counterparts – and that revenue isn't being cut down with retail overhead.

But the other benefits of physical media, like its collectable nature, the connection of holding an actual object, and the fact that it can't be taken away from you on a publisher's whim, all hold true across both industries. The vast majority of modern game sales are digital, but the physical games market actually had some minor growth recently. Whether that growth would be enough to turn the tide back towards physical media is a question it'd probably take years to answer, but Sony certainly isn't waiting around to find out.

Sony killing physical PlayStation games is "the latest attack on our diminishing rights," leading digital rights group says: "The end goal is to turn the customer into a renter."

Nintendo is famously protective over its IP, but even some of its most closely held secrets, like the recently revealed Zelda: Ocarina of Time remake, have been leaked ahead of their official announcements. That's despite the fact that, according to two of the company's former marketing leads, you were almost sure to lose your job if you were found to have mishandled confidential information.

Kit Ellis and Krysta Yang, the ex-Nintendo marketing heads behind the popular Kit & Krysta podcast, speak at length about what it's like being responsible with Nintendo's secrets in a new episode of the show. Apparently, it's pretty stressful. Unsurprisingly, information about unannounced projects was handed out on a strictly need-to-know basis, and if you let it slip to anyone who wasn't approved to know, your career at Nintendo was at risk.

"There were some very clear lines for the people who were traveling with product," says Ellis. "It was like, yeah, lose the product, you lose your job. ... if you're responsible for the information getting out there in a reckless way you're probably gone."

Yang adds that being privy to "pieces of information was the most valuable commodity" working at Nintendo, because it meant the company trusted you with its secrets. But with great power, of course, comes great responsibility, and both Ellis and Yang admit they were "scared straight" of accidentally leaking something.

According to Yang, it was "hard to keep a secret because sometimes you struggle with like, 'ah I wish I could just tell that one other person because that would make my job a little easier, but I can't so I gotta be real cagey about the way I communicate with this person."

Regardless, Yang reiterates, "If the information got out and it was pinned to you as the reckless person that accidentally did that, it was very clear that that was going to be the end of your career at Nintendo."

Ellis and Yang previously said Nintendo's long-awaited reveal of the Ocarina of Time remake fell flat because of reputable rumors from noteworthy industry leaker Nate the Hate. You can argue that it also fell short of expectations because hardly anything was shown beyond a sleeping HD Link, but Ellis and Yang reckoned Nintendo was "looking to kill" following the leaks.

After 10 years, unofficial Zelda: Ocarina of Time remake ends development following official Switch 2 remake reveal: "I think I have made history"

Disco Elysium developer ZA/UM has announced layoffs impacting up to 32 of its employees after new RPG Zero Parades: For Dead Spies suffered from disappointing sales. Disco Elysium fans are not surprised.

"Talented passionate workers, evil inept ownership," says one reaction to ZA/UM's announcement on Bluesky. In the years since adored RPG Disco Elysium launched in 2019, ZA/UM has managed to earn several lifetimes' worth of bad karma: it canceled a Disco Elysium sequel in 2022 and other Disco-related projects among the company leadership's downward spiral into finger-pointing, lawsuits, and an apparent hostile takeover from CEO Ilmar Kompus, who studio founder Robert Kurvitz accused of fraud. ZA/UM later underwent mass layoffs in 2024, and many of Disco Elysium's developers no longer work for the company. Instead, they splintered off into several new studios competing with each other in making the perfect Disco spiritual successor.

In spite of all this, Zero Parades is a good game – our three-and-a-half star out of five Zero Parades review at least found it capable of "some of the old charm" – and ZA/UM proudly references its "critical acclaim" in its July 17 layoff announcement.

Nonetheless, Zero Parade's "commercial performance has not enabled us to sustain a studio of our current size," the developer says. "We have served redundancy or at-risk notices impacting up to 32 of our colleagues across all departments at ZA/UM Studio. Their work has made a lasting difference and left its mark on ZERO PARADES."

ZA/UM mentions it's working with ZA/UM Workers' Alliance representatives, and it pointedly says that layoffs simply twist "the shape of ZA/UM, but not its purpose."

"Our artistic standards remain unchanged: we will persist," the studio concludes. But its earliest fans are capable of the loyalty the studio needs right now, and they seem unconvinced.

Zero Parades being an easier RPG than Disco Elysium makes perfect sense – and makes it more fun.

Behold, the terrifying march of time: Skyrim came out in 2011 and Fallout 4 launched in 2015, yet both games still bookend their respective series. Bethesda hasn't released a new mainline installment for its two best-known RPG series in over a decade, and Starfield didn't scratch quite the same itch for many.

So, today's motherlode of Fallout and The Elder Scrolls news, unceremoniously dropped online this morning, was a welcome release from years of waiting, rumors, silence, and more waiting. Here's a one-stop look at everything Bethesda revealed today, on the heels of layoffs that have cost the studio several design veterans from these series. (Bethesda boss Todd Howard called the layoffs a "really tough" part of a "change" to the studio.)

Fallout 5 is in pre-production, which could mean anything from a small group of developers putting white boards through the ringer to ideas on a napkin in Todd Howard's desk. Bethesda's active development priority is The Elder Scrolls 6, which, the studio says, is going well despite having nothing to show eight years after that notorious announcement teaser.

Both of these games use Creation Engine 3, the latest evolution of the game-making software, tools, and resources that have come to define Bethesda's style.

Remasters of Fallout 3 and Fallout: New Vegas are in the works, though we don't know who's making them or when they'll arrive. Original New Vegas developer Obsidian has returned to partner closely with Bethesda on the Fallout series, but its project is equally unknown. The Elder Scrolls 4: Oblivion Remastered was notably in the hands of third-party dev Virtuous.

Similarly, Zenimax Online Studios will work more closely with Bethesda proper even as it continues support for The Elder Scrolls Online, which sounds difficult given its more severe layoffs.

Fallout 76's 2027 expansion, Raven Rock, will act as a "prequel story" to Fallout 3. Mobile hit Fallout Shelter is on track for more seasonal updates after reaching over 250 million players, and is also the focus of an "unscripted" TV project in the works at Amazon Studios and Kilter Films. Work on Fallout season 3, the next chapter of the hit TV show, continues apace.

According to Bethesda's latest figures, Fallout 4 has sold 35 million copies and Skyrim has passed 65 million, putting the studio's latest high-profile releases at a combined 100 million copies sold, which somehow makes this decade-and-change of non-news feel even more surreal.

Starfield, meanwhile, has seen over 17 million players, and is entering Year 3 of post-launch support with plans for further gameplay refinements, additional stories, and future Starborn content.

"Across Bethesda Game Studios, we're building for the future of Fallout, The Elder Scrolls, and Starfield," the studio's announcement concludes. "We're investing in our technology, bringing teams closer together, supporting our live games, expanding into new forms of entertainment, and developing the next generation of Bethesda RPGs."

And yes, the real announcement is, ultimately, more waiting.

"Don't fall for it": Union says Fallout 5 and Elder Scrolls 6 news shouldn't distract you from huge Bethesda layoffs as Xbox CEO praises the series' "remarkable" achievements

Marathon game director Joe Ziegler has stepped down and left Bungie a short two months after the developer announced its final update for fellow FPS Destiny 2. His last day at the company was July 17.

Former Destiny 2 design lead Del Chafe III will take over as game director with help from Marathon's current creative director Julia Nardin. Ziegler writes in a Twitter announcement, "Both of them have been operating in a strong leadership capacity for the team and are ready to guide Marathon into the next chapter with an even better and brighter future." Marathon launched in March with a peak concurrent player count of 88,337, according to Steam DB, and its current player count as of writing is 6,775.

Nardin told GamesRadar+ earlier this summer that Marathon's team already knew "where we want to take the story over the next few years," so, at least publicly, Bungie looks ready to invest in Marathon as it leaves Destiny 2 in a sad, comatose state. But the fact that the shooter has gone from nearly 90,000 simultaneous players to under 10,000 is a foreboding one.

"I just want to say a deeply heartfelt thank you to all of you for supporting me and Marathon in our windy mission to bring a dark and terrifying space survival frontier to your screen," Ziegler says. "The mission will continue in new and surprising ways so stay tuned for what this team has in store for you!" The developer says he will "be heading to something new, somewhere else" with updates to come "soon."

"Hopefully as I move onto new things, you'll join me for those adventures as well," he adds.

Bungie has recently been shedding employees like cat hair – it laid off "most" of its Destiny 2 team in a massive sweep, and while PlayStation CEO Herman Hulst swore to staff at the time that Marathon "remains an important part of our portfolio, and we will continue to support the team," some of its devs were also impacted by layoffs. Following those layoffs, Bundie studio head Justin Truman reportedly stepped down from his position after less than a year.

"Working at Bungie was the most toxic, dysfunctional experience of my professional life," former narrative lead Michael Zenke, who left Bungie in 2017, remarked after Destiny 2's death knell update was announced. Ziegler's sudden departure from Marathon after a now seems like evidence of this. You can't enjoy a home with a crumbling foundation.

As Destiny 2 ends, what's next for Bungie?

Another day, another Diablo 4 stir-up. This time, however, I'm not sure how much blame can be reasonably placed on developer Blizzard, as a big part of the issue stems from some very important – and not even very fine – print that's just not being read.

I'm always cautious to throw up a shield around Blizzard when disgruntled Diablo 4 players come a-knockin', but in this case, the root of the controversy can be pretty evenly divvied up between legitimately confusing precedent set by another crafting recipe, and also gamers' unwillingness to read onscreen text.

See, Diablo 4's season 14, which hasn't been going down well at all, introduced a new crafting recipe for the Horadric Cube. It's called Upgrade to Mythic, which at face value would make you think it's a way to take a Unique and make it a Mythic item with all of the same properties and one additional Mythic power. After all, the pre-existing Upgrade to Legendary path does exactly that, but at the Legendary tier. But no, the Upgrade to Mythic recipe takes your Unique and gives you back a random Mythic item of the same type. So your Unique dagger is going to come out a Mythic dagger, but here's the rub: it won't necessarily be the same dagger that went into the Cube, and in all likelihood, it will be a completely different item with its own stats.

The tooltip for the recipe reads verbatim: "Transmutes a Unique equipment item with at least 850 Item Power into a random Mythic of the same item slot," which is pretty darn unambiguous. That said, I can understand that the Upgrade to Legendary recipe being what it is can cause some confusion. It's just that, still, at the end of the day, simply reading that recipe description even just once would completely eliminate any doubt about what the crafting tool is going to do.

Still, "Diablo 4 Players Keep Destroying Valuable Items Because of One Misleading Recipe," reads a recent headline from Icy Veins. "Guilty," reads the top comment on a Reddit thread discussing the article. "I lost a really good dagger because I thought I was 'upgrading.'"

"Me too. I logged off for a few days afterwards," says another commenter.

"Same lol," says another.

"Yup me too," says another. And so on.

Again, I'm not saying Blizzard is completely blameless here. It is undeniably weird that the Upgrade to Mythic recipe destroys the input item and gives you something completely random when the Upgrade to Legendary recipe gives you the same item but Legendary, but I also can't help but think this whole mess is a pretty compelling argument for the infamous yellow paint that's often used as a visual cue to guide players toward their goal. In this case, it's not about reading between the lines – it's literally about reading the lines.

On the bright side: New Diablo 4 hotfix finally increases Mythic drop rates and removes limits on equipping them as Blizzard admits "not every idea lands exactly as intended."

The Famicom was already a success in Japan by the time Nintendo considered bringing it worldwide as the NES, but in the wake of the Atari crash, its fortunes in the US were by no means assured. While Wikipedia shows that the NES launched in the US in 1985, that was effectively just for a test market in New York City, and Nintendo of America was fighting hard against its own budget to get the console off the ground.

Last year, a handful of Nintendo of America's earliest employees joined a panel at the Portland Retro Gaming Expo to talk about their experiences launching the NES. While the company was technically headquartered in Seattle, Washington, several key employees also worked out of a warehouse in Hackensack, New Jersey in order to support the test launch in New York City. This warehouse, it seems, was not a great working environment.

"They would tell me that there were snakes in the bathroom," Gail Tilden, who was at the time NOA's advertising manager, says. "I often was staying in the city with the ad agency, but then when I would come out, I couldn't go to the bathroom all day because they would tell me that there were snakes and rats in the bathroom."

"They were just garter snakes," according to Bruce Lowry, who was then NOA's vice president of sales. "They weren't anything that were going to bite you." Clearly, the company's facility budget wasn't particularly robust, but it seems the advertising budget wasn't much better. This is why Nintendo of America had to start doing barter advertising – an established practice that the company would return to years later.

With barter advertising, "you say 'we'll give you our advertising dollars if you will do X,'" Tilden explains. "That's kind of what we did with Toys R Us. 'We're going to place our advertising dollars with the agency you own and you're going to carry our product.' With Pokemon, we did the same thing. We used Nintendo's advertising dollars to get the show on the air in 80 markets to kick off the launch of Pokemon and [that] was a big contributor to the success."

In 1985, "we didn't have a lot of money at Nintendo, so we bartered for TV time," Lowry explains. For NOA's deal with Toys R Us, he says that the company's contact would "buy the time for us and we'd give them cartridges or games and then he'd sell those to Toys R Us. That's how that whole thing worked. It was kind of crazy." But it wasn't quite so "crazy" as the literal bartering Lowry was about to do to make sure kids actually saw Nintendo's TV commercials.

"What happened was our ads started running at 2am in the morning," Lowri says. "There weren't a lot of kids awake at that point – or even parents awake." So he decided to go over to WABC, the flagship New York City network of ABC. "I just said, 'I'll go over there and talk to this guy, the boss there, and tell him he has to change that,' naive as I was," Lowry says.

