Just one day after the game's launch, there's a patch on the way for Beast of Reincarnation to address criticisms of the action-RPG. Developer Game Freak plans to release the changes in the coming days.

The studio announced the update on Twitter. "Thank you for playing Beast of Reincarnation!" the post starts. "We take your feedback to heart and are currently planning a series of continuous updates."

The list of changes is mostly things you'll commonly find in a post-launch patch, like camera changes, fixing text size, and myriad bug fixes. But one thing that stands out is "Story pacing improvements," something that'll be altered incrementally, according to the tweet.

It's unclear exactly what this refers to, but it seems players are unhappy with the main narrative, and Game Freak agrees there's room to improve. Getting the story right in a glossy action-RPG like this can be crucial, because it's what many players are there to experience, and as this is all fresh territory for the studio, I suspect the devs have come up against the learning curve of pleasing those fans.

That's not to imply Game Freak's just a Pokemon team - far from it - but Beast of Reincarnation is the devs branching out in a significant way. Something that jumps out to me is that combat isn't mentioned. First impressions from reviews made this a clear dividing line between those who enjoyed the experience and those who found it quite middling. Our own GamesRadar+ Beast of Reincarnation review calls the combat "firm but fair," whereas others called it completely uninspired.

Another update could be in the pipeline to address those criticisms. But either way, this first set of fixes is intended to arrive next week.

Game Freak admits Beast of Reincarnation "doesn’t really fit our vibe" after decades of stylized Pokemon but knew "photorealism would be the best fit" for the action RPG

In a year ruled by RAM shortages, blighting everything from the best gaming laptops to the smartphone in your pocket, any sniff of a new competitor is good news.

ChangXin Memory Technologies (CXMT) is "China's only mass-market DRAM manufacturer at scale" in 2026 (Counterpoint) and has leapt from a 1% to 8% revenue share in the global DRAM market in Q2 (Counterpoint). As the "fastest growing" DRAM manufacturer across the world, giants SK Hynix, Samsung, and Micron's forays in HBM have seemingly left a gap for more traditional R&D.

Now laptop manufacturers are reportedly turning to the memory underdog to ease their supply chain woes. A recent Nikkei Asia report suggests that HP, Asus, and Acer are all using a "limited amount" of CXMT memory in laptops sold in China. It's no surprise - after all, Apple is reportedly testing the use of CXMT's memory in its products sold in China, and the brand already supplies domestic brands Xiaomi, Transsion, Honor, Oppo, and Vivo.

This is no miracle moment, though. For now we're only talking about 'laptops' as a generalization. There's no word on whether HP, Asus, and Acer will extend this use to gaming rigs, and whether CXMT will relax its focus on Chinese manufacture and domestic markets in time to make a meaningful dent in new release price tags.

The competition CXMT could one day pose to Micron, Samsung, and SK Hynix, though, is certainly a glimmer of hope. The big three have been writing the rulebook for over ten years now, and their focus on HBM manufacturing has left a "growth window for CXMT," explains a recent Pandaily report.

With the brand's LPDDR6 research continuing to show results, and plans for a second manufacturing plant in Beijing in place (Reuters), the RAM underdog has every opportunity to capitalize on the gap left by the Big Three.

• See all gaming laptop deals at Best Buy

Need a new machine before CXMT goes global? Check out the best Razer laptops and best Asus gaming laptops I've tested so far.

An analyst has shared why Call of Duty's Black Ops 1 and 2 ports are vastly outperforming Halo: Campaign Evolved on PlayStation.

Over on Twitter, Alinea Analytics head of market analysis Rhys Elliott posts a chart of estimates of July's best-selling games on PlayStation consoles. Activision's Call of Duty: Black Ops and Black Ops 2 ports are right at the top, with the latter estimated at 8.2 million sold, making it far and away the highest-selling game of the month, while Black Ops 1 is estimated at only 3 million.

Halo, on the other hand, was estimated to have sold around 351,000 copies in July.

"Beyond the CoD doing ports doing GANGBUSTERS, the thing that stands out is Halo's notably slow start on PlayStation, which ironically stings even more next to the success of two effort-light CoD ports," Elliott explains. Not to mention Halo's stock has somewhat fallen in the last decade and a half, with Elliott adding, "One can’t help wondering what could have been if Halo had kept the trajectory it had around Halo 3 and Reach."

And ultimately, he believes price is the main factor, saying, "A proven, beloved old game, dropped at the right moment and, just as importantly, at the RIGHT PRICE, can out-earn almost anything new and buy a bit of breathing room in the slate."

And while the Call of Duty ports are kind of expensive, they launched with a pretty significant limited-time discount for PS Plus subscribers. Elliott adds, "CoD got it. Halo didn't. Sixty dollars for what’s essentially a graphical touch-up of a 2001 game was always gonna be a rough sell, and players clearly weren’t having it."

Halo: Campaign Evolved was the 4th most popular game on Xbox at launch in the US but only 29th on PS5, analyst says

It seems an underrated Wolfenstein game could be making a surprise return in the near future. Listing information on Steam for 2009's Wolfenstein indicates a remaster might be in the offing, right in time for this year's QuakeCon.

The suggestion comes from the first-person shooter's metadata on Valve's marketplace. A sharp-eyed Twitter user spotted there'd been some sudden changes to the 17-year-old game, per SteamDB. To start, the release date was removed from its store page.

That happened a little over three weeks ago. Other changes since include adding Steam Deck compatibility. These are the first substantial alterations in years, contributing to a theory that the FPS is being remastered for a surprise reveal and drop during QuakeCon this weekend.

I could certainly see that happening. It'd be a nice curveball, especially if we're getting updates on what's coming next in the Wolfenstein franchise. What's more, this would mark Wolfenstein 2009's grand return as a purchasable release.

Licensing restrictions led to its delisting in 2014 and removal from all digital storefronts. The only way to get it since has been to buy a physical copy for the Xbox 360 or PlayStation 3. You have to remember, this was developed before ZeniMax owned id Software, in collaboration with Raven Software and published by Activision.

ZeniMax probably didn't care to have another publisher reaping any rewards from its IP, and Wolfenstein: The New Order coming out in 2014 allowed some predecessors to fade into the past. But you can't keep a good dose of Nazi-hunting down.