"I walked in with a game cartridge and everything and said, 'I'd like to see your station manager. I'm an advertiser.' Now, I didn't mention the fact we were bartering and how we were getting our ads in there. They would not let me in. You're not getting past these six women who probably know death holds. You're not going to go past them. At which point, this limousine pulls up and a guy hops out and he has his top coat on. He runs in. He glances over. 'What's that?' I said, 'Oh, it's the new Nintendo. We advertise with you.' Well, he fell for it and he goes, 'Well, come on in. Let's see it.'"

Lowry explained NOA's barter arrangement to this unnamed network executive, and explained that "that's why we're airing at the time we're airing. I said, 'Do you have kids?' 'Yeah.' 'Take [the Nintendo game] home and see what they think about it.' So I gave him one."

The next day, Lowry got a call that the network wanted to see him again, because that executive had "more friends that want game systems." So "we drove over there and gave him some more and gave him some more. Now our commercials got to be on at 11 o'clock at night. A little better."

Obviously, an 11pm commercial still isn't prime advertising time, but things would soon get better – if only thanks to good fortune. Somewhere in this timeframe, Lowry visited a local bar where an NFL game was being shown on TV. "It was a Monday night game, the [New York] Giants playing somebody," he explains. "It was a big game, and they came on and they had a Chevrolet commercial. I guess they hadn't sold the spot for a local spot."

That's when Nintendo's ad showed – right in the middle of a major broadcast for one of the area's biggest sports teams, giving the NES a massive platform in front of exactly the New York audience the company was trying to court. "They threw it on there and the next day things started moving," Lowry says. "That was pure luck."

Out of this crucible came the best NES games of all time.

Assassin's Creed Black Flag Resynced devs at Ubisoft are, technically, currently running a community treasure hunt throughout July with three secret pirate troves ready to be torn open. But it's not the challenge Ubisoft anticipated – fans are way too good at playing pirate, having already dug up all the loot in a matter of days.

Ubisoft introduced the community hunt only last week on July 11, writing in a Twitter post, "We've heard word that 3 chests lie hidden across the Caribbean, each containing a unique bounty. We'll drop a new clue every Friday of July! Remember... No pirate sails alone. Work together, crack the clues, and claim the treasure." But there really wasn't any need for patronizing – pirate-tronizing? – advice. Black Flag Resynced players have already dug up all the gold they could. (Spoilers ahead for pirates who want to work out Black Flag's community event on their own! Argh!)

The first buried chest is located at coordinates (421,939), and rewards players with 4,000 Reales – this is the classic treasure hunt reward, a fat mound of money. The second chest located at (501,168) is a little more dramatic: it includes the legendary Uncrowned Prince rapier and legendary Guardian Beast Figurehead. One player on Reddit seems to have discovered it on a lark, writing in a post, "I think I stumbled onto some more items." They did, indeed.

Then, there's the third and final community chest, which contains the biggest prize of all. Found at coordinates (28,293), this bounty includes the legendary Aveline Figurehead and rare Explorer Outfit originally found in the Assassin's Creed Black Flag from 2013. Resynced players initially fretted that the exceedingly rare outfit in red and white – traditional Assassin's Creed colors – hadn't been brought over from the original game. But, as content creator Synth Potato puts it on Twitter, the Reddit user -Holliday was blessed with "genuinely insane luck" and discovered the Explorer Outfit waterlogged at the bottom of the ocean.

"I glanced at my map after taking a naval contract and just how the area looked on the map peaked my interest enough to go check it out," -Holliday explains in a Reddit thread. "Dropped anchor and jumped off, I immediately seen air bubbles and could not believe my eyes once I spotted what was inside. I was honestly briefly shaken with excitement since I knew it was highly sought after and didn't believe anyone had found it yet."

"You just ruined it for Ubisoft," replies another Reddit user. "I love it."

Ubisoft confirms on Twitter that, "We were going to reveal a clue for this community chest on Friday but your treasure hunting skills are too great." That's too bad for Ubisoft, but a pleasant indication that fortune favors the Black Flag fans.

Assassin's Creed Black Flag Resynced New Game Plus is coming, director promises: "We're working on that right now."

I'm sure nobody needs to be told that Bethesda's seminal RPG Skyrim is a best-seller. I mean, you don't get ported as much without having sustaining market value. But what may be surprising to hear is that The Witcher 3 has actually out-sold the dragon-heavy adventure, at least according to figures provided by the studio.

During a time of turmoil for the company and the industry as a whole, due to Xbox's widespread layoffs, Bethesda provided an official update on social media. Buried in the post, which touches on Fallout, Starfield, The Elder Scrolls 6 and more, is a little milestone for the latter's fifth mainline installment.

"With over 65 million copies sold, players are still exploring Skyrim 15 years later, but we know it’s been a very long wait for the sequel," the company writes. "The next chapter is on the way. We’re where we planned to be, loving how it looks, and playing it every day."

65 million copies; that's a lot. It's an amount most developers can only dream about. But then, most developers aren't Todd Howard and his team of quest-creators and dungeon masters.

If you're wondering where that ranks in terms of all-time sales, it places Skyrim in eighth, directly behind Terraria, and just ahead of Super Mario Bros on the NES. And it's actually tied with Geralt of Rivia's landmark outing, The Witcher 3.

CD Projekt Red confirmed The Witcher 3 had shifted 65 million copies in May of this year. It and Skyrim may have done so around the same time, even. But what's crucial to remember here is that The Elder Scrolls 5 had a four year head start, coming out in 2011 (I know, I know), whereas The Witcher 3 arrived in 2015.

I don't mean to cause drama here, but that sounds like a challenge. Todd, another port is in order. Make Skyrim the launch game on the next Xbox. That should do it. I mean, unless The Elder Scrolls 6 is going to be around by then - but I'm not holding my breath on that one.

Fallout 5 is "currently in preproduction": Bethesda breaks silence on long-awaited RPG

Final Fantasy 14's planned mobile port – a release that Square Enix hoped for the world to see after its launch in China – is now off the table entirely, apparently.

In case you're out of the loop on Final Fantasy 14 Mobile, it first kicked off years ago when "a small team of die-hard" fans proposed the idea to MMO director Naoki "Yoshi-P" Yoshida, "armed with a 100-page proposal" – a proposal that interested the lead, to say the least.

It's largely been off the radar since its announcement and development at Tencent, however, with little news popping up about it aside from its release last summer in China. Now, sadly, it seems it won't be coming out anywhere else – even though the rest of the world was set to see Final Fantasy 14 Mobile sometime after that initial region-exclusive release. And, to top the disappointing news off, the Chinese edition is going offline as well.

Square Enix confirms as much in a new announcement on the canceled project's official website, first looking back at the mobile port's June 2025 launch in China.

"On the launch day of Final Fantasy 14 Mobile (Chinese Edition) in the Chinese mainland, we said, 'Resonate with the Light, and blaze as one,' and promised that the adventure had just begun. Over this time, it is you who have truly brought 'Mobile Eorzea' to life. Every suggestion you shared on gameplay, experiences, and features guided us to build the game world."

It's heartwarming to hear, but it wasn't enough to save the port, it seems.

"Today, however, we must regretfully share an important announcement. Due to adjustments in business operations and changes in the market environment, Tencent and Square Enix have, through amicable negotiation, decided to terminate the licensing agreement for Final Fantasy 14 Mobile (Chinese Edition)."

The game will go offline in China on September 30 this year – and, once again, will not be coming overseas.

As Square Enix states, "To everyone who has been looking forward to the global version, we also offer our sincere apologies for being unable to meet your expectations" – which, you know, makes it pretty clear this is indeed the end end of Final Fantasy 14 Mobile.

Unfortunately, it's not the first Square Enix or Final Fantasy title on mobile devices to bite the dust. The Final Fantasy Crystal Chronicles remaster went down last year.

Final Fantasy 7: Ever Crisis is also shutting down after three years, much to fans' dismay. At least we've got Evercold to look forward to, I suppose – and, you know, the Nintendo Switch 2 port, which arrives next month with a free trial.

It's disappointing to learn that the MMO seemingly won't ever be available to play via our mobile phones, but perhaps it's for the best. I'm not sure I can imagine tackling a Savage on my Samsung Galaxy, honestly.

Final Fantasy 14 hit with yet another stalking mod, not even 2 weeks after the MMO's last one shut down.

Final Fantasy Resonance is going heavy on the Final Fantasy fan service – from the iconic series heroes who temporarily join in on battles to the nostalgic pixel art and fate-defying story – but the fan service goes so deep here that the upcoming game even includes a callback to one of the franchise's most infamous challenges of all time, Final Fantasy 9's jump rope minigame.

Final Fantasy Resonance is somewhat of a celebration of the entire series. After all, you can literally summon fan-favorite characters, such as Cloud and Lightning, to slash enemies into tiny little pixel squares. But good fan service celebrates the uglier, less popular parts of the fandom, too. Enter, Final Fantasy 9's jump rope.

Square Enix recently revealed a couple of minigames you'll be able to partake in when the turn-based game launches later this year, including one that has you play hide-and-seek with Moogles and another that tests your timing with a skipping rope. (Thanks, Gematsu!)

Anyone that's played even the first few hours of Final Fantasy 9 might remember a section that puts us in the oversized shoes and pointy hat of Vivi, the black mage, who can choose to simply remain in the early-game area and jump rope with some kids forever. Or until he becomes delirious since the minigame is really tough. Like, my knuckles are aching and my brows are clammy and all I can hear is the sound of Vivi's boots knocking on the ground, echoing up and down my skull, kinda tough.

Better yet, the challenge was tied to a few really powerful cards used in Final Fantasy 9's Tetra Master minigame. Nowadays, completionists and super fans are even more incentivized to reach 1,000 consecutive, successful rope jumps thanks to two achievements – a challenge that one fan twisted into a FromSoftwarian nightmare by going in with a blindfold.

Either way, for better or for worse, you can partake in the jumping of ropes in Final Fantasy Resonance thanks to a group of kids playing in a village. Perhaps Square Enix will take it easier on our thumbs this time around...

Each town supposedly has a different minigame, so the door's open to other fan-favorite/fan-abhorred activities as well. Blitzball? Fort Condor? Just fishing? We'll find out when Final Fantasy Resonance comes to PC and all current consoles on October 22.

More traditional Final Fantasy remakes could happen, as Square Enix says it'll follow what "truly resonates" with fans, even if that's not open-world action.

As Bethesda announces what's going on with the future of the studio, director and producer Todd Howard has acknowledged the layoffs that have hit the studio as part of Microsoft's latest batch of staff cuts.

Speaking to Bloomberg, Howard calls the cuts at Bethesda Game Studios "really tough" for him and his colleagues. This latest round of cuts saw staff at the studio laid off as part of Xbox's seemingly now-yearly mass layoffs – including 18-year veterans of the company like Ray Lederer. Bethesda as a whole also got hit hard as we also saw fellow ZeniMax Studios id Software and ZeniMax Online Studios face heavy cuts.

Howard adds, "This is Bethesda's 40th anniversary, and there have been periods where we've gone through changes," referring to a portion of the 1990s where the studio was on the brink. But now, he says, "We're going through a change so that we focus best on the franchises and what we need to do to deliver for everybody."

Word over the last week is that Xbox has been pushing Bethesda to focus on marquee titles with Bethesda Game Studios on The Elder Scrolls 6 and Fallout 5, while the wider ZeniMax studios work on Doom, Quake, and Wolfenstein.

Howard also spoke about his personal feelings on the layoffs with Windows Central, saying "I've been doing this a long time, whenever you've worked with people for, in some cases, many decades, and they're no longer here, that's really personally very difficult, and difficult for our teams."

These interviews have come alongside word that Fallout 5 is "currently in preproduction," that Fallout 3 and Fallout: New Vegas are both getting remasters, and that Obsidian is returning to the post-apocalyptic RPG series for a new entry. But with layoffs across Bethesda and Obsidian, as one workers union has already suggested, it's hard not to see this as Microsoft trying to change the subject.

Video game fans are currently quite unhappy with everything going on at Xbox, with thousands of developers losing their jobs, and calling into question how these diminished numbers will affect development going forward. So a big blowout of every Fallout project everyone wants to know about – with nothing to actually show from them – arguably feels more like an attempt at a distraction or reassurance, rather than it being the right time to drop this news.

There's been a new patch for StarCraft 2 from Blizzard, and you might think after 16 years there isn't much the studio can do to truly disrupt the game or its community. Well, you'd be wrong, because a tweak in the latest update is sending shockwave through the player base right now.

The alterations listed are based around both Proton and Terran against Zerg, and there aren't all that many. "We are making changes based on player data and feedback," writes Blizzard in the intro. And right at the top of the Terran list is the biggie: Command Centers now cost 300 minerals instead of 400.

This is rather significant, because it's the main strategic hub of the Terran forces, presenting quite a lot of strategic value for a comparatively low price. The immediate comparison is to Supply Depots, which are 100 minerals, because although Command Centers are still three times more, you get 15 supply. Building one much earlier in a round is a no-brainer, and you can make a bunch of them later with considerable ease.

"This is the most impactful change that we've had in StarCraft 2 since Legacy of the Void," StarCraft 2 YouTuber Harstem says in a video going through the patch. "This is such an insanely big buff to Terran."

To him, this will impact the early, middle and late stages of any confrontation, because of how it subsumes Supply Depots as a choice now. He echoes the sentiments of many fans. "Might be a way to fix Terran early game economy but ultra late game will be even more broken," one Redditor observes.

"Holy [fuck] what are they doing in Anaheim," another incredulously asks. "I feel like this was an accident," a third commenter on Reddit says.

This is very much the kind of change that gets tempered post-rollout, because it's either an error, or the impact is greater than the devs anticipated. One player tells the community to make use of it while it's available. "That shit is 100% getting reverted. Gotta abuse it while you can!" they exclaim. I don't think they're wrong.

StarCraft 2 devs take another swing at getting the RTS game's surprise new update right, but Blizzard still hasn't rolled back the one change fans most want undone.