It's just a pity this comes amid strife at id Software, as the studio was impacted by Xbox's re-structuring and layoffs. We'll find out soon enough what the lay of the land is for the team when QuakeCon happens this weekend.

After earning $1 million on Steam from a game that took 4 months to make, stunned devs end up in Valve's coveted "chocolate tier"

An Assassin's Creed veteran who directed Valhalla and served as lead designer on the OG Black Flag and more has returned to Ubisoft as the series' game director.

Eric Baptizat spent almost 16 full years at Ubisoft between 2005 and 2021, during which time he was credited with lead roles on the two aforementioned games, as well as Assassin's Creed: Origins and Unity, before moving to EA's Motive Studio to direct Battlefield 6 and the Dead Space remake. Now, as announced by the Assassin's Creed series' head of content Jean Guesdon, Baptizat is back.

"After an incredible professional journey, including 16 years at Ubisoft and then leading the critically acclaimed Dead Space remake at EA Motive, Eric Baptizat is coming back to the Assassin's Creed family as our new Game Director for the brand," Guesdon announces in a new LinkedIn post.

"Éric needs no introduction in this universe. 16 years at Ubisoft, key contributions to Black Flag, Origins, and Valhalla as Game Director, his passion for gameplay craft and his deep connection to this franchise speak for themselves," he continues. "Seeing someone with his expertise, his rigor, and his collaborative spirit step into this role fills me with confidence and honestly, a lot of excitement, for what's ahead for the brand."

Baptizat isn't the first veteran Ubisoft has rehired like this – ironically, the same happened with Guesdon himself. He spent 17 years at the company between 2005 and 2023 before departing, and was later appointed head of content this February, also taking over as creative director on Assassin's Creed Hexe following the departure of Clint Hocking (in what was, in fact, his second time leaving the company).

Things haven't exactly been smooth sailing at Ubisoft recently. At the start of the year, it was announced that the company was undergoing a "major reset," which led to six games being canceled. This same reset saw production split into different "creative houses" tasked with the development of different series – Vantage Studios, for example, includes the likes of Assassin's Creed, Far Cry, and Rainbow Six. That's the same one that was backed by Tencent.

Clearly, it's in Ubisoft's interest to smooth things out – Assassin's Creed Black Flag Resynced has had a very strong start, but there are a bunch of other upcoming Assassin's Creed games on the horizon, including Assassin's Creed Hexe, Jade, and Invictus. Hopefully, Baptizat will be able to help get these out the door successfully to keep things moving in the right direction.

OG Assassin's Creed Black Flag devs "had a lot of teething difficulties" trying to nail down the "seamless naval experience."

One of the best ways you can kill a few in-game hours in Kingdom Come: Deliverance 2 is at one of the RPG's many taverns, sitting across from a crap-talking patron in a game of dice, a mug of ice cold ale at your side. Soon, you'll be able to replicate that experience in real life under the stewardship of Luke Dale, the actor who plays the most lovable royal you'll ever meet, Hans Capon. You'll have to travel to the Czechia if you aren't already there, but that's a small price to pay for the authentic Devil's Den experience.

"Ever since I can remember, I've always wanted to run a pub, a restaurant, a cafe, something. Something that was bricks and mortar, something that felt real," Capon says in a new video all about his new Prague-based pub, The Nobleman.

"Because so much of what I've done in my life has been acting, filmmaking, and more recently, streaming, and these things, however amazing they've been, there's an element of which it doesn't feel real to me, and I've always wanted a business that was mine that I could run and I could come to and I could be a part of a community and engender a great feeling in a community."

It's clear Dale and his team have a long way to go, and thus it's unclear what the final product will look like, but the bones of The Nobleman are extremely cozy in a way that most Kingdom Come fans only get to experience in the game right now. Dale, who lives and works in Prague, calls the tavern "a love letter to Prague, a love letter to the Czech Republic, and how much I love this city and this country and everything that it's given me."

Unlike his pampered character in Kingdom Come, Dale is putting in the hours of hard manual labor to make his dream a reality, sanding down tables, transporting building materials, and moving around furniture. "It's like the equivalent of carrying sacks," he jokes in reference to an early scene in Kingdom Come: Deliverance 2. "A rare sight."

Dale says The Nobleman is "inspired by the places where Noblemen would gather and conspire and socialize," noting that it isn't "a themed bar" or "tourist attraction, but a local space where local people can have a really good beer, amazing food, and a bloody great time." As part of the medieval theme, you'll see "trinkets of shields and things on the walls and things that will remind you of that world," which sounds downright delightful.

The Nobleman is planned to open on October 1.

Kingdom Come: Deliverance 2 lead designer says "friction is intentionally" in the RPG because when "you overcome the friction, you feel better about yourself"

Right on schedule, the acquisition of EA by Saudi Arabia's Private Investment Fund, Silver Lake, and Jared Kushner's Affinity Partners has closed. One of the biggest publishers in gaming has been bought.

EA is now a private company following the biggest leveraged buyout in history, with the deal clocking in at $55 billion – in considerable excess of EA's previous market value. A $20 billion chunk of that is debt.

Control of series ranging from The Sims and Battlefield to Mass Effect and Dragon Age is now in the hands of a group of investors collectively referred to as the Consortium, with Saudi Arabia's PIF holding a super-majority of the company.

In a press release, EA CEO Andrew Wilson, who was recently awarded an $8 million raise thanks to the success of Battlefield 6 after the people who made Battlefield 6 a success were rewarded with layoffs, says, "This moment recognizes the extraordinary people whose creativity, ambition and passion have made EA one of the world's leading interactive entertainment companies."

"We're entering this next chapter from a position of strength with partners who share our vision and ambition," Wilson continues. "Together, we'll invest boldly, accelerate innovation, and build the next generation of games and experiences for the hundreds of millions of players and fans who inspire us every day."

Turqi Alnowaiser, deputy governor and head of international investments at the PIF, a group which has been accused of using acquisitions in entertainment and sports to launder Saudi Arabia's public image and reputation for human rights violations, adds, "Entertainment and sports are key areas of strategic focus for PIF, and are among the fastest growing and evolving sectors around the world. Together, the Consortium is uniquely positioned to be a long-term partner to EA’s management team in driving sustained growth and innovation for EA and the industry."

This press release arrived shortly after EA closed its investor relations page, which previously archived calls, reports, and other documentation related to quarterly earnings, strategic planning, leadership changes, and other financial red tape. With the company now privately owned, such reports will no longer be shared publicly, turning one of the most influential publishers in the industry into a complete black box.

The deal's closure will surely only intensify concerns that EA's new owners will take a hacksaw to the company's IP, either by censoring existing series like The Sims or abandoning less profitable series like Dragon Age. The latest installment, Dragon Age: The Veilguard, disappointed EA leadership.

Considerable structural changes typically follow deals like this, and with EA making layoffs already amid wider games industry turmoil, there are concerns that many employees will be cut in the quarters ahead. Multiple games analysts also told GamesRadar+ that EA may pawn the rights to some IP instead of outright burying them.

Additionally, US senators argued the deal presents "foreign influence and national security risks."

Last year, EA told employees that "our creative freedom and player-first values will remain intact" even after the buyout.

Saudi Arabia's $55 billion takeover of EA could waste "one of the best catalogues in the industry" by reducing it to a "sequel-and-mega-franchise machine," Helldivers 2 boss worries.

Size up every god in all the realms of Baldur's Gate 3 and you'll find no force mightier than the quicksave key, an ancient relic capable of instantly anchoring you in the timestream. In newly released player stats, developer Larian reveals that the most devoted among us have invoked the key's divine power over 1,400 times in a single playthrough.

Once again breaking down Baldur's Gate 3 by the numbers, Larian, in one slide of its report, puts perfectionistic players under the microscope.

"560+ manual saves were made by a handful of players in a single playthrough," the studio explains. "1,400+ quicksaves were made by an even smaller handful of players. You doing okay there?"

I should hope they're doing okay after that many saves. If anything, I'm surprised these figures aren't higher. I was pretty new to the genre, and even I, in the 140 hours I put into Baldur's Gate 3 on my first run, surely racked up a few hundred combined saves. That was me actively trying to limit save scumming, believe it or not. I was just being meticulous about backing up my progress after a few unfortunate crashes, I swear. Generally, I try (not always successfully, I admit) to follow the Slay the Spire rule of save scumming in all games: mistakes are forever, but honest and disastrous misclicks can be undone.

Frankly, few things more reliably dispense relief than slamming the quicksave button after something good happens. That lucky break was just a memory before; now it's recorded history that those explosives that I definitely saw before casting fireball just so happened to kill everyone except my party.

But it's a slippery slope. The key's power can be habit-forming. A lockpicking check here, a stealth check there, and then before you know it, you're min-maxing the whole timeline, flickering in and out of existence in a way that would surely alarm the Faerun pantheon. "What is that mortal doing?" one perplexed deity would ask, checking in on the mortals as you or I would watch birds. "I think they're trying to hit two nat 20s in a row," another would answer.

This is, of course, why Larian saw fit to test humanity with Honor Mode and forbid any and all save scumming. Fortunately, other games have gone all-out with it and built entire combat systems around making the most of your saves.

Larian just released a bunch of Baldur's Gate 3 stats, and 9,122 of you need to be jailed immediately.

Baldur's Gate 3 is officially three years old, and developer Larian is ringing in the year ahead with another batch of fascinating, horrifying player data that once again proves there ain't no sicko like an RPG sicko.

In a new Twitter thread, Larian goes over some standout figures from the past three years of all our Faerun fun. Baldur's Gate 3 has crossed 500 million mod downloads, for one, with 13,000 unique mods uploaded across all platforms.

It wouldn't be a Baldur's Gate 3 report without some murder, so Larian quickly delves into the story NPCs who died under mysterious circumstances most frequently. And boy, y'all really hate Zevlor, the Act 1 Tiefling refugee leader. He died more than anybody else, and was the second-most-common victim of Dark Urge players to boot.

"More non-Dark Urge players have managed to murder Alfira than Dark Urge players," Larian adds. "Spawn of Bhaal or not, maybe it’s time to stop pointing fingers." Guilty as charged.

But all that murder pales in comparison to the final stat in the report. A full 9,122 players have outdone every Durge, every thief and cultist, and every last Baldur's Gate ne'er-do-well by playing the game in unspeakable resolutions.

"114 of you decided a 1:1 ratio would be the best way to play," Larian explains, suggesting over 100 players managed to get Baldur's Gate 3 to display on, I don't know, an Apple Watch? A Game Boy? An in-flight airplane media screen? Or, in their defense, perhaps the best screen they had access to.

A further "9,008 of you thought it would be fun to play in a 9:16 aspect ratio," the report adds. That'd be the sort of vertical-oriented resolution commonly used as a third screen in bigger setups, especially for programmers who want to see a lot of code at once, writers or researchers displaying search results or editorial tasks, or possibly Twitch or YouTube streamers popping out their chat view.

It is not a very good resolution for playing games, with the possible exception of games like vertical shoot-'em-ups or the likes of Downwell. Paying Baldur's Gate 3 vertically sounds like going to an IMAX theater just to watch while laying on your side – or worse, Baldur's Gate 3 for the short-form video-rotted brain. That said, I do wonder how some of this was measured. Could split-screen co-op affect the numbers somehow? If someone accidentally booted the game on the wrong monitor, would that factor in? I'm assuming Larian accounted for how long people played with these resolutions. Whatever the case, jail.

After Baldur's Gate 3, Divinity scholar tries to unmask Larian's next big RPG villain by painstakingly translating ancient symbols from behind-the-scenes footage.

The two makers of physics-based tower defense game Sir, We Have an Orc Problem are officially Steam millionaires.

After an explosive launch that brought in $360,000 of revenue in just 24 hours, small German developer Mumpitz Games says its orc-obliterating strategy game has now earned $1,053,927 in gross revenue after "exactly one week," or $898,460 in net revenue with taxes, refunds, and chargebacks removed.

Bear in mind, this game took four months to make, though it was notably made by people with many years of experience and other games under their belt. Obviously, more fees will also be cut out of this lump sum, including Valve's Steam tax, but that's still an enviable payday.

Importantly, the game is good. Short and sweet, Sir, We Have an Orc Problem sits at 2,106 Steam reviews averaging 86% positive. According to the dev's Steam backend data, the median player is putting 5 hours and 20 minutes into the game, which is more than enough to finish it according to many Steam reviews. And I do love me a short, $10 game.