There's a new Slay the Spire 2 patch, and it brings some big changes to the deckbuilding roguelike. Several cards have been either nerfed or buffed, reframing certain strategies and keeping players on their toes, and adding two fresh Neow relics, just to tie all together.

Those Neow relics are a good place to start, per the patch notes. The first, Dowsing Rod, puts one Dowsing into your deck after you pick it up, and the second, Neow's Sacrifice, gives you one Ambergris and puts one Guilty into your deck. They each come with other circumstantial effects too.

Then we're into the maelstrom of card tweaks. Necrobinder's Eidolon has been reworked to play every Ethereal in the Exhaust pile, while Regent's Pillar of Creation's got downtuned to giving you 5(7) Block the first time you create a card on each turn.

Well-Laid Plans is now rare, costs 1(0), and makes it so you don't discard your hand at the end of a turn. That's not the only card to have its rarity shifted either, as Dominate is now rare as well, though with no effects changes.

The Dominate shift is spurring discussion among hardcore players. "Dominate going to rare is a HUGE nerf," says a top commenter on Reddit. "Completely deserved though, card was just way too good to be uncommon," another says in response. It's pointed out that Taunt becoming common balances out the changes, at least on paper.

People are a little stunned at what Mega Crit's done to Eidolon. "What the heck. Eidolon sounding crazy in long fights," a commenter says. Some are lamenting Eidolon's old effect, since it exhausted your hand, thus removing status effects, but they admit the new effect is "powerful."

Generally speaking, the alterations appear to have thrown the community for a loop, which was likely the intention. Now that Slay the Spire 2's been out over three months, there'll be a contingent who already know many of the combinations inside-out, whereas this kind of patch challenges their knowledge.

"INSANE card changes wow," says another popular comment. If you haven't played in a little while, this is a good excuse to jump back in.

Slay the Spire 2 lead says the garbage placeholder art is "important" and gen AI would ruin it: "People would judge the game as if it's a 1.0, fully developed video game."

The sequel to The Legend of Zelda: Breath of the Wild – now known as The Legend of Zelda: Tears of the Kingdom – was such a tightly-guarded secret within Nintendo's corridors that the vast majority of employees only found out about the game's existence along with the fans.

Nintendo of America ex-marketing and PR leads Kit Ellis and Krysta Yang (formerly the director of social media marketing and original content, and senior manager of creator relations and original content, respectively) recall that the open-world sequel was perhaps the most top secret project in all of their years working at the company, courtesy of a recent YouTube video.

Ellis says the sequel held a "higher level of security than anything else" he's ever worked on, and "less than 10 people probably at Nintendo of America" knew about the game before its similarly shadowy reveal trailer during the Nintendo Direct at E3 2019 – one that didn't even come with an official title, release window, or gameplay glimpse attached.

"I had to do all of these teams' jobs in secret, and when this [the reveal] happens, feed them this thing and tell them what to do with it," Ellis, one of the few people who did know about the game's existence before its reveal, says. "For example, the social team, who I was overseeing at the time." Ellis didn't usually create social media content for the publisher's various channels or write press releases and whatnot, but in this case, he did because the rest of the team had to remain in the dark.

That also means that for many Nintendo employees, including Yang, their first time finding out about the sequel came when they watched the Direct stream live together. Although Yang had already seen the rest of the presentation in advance, the trailer's appearance at the end came as a complete surprise.

"We popped off," Yang says. "That was the first time I've had a surprise at Nintendo in all of my, at that point, 12 years or something... It was crazy." The duo also remember that it was the first and perhaps only time Nintendo had ever kept a secret from that many staff members so close to a project's reveal.

Before E3's eventual demise, Nintendo would also screen their presentations for the media before they went live for the rest of the world. The version of the Nintendo Direct that the press saw and that Nintendo employees rigorously prepared was missing that final One Last Thing moment.

I can't say I'm entirely surprised, either – Breath of the Wild was the game that ushered in the Nintendo Switch era and it very quickly became one of the most lauded games of all time. For good reason, I might add. It's still one of the best Switch games ever, and funnily enough, also one of the best Switch 2 games so far thanks to some very sweet technical improvements. No surprise that it's follow-up carried so much hype, then.

Clair Obscur: Expedition 33 lead says Zelda: Breath of the Wild was "the first open-world game that actually delivered on the promise of an open world."

Bethesda says Starfield "remains an important part of our future," teasing plans for the space RPG's third year following worries from fans that the project would be swept under the rug as part of Xbox's big reset.

Over on Twitter, Bethesda speaks about what the road ahead looks like for the studio following sweeping cuts across Xbox's portfolio of studios. As for Starfield, there's seemingly still plenty to come, as Bethesda clearly proclaims, "Starfield continues." That'll be a relief for worried fans already, but thankfully there's more information on offer.

"With over 17 million players logging almost a billion hours to date, Starfield remains an important part of our future," Bethesda says. "As we enter Year 3, we'll continue expanding the Settled Systems with new stories, targeted gameplay improvements, and additional updates, while preparing for the launch of new Starborn content next year.

"More than 40% of players already customize their experience through Creations, and we'll continue investing in creators and giving players new ways to make Starfield their own."

So, why the worry? Following news of Xbox's reset that will see 3,200 jobs chopped when all is said and done, reports surfaced that studios would focus on their key franchises – including The Elder Scrolls and Fallout for Bethesda. While there were never any claims that Starfield would be tossed into the bin, fans felt uneasy that the space RPG wasn't mentioned.

Despite it all, it seems like Bethesda is continuing with Starfield for now.

That's not all for Bethesda, either. Bethesda says The Elder Scrolls 6 is going great, Fallout 3 and Fallout: New Vegas are both getting remasters, and 16 years after Fallout: New Vegas, Obsidian is returning to the post-apocalyptic RPG series. Busy day, then.

Oh, and Fallout 5 is "currently in preproduction." Definitely a busy day.

It's official: Obsidian is returning to the Fallout series. 16 years after the launch of the beloved Fallout: New Vegas, the venerable RPG studio is returning to the post-apocalypse for a new entry that appears to be entirely separate from Fallout 5. You can count Todd Howard himself among those excited about the news.

"The wasteland continues to expand as we team up once again with our longtime friends at Obsidian Entertainment," Bethesda says in its announcement about the future of Fallout. "We're happy to confirm they're working with us on a new Fallout project. We'll have more to share in the future."

"We could not be more excited to work with Obsidian again," as Bethesda boss Todd Howard tells Bloomberg. Bethesda's level of input into Obsidian's game also isn't clear, but he says "the Fallout franchise is managed out of here and our staff and our franchise teams."

Howard doesn't offer much concrete detail on what Obsidian's game will look like, but believes the "timing is right" for the project to get started. Bloomberg previously reported that Obsidian was working on an Avowed sequel which Microsoft canceled to make room for this new Fallout project.

As part of this news blast, Bethesda also confirmed that Fallout 5 is "currently in preproduction," and will presumably be released some time after The Elder Scrolls 6. The long-rumored remasters of Fallout 3 and Fallout: New Vegas were also finally confirmed, so if you're looking for an excuse to learn why these titles are ranked so highly among the best Fallout games, you're about to find one.

Only 16 Fallout: New Vegas developers still work at Obsidian, says RPG's original writer.

Bethesda Game Studios has undeniably felt the impact of Microsoft's recent plan to cut over 3,200 employees at Xbox – but according to the company, The Elder Scrolls 6 is still chugging along just fine.

The studio reveals as much in quite a lengthy new post over on Twitter, confirming that The Elder Scrolls 6 is currently Bethesda's primary focus – and the developers feel pretty confident about the new RPG, too. That and the next Fallout game, which we now know is for sure happening.

"Our teams are now developing The Elder Scrolls 6 and Fallout 5 on Creation Engine 3, a shared technology platform we've been building since Starfield's launch," writes Bethesda. "It allows our teams to support multiple projects simultaneously with new tools, rendering, and systems that define our games."

This lines up with what we know about Bethesda's in-house engine – Todd Howard said the devs are "very happy where the tech is and where it's going" early this year, describing how Bethesda has "handled" the new Creation Engine "better than we ever have" thanks to lessons learned from Starfield.

The studio's current thread continues, describing where the new Fallout and Elder Scrolls are in terms of development.

"Fallout 5 is currently in preproduction. The Elder Scrolls 6 is our primary development focus today, with the majority of our team currently working on the next chapter of the franchise. With over 65 million copies sold, players are still exploring Skyrim 15 years later, but we know it's been a very long wait for the sequel."

That's an understatement – but Bethesda's words here are reassuring nonetheless. It has been well over a decade since Skyrim changed the RPG genre forever, leaving us all craving the next Elder Scrolls, after all.

But, as the studio confirms, "The next chapter is on the way. We're where we planned to be, loving how it looks, and playing it every day."

It's bittersweet, with all things considered – especially amid all of the layoffs. The company's union representatives reported a big loss of "dozens of programmers, artists, designers, and testers," which would imply quite the impact on development.

Devs affected by the layoffs also said that making new Fallout and Elder Scrolls games would "be harder than ever now" following Microsoft's Xbox cuts, so... yeah.

Here's hoping Bethesda truly is cooking with The Elder Scrolls 6 and Fallout 5, and that former devs land on their feet, too.

Elder Scrolls Online is "not going to be able to put out the amount of content at the speed" it was, former dev says following Xbox layoffs.

After seemingly endless amounts of speculation and rumours, Fallout 3 and Fallout: New Vegas remasters have been officially announced by Bethesda.

This happened in a Twitter post where Bethesda Game Studios acknowledged the future of the studio following Microsoft's latest massive wave of layoffs – including the future of its big three: Starfield, The Elder Scrolls, and Fallout. While Starfield got some more proof of life and Elder Scrolls got a pretty simple "we're working on it," Fallout fans are eating right now.

Not only has Bethesda outlined the future of Fallout by confirming that Fallout 5 is in pre-production, and that the rumours are true and it will be working with Obsidian Entertainment on a new Fallout game, but the past of the series is also getting some love as Bethesda finally confirms those remasters are happening.

"We also know many players want to revisit previous Fallout experiences." Bethesda says, adding: "While we're not announcing any dates today, we have been working on remasters for both Fallout 3 and Fallout: New Vegas."

This duo of remasters has been heavily requested and heavily rumored since the release of The Elder Scrolls 4: Oblivion Remastered in 2025, and while it's not exactly been a massive secret, this is the first time Bethesda has outright mentioned it's happening. Fallout 3 was first released back in 2008 and marked Bethesda's first outing with the franchise, while New Vegas was helmed by Obsidian Entertainment – a studio at the time filled with ex-Fallout 1 and 2 staffers – and is widely considered the greatest game in the franchise.

Only 16 Fallout: New Vegas developers still work at Obsidian, says RPG's original writer.

Compact gaming tablets are few and far between; this is a niche within a mobile gaming niche after all. But, if the prices of the best gaming handhelds have you down and you're not quite ready to swap to one of the best gaming phones, they do represent a growing area of interest.

RedMagic turned its attention to this 9-inch market with the original Astra slab last year. That was a high-powered OLED device ready to take on both portable and, to an extent, console performance. Now it's back with a boosted Snapdragon 8 Elite Gen 5 chip, additional liquid cooling, a faster refresh rate... and a higher starting price, as is the way with most tech in 2026.

The RedMagic Astra 2 is a little marred by its predecessor's power. After all, most thumb-tappers and emulation systems won't need much more than the original Snapdragon 8 Elite just yet. Considering the price jump from a base $499 model to a 12GB / 256GB $749 version in 2026, those extra new additions to the overall experience are going to need to pull their weight.

RedMagic Astra 2 Performance

In its synthetic benchmarks, the RedMagic Astra 2 initially proves itself with slightly higher Wild Life Extreme and Solar Bay performance compared to its predecessor. First runs look good, with the RedMagic Astra 2 coming in roughly 1,000 points in the lead. I scored 7,212 in my first Wild Life Extreme test and 12,106 in the first Solar Bay run. Things get a little spicy after that, though.

Repeated runs brought those numbers way down, to the point where the system averaged 6,705 in Wild Life Extreme and 10,677 in Solar Bay (across all three runs), dropping it below the previous generation on the latter. That, while the system was growing noticeably hotter.

RedMagic states its new liquid cooling tech is an advancement on what came before, but it doesn't feel like it between the hands. More intensive runs like this quickly proved too uncomfortable to keep hold of, something I noticed with more demanding games like Call of Duty: Mobile as well. It looks pretty running across the back panel, but something seems to be awry here. After a cooldown, Solar Bay ran to a final score of 13,152.

I was curious, then, to see what the Wild Life Extreme Stress Test revealed. Without that liquid cooling enabled, the system showed a 43.9% stability score, with the final loop operating at less than half the performance of the first. With RedMagic's new system in full force, things ran a little smoother, jumping up to 65.7% stability. That's a good nod in the direction of the objectively neat liquid running across the back of the device, but sustained performance does drop from what I expected from the invigorated system.

What I loved about the RedMagic Astra 2

All about that display

The OLED panels RedMagic uses in its Android devices is among one of the more impressive I come across day to day. Its incredibly vivid sensibilities handle bright pops of color with a serious punch, keeping everything crisp and sharp in the process. The smaller screen keeps everything beautifully tight as well, with stringent color handling and razor sharp detailing.

It may be the same panel as we saw last year (albeit running at a faster 185Hz refresh rate) but it's certainly a screen to be proud of.

Compact form factor

I said it last year, and I'll say it again, the 9-inch design of the RedMagic Astra 2 gives it a fantastic feel in the hands, while still affording a nicely dense display space and keeping controls at your fingertips. On-screen buttons and thumbsticks feel easily reachable and weight is kept to a manageable 363g (slightly lighter than the original's 370g) to keep fatigue at bay.

It's the perfect size to combine a more immersive gaming and streaming experience than you'll find from a phone, without proving too unwieldy for either the hands or your bag.