"We will continue to improve the game," Mumpitz adds in its Twitter post. One of the devs previously admitted that, yeah, the art "kinda looks bad to be honest," hoping "maybe we can make it a bit prettier soon."

I do want to pause on those numbers for a minute, because this is a useful example of how wide the reviews-to-sales ratio can swing on Steam. With just over 2,100 reviews but over 128,000 copies sold, Sir, We Have an Orc Problem is averaging around one review per 60 units, which is far above the common napkin math estimate of about one to 30 or so.

Responding to a recent Twitter reply which argued the game has a solid cure but "the balance, art, depth, content are really lackluster," the Mumpitz account says, "I appreciate the valid feedback."

There's also another important number in this mix, and it's something many small teams dream of after releasing a game on Steam. Sir, We Have an Orc Problem is going to keep selling, and it's already comfortably above the revenue threshold believed to be used by Valve when sending out gifts of chocolate.

As Steam sleuth Chris Zukowski explained last year (after the Peak devs lamented previously missing Valve's coveted "chocolate tier"), Steam developers who earn approximately $800,000 in annual revenue receive an actual box of chocolate, estimated to be worth around $150, from Valve as a little thank-you and congratulations. If you cross $2 million or so, your chocolate is apparently upgraded to a $250 gourmet box.

There's a lot of 2026 left, so while Sir, We Have an Orc Problem will surely slow down after the launch sales boom, I wouldn't be surprised if it ends up hitting $2 million eventually. It is, after all, in what Zukowski calls "real Steam," the algorithmic promised land that will keep a game ticking over until the sun burns out.

An "extremely challenging" action game is spreading like fire on Steam, with nearly 1,800 reviews that are 92% positive after a week.

There are, apparently, multiple Fallout games on the way, including one being made by Obsidian Entertainment. This is an appealing prospect, since that's the same studio that gave us Fallout: New Vegas, and rumor has it Josh Sawyer is back in the director's chair as well. One of the studio's co-founders believes this much is good for both the company and for publisher Bethesda.

Chris Avellone, a co-founder and former senior designer at Obsidian who worked on New Vegas, Star Wars: Knight of the Old Republic 2 and more, told the Human Can Opener that he immediately got excited at the prospect of New Vegas's writer returning. "If they got John Gonzalez to be the lead writer again, that's going to be awesome," he says.

"I have yet to play a game that John wrote for that I didn't really enjoy the story," Avellone explains. "Overall, I love his writing. I want to know the answers to these questions that he's presenting to me in the narrative. Having him back at Obsidian is going to make that Fallout game shine."

Gonzalez did come back to Obsidian in January 2025 after a spell at Guerilla Games working on the Horizon series, where he's now creative director. "Back to Obsidian for exciting times! (No, it's not [Fallout: New Vegas 2])," he says on LinkedIn, putting a dampener on Avellone's hopes.

However, it's unclear if he's updated his page since Xbox's massive restructuring of its games studios, where there were hundreds of layoffs, and many teams had their slates changed. Obsidian is one such team, where Fallout became a more central priority according to reports. Gonzalez's focus may have shifted as a result.

Naturally, Avellone gives a hat tip to Tim Cain and Leonard Boyarsky, developers who worked on the original Fallout and its sequel and are now at Obsidian, where he "can't imagine" they wouldn't be incorporated into a new Fallout game in some capacity. "I think it's going to be both good for Obsidian, because I don't know how well their original IP was gaining traction," he adds.

"And I think it's going to be good for Bethesda, in many ways," he says. "Bethesda has chronically long lead times for all its titles coming out, it's just how the studio's always worked." Obsidian could be a "satellite studio" to help share the publisher's workload and increase the cadence of releases.

Considering we're now 11 years removed from Fallout 4 without any concrete evidence of Fallout 5, he has a point. We'll see what the future has in store.

You can't buy Fallout 5 or Elder Scrolls 6 yet, but you can buy Bethesda's new $160 Nuka-Girl statue

We all know it's a terrible time to try and build a gaming PC, or try to upgrade an existing one. High manufacturing costs are all over the place, but most brands seem content with passing those onto consumers. In a rare turn of events, PC cooling brand Arctic is taking a surprisingly wholesome step to help customers.

Last year, when the brand was hit hard by US tariffs brought about by President Trump, it had to raise its costs in order to continue operating. Now, after the Supreme Court has ruled some of these tariffs unlawful, Arctic is being paid back reparations. Instead of taking that as profit, Arctic's CEO has declared that a dedicated US sales promotion will take place and that "it will remain active until every single dollar ARCTIC received from the tariff refund has been paid back to our customers."

"As a consumer myself," said Arctic's CEO, Magnus Huber, "I feel your pain.

"We tried our best. Did lots of overtime, and still had no choice but to forward the tariffs to you, our dear American customer. Last year, I had mostly bad news to announce. This year, the Supreme Court declared some tariffs unlawful, and now Arctic gets the money back!

"We're passing it on to you by offering a dedicated sales promotion across the US."

It's not a common thing to see in this day and age: a CEO and founder of an international company who wants to help out customers instead of taking a big pay rise. But Huber continued by saying that Arctic "is my baby", and he says it's a dream come true that's only possible because of consumers.

As well as the above Short posted to the brand's YouTube channel, Arctic also posted the news in a blog post, saying that some prices have already begun to lower in US territories on the members of the product lineup that were impacted most by the tariffs.

Arctic is currently celebrating its 25th year in operation, and is known for its thermal pastes, fans, and air and liquid coolers for your gaming CPU. Originating in Denmark, its products are sold around the world at various retailers.

The company is branding this decision as the Arctic Payback Scheme, and on the deals page of its website, it says "you save all year long", which might indicate how long the company estimates it'll take to pay things back in kind.

To give you a brief reminder of just how rare a move this is in today's PC market, we're in the middle of RAM shortages that are seeing AI companies strip the earth's supply of memory wafers. Consumer brands are then hiking up the costs of the RAM that they do have available because it's in shorter supply and manufacturing can't keep up. That's had a knock-on effect for SSDs, motherboards, CPUs, and that's not even mentioning how expensive graphics cards still are (seemingly permanently) since 2020's shortage.

MSRPs are considered deal prices all over the market right now; people are losing jobs in the wider gaming industry, prices are being raised even outside the tariffs situation, and even the biggest brands like Microsoft are reporting low hardware sales. All of this is going on, and yet CEOs don't seem to be in any hurry to pay back while raking in massive profits. I suspect that along with restoring some good faith with consumers, this is also going to make Arctic's wares popular choices for the foreseeable future. Hopefully it inspires other companies to do the same.

PC gamers should also take a look at the best graphics cards, the best RAM for gaming, and the best computer speakers.

After some confusion about the latest Palworld mobile game announcement, Pocketpair's head of publishing and communications John "Bucky" Buckley has tried to clear things up.

It's been a pretty huge few weeks for Palworld, between the launch of the game's 1.0 version which drew in a massive amount of concurrent players, the launch of the Palworld card game after being announced earlier this year, and now the announcement of Palworld Online, which is a mobile-only MMORPG spin-off of the game.

Those, on top of already existing projects like Pocketpair Publishing, Palfarm, and More Than Just Pals, mean that the developers behind the franchise have been pretty busy, but Bucky wants to clear up its not just Pocketpair.

Over on Twitter, Bucky says: "I appreciate all the messages, emails, DMs, etc about things like Palworld OCG, and I'm so happy that you guys like the stuff we're doing with Palworld. That said, a lot of these things are actually not made by us, so I can't really help with your questions much!"

He then provides a MS Paint explainer of what Pocketpair does and doesn't do with the franchise. For example, the studio develops Palworld, Craftopia, Palfarm, and More Than Just Pals, and is involved in running Pocketpair Publishing. Meanwhile the company licensed out the IP to create Palworld OCG, Krafton for Palworld Mobile, and Garena for Palworld Online.

Even with this many cooks in the kitchen, Bucky reminds that "we are STILL 100% self-owned and self-funded." So basically, if you have a problem with Palworld Mobile, the ball is in Krafton's court, not Bucky's Twitter.

A Palworld MMO is coming this year: Palworld Online brings "original story elements," but not from Pocketpair.

Life giveth, and life taketh away. A prank title called This Game Costs $200 was put on sale for, you gussed it, $200, nearly making the solo developer behind it a millionaire before mass refunds on Steam left him with just over $2,000.

The creative mind behind this endeavor is Michael Major, an 18-year-old who had a brainwave: what would happen if I put a random game on Steam for $200, the maximum price tag possible?

Thus, This Game Costs $200 came to be. The project is a meme-filled asset flip, described as a "psychological 'comedic' experience" on the store page, and running anyone who buys it a solid two hundred American dollars. In a report by WMUR-TV, Major says he didn't think anyone would bother, but he was wrong. 6,717 buyers wrong.

The game went up quietly in January, a spiritual successor to another digital joke, This Game Costs $10 - I'm sure you can imagine what that one's like. In recent months, there was a surge of activity, leaving Major with potential returns of over $1,300,000.

"I think I almost died," he says. But before he could get too excited, Steam's refund policy kicked in to bring reality crashing down. 6,707 of those purchases sent This Game Costs $200 back, leaving Major with just over $2,000. Oh, what a world!

Most of these users are from China according to sales data, and many of them refunded without even opening the game. It's difficult to ascertain whether this was a concentrated effort of some kind or just odd coincidence. Steam and other digital stores have been tied to money-laundering schemes before, but without further evidence, it's all just pontification.

Sadly, what matters here is that Major isn't an overnight millionaire. But hey, This Game Costs $1000 might be what does it.

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

Big Walk is a multiplayer puzzle game. It's an open-world co-op game where you explore an island and successfully complete challenges with friends using in-game proximity voice chat. It is a "friendslop" game, insomuch as that means a relatively low-lift game that you play with friends featuring sometimes-wacky physics. Big Walk is a new game from House House, creator of the infamously beloved Untitled Goose Game.

Big Walk is a COVID game.

Let me explain. Big Walk isn't about illness or pandemics, unless I've really misunderstood something, but it is thematically and mechanically a direct result of COVID. There's a direct line between the two, and it's not even subtext. You don't even have to take my word for it.

"End of 2020 was when we wrapped up Goose Game and we'd been obviously cooped up in our house under lockdowns and not spending time with each other," says House House developer Nico Disseldorp when I ask why the team decided to stake its future on a game where you walk around an unnamed island for indeterminate reasons. "We'd gone from working on a video game, standing behind each other and pointing at the computer and hanging out every day to only really spending time with each other in video games. And that was the time in the week where we felt most connected to each other."

"So we said," continues Disseldorp, "'Well, let's make one of these video games that we can play together. It'll be fun for us, and we'll get to spend time with each other inside the video game we're making, but let's make one where it's all about the feeling of togetherness. So rather than we're going to be hanging out together while doing something else, it's like the video game will be about hanging out together, and we'll figure out what that means as we go along.'"

Walker-talker man

You could more broadly associate the rise of "friendslop" games with post-COVID development, and people certainly have. It doesn't exactly take a genius to answer the question of: why are so many video games where you just sort of hang out and complete tasks with friends, regardless of distance, coming out and resonating? Why, perhaps it was the sudden and stark isolation of quarantine and distancing that went on for months and years, starving people of social interaction globally!

Trying to talk about Big Walk's mechanics and how they grow out of this fertile soil is difficult in part because it's a puzzle game. If I say too much, I've basically given away the puzzle. But it's also difficult in precisely the way that makes it a COVID game. More than anything else, Big Walk is about learning to communicate effectively and collaborate despite numerous obstacles deliberately frustrating or even entirely preventing both.

Because the various items and puzzles have no names or designations, any given group of players has to start from scratch on describing, expressing, and instructing. How do you indicate "yes" from a distance if someone can't hear you? What does "no" look like? What do you call the little… gourd-looking key items? (Every session I've ever played ended up calling these "babies," by the way. Your mileage may vary.) This is, you'll be shocked to learn, entirely deliberate on the part of the developer.

"We've kind of left a lot of built-in ambiguity – lots of the items, the characters, lots of the spaces in the world, they're deliberately a bit difficult to describe," says Disseldorp, "and that's part of the game is for you to figure out what language you want to use with your friends."

"This isn't a game where you can just not describe them," adds Disseldorp. "There's so much teamwork that you will need to kind of build that shared language. But through doing that, you take ownership and build a shared understanding of the game together."

Art is reflective of the time in which it was made, regardless of intent, but I'd argue that Big Walk is absolutely intentional. If you work together, regardless of how isolating the distance and difficulty to communicate or how big the problem (or walk), you can come to a solution together. There is, I think, a lesson somewhere in there.