Dual ports

There are two USB-C connections here, designed for charging and utilizing accessories at the same time. We've still got the beefier connection on the right side (frustratingly it's still off-center, so you'll be relying on Bluetooth for any mobile controllers you've got going on) as well as a new port on the lower lip.

Massive battery

Yes, larger 13-inch tablets will generally run with a 9,000-odd mAh battery, but more compact options typically stick at around 5,00mAh. That's why the 8,300mAh charge in the RedMagic Astra 2 stands so tall. This isn't a chunky device, but it's still sparring with some of the more endurance-focused tablets on the market.

In a week of more casual use (emulation gameplay, a few CoD Mobile rounds, YouTube sessions, and web browsing) I only needed to charge the tablet once. Considering my aging iPad Air needs to be plugged in every few nights, that's a win. Of course, this is straight out of the box - but the capacity of that charge means that, even with some degradation over time, you're still looking at an all-dayer here.

Of course, more demanding games are going to drain your system. I noticed a 20% drop during an hour or so of more intensive runs at full brightness.

Packed Game Space

RedMagic's Game Space software is where it keeps all its unique gaming-focused bonuses. Flipping the familiar red toggle automatically launches this completely separate system, but this is far more than a game launcher. Like its phones, RedMagic uses this space for all your saved gameplay, in-depth performance and control settings, and accessory connections. Dive a little deeper into plugins and you'll find options for additional rumble haptics, motion and gesture controls, specific enemy filters to improve visibility, and additional screen map modes.

There's a whole world of tweaks and adjustments to make your favorite games run better and, crucially, be more enjoyable here. But this is also where you'll find my second favorite software feature: Gravity X.

This is what changes the RedMagic Astra 2 from a gaming tablet to a potentially console-like experience. Connect the device to your monitor, pair up your keyboard, mouse, or controller, and you're essentially getting a "dockable" experience for big screen and on-the-go play.

What to consider about the RedMagic Astra 2

Hands still get in the way of speakers

This was a design concern I had with the original model, and it doesn't look like it's been rectified in the Astra 2. The speaker grills, while nice and powerful, are located on the top and bottom panels of the tablet. In portrait mode, that's fine, but in landscape mode, the natural resting position of the hands can often cover some or, when reaching towards the top of the screen) all of these little dots. That means audio quickly becomes muffled when that grip is adjusted.

Still no memory card slot

Like the Astra before it, the latest iteration still keeps that memory card slot at bay. That's a little frustrating for emulation purposes, or if you also need a tablet for everyday productivity and media markups. While mobile releases typically don't take up too much space, with a Genshin Impact download coming in at roughly 40GB right now, that 256GB version may start to struggle in the future. Your saved screenshots and video captures will all be contributing to that load, after all.

Some noticeable whine

Now this is one that seems to be new for the RedMagic Astra 2. The system displays a surprising amount of coil whine when running more demanding titles in higher settings. It's not necessarily loud enough to be audible when the speakers are cranked, but it's a considerable side effect when no audio is playing.

Should you buy the RedMagic Astra 2?

Even without the performance concerns, I'd be hesitant to recommend the RedMagic Astra 2 while the previous generation model is still around. You're looking at a hefty markup over the original price tag for a minor performance bump, a new cooling system that doesn't quite have the benefits you may expect, and a higher refresh rate display that the vast majority of games aren't equipped to deal with.

Unfortunately, the original RedMagic Astra is now unavailable in the US (the UK still has some stock left). That being the case, this is likely the definitive Android experience for now, especially with an additional cooler applied. After all, there's an incredible amount of power packed into this compact, sturdy chassis, hiding behind a gorgeous display. We're still talking about power that the vast majority of titles won't even stress. It's just a shame its costs have ballooned higher than its processing upgrades.

How I tested the RedMagic Astra 2

I used the RedMagic Astra 2 as my daily driver for mobile gaming, game streaming, emulation, YouTube, movies and TV shows for two weeks. I primarily played across my PSP collection, while spending a good amount of time in Call of Duty Mobile and sprinkling in a few Marvel Snap matches. I performed dedicated tests across 3D Mark's Wild Life Extreme and Solar Bay tests, running each one three times before taking a final score. I also ran two Wild Life Extreme Stress Tests. For more information on how we test gaming tablets check out the full GamesRadar+ Hardware Policy.

For more portable play options, check out the best gaming earbuds and best gaming laptops on the market.

Fallout 5 is in preproduction at Bethesda as the studio prioritizes The Elder Scrolls 6.

Bethesda broke its silence today, releasing a lengthy look at the studio's pipeline and the plans for its biggest franchises. Fallout is a key focus, with Fallout 5 essentially simmering in the background.

"Our teams are now developing The Elder Scrolls VI and Fallout 5 on Creation Engine 3, a shared technology platform we've been building since Starfield's launch," Bethesda explains. "It allows our teams to support multiple projects simultaneously with new tools, rendering, and systems that define our games.

"Fallout 5 is currently in preproduction. The Elder Scrolls VI is our primary development focus today, with the majority of our team currently working on the next chapter of the franchise."

The Creation Engine 3 suite "extends beyond our teams to the technology, tools, and systems that will power the next generation of Bethesda RPGs," the studio adds.

Though the next mainline installment is years away, Bethesda stresses that "Fallout is one of our biggest priorities today. Fallout 5 remains our long-range destination, and we have multiple Fallout projects in active development right now."

This suite of projects includes remasters for both Fallout 3 and Fallout: New Vegas, though Bethesda is "not announcing any dates today."

Partially confirming reports, Bethesda says original Fallout: New Vegas developer Obsidian Entertainment is once again working on the franchise, though it doesn't give specifics beyond "a new Fallout project." Other reports claimed a different Fallout RPG had been in development at Obsidian before Bethesda axed it a while ago, forcing it to be similar to Fallout but not connected to the IP.

The live Fallout games, Fallout 76 and Fallout Shelter, will continue to receive new content as well. A new Fallout 76 expansion, Raven Rock, is coming in 2027 and described as "a prequel story to Fallout 3." New seasonal content awaits Fallout Shelter players, not to mention "an unscripted Fallout Shelter television project is also in the works with our partners at Amazon Studios and Kilter Films."

This flurry of announcements follows quiet years for Bethesda – its biggest franchises have gone untouched in-house for more than a decade – and a recent wave of layoffs that hit the studio as part of wide-reaching cuts ordered by Xbox.

In today's statement, Bethesda says its constellation of studios is "investing in our technology, bringing teams closer together, supporting our live games, expanding into new forms of entertainment, and developing the next generation of Bethesda RPGs."

Bethesda says The Elder Scrolls 6 is going great, actually: "We're where we planned to be, loving how it looks, and playing it every day."

You've just left the cinema, but The Odyssey still beckons. But what if I told you there were four incredible games you can play to recapture a taste of the adventure? From the most beautiful and best open-world games to RPGs set among the Greek isles, I've picked these games because of how each draws upon different aspects of what makes The Odyssey so thrilling.

There's sword-and-sandals combat action to be found in one, if it's the glory of battle you crave, while others have a tighter focus on the myths and legends that have fueled Homer's classic for thousands of years. There's even a bit of a wildcard entry that might confuse you entirely, since it features neither gods nor Greeks, but I think the common theme of long, laboring journeys more than makes up for it.

If you're in need of a little refresher before you get stuck in here, check out our beginner's guide to The Odyssey to help you pick out your favorite aspects of the film – it will help narrow down your search, trust me. So what are you waiting for? Here are four games to play after experiencing The Odyssey!

The best games to play after watching The Odyssey, starting with...

Hades 2

A no-brainer game to play after watching The Odyssey is "godlike roguelike" Hades 2. The game features Odysseus himself as a Shade (aka a ghost) as well as a host of connected characters. His sea monster nemesis Scylla has been reimagined here as a glam rock siren, guarding the deepest layer of Oceanus with her bandmates Jetty and Roxy. Charybdis the Kraken also shows face, both as a randomized miniboss encounter and as a special guest in Scylla's band.

Melinoë also runs into the goddess Circe on the isle of Aiaia during her Surface runs, and can even engineer a meeting between her and Odysseus so he can make amends for his treatment of her in life. Oh, and the voice of Greek poet Homer narrates Mel's quest throughout! Hades 2 is one of the best roguelikes ever for its expert blending of snappy isometric combat and beautifully scripted storylines, and I can't recommend it highly enough for any fan of The Odyssey's mythical roots.

Mythwrecked: Ambrosia Island

If you want your odyssey to be lighter on the violence yet heavier on the Greek pantheon itself, Mythwrecked is the game you should play after watching Christopher Nolan's latest and greatest. Shipwrecked on an island dotted with amnesic gods, it's your job to help recover their memories and make some powerful new friends on the way.

Mythwrecked is a narrative-heavy experience, drawing on the rich mythology and lore of The Odyssey while giving it a more modern twist. Unfortunately, you cannot romance any of these divine beings (*cough* Hades 2 is where you want to be), but this gorgeous PG-13 indie is the perfect fix for those who'd prefer their next great adventure to be a bit less bloody.

Assassin's Creed Odyssey

The film name's in the game title, after all. Assassin's Creed Odyssey, set among the Greek islands during the Peloponnesian War, places you in the sandals of mercenary twins Kassandra or Alexios of Kefalonia as you unravel a nationwide conspiracy with decidedly Templar links – or as they were known back then, the Order of the Ancients.

Much of the action in this RPG takes place between the warring Athenian and Spartan armies. However, between ganking the Templar Order and lending either army a hand in battle, the thing that really makes AC Odyssey feel like The Odyssey is the amount of Greek mythology you encounter. Expect to go head-to-head with Medusa, the Bull of Minos, and even a cyclops as you uncover the glorious open world, with plenty of naval travel and combat if you're keen to ride the waves between each island. No other game on this list offers a third-person Ancient Greek experience, making it the most thematically and contextually similar to Nolan's new film of the bunch.

Death Stranding 2: On The Beach

Now this might be a hot take, but Death Stranding 2 actually has a lot more in common with The Odyssey than you might think. At first glance, Sam's journey as a courier in a postapocalyptic Australia sounds about as far from the aftermath of the Trojan War as you can get. But think about it: Death Stranding is a long, arduous journey – an odyssey, you might say, albeit on foot – with plenty of pit stops along the way.

It too features a central protagonist with numerous other faces he encounters on his journey, all the while moving toward a single endpoint that somehow gets only further away the more he moves toward it. It's a grueling feat of a video game that perfectly encapsulates the relentless slog of The Odyssey (check out our Death Stranding 2 review for more), though this time, you'll be fending off BTs instead of sirens.

The Odyssey is out in cinemas now. For more information on Nolan's latest, check out our glowing The Odyssey review.

Nintendo has hundreds upon thousands of hardware patents up its sleeve.

Not all of these come to fruition, but I'm totally on board with the one published in China that was discovered by the aptly named Nintendo Patent Watch on BlueSky, which pertains to a dock for the Nintendo Switch 2 that is also compatible with the older Switch handheld.

As it stands, the official dock packaged with every Switch 2 handheld is not compatible with the older console, as its power output is only adapted to suit the newer console. If you want to play your original Switch on the big screen, you have to go old-school and dig out your dock instead. However, according to Nintendo Patent Watch, this dock can recognize which of the consoles it's connected to and act accordingly - something we've not yet seen in a first or third-party accessory so far.

A Nintendo patent published in China describes a Switch 2 dock that can also support Switch 1 console. Since NS2 and NS1 handle the Power Delivery negotiation differently, the dock can recognize which console is connected (imgs 1-3) and behave accordingly.worldwide.espacenet.com/patent/searc...1/

— @ninpatentswatch.bsky.social (@ninpatentswatch.bsky.social.bsky.social) 2026-07-17T13:34:11.791Z

For a dock to accommodate both handhelds, there's a more to consider than what the average best Nintendo Switch 2 accessories have to deal with. Nintendo Patents Watch reiterates this in their BlueSky thread: while the original device's dock features a standard USB 2 alongside a lower-res video output and a lower-fan RPM (Rotations Per Minute) to keep its internals nice and cool, the Switch 2 dock is a bit beefier.

The Nintendo Switch 2 dock uses USB 3, can output in 4K, and has a higher fan RPM. There're also the power differences, which is notably why the Switch 2 dock is not currently compatible with the older console. As it stands, the Switch 2 has a power delivery of up to 60W, while the original handheld requires 18W, so there's a lot at stake and likely why we didn't get a backwards-compatible version at launch.

Like plenty of other hardware patents, likely nothing will ever come of this. Brands like Nintendo and, more recently, Sony PlayStation with its bizarre joystick controller patent like to publish patents all the time with no end product in sight. While we can only speculate, these patents very likely have less to do with creating new products for one of the best gaming handhelds and more to do with cultivating a "we won't make one but you can't either" approach to prevent third-party brands from thinking of it first.

Personally, I'd at least like the opportunity to dock both devices in the future, even if it seems like a pretty redundant accessory given the Switch 2's masterful backwards compatibility. Even with the Switch 2 versions in tow, some games like The Legend of Zelda Tears of the Kingdom just look better on an OLED Switch's display, but having the plug socket real estate to set up both devices is a bit of a pain.

Yet while this new dock might not ever come to fruition, Nintendo Patents Watch states the drawings included in the filing help "settle a debate among Nintendo hardware enthusiasts." According to them, the illustrations show a setup where a "fan (#23 in img 1) takes in air from opening 21F. The air flows over the dock’s circuitboard 22, enters the console from the bottom opening 30B, and exits from the top opening 30C", which suggests the Switch 2 dock fan does in fact cool both the dock and the handheld. I'll take that new factoid over no new shiny universal dock.

• View all Nintendo Switch 2 docks at Amazon

Creating the ultimate Switch 2 setup? Check out our guides to the best Nintendo Switch headsets, the best Nintendo Switch 2 cameras, and the best Nintendo Switch 2 controllers.

Palworld recently got its long-awaited 1.0 update, with patch notes so big they can only be described as monstrous – and boy, has it brought in a lot of players.

In fact, the survival gem saw its new full release spur enormous player numbers – and loads of positive reviews on Steam to boot. In fact, Pocketpair's game has even managed to overtake Valve's own Counter-Strike 2 in terms of its concurrent players a couple of times on roundups of Steam's most-played games.

Fans have caught sight of Palworld doing so over on Reddit and the like… but they're not alone. The developers have evidently noticed its climb up the Steam charts, too.

We officially have reached #1 on Steam!!!! from r/Palworld

Head of Pocketpair publishing and communications John "Bucky" Buckley acknowledges the feat over on Twitter, showcasing a screenshot of Steam's most-played charts – and Palworld's spot right at the top, with Counter-Strike 2 and Dota 2 following right behind it.

"Pause," writes the lead. "Let me enjoy this moment for just a little longer." A well-deserved moment, too, if I do say so myself, considering the sheer amount of content 1.0 boasts.

Fellow industry heads are chiming in as well, with Pearl Abyss (the studio behind Crimson Desert and Black Desert Online) PR and marketing director Will Powers commenting, "It's a good feeling. Well deserved." In response, Bucky says, "Thank you, gamer."

In a separate post, Pocketpair CEO Takuro Mizobe celebrates the game's achievement, sharing his thanks with fans and expressing how glad he is that players are enjoying it.

It's wholesome, and it's nice to see a team that started as an indie group now thriving. Pocketpair's not done with Palworld yet, either, with more for the game and beyond up its sleeve.

There's still the Stardew Valley-esque farming sim Palfarm to look forward to, which will be a nice cozy counterpart to Pocketpair's flagship title, and the admittedly cursed Palworld dating sim that's also underway at the company.

Now, if you'll excuse me, I have a base to go build, and Pals to command – those trees aren't going to chop themselves, after all, and I'm in dire need of more wood to use on my virtual home.

Palworld would collab with Ark, No Man's Sky, and Enshrouded "tomorrow" if "we could make it make sense," says publishing chief.

Doom: The Dark Ages director and id Software co-studio director Hugo Martin has acknowledged the layoffs the studio is facing, and says things aren't as dire as they sound.

As part of a Slayers Club Live stream on the Bethesda YouTube channel (spotted by Kotaku), Martin says: "There's been reports that we've been 'nerfed into the ground' and 'gutted' and we have 50 people and that’s not true."

These reports came from a mixture of places. Derek Best, a principal VFX artist at the studio, talked of Xbox "nuking a team into the dirt," while a WARN notice filed in Texas suggested that 136 of the 185 developers at the studio were let go.

Martin continues, "We're the size we were when we made Doom 2016 and id Tech is very much alive and well." Reports also claimed that the id Tech team was decimated at the Texas studio, but Martin says: "You have to understand we have id Tech engineers both in Frankfurt and at MachineGames. We collaborate quite a bit."

Furthermore, he adds: "The id Tech is there, the Doom team is here, and we're excited to share with you guys more of what we're working on in the future when it is appropriate and approved."

After the layoffs occurred, former employees claimed Martin had proposed a "Gun Fu" action game inspired by the likes of John Wick, while Perfect Dark, a western robot survival game, and multiple Doom projects were also rumoured to have been pitched.

Martin says "the fact that we made a game that people like and is critical and commercially successful – like I said, it's doing very well related to the forecast and stuff – that's good for everyone, for the people at the studio, for the people who, unfortunately, we had to say goodbye to." He adds: "But what matters the most is that the games are good and I'm so happy that people, I don't know… It's just a good thing for everybody, it's going to help. So we are really here to just play the game now and celebrate the work."

If anything, Martin's note that Doom was critically and commercially successful just makes Microsoft's layoffs more mind boggling. A legendary studio which created some of the most iconic shooter franchises in history – ones Xbox is reportedly pushing Bethesda to make more of – facing layoffs at this scale while also being successful and owned by one of the most affluent companies in history is difficult to explain, to put it lightly.

Laid-off id Software devs "cannot imagine a path forward where they make another game in id Tech," despite the Doom studio's claims.

Despite having 15 years between them, Call of Duty: Black Ops' PS4 and PS5 port is seemingly suffering from the same exploits that its PS3 version has also been a victim of.

Activision released both Call of Duty: Black Ops and Black Ops 2 for the PS4 and PS5 last week in the form of straightforward ports, not remasters – both games are also on Xbox Series X|S via backward compatibility. While making two fan-favorite games available to more people should've been a slam dunk win for Activision, XP exploits quickly made multiplayer lobbies nearly unplayable for large waves of Black Ops 1's online population.

As spotted by IGN, YouTuber Tdawgsmitty recently chatted with a modder who explained that the problem might actually be a leftover exploit from the original game's PS3 and Xbox 360 days. Right now, there aren't any aimbots and such flooding the game, but people are modding save files to farm more XP than is usually possible by spamming themselves with grenades, say, which is ruining competitive games for regular players.

"Essentially, what you're doing is that it's like PS3 where you copy [a save file] to your USB, and there's a website that lets you unencrypt it," the modder says. "The site lets you use a jailbroken PS4/PS5, and it will decrypt it for you. The save data is the exact same as PS3. What sucks about this port is that Iron Galaxy [and] Activision didn't bother changing the encryption on the files, which is the whole reason why this is available right now. That's the only reason why."

Activision disabled "select playlists" a few days ago while it investigates reported issues. It then updated some playlists with "a server-wide fix," though the modder suggests other game modes are still exploitable.

For now, reminisce with the best Call of Duty games of all time.

The shield saw, the star of last year's Doom: The Dark Ages, was my favorite weapon in Doom's entire bloody history. Not content with just sticking a parry in Doom and going for lunch early, id Software instead delivered the world's deadliest beyblade. A merciless disc of death you could frisbee into a screaming demon, or boomerang through entire hordes. The slowest, most lumbering entry of the new-Doom trilogy also starred a 'shield bash' that sent you rushing across the battlefield and slamming into Hell's finest. Slow? Please. Sonic wishes he could move like this.

The shield saw should be patched into Dark Souls immediately. Every other shield in gaming should hang its non-head in shame. What I'm basically trying to get across here is that the shield saw rules. And within the opening hour of Doom: The Dark Ages – Revelations, the FPS' new DLC, id took my shield saw away and snapped it in half.

It's a bold new step forward for the Doom Slayer, but rather than developers being able to celebrate, the studio is already losing half its staff as part of Xbox's ongoing large-scale layoffs. That includes reportedly putting the future of the id Tech engine itself in jeopardy, and leading developers to question the value of Microsoft's purchase of ZeniMax, which included id owner Bethesda, back in 2021 in the first place. That's all before we even had enough time to tell you this Doom: The Dark Ages expansion is actually super rad. Turns out, big business can be more devastating than any BFG – and that's heartbreaking.

Sawly Missed

The Doom Slayer has been sent to Hell-prison, you see, presumably on about four billion demon murder charges. He thankfully gets to keep all the spectacular guns from last year's game, including the one that sprays bone fragments of demon skulls, the shotgun that sounds like the Earth itself splitting in half when you fire it, and that wonderful chainshot that's essentially the grittiest reboot of ball-and-paddle ever.

While it's great to be reunited with all these magnificent murder-toys, the shield saw being taken away truly hurts. Last year this studio trained us to approach Doom in a whole new defensive way, and now it's ripped and torn that option out entirely. Even FromSoftware let us enjoy an entire trilogy of Dark Souls games cowering behind a shield before snatching it away with Sekiro. id barely waited a year.

So what replaces this divine disc of death? The new chain spear, which is so weedy in appearance compared to a shield/chainsaw hybrid that I thought the game was joking. It looks like the kind of thing the Doom Slayer would use as a toothpick.

The spear actually shares a surprising amount of the shield's functionality. You can hookshot onto obstacles on enemies, like the shield dash. It can parry green attacks, and it stuns enemies you lob it into – though this effect only lasts until its hookshot has finished dragging you towards your victim. Which means you'll now be standing right next to a monster who's no longer stunned and is ready to get revenge. Gee, thanks.

Ah, but I soon discover that where I land is actually in my control. This isn't your bog standard videogame hookshot, wherein you latch onto where you want to go and then simply watch yourself get yanked towards it. No, you're able to swing left, right, and above as you're hooked forward, opening up some sublime new strategies.

The cacodemon, the floating megabrain that caused me so much misery in the main campaign, is now basically a hookshot launch pad for me to ascend myself to bullet heaven. I fling myself over it then unload super shotgun blasts into its grey-going-on-red matter the whole way down, landing in a fresh pile of its giblet-y remains. Bloody bliss.

Revelations also restores the much-missed dash button from Doom Eternal. Not being able to block isn't so bad when you can hurl yourself around or keep flinging yourself into the sky. Better yet, Revelations starts rewarding daring dodges as much as it rewards parries.

Death From Above

Last-second dodges fill a meter you can spend on executing special moves. I initially opt for a ground slam that damages anything stupid enough to be near where I land. That dash works in the air, too, so I can hook myself up and get an impressive amount of kills in before my feet ever get reacquainted with the ground. Doom has rediscovered its love of sending you airborne and developed a newfound romance with keeping you up there.

Ammo scarcity, something I all but forgot about in The Dark Ages proper, constantly catches me out this time. Probably because all my ammo upgrades from the main campaign are gone, and Revelations is about as difficult as that game's third act right from the starting shot. Not being able to just rely on a couple of guns to get through an encounter, but actually properly engaging with the weapon wheel is friction I'd sorely missed. Oh, I have a weapon called the impaler! Good to see you, old friend. Sorry for, er, completely forgetting you existed. Um… has the shield saw asked about me at all?

Doom has also learnt how to keep a secret again. The Dark Ages' main campaign made the bizarre decision to put almost every collectable on the map screen. Then it had the audacity to cheer 'you found a secret area!' when you walked into the clearly signposted 'secret' area. Imagine if I showed you where my bathroom was and then bellowed "SECRET AREA FOUND" as soon as you entered it. You'd be baffled for a number of reasons. Revelations, somewhat ironically, knows to keep things under wraps so finding its secret areas and bonus pickups actually feel like achievements again.

You'll want to seek them out, too, to afford the excellent Chain Spear upgrades. There's Deflection, which makes the spear reflect back automatic weapon fire whenever you dash, the slayer twirling it like a dance baton (where was this in Lollipop Chainsaw?). Tormentor will spin you around an enemy you've got the hook of the spear buried in, perfect for filling them with lead. Upgrade Tormentor again and enemies will also drop ammo and catch fire during that process. Cowards are definitely onto something – shooting someone in the back is immensely satisfying. …What?

So, after a steep learning curve, the Chain Spear definitely won me over. But before it did, something odd happened. The saw shield came crawling back. A few hours in, Revelations returns the shield to you, and now you can switch it out with the spear whenever you want. I was really torn about this. Great as it was to have my favorite toy back, I respected the game a lot more when it locked me into a new playstyle.

Offense is the Best Defence?

The shield is essentially a safer, steadier bet. Whereas the spear, when used well, can end a brutal battle in seconds. The catch being it can also end the battle for you in seconds. Eventually, you learn when best to switch them out on the fly. Demons who fire automatic guns at me are no match for a spear which can deflect those bullets. Whereas near the end of a long, long onslaught of demons, I appreciate a quick breather behind the shield so I don't lose the last twenty minutes of progress.

Once I truly got a handle on the spear, the shield was reduced to mere cameos, but I still think the game would have benefitted from at least another hour of it being my sole option before tempting me back into the more familiar pleasures of the shield saw.

It's a minor pacing complaint with what's otherwise a terrific package, an inspired remix of Dark Ages and Eternal that's as exhilarating as Doom has ever been. It's beautiful, the story is… well, much less crap than the main campaign's, and the puzzles can actually be called puzzles this time without being laughed out of the room. Best of all, the core combat is about as good as FPS gunplay gets. Only Saros threatens this one's perch for single-player shooter of the year. I said single-player, Marathon stans. Put away your shield saws…

Imagine owning a studio that can make games of this quality, that last year got three million players on board, and then gutting them more viciously than a demon on the wrong end of a chain spear. Tragically, Xbox's cruel layoffs that are targeting 3,200 roles across several studios may have finally delivered the killing blow to the Doom Slayer. Let's hope Revelations isn't the swansong to a studio of such incredible talent.

Check out our best FPS games ranking for more blasting!

PowerA of Japan unveiled on its official X (Twitter) page on July 15, 2026, that a new clamshell case themed around Splatoon Raiders is coming ashore. A case where every drop has had the utmost care put into its design, inside and out.

The $18.85 (Amazon Japan) accessory features the official box art from the upcoming game, which isn't that exciting. Plenty of other brands, like Keys Factory, are also releasing a wealth of accessories using the exact imagery. But while its exterior design might not stand out amongst plenty of the best Nintendo Switch 2 cases I've tested so far, it's the matching green and orange interior that I'm happy to see after dealing with a sea of plain alternatives over the years.

I've owned a lot of cases for my original Nintendo Switch, but they all relied on all-black interiors. This was always a bit disappointing, especially as it felt cheap to bear witness to the dull design when the exterior was always flashy and appealing.

The inside of the best Nintendo Switch cases is never going to be as important as the outside, as ideally that's what people see when you take your handheld out and about. Yet, I always felt a bit cheated when I bought a flashy new licensed case, often ones which are priced higher than the plain alternatives, only for its inside to be absent of any attention in the design department. Yet, this new Switch 2 case generation has started to give me hope of a flashier future.

Take this Slim Case by PowerA, for example. The brand could have easily resorted to a boring interior, but instead it chose to take advantage of the orange and turquoise green color palette of the Splatoon Raiders art and match that on the inside. The lining of the case features the same bright orange coloring of the art and the upcoming game's logo, and even that little game storage flap hasn't been forgotten, as it's sporting a turquoise green colorway. This case can be folded to act as a makeshift stand, so it makes sense for the inside to get just as much attention, but it's great to see it get vital attention nonetheless.