Big Walk is currently available on PC, PS5, and Nintendo Switch 2. If you're looking for something in a similar vein, be sure to check out our ranking of the best co-op games.

Starforge Systems Apothecary Diaries PC is one of those pre-built gaming PCs I dream of having at my disposal. Not only because its specs far outmatch my current desktop, but because the details spread across its UV-painted APNX V2-F case are an anime nerd's dream.

The intricate borders travelling along the build perfectly capture the ornate backgrounds found in the anime series. In fact, the entire PC looks like something that Maomao herself would stumble upon in the palace, as does its eye-watering $2,799.99 starting price. That's the kind of digits that only an emperor could afford, and it's far, far out of my budget. However, Starforge Systems is currently running its annual Forge Day Sale, which has dropped the starting price of this dreamy anime PC down to $2,499.99 (Starforge Systems), saving $300 off this stunning anime dream build.

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Much to my chagrin, today's deal price is still more than I can personally spare. Though I can't pretend I didn't contemplate adding it to my online shopping basket, particularly once I remembered that the brand does indeed ship to the UK.

While it's still expensive no matter which way you cut it, you at least get modern components for your cash. That deal price encompasses the "Core" default build, which includes a GeForce RTX 5070 graphics card, AMD Ryzen 7 7800X3D CPU, 32GB DDR5 6000MT/s of RAM, and a 1TB PCIe 4.0 NVME SSD. That's all sitting inside the gorgeous PC case, which doesn't just include ornate borders but UV-printed versions of both MaoMao and Jinshi on the glass.

My favorite inclusion of my beloved anime pair is not on the exterior of the case, but how they're included on the inside. This PC includes one of the brand's platelight panels, a panel of art that's backlit by an LED light. It's a purely cosmetic feature, but seeing Maomao and Jinshi's faces illuminated and peeking through the glass of the case is a sight to behold.

This $300 off deal today includes the configuration I mentioned above, the stunning Apothecary Diaries PC case, a piece of matching 12 × 18 inch wall art, a 900 × 400 mm deskmat, and the 'Another Day' Apothecary Diaries platelight, but you can pick up alternative art based from the series to place in its stead for $29.99 (Starforge Systems), as they too are discounted as part of Forge Day.

If you aren't an Apothecary Diaries fan, while I will totally judge you for your tastes, there are other anime builds to choose from. Starforge Systems has also knocked down its Frieren & Himmel pre-builds, which now start from $2,499.99 (Starforge Systems) all the way up to $3,799.99. As with all its PCs, the fancier the cost, the fancier the parts, but you'll still get them all packed into the stunning anime case, which has swapped Maomao and Jinshi for everyone's favorite love-torn hero Himmel and the totally oblivious n mage Frieren.

It should be mentioned that even during a RAM shortage and the current hellscape of the PC consumer market, you don't need to spend this much to get a PC with these kinds of specs. Newegg and MSI have an equivalent RTX 5070 build currently selling for $1,749, for example. Starforge is just one of the few brands appealing to the anime fan in all of us with its exclusive case designs.

There are also MSI's Frieren PC accessories that are worth checking out, though they're still pretty new, so don't expect any juicy discounts quite yet.

• View all pre-built gaming PC deals at Starforge Systems

Check out our guides to the best gaming headsets, the best PC controllers for gaming, and the best gaming chairs if you want to upgrade your gaming setup.

Final Fantasy 7 Remake series director Naoki Hamaguchi has revealed Final Fantasy 7 Revelation is close to completion, and that he's quite confident that it'll hit the mark.

Speaking to YouTube creator Ashif’s Release Notes (via Genki_JPN), Hamaguchi was asked about his approach to helming the Final Fantasy 7 Remake trilogy, as someone who was inspired by the series itself, and while the 12 years he's been working on the project have caused him to feel a massive amount of responsibility and pressure, things have somewhat calmed as he approaches the end.

"Having been able to announce FF7 revelation at SGF, I hope that people out there can look at it and think this looks like it will be pretty good," Hamaguchi says, adding, "As we are now approaching the end, it's nearing completion. I personally can pick it up and play it and think, 'yeah, this feels good; this is satisfying.' So I am quite confident in it."

Of course, with it being the final entry in the Final Fantasy 7 Remake trilogy and coinciding with the original game's 30th anniversary, Revelation has a fair amount riding on it as a release. Hamaguchi acknowledges this: "Of course the final judgment is in the hands of the players... but I feel confident." He adds, "I can see the end. So my honest state at the moment is that I can finally feel that pressure lifting."

Despite some major problems people have with the current remake games, and the weird ending of Rebirth leaving the series on a bit of a rough note for many, it's hard to deny that they are mostly an excellent time. Hopefully the finale lands for everyone, and finally clears up some of the weird remake timeline shenanigans.

Final Fantasy 7 Revelation boss says the ending "might be fully faithful to the original" RPG, or "it might end up being something completely different"

PATCH NOTES v04.08.2026 – Ubisoft and Insomniac Games are enjoying a healthy boost to player counts across Assassin's Creed and Spider-Man games off the back of cinema blockbusters, with numbers so staggering it points to an exciting new normal for the relationship between how games and movies help one another extend experiences.

What's going on this week in gaming?

• 2018's Assassin's Creed Odyssey's active player count is surging
• Marvel's Spider-Man Remastered returns to Steam's Top 10 best-selling games list

Why is this happening now?

• Christopher Nolan's The Odyssey has reignited interest in the Ancient Greek time period
• Spider-Man: Brand New Day secures second-biggest opening weekend in box office history

The Hollywood Patch is live

• The last week has been a reminder that sometimes the box office can deliver just as meaningful of a live video game update as its developers

It's unusual to see such vast spikes in sales and player counts of older games like Assassin's Creed Odyssey and Marvel's Spider-Man, and in this case, blockbuster movies are the driving forces. It highlights a shift in the way that people are interacting with big adaptations, as they search for ways to stay in these worlds once the credits roll.

Christopher Nolan's The Odyssey has become a monocultural moment, dominating cinemas and conversation for weeks. It's also sending players straight back to Assassin's Creed Odyssey, with analysts estimating that the 2018 release has seen a 90% player engagement jump in the 10 days following the film's release.

AC Odyssey features a lot of the same mythology as Nolan's latest despite not actually being about Homer's Odyssey at all, and with RPGs having a bit of a moment in the 2020s, it makes sense that vast open-world games that feature similar themes, settings, or characters as a major film can receive a second wind by association.

A similar trend is emerging out of Spider-Man: Brand New Day, though this time via direct brand synergy. The film has reportedly brought in $927 million across its opening weekend, success which has inspired Marvel's Spider-Man and Marvel's Spider-Man 2 to launch back into Steam's top 10 best-sellers. For Sony and PlayStation, it's proof that a great movie can be as effective as a big game update.

Meta Shift

Both The Odyssey and Spider-Man: Brand New Day demonstrate how successful movies can help revitalize older games of a similar or shared IP. Assassin's Creed Odyssey has immediately become a go-to game to play after watching The Odyssey, featuring many mythological elements seen in the film's epic poem source material, while sales of the Marvel's Spider-Man games have benefitted from a timely Steam sale in line with Brand New Day's launch.

The trend of film-game crossover speaks to more than just the enduring success of select franchises. We've seen a general increase in licensed game adaptations (or brand new instalments) of movie IPs as of late, with 007 First Light and Indiana Jones and the Great Circle being two notable new games that center on icons of the big screen. There's even an untitled John Wick game also in the works from Saber Interactive!

Paired with Halloween: The Game and Clive Barker's Hellraiser: Revival, two licensed upcoming horror games launching in 2026 that feature some of the most famous names in the biz, the potential for symbiotic success as film IPs cross over to gaming is stronger than ever.

But will it work the other way? I'll be interested to see how the new Zelda movie affects sales of games like The Legend of Zelda: Tears of the Kingdom, for example, and the same can be said of the numerous other upcoming video game movies out there. Me and my colleagues on the GamesRadar+ team often find ourselves on a bit of an IP kick after a fresh release, be it film or gaming. That's just how fandom works, and gone are the days where movie prestige outpaced that of video games.

Patch Notes summary

Ancient Greek-set Assassin's Creed Odyssey has seen a 90% increase in active players as Christopher Nolan's take on The Odyssey storms theaters. At the same time, the Marvel's Spider-Man games have soared into the Top 10 Best-sellers list on Steam, bolstered by an attractive discount to celebrate Spider-Man: Brand New Day's opening weekend.

It's clear that fans are seeking to extend their experiences of both film and video games by helping themselves to both. It just goes to show how the power of an excellent IP can bring years-old games back out of retirement – even if you might have to dust off an old console or take advantage of a Steam sale to make it happen.

Related stories:

Generally speaking, using generative AI is a quick way to annoy your fanbase, and that's exactly what happened when Stellar Blade: Blood Rain developer Shift Up revealed a music video using the tech for the upcoming game. The head of the company has now responded to the waves of backlash, clarifying that the original design of the sequel's protagonist was made by human beings.

On Twitter, Kim Hyung Tae, the CEO of Shift Up, responds to someone asking if the developer could rely more on its actual workforce rather than AI. "Evie, the character at the heart of this video, was created from head to toe by our talented artists and modelers through more than a year of dedicated work," he starts.

"The AI is not creating her from scratch," he explains. "It is rendering and presenting the character based on the data, designs, and craftsmanship our team created."

It sounds like Shift Up created its own AI tool, then fed it various models and ideas for it to spew out the video on the other side. Developers and publishers adopting the tech have been using it similarly, essentially creating their own, in-house ChatGPT for whatever they need it for.

Even if everything given to the interface was manmade, it's still resource-intensive technology for what you get that comes with a myriad of ethical concerns, including how labor is deployed and valued. To finish, the studio's CEO asks that we view the Stellar Blade: Blood Rain clip, made for the song 'Wanna Be In Love,' through a lens of meshing human creativity and AI.

"We would truly appreciate it if you could view the work with that understanding in mind," he adds.

While it's helpful to get more context for how this thing came to exist, I'm not sure he's going to convince anyone to change their perspectives. "If this is your defense then you're not getting it," says one fan on Twitter. "Nobody is debating that you made the character, but you then used the big old AI shortcut to make content with that character."

But then, this is all in line with previous comments, as the Shift Up lead considers AI necessary to the South Korean game industry. Prepare to take more hikes through the uncanny valley courtesy of Shift Up.

Stellar Blade Switch 2 age rating suggests release date news could be imminent, and we probably won't be seeing any Dispatch-like censorship, either.

Capcom has announced that Resident Evil Veronica has hit 2 million wishlists on Steam, less than two months after its reveal at Summer Game Fest.

The news was announced on Twitter on the official Resident Evil account, with a post reading "2 million biscuits for the 2 million of you who've wishlisted Resident Evil Veronica. Thank you!" This was accompanied by the elderly French lady with a very young-sounding voice featured in the debut trailer for the horror remake looking very happy. I sure hope following her doesn't lead to anything terrible happening.

While wishlist numbers aren't publicly available, SteamDB does keep track of the most wishlisted games on the platform. At the moment, Resident Evil Veronica sits in eighth place on the board behind the likes of Deadlock, Light No Fire, Fable, and Total War: Warhammer 40,000. However, Resident Evil Veronica is releasing on PS5, Xbox Series X|S, and Switch 2 as well, so those numbers will likely have added a fair amount to the total.

Granted, it's no wonder Resident Evil Veronica is as anticipated as it is. The original game is the second-highest-rated game in the series on Metacritic (behind the original Resident Evil 4), and even if its stock has fallen somewhat within the fanbase since then, it's still a pretty beloved entry. More crucially, the new game is reportedly being worked on by the team behind the remakes of Resident Evil 2 and Resident Evil 4, which – alongside their original incarnations – are the most beloved games in the series.

Resident Evil remakes allow Capcom to release yearly games in the series and invest money back into new games like Pragmata, producer says

Many of the best gaming handhelds have seen their prices shoot North in 2026 so far, and the Steam Deck is among the more egregious MSRP increases. Now sitting at $789 in its basic 512GB configuration, the Steam Deck OLED - like the rest of the market - has seen a considerable markup in recent months. That's why the few discounts we do see are so important.

One of Valve's biggest competitors has just delivered. The Lenovo Legion Go S has dropped to $635.54 at the brand's own store this week (was $1,137.41). I'm normally checking back in on discounts of just a couple hundred bucks here, but we're down a full 44% right now - a hair over $500 in your pocket.

This is where I get the bad news out of the way. We didn't review the Lenovo Legion Go S particularly favorably - but I'll caveat that with the fact that Phil checked out the Windows version. A lot of their concerns stem from that finnicky handheld operating system - taking Microsoft out of the picture the handheld received "almost full marks for design" while its adjustable triggers and improved controls garnered praise as well.

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At launch, with last year's pricing landscape, the Legion Go S felt a little short with its AMD Ryzen Z2 GO processor. Today? Things look a little more favorable in light of that new $635 price tag.

After all, this thing comfortably beat out the much older Steam Deck OLED in our benchmarks - all with a larger, faster display running at a higher resolution. No, you're not getting that OLED panel up top, but you are getting a more impressive screen overall.

Here's how we benched the Windows version last year:

Ultimately, if you're looking for a mid-range handheld in the three-figure price range right now you've got three options; pay over the odds for a Steam Deck OLED, pay slightly over for the Lenovo Legion Go S, or opt for the $600 Xbox ROG Ally.

If you're after a Windows experience, there's no problem. Ditch the deal, head to Amazon, and grab the $599 ROG Ally. You'll be dropping speed from the Z2 Go's additional GPU cores, but you'll have an easier time loading games from other storefronts. Otherwise, today's discount alleviates some of the pricing pressure we've been feeling in the mid-range handheld market for some time now.

• See all gaming handhelds at Best Buy

We're also hunting down all the best retro handhelds to store your collection, or take a look at the best gaming laptops and best gaming tablets for more portable play.

Game Freak's big action RPG Beast of Reincarnation is finally here, alongside its first critic and player reviews, but folks' thoughts on the Pokemon developer's latest outing are all over the place.

There's been a lot of interest in Beast of Reincarnation purely because this is a totally new offering from the Pokemon devs. It's not the studio's first non-Pokemon game, as it's done plenty, from Little Town Hero to Pocket Card Jockey, but the more realistic visuals, post-apocalyptic setting, and intense action combat have certainly turned heads, especially as folks draw comparisons to the titles Game Freak is best known for. However, so far, reviews have been incredibly mixed.

On Metacritic, Beast of Reincarnation's average critic score varies slightly depending on the platform it was played on. There aren't enough reviews logged on Xbox to calculate an average, but on PC it's at 72, while its PS5 score is slightly higher at 73.

Making up these averages are some wildly differing scores. At the top end of the scale, Vice gives the game 9.5/10, writing that its "combat isn't just innovative, it's incredibly fun," and that the mix of real-time and turn-based action is "a perfect blend." GamesRadar+'s own Beast of Reincarnation review similarly gives it 9/10 – we called it "a great ARPG, with firm but fair combat and wide scope for crafting a build to your tastes. Surprisingly, perhaps, it also has a deep and thoughtful story that it trusts you to dig into yourself."

Not everyone is a fan, though. VGC and Eurogamer both give Beast of Reincarnation 6/10, with the former criticizing the "unoriginal setting and story" and lack of enemy variety, while the latter says it "riffs on Sekiro and Monster Hunter with mixed results."

While it might be a bit early to get a proper gauge of player thoughts, early Steam reviews tell a similar story to the Metacritic ratings. Its rating is currently Mixed – at the time of writing, 52% of the 700+ English reviews are positive, so it'd be hard to get any more divisive. One writes: "So far so good – feels like a blend of Sekiro, NieR Automata and Princess Mononoke. Combat feels slick and the 'hair' movement extending vertically and horizontally is a really nice touch that opens up the game."

Others aren't so generous. Another says it "looks far more ambitious than it actually plays," and that "combat feels flat and repetitive," while a similar review states that "combat feels unrewarding and uninspired, guarding and parrying are very inconsistent and sword impacts feel like a dry pool noodle."

It can't be the start that Game Freak was hoping for, but it's interesting to see how much opinion varies – I'm left wondering what the consensus will be once folks have more time with it.

Game Freak admits Beast of Reincarnation "doesn't really fit our vibe" after decades of stylized Pokemon but knew "photorealism would be the best fit" for the action RPG.

Couch co-op in Big Walk is something that many players will be anticipating or hopeful for, as this multiplayer cooperative game would arguably lend itself to local co-op by definition. However, while it's possible to get a large group of friends together in Big Walk on multiplayer online servers, I'm sorry to say that couch co-op isn't something you should expect from Big Walk right now, as I'll explain below.

Can you play Big Walk couch co-op with friends?

No, Big Walk does not have local or couch co-op mode, only online multiplayer.

That may change in the future, but there's no actual evidence that it will, and in fact developer House House may not include it for specific reasons concerning player communication.

See, much of Big Walk's gameplay and challenge is centered around in-game audio and proximity chat - the idea that players' ability to communicate diminishes the further away their characters are from each other. That isn't just a fun gimmick, but an essential part of the game to be managed and overcome. Playing local co-op, where you can turn around and talk to your friends at any time, would diminish or compromise that element accordingly. For more details, I definitely recommend you check out the official Big Walk FAQ page, which explains this element of the game further.

To find out more about who you can and can't play this game with, check out our guide on how to enable Big Walk crossplay!

© GamesRadar+. Not to be reproduced without permission.

With a name like Beast of Reincarnation you might expect this to be a game full of aggressive enemies and intense combat. And it is. Yet it's not long before you start to discover that there are layers to this world, and the people who live in it. Layers that make this a strong and deep experience rather than a fun but shallow action game.

Don't get me wrong; there is a lot of fighting. That's almost exclusively what you'll be doing, and in fact, I found it greatly amusing that I came across a grand total of one puzzle in my playthrough. You take the role of Emma, a young woman who is tasked with killing the titular Beast, the source of post-apocalyptic Japan's Blight that mutates animals, spreads pretty but corrupted foliage, and kills people. Before she can do so however, she'll need to kill many of the giant creatures known as Nushi in order to absorb their power, and cleanse the surrounding areas as she buffs up. There's no shortage of lesser enemies standing between her and each Nushi, either.

Emma let you finish

Please don't mistake Beast of Reincarnation, with its high-fidelity sci-fi, and sword-wielding, reserved heroine for being much like Stellar Blade. Unlike that game's star Eve, who is uncomfortably thrust into danger