PowerA isn't the only brand to starting to give more care to the design choices of its cases. I was disappointed that the Hori Gengar and Mimikyu Vault Case I reviewed earlier this year had a black bottom interior. However, the brand ensured the accessories pocket and the game storage at least matched the same pastel purple found throughout the outside of the case.

The brand's Switch 2 cases have only improved from there. Hori's upcoming Kuromi and Cinnamoroll Switch 2 cases don't just include lining that replicates the bright pastel designs found throughout the new Sanrio accessories. Instead, they go all out by incorporating fabric that includes art of the same set of tasty treats - from cakes and ice cream - as are dotted around the main front-facing part of the cases.

Not all licenced accessories are made the same. However, the trend of ensuring every inch of these products feels just as well-thought out as the exterior is one I can't wait to see continue as we dive deeper into the Switch 2's lifespan. In the meantime, if you want to make a splash with this upcoming PowerA Splatoon Raiders Slim Case, it's expected to drop on November 30, 2026.

So far, it's only available at Amazon Japan. Yet with the game launching in a matter of days (July 23, 2026), I can only imagine it won't be long until we see Amazon US and UK bursting at the seams with the same ink-credible Splatoon Raiders goodies.

• View all PowerA Switch 2 cases at Amazon

Check out our guides to the best Nintendo Switch headsets, the best Nintendo Switch 2 controllers, and the best Nintendo Switch 2 microSD Express Cards if you're looking for more fresh Switch 2 accessories.

After almost three weeks of community outcry, Blizzard is modifying the drop rates for Mythics in Diablo 4 Season 14. Players had been finding it tough to get Unique Mythics, to the point where many couldn't find any despite farming specifically for them, and now hotfixes are being rolled out to take the edge off.

"We've heard your feedback on Season of Death Awakening, including Mythic unique drop rates, equip limits, and more," Dan Tanguay, the design director of live service for Diablo 4, says on the official Blizzard forums, as relayed by Marcus 'Marcoose' Kretz, senior community manager for the Diablo series.

"In a patch releasing today, we're increasing the drop rate for Mythics from the Corrupted Reaper boss fight and removing equip limits for Mythic Uniques," he writes. "Additionally, in a patch coming next week, we're adding Superior Lair Keys to the Glints of Hope repeatable cache and increasing the Mythic Tribute drop rates in the Undercity."

How much the drop rate for the Corrupted Reaper battle increases will need to be tested, but seeing as numerous players have gotten exactly zero uniques from that encounter, things can really only go up. Letting people equip more than one is helpful as well – you can only have one crafted Mythic at a time currently, significantly reducing the options for any given build.

His post was made on July 16, yesterday at time of writing, meaning it should be live and available to you whenever you boot up Diablo 4 next. A fan on Reddit amusingly told others they can now "re-install Diablo 4," since a few had commented they were ostensibly avoiding this season due to what was happening with Mythics.

The second patch Tanguay mentioned should massage out further problems, too. "Seasons are where we experiment with new ideas and push Diablo 4 in new directions," he finishes. "Not every idea lands exactly as intended, but we’ll continue listening to your feedback, addressing what’s not working, and applying those lessons to future seasonal updates."

Diablo 4's Overwatch crossover skins have been revealed and they are completely cursed: "Mercy looks like a 90-year-old grandma."

As Assassin's Creed Black Flag Resynced players beg Edward to put his pipe away, Ubisoft has confirmed it's looking into it.

The remake of the title many people consider the best Assassin's Creed game is unsurprisingly pretty well liked, with it being the fourth-highest-rated game in the series – it even saw the biggest Steam launch in the series' history. But the biggest complaint with the game itself – well, aside from the gross $80 DLC and it being briefly unplayable over the first weekend on PC, but those aren't as funny – has been Edward's pipe.

For whatever reason, the blowpipe weapon in Assassin's Creed Black Flag has been moved for its Resynced return. As far back as months before the game launched, fans picked up on the weird positioning of the weapon, and players have been asking for a toggle to make the blowpipe invisible until you need to use it.

Speaking with YouTuber JorRaptor, Richard Knight – game director on Assassin's Creed Black Flag Resynced – acknowledges the complaints about the weapon. When JorRaptor mentions that players are looking for a way to hide it, Knight explains, "I'm not sure this is official yet," but "one of our most senior programmers is working on it right now." He adds, "The feeling is mutual. I have a feeling it's coming soon."

As for why it wasn't there from the get go, Knight says: "I wish it was just a magical feature that just was there the moment it started, but it's just because of the way characters are set up." He explains, "Somebody has to do setup to make this specific part of the character just disappear only when this specific setting is enabled, which you know we need to do."

So while nothing is "official" yet, you can rest easy knowing you'll be able to have Edward sans blowpipe soon.

If you're yet to set sail in Ubisoft's new remake, be sure to check out our Assassin's Creed Black Flag Resynced review.

Rockstar Games' open worlds are humungous affairs full of things to buy, shoot, collect, rob, and do. Although with games as lush and extravagant as Red Dead Redemption and GTA 5, it might surprise you to learn that Rockstar Games is actually quite restrained, and the developer cuts a lot of content before passing the finish line.

That's according to former GTA 5 producer John Ricchio, who recently told Kiwi Talkz about how the Grand Theft Auto developer trims the fat on its mammoth games. "There was so much stuff in GTA, particularly GTA 5 – oh my god, there was so much stuff that was like done," he says in the interview. "Like, minigames that were completely done and ready to go, except for like animation, right?"

Minigames were allegedly binned because "the animation team were getting destroyed," and there was "so much animation work to do to bring everything to the same level" in a game as large as GTA 5 "that we had to cut stuff that was otherwise completely done." There simply wasn't enough time on the calendar to have everything meet the same level of quality.

Ricchio was often told by fellow developers that sweeping cuts are just "'a thing that happens, you know, because the game is so big – GTAs are always gigantic.'" Rockstar leaders wouldn't hesitate to bin larger parts of the game, either: "They'll throw out entire levels and they'll throw out entire things because they don't have enough resources to get everything to the same level."

Major cuts were sometimes "hard to deal with" for the dedicated developers who had been working on features or levels or minigames for a "really long time," especially when everyone on the team was happy with the cut work. "It wasn't like they went into DLC or anything… They just disappeared," Ricchio adds.

But he also acknowledges that such cuts are part of working under a "large production" like Rockstar Games, and it's sometimes for the best. "Every decision can't be made by everyone," he says, and when a developer's headcount stretches as wide as Rockstar's, there'll inevitably be decisions that not everyone will agree on.

According to another ex-developer, an entire single-player Agent Trevor DLC was abruptly scrapped after the dizzying success of GTA Online. Rockstar Universe also lists all of the games' supposed cut content, mostly based on glimpses of features from old trailers that never made it into the finished product.

GTA 5 is still selling millions a year, letting Rockstar do whatever it wants with GTA 6: analyst estimates 1.8 million just on PS5 in 2026.

Clockwork Revolution isn't going to feature an overly annoying companion, thankfully, with inXile Entertainment founder and Fallout veteran Brian Fargo confirming as much.

We've all played games with less-than-ideal companions. From too much hand-holding to generally pesky personalities, there's no shortage of qualities that can make gameplay a bit of a slog to get through. The Legend of Zelda immediately springs to mind for me, with the ever-loathed (and beloved) Navi, and Metroid Prime 4: Beyond's Myles Mackenzie, the notoriously annoying sidekick of protagonist Samus.

Much to the gaming community's delight, however, Clockwork Revolution won't feature a companion that makes you want to connect your head with the desk – Fargo, studio head and game producer, reassures us of this in a new online post.
"Been getting questions about the companion in Clockwork Revolution. Rest assured: I LOATHE companions that point out the obvious because they think players are dumb," he writes.

"Ours only speaks when it knows something you couldn't or has something genuinely funny to say. Kept rare on purpose. Hoping by the end you say, 'I wish she talked more, not less.'" That'd certainly be the day, eh?

As for why Fargo and fellow developers at inXile chose to make their companion (presumably Prentice, the flying, foul-mouthed automaton described by publisher Xbox Game Studios last month) that way, basically, it has to do with retro games and how Fargo feels they treated their players.

"My philosophy goes all the way back to the '80s," as he explains in response to a fan agreeing that they're "so tired" of spoiler-laden companions.

"Even when the audience was truly younger than today, we always treated them with intelligence, and we never regretted doing so." That makes a lot of sense – and explains why older games feel more "difficult" in contrast.

I'm personally thrilled to learn Prentice won't be as hand-holdy, but I suppose we'll have to wait and see just how far that goes when Clockwork Revolution releases in 2027.

Time-bending RPG from Fallout veteran has choices that "take a long time to catch up with you."

Castlevania Belmont’s Curse is a Metroidvania with a capital Vania 'V'. It’s the first proper Castlevania game in 12 years, and a proud 2D action graduate of the Symphony of the Night school of design – not only one of the best Metroidvania games, but the one that set the blueprint for hundreds of replicas, establishing the genre.

Thousands of Metroidvania have followed in Symphony of the Night's wake, with a surge in indie popularity following 2014's Castlevania Lords of Shadow 2 – the most recent game in the series. So, how do you bring the originator back into a space that’s now overcrowded with imitators?

Whipped into shape

This question stays at the forefront of my mind for approximately 10 seconds as I settle in to play the first 3 hours of Castlevania: Belmont’s Curse. But any thoughts about the weight of the franchise's genre-defining legacy quickly fade, replaced by one singular obsession: the Vampire Killer whip. When will I get the whip? Where do I get the whip? Will the whip feel as good as it looks?

Every second I spend without the whip is agony. Hooks dangle tantalizingly from the ceilings, begging to be traversed, but remain out of reach to my bare beginner hands.

I find myself galvanized, utterly fixated on claiming this weapon, a wry smile creeping across my face as the obsession takes hold. You see – this feeling, that gnawing sense of desire, is quintessential Castlevania.

Few series understand the power of longing quite like Castlevania. Whether it's a weapon, a spell, a trapped item, an inaccessible path, or simply the relief of the next save point, these dense, Gothic labyrinths have a particular talent for making the player truly, deeply want things. And I want that whip.

As Rose Belmont, the daughter of Trevor Belmont and magician Sypha Belnades, I storm, whip-less, through the blood-soaked streets of Paris until I meet the first proper boss in the game: The Fallen. He throws a large Holy Cross my way, it spins and ricochets against the walls, and every fiber in my being tells me to jump. But, then what? In a thoughtless moment of frustration on my fifth attempt, I slice the Holy Cross. A cocktail of surprise and satisfaction ripples through my mind, because in true Castlevania fashion: the less likely option has been rewarded.

Cleaved by his own cross, The Fallen is now down to his second phase, gripping me within his far-reaching whip, or using it to swing between walls. It’s difficult to get close enough to land a hit on him in this phase, and the fight is admittedly very challenging for a first boss.

But alas, the greater the trial, the finer the weapon earned. It would be an insult for the Vampire Killer whip to be wielded by an enemy less fierce.

As with all truly great bosses, I breathe a sigh of both relief and dismay upon defeating them. Glad that the stress of his second phase is over, but sad that I’m no longer fully absorbed in the all-consuming tension and rhythm of the fight.

But most importantly, I finally get my hands on the Vampire Whip. And it absolutely rules. There are few moments in life where the catch lives up to the chase, but this weapon is one of them. It’s a sheer joy to use from the moment it’s equipped.

I traverse new aerial routes via the hooks, swinging upwards through the vertical climbs with fluid motion. I whip onto enemies, using their positioning to access unreachable areas. This is a weapon that works in harmony with an inquisitive mind – experiment with it and you’ll be amazed at what it can do.

When in Paris

Wayfinding is intuitive in Belmont’s Curse, with exploration rewarded as the vast city of Paris gradually opens up around you in a non-linear map. With a setting as cool as 15th-century Paris, Konami would have been fools to confine the game to a single castle. Instead, there are beautiful gothic streets and catacombs to roam, alongside burning, imposing buildings to climb.

The city's architecture, with its lofty, monumental landmarks, complements the verticality of the game beautifully. Long stretches of vertical traversal feel exploratory rather than repetitive, as sweeping rooftop views of Paris unfurl around you.

Boasting a striking 2.5D art style, Belmont’s Curse is a feast for the eyes. But it doesn’t really look like a Castlevania game. Its solid slabs of colour and cartoony animations lack the rich, gothic detail I associate with the series. From an aesthetic standpoint the game has far more in common with Dead Cells.

I was wondering which aspects of developer Evil Empire would shine through in Belmont’s Curse, and turns out: it’s not the roguelike gameplay, it’s the art style. Belmont's Curse may wear the stylish clothes of Dead Cells and The Rogue Prince of Persia, but it doesn't play the same way at all. The shared ground between these Evil Empire games is predominantly the visuals.

While the bolder look is a swerve of direction that will take some adjusting for longstanding Castlevania fans like myself, it is fitting for a game series that recently had a huge hit animated show on Netflix. The game and TV series clearly share a visual identity, which makes sense considering that Belmont’s Curse will be many fans’ first Castlevania game after binging the likes of Castlevania: Nocture.

Growing up loving a game series the way I love Castlevania, it’s hard not to get bogged down in nostalgia. My eyebrows shot up with skepticism when I began moving around as Rose Belmont. She feels so different. Easily the most agile protagonist the series has ever seen. But, stepping away from the blueprint doesn’t mean losing what made the series great. In fact, I appreciate that Konami and Evil Empire are willing to push Castlevania forward with a fresh feeling character rather than opting for the more rigid, familiar style of movement.

Rose is an absolute joy to control, with a nimble moveset that lets her slide behind enemies, vault through the environment, and wall-jump her way across the streets of Paris. Alongside her trusty whip, Rose wields the Arcana System, a magical toolkit powered by enchanted tarot cards gifted to her by her late mother, Sypha Belnades.

Defeating powerful foes allows Rose to seal their essence into these cards, transforming them into Arcana that grant new abilities. These powers can range from devastating, screen-clearing spells to subtle enhancements that completely reshape how she approaches combat and exploration, making every new card feel like a meaningful expansion of her arsenal. Belmont’s Curse carries all the grace and elegance of the Castlevania series in an excitingly different way. Yes, it’s back to a 2D action adventure world, but it’s back to anything but basics.

It’s a tricky tightrope to walk: keeping old Castlevania game fans happy whilst simultaneously pleasing a new, modern audience derived from Netflix. There are plenty of nods to both to appease fans. But, the core of Castlevania is preserved here, with its beloved SotN-style gameplay of tight combat, intriguing exploration, and arcane spells. And I’m thankful for that: I’d much rather Belmont’s Curse play like a Castlevania game than just look like one.

Want to hop in? Check out our where to start with Castelvania tips!

For my money, the biggest advantage console gaming has over PC gaming these days is that you can still get your games on physical discs and cartridges. With PlayStation ending discs for new releases in 2028, that advantage is disappearing – and for at least one PC gamer, physical games are making a comeback on Steam with an extremely cool array of custom, SSD-based cartridges.

"Got a couple of used 2.5" SSDs for cheap so I decided to make a Game Cartridge system," Jibril-sama explains on Reddit. "Games are actually on those SSDs with a script to auto navigate steam to the game's page. Auto-starting the game right away is also possible."

The clip below shows a bunch of these cartridges, each of which comes in a slick custom casing with game art. Jibril-sama plugs one into a dock, and the game instantly becomes available to play on Steam. This is entirely impractical for a lot of reasons – we'll get into those in a minute – but there's no denying it's cool as hell.

Steam Game Cartridges from r/pcmasterrace

The system shown in the clip runs Linux, and "all it needs is a systemd template to check for a script on the SSD and launch it. And a udev rule to trigger the system," as Jibril-sama tells our friends at Tom's Hardware. "So basically: Plug in SSD -> udev rule sees the event -> triggers the systemd daemon -> systemd daemon looks into the SSD and finds the script -> execute the script."

But how on earth are you getting ahold of that much storage media unless you're literally the owner of an AI datacenter? Well, Jibril-sama apparently isn't kidding about getting those SSDs cheap – apparently the 128GB drives were just €7 apiece, which given storage prices these days, feels like trading beans for gold.

I had a pleasure to help with work on a viral project which took over a part of the internet yesterday!Check it out here:makerworld.com/en/models/30...All pictures were done by me, including the ones in Tom's Hardware article.#steam #PC #cartridge #photography #retro #gaming #DIY

— @princessmidori.bsky.social (@princessmidori.bsky.social.bsky.social) 2026-07-16T21:57:40.114Z

It's actually pretty easy to do the practical part of this without all the cool cartridges, since you can just designate an external USB drive to house your Steam library, either entirely or in part. It's a nifty way to keep all your games installed if you're out of room on your system's main drive, but admittedly, it's not nearly as fun as plugging individual games in.

And either way, "you still don't really 'own' the games on Steam," as Jibril-sama readily admits. You'll always be beholden to Valve's online authentication to actually play your games, which means this isn't really a way to preserve your library the same way as traditional physical media. "But it's at least something fun and useful to me personally."

Discontinuing physical discs is one thing, but the PlayStation Portal already hints at Sony's worrying ambitions for an all-digital future.

Hi, have you had your fill of bad video game news this week? I hope not, because I just picked up a plate of fresh, sizzling garbage: a study by former Habbo Hotel developer Sulka Haro suggests half of the games available on Steam by 2028 will incorporate AI-generated content.

Haro analyzed approximately 53,600 Steam games launched across a three-year period, from July, 2023 to July, 2026, he shares in the study posted on his Substack. According to the developer, once Steam introduced the AI-disclosure feature in 2024, a steady increase of games on Steam began admitting to AI-generated content. "If the current trajectory holds," Haro writes gravely, "AI-disclosed games cross ~50% of all Steam releases somewhere in 2027–2028."

Haro says that nearly 31% of Steam games currently share their AI usage – that's "roughly one in three new Steam games," he remarks. "A real adoption ramp built on top of a baseline that started at literal zero," since there was no Steam page field for developers to punch in details of their AI usage before 2024.

It seems that part of Haro's anticipation of more, so many more AI-assisted games on Steam comes from his discovery that the people he calls first-time, "AI developers" usually squeeze out crud like a frog giving birth. "AI lowers the barrier not just to make a game but to make several," says Haro, "which also feeds the shovelware tail (the 5+ bar is 3× higher for AI devs)."

At the same time, Haro clarifies that "80% of the 37,000 distinct publishers [on Steam] have never shipped a single AI game, and of those that have, 89% shipped exactly one." So the slop factory is operating at a modest, rather than exponential, pace.

Though, anecdotally, I can see that its wheels are quickly churning. Earlier this week, Circana industry analyst Mat Piscatella predicted that game discovery will only get worse on storefronts like Steam as AI vibe coding makes it easy for people to clone legitimate games, including indie hits like Peak. So as we walk faster toward Haro's prediction of 50% AI-made games on Steam by 2028, I bet we can expect to get hit with more scams and lazy ripoffs, too. Oh, well. I hope all that slop tastes good.

P.S. It doesn't. Earlier this summer, we found out why so many game developers don't want to use generative AI.

Surprise! The official PlayStation YouTube channel has randomly dropped a new trailer for Marvel's Wolverine with some notable story and character reveals, and as you might imagine the community is – wait, what's that? Oh, the comments are absolutely flooded with anger about Sony's decision to end physical discs, to the point where hardly anyone is actually discussing the content of the trailer.

The trailer seems to effectively be an extended cutscene, but it does have some meat for fans to chew on. We see Wolverine chasing a photo of himself and Jean Grey through an array of battlefields, suggesting that their relationship will be a central part of the story. More surprising is that Sabretooth – who we've seen appear in previous footage – seems to be teaming up with Logan. We've also finally got confirmation that Lady Deathstrike will appear in the game.

But if you scroll through the comments on YouTube, you won't see much discussion about those facts. Instead, you'll see messages like "We want physical games," "WE WANT PHYSICAL GAMES!" and "WE WANT PHYSICAL GAMES!!!!" Others are chiming in with comments like "That disc is going to look awesome," "This is gonna be a day one buy on physical disc," and "Can't wait for my PHYSICAL COPY."

Marvel's Wolverine will indeed be released on a physical disc, something that the devs at Insomniac confirmed in the wake of news that GTA 6 would be a digital-only launch. Since then, Sony announced that there will be no more new PlayStation games on disc as of 2028, so it seems Marvel's Wolverine is likely among the last of a dying breed.

Analysts expect that Sony "will not reverse" its decision to kill discs despite the backlash, but boy – that backlash is loud on the official PlayStation YouTube channel. It's not just a response to a big, first-party title like Wolverine, either – every single new trailer uploaded to the channel is inundated with the same sorts of comments supporting physical media.

Non-Sony devs are certainly taking notice. Eat Pant Games, the New Zealand indie studio behind adorable platformer Teeto, posted a harrowing recap of seeing 400 comments under the game's release trailer, only to find that they're all about physical discs. Teeto is a small enough release that it's only happening digitally for now, but the devs are hopeful that could change in the future: "WE CAN HAVE BOTH."

Despite some reports to the contrary, Sony hasn't been shutting off comments in response to the backlash. Trailers for titles like Instant Sports 2 are flagged as family-friendly content on YouTube, which means comments are turned off automatically – presumably to protect kids from the horrors of gamers who are mad about Sony's efforts to hasten the death of physical media.

Sony killing physical PlayStation games is "the latest attack on our diminishing rights," leading digital rights group says: "The end goal is to turn the customer into a renter."

Sony plans to end physical discs by 2028, assuming no one wants to hold anything in their hands anymore now that we have the Fortnite item shop to provide us with Skibidi Toilet backpack in exchange for real money. But if that were even a little bit true, then Mortal Shell 2 developer Cold Symmetry wouldn't have to be so despondent. Its PS5-exclusive Revered Edition with a physical disc is running out of stock, which is great, but Cold Symmetry doesn't yet have confirmed plans to replace it.

"Demand for the PS5 physical Revered Edition of Mortal Shell 2 has exceeded expectations," Cold Symmetry writes in a July 16 Twitter post, ahead of the grim Soulslike sequel's August 20 launch. "Unfortunately supply across a number of retailers has now been fully reserved, meaning that in a growing number of markets fans are unable to pre-purchase a copy of the game. We apologise for the lack of availability."

Mortal Shell 2 follows the first game from 2020 in being a frigid stone slab of an action-RPG, all gray and mist blue as you possess fallen warriors' empty Shells and use their combat powers against heretics. Its fancy $70 Revered Edition comes in a big box with a physical game, steelbook, artbook, and in-game exclusives. While most major retailers seem to still be accepting pre-orders for the Edition, Cold Symmetry suggests there's no guarantee your order will be fulfilled if you place one.

"There is a very low chance of additional physical copies becoming available before the game's release," the developer continues on Twitter. "We are working with our distribution partner to review ongoing demand and we'll update as soon as we hear their decision on next steps."

"To be clear," Cold Symmetry reiterates, "there is no guarantee of a stock replenishment plan after launch as this decision is not ours to make."

But even if the Revered Edition's physical games are sold out for good, fans have decided Mortal Shell 2 will still be the accidental poster child of discs. Niko Partners video game market analyst Daniel Ahmad writes on Twitter about Mortal Shell 2's slipping stock, "Granted this is overall a supply issue rather than demand, but it does show this model works and could continue working."

Others scoff more full-throatedly at PlayStation for ever doubting the game format. In any case, it seems that physical media doesn't lie down and die just because Sony wants it to.

Sony's attack on physical goods spreads to Crunchyroll as it adds a $14 subscription requirement just to access new store "experience."

Genshin Impact's free 5-star selector, To Temper Thyself and Journey Far, will begin its fifth cycle on August 10, loosely coinciding with the expected release date of update 7.0 and the Snezhnaya region. The milestone, tucked away in the game's new event timeline, is significant, as it marks the end of the giveaway's four-part debut cycle and could open it up to changes including new characters being added into the rotation.

To Temper Thyself and Journey Far lets Genshin Impact players obtain free Constellations for 5-star characters they already own by repeatedly completing in-game tasks. Each cycle is 12 weeks long, and you have to log eight completed weeks in that time to earn a Constellation (among other rewards), completing at least five days of tasks each week.

The other catch is that you can't redeem the same character multiple times to stack up Constellations. Most people use the event to take a character with no Constellations to "C1," unlocking the first passive ability normally acquired by pulling duplicates of that character. But if you had a character at C1, you could also use a freebie to upgrade them to C2, and so on.

With the next cycle of To Temper Thyself and Journey Far beginning, players will seemingly be able to claim another four free Constellations in the year ahead. The question is whether the selection of characters will be updated in the Snezhnaya era – either expanded, with more characters becoming redeemable, or edited, with some characters rotating out.

Many players have expressed hopes that more and better characters will be added to this event following Snezhnaya's release. Yumemizuki Mizuki is a notable absentee as the only standard-banner character not available, though she is included in the dedicated standard 5-star selector that comes around with Genshin Impact's anniversary.

The timing of the event could leave the door open to more Sumeru or even some Fontaine-era characters becoming available, though I wouldn't expect the strongest of the lot to be given free Constellations like this. As one of the 11 people who pulled Chiori and Emilie, I don't think adding them to the list would be a threat to characters like Zibai or Nefer.

The original roster mostly consisted of old and outdated characters, like Kamisato Ayato and Eula, but some found new life with free Constellations. A C1 Shenhe is a more compelling teammate for the meta-relevant Cryo DPS Skirk, and a C1 Hu Tao isn't an unreasonable Pyro partner for modern support character packages like Columbina and Ineffa.

The value of the characters in the event has changed in the past year, which has seen the power level of new characters rise considerably alongside buffs to older units. For example, recent changes to Yae Miko have made her probably the best C1 pick in the entire game for her synergy with the Stellar Conduct reaction which much of the Snezhnaya cast will evidently be built around. Cyno, another Stellar Conduct target, is in a similar position. Likewise, characters like Albedo and Klee benefited from buffs to units with the Hexerei faction tag, making their early Constellations more appealing.

Valve has "a nice thing going on on PC," Epic Games boss Tim Sweeney says, but "they're missing out on a lot of opportunity" without the likes of Fortnite and Genshin Impact.

Ever since the DS and Wii, Nintendo's built its brand on staying out of the AAA graphics race that its competitors have usually pursued. But the seeds of that corporate philosophy were around at least a decade earlier, when games like Super Mario 64 were at the cutting edge of 3D graphics, and RPGs were exploding across new cinematic frontiers. For Shigeru Miyamoto, though? Even in the '90s, he'd rather have just kept launching cannonballs on his OG Macintosh.

In July 1996, Miyamoto was interviewed by Kenji Eno, the developer best known for the cult horror game D. Eno, known for experimental game design, had just played the newly released Super Mario 64, and wasn't nearly as impressed as the rest of the gaming world. He dreamed of something more interactive from the 3D world, where snow would realistically react to Mario's footsteps, kicking up into snowballs as you ran around.

"I would love to do that," Miyamoto responded, according to a newly translated version of the interview on Shmuplations. "However, strategy guides exist now, so the joy of someone discovering something entirely on their own doesn't really translate anymore. Everyone expects to be able to beat the game as a given. There's a massive dilemma there."

Miyamoto's distaste for pre-determined solutions and linear exploration is part of why he decided old-school Zelda dungeons aren't "really that much fun" while making Ocarina of Time a few years later. With Mario 64, he wanted the game to be smaller in scope, but feared the market would reject something that wasn't packed with content and technical wizardry.

"In reality, instead of having six or seven stars per stage, I only wanted half that number," Miyamoto explained. "But like I said before, the foundation is set now, so we perhaps can start doing stuff like that from here on out. Do you remember that old Mac game where you'd shoot cannons at each other in a windy area? You'd adjust nothing but the launch angle and power to hit the enemy artillery hiding behind rocks. The other side would shoot back at you using the wind too."

Shumplations suggests that Miyamoto is probably talking about Cannon Fodder, not to be confused with the 1993 goofy shoot-'em-up that became a hit on Amiga. This Cannon Fodder is a simple 2D game with purely black and white graphics where your cannon fire can destroy objects in the environment.

"I think that kind of thing is far more interesting than the RPGs we see today," Miyamoto argued. "But you just can't make a game like that when you have to worry about justifying a 9,800 yen price tag. People look at a casual game like that and assume it can be made on a low budget, or that a rookie can handle it, or that if it's that simple, it could just be distributed via the Satellaview."

Satellaview was a satellite-based distribution service for Japan's equivalent to the Super NES which offered downloadable games. The idea that you purchase "big" games with high production values at a store and smaller, more experimental titles digitally would persist for years, even as digital distribution became more prevalent. That line was drawn even more strongly in the '90s.

"Everything gets manufactured based entirely on price," Miyamoto said. "Instead of opening up a playground for people to try out new ideas, everything has just become a conversation about cost. I find that a bit frustrating."

Even here in 2026, as we're being forced to say goodbye to physical games, we're still debating game prices – but it has become much easier for smaller-scale games with fresh ideas to make it to market. Who knows? Maybe Steam's next surprise hit will be all about two players shooting cannons at each other.

Zelda was Nintendo's answer to "traditional RPGs," Shigeru Miyamoto says: "We wanted the player to interact with the game world using the controller, and conquer dungeons."

Maintaining a live-service game is a tough line of work. You've got to keep the updates coming, constantly roll out hotfixes, and you're constantly relying on your community to make the release viable. Warframe's been going steady for 13 years now, an impressive feat, and Rebecca Ford, the game's creative director, takes nothing for granted.

"You can be as wise as those that came before you, you can learn from those who have not continued on, and the truth is always somewhere in the middle of it," she explains to GamesRadar+ during an interview at TennoCon 2026. "Just try and make a good game before they kick you out."

That's a slightly dispiriting outlook, but it's pragmatic, since we just saw the sudden finish of Destiny 2. Bungie's sci-fi FPS came to a slightly unceremonious end in June, with a sudden final update after it was reported Sony took a considerable loss on acquiring the studio, leading to a large amount of layoffs.

Warframe developer Digital Extremes knows full well the environment it's in. "It shows that even if you care so much, the business side of this industry always gets the last remark," Ford says of what happened to Bungie. "Those are the types of stories and experiences that, when you're in a position where you have your own game, your own IP, and you work as hard as you do on it… That's not the first time it's happened, and it'll happen again, where the business aspect of the video game economy makes the decision for you."

She mentions that "the idea that we aren't in charge of our own goodbye is something I wake up thinking about every single day," demonstrating the kind of pressure she and her colleagues work under. Right now, Warframe seems to be going strong. TennoCon gets bigger each and every year, and being both free and well-balanced as a game makes Warframe appealing and easy to settle into.

There have been layoffs in the studio before, though, and Ford notes that despite this, the internal structure contains many longtime employees – including herself, as she's risen from community management to her current role – giving them a distinct perspective.

"Anyone here in a leadership position didn't come into the company in that position, which I think gives us a little bit of a unique way of working as a team," she explains. "None of us signed up for this, but we do it because it must be done, and we trust each other, which is one of the most fundamental parts of our operations, and every day, every week, we can improve how we work as a business with an office, or how we work remote as a studio."

Warframe lead Rebecca Ford says Destiny 2's death is "horrible news" for everyone: "Not the first time it's happened, and it'll happen again"

A Florida man has been arrested by federal agents amid an FBI investigation into a Steam malware scheme said to have plundered crypto wallets in the past two years.

South Florida outlet Local 10 News reports that 21-year-old Zyaire Dontaevious Zamarion Wilkins was arrested on Tuesday, July 14 and charged with participating in the scheme, whose operators are collectively said to have stolen "at least $220,000" in cryptocurrencies from roughly 80 crypto wallets. On current charges, Wilkins faces up to 10 years in prison under the Computer Fraud and Abuse Act.

Steam and owner Valve are not specified in the federal complaint tied to Wilkins' arrest, but the FBI does specify Steam in a March request for victim information regarding malware threat actors believed to have been active "between the timeframe of May 2024 and January 2026," and the details of these incidents are closely aligned.

The FBI also listed several games identified in the malware scheme: "BlockBlasters, Chemia, Dashverse/DashFPS, Lampy, Lunara, PirateFi, and Tokenova." All of these games are no longer on Steam and, in SteamDB archives, have been flagged as "suspicious, as it may be malicious or impersonating another product."

The removal of BlockBlasters made headlines last year. Reported crypto figures indicate this one game was responsible for a majority of the malware distribution.

Agents say Wilkins and his collaborators promoted "eight games embedded with malware" online and ultimately reached "approximately 8,000 individual customers," apparently including several specific people targeted for their "large cryptocurrency holdings." Wilkins allegedly paid $10,000 for a Trojan program capable of the remote access necessary for this type of hack.

Local 10 News reports that Wilkins was tracked down via Bitrefill purchases of over 150 digital gift cards primarily for Uber Eats. The complaint adds that Wilkins' crypto history showed he had personally sent or received $382,000.

Malicious games and mods are not unheard of on Steam, and games are a relatively common vehicle for this type of malware. Earlier this year, a developer called out a worm-like mod which was evidently spreading through the UGC Steam Workshop and replacing other files "with itself."

Hacker behind GTA 6 leak that cost Rockstar $5 million reportedly awaiting retrial after being released from secure hospital.

Meccha Chameleon, the latest "friendslop" hit on Steam to absolutely dominate the web, is now second in player count to its fan-created Roblox clones.

The new indie gem is no stranger to clones, having seen an AI ripoff so bold as to use its title in some regions come to light earlier this week – but those on Roblox are arguably more of a "threat," so to speak, seeing as they're freely available… and the platform boasts millions of daily users.

Unsurprisingly, there are a good few, too, ranging from "Paint and SEEK!" to "Paint Or Seek" to… "Paint To Hide!" and so on.

What is surprising, however, is that these Roblox clones have now reportedly overtaken the actual Meccha Chameleon in daily peak player count.

A Reddit chart from RoWatcherHQ, an account that focuses on gathering data from and about Roblox, highlights this, showing that around 150,000 to over 200,000 players still engage with the clones.

These figures aren't as high as Meccha Chameleon's record of 340,534 – but they're higher than its current numbers.

[OC] Peak daily players: the Steam game Meccha Chameleon vs. its Roblox clones. Three weeks after launch, the clones combined pulled ahead of the original from r/dataisbeautiful

Right now, as per the chart and SteamDB, Meccha Chameleon has about 55,000 players in-game. That's how many users it's boasted daily for a few days now, meaning that it's faced quite the drop – especially when lined up against the free Roblox clones, which only started to surface some three or so weeks ago.

Obviously, Meccha Chameleon isn't hitting mind-boggling lows here or anything… but it's still disheartening to see.

This isn't a first for Roblox, either, as the platform features a plethora of other game clones. From REPO to Dead by Daylight, its users have copied just about everything under the sun – and evidently, they won't be slowing down any time soon.

I do wonder if Meccha Chameleon's own developers will share their thoughts on the matter at all, or if they'll strike down the paid clones over on Steam.

Only time can tell, I suppose, but I'd advise folks to give the original game a go – it's a whole lot of chaos, and even more fun, if you ask me.

Viral indie hit Meccha Chameleon sells a massive 15 million copies in less than a month, becomes the fastest and best-selling game of the year

The GOG store had its biggest bump in visibility thanks to Capcom's PS1 survival horror classics, the CD Projekt Red-owned store's staff say.

Marcin Paczyński, senior business development and partnerships manager at GOG, revealed last year that Capcom was initially hesitant to re-release the classic Resident Evil trilogy as Resident Evil (2002), Resident Evil 2 (2019) and Resident Evil 3 (2020) already existed and were – in its eyes – superior games. However, speaking to RPG Site, Paczyński says that the success of that trilogy's return – which led to it being released on Steam – has probably made it easier to convince Capcom to play ball with returning classics.

"The launch answered a lot of questions by itself," Paczyński says. "The classic Resident Evil games and Dino Crisis sit at over 90% positive user ratings on GOG, and it's worth remembering how seriously Capcom approached them: they were treated as full new releases, with complete QA and certification, per language."

Paczyński responds to the question of whether things have gotten easier since Resident Evil, saying: "We understand what it means for a company to hand over brands this iconic, brands that are truly its own. That takes real trust, and we're grateful Capcom gave us that chance." He adds, "We delivered. Perhaps that makes conversations with other partners a little simpler now, because there is a track record to point to.

"As for whether more of Capcom's legacy is coming: the top of the GOG Dreamlist is the most honest answer I can give." At the moment, Resident Evil Code: Veronica X is Capcom's highest ranking game on the Dreamlist, with 83,884 votes making it one of the top requests on the site.

Paczyński also credits Capcom's releases with giving the store a boost in visibility, saying: "Bringing back Resident Evil and Dino Crisis did more for GOG's visibility than almost anything else in recent years." He adds, "It showed players that the biggest classics can come back done right, and it showed rights holders, especially in Japan, what a classic release can look like on PC."

As for Capcom itself, he says the company has been a "fantastic" partner "through all of it, demanding in the best sense, and we would love to do more together. That is no secret." So hopefully we'll see God Hand and the Mega Man Legends games get a PC release soon… please.

"Resident not-Evil" is Resident Evil 2 director's joke cozy life sim pitch starring a retired Leon Kennedy fishing, baking, and "inviting his old friends over for barbecues."

Video game preservation is a constant uphill battle. Many games publishers don't seem to care all that much about it, making old tech work on new systems requires endless patience, and now Sony's discontinuing physical PlayStation games. In addition to all of that, there's the bugbear that is Windows 11, which is causing some impressively obtuse issues for older releases.

Michał Obuchowski, GOG's publishing technical manager, knows this too well. "Microsoft is reworking how elevation works - the old 'click Yes' on a UAC prompt is being replaced by something called Administrator Protection, where the system spins up a hidden, one-time admin account and a short-lived token gated behind Windows Hello," he explains to RPGSite.

"It's a reasonable security move, but for us it changes how a game asks for the permissions it needs," he adds. "And the catch is you don't really know what actually changed until Microsoft ships a preview."

"The further Windows travels from its roots, the more 30-year-old baggage it drags along," Obuchowski says. "And Microsoft keeps trimming it: Directshow suffered a regression in newer Windows 11 builds, causing some classic game videos to break in spectacular ways, legacy drivers, [and] old copy-protection schemes which may prove tricky to remove, making it ever more important to ship games DRM-free."

For a tech giant invested in new software like Microsoft, many of these alterations could seem minute, but as Obuchowski observes: "Every time a piece of [Windows] gets retired, something from 1998 can stop booting."

GOG's done some miracle work over the years restoring older games to a playable state. Relatively obscure projects like Ecstatica and Clive Barker's Undying are now preserved and buyable in their original state, as well as genre-defining greats, such as the first three Resident Evil games.

In each and every case, the GOG team would have been up against disjointed technology, exacerbated by Windows. I don't have much faith that aspect will get any easier, which makes it all the more crucial that we support preservation initiatives.

GOG dunks on Sony and reminds everyone why PC gaming is so beloved: "You don't need a storefront's permission to play what you bought."

Fans sighed but understood when EA's free-to-play Skate reboot from 2025 started its ongoing Early Access period with microtransactions, but EA vice president of advertising Alexander Dao seems curious to see if that sigh could turn into a dry-heave as the publisher toys with in-game ads.

Dao recommends some developers start designing in-game ads during their production periods, telling The Game Business in a new interview, "As you think about new games that are coming out, as you think about free-to-play experiences that are happening on the console side – like our Skate game – those are opportunities where, if you actually design them with the right advertising and brand experience in there from the get-go, it just makes it easier."

Earlier this summer, EA established the EA Advertising "platform" for brands eager to test gameplay ad placements, emphasizing in an announcement that EA Sports games were particularly ripe for "participatory experiences where brands come to play."

If you're gagging, that means it's working.

At the time, EA had already introduced the home improvement store Lowe's to Madden NFL, partnered with Visa credit cards, and added Vans shoes to Skate. But Dao reminds developers, too, to invest in the "huge opportunity" of in-game ads.

"Building the advertising experience is really retrofitting it in," Dao says about the current state of in-game ads, but if developers help, "it makes it feel more native and it creates more flexibility in the types of brands that can come in and out."

I recoil at the idea of advertisements feeling "native" to video games that aren't inherently advertisements, like the promotional games of yore spanning diet sodas, fast food, and beer. At the same time, EA Advertising is really just making an enthusiastic return to those Wild West days of video games between the '80s and early 2000s when games like NFS: Underground 2 were glad to laser-blast you with Best Buy billboards while you were cruising.

Many of my favorite games from childhood were congested with ads, and the in-game product placement in the dress-up game Stardoll at age 10 still influences my closet with fashion brands like Miss Sixty and DKNY. It worked!

I find that frightening – especially now that companies have more opportunities via smart refrigerators and unskippable YouTube ads to tattoo our retinas with their stuff.

In 2026, game developers are already tasked with navigating mass layoffs, studio closures, and game cancellations – if EA ends up successful in guiding them to create more in-game ads, forcing them to obey the financial interests of a company that could dissolve their job at any moment, then there will be no more room for artistry. Just fear and Mountain Dew assets.

After "incomprehensible" Xbox layoffs, id Software producer says worker-owned studios are "the only path forward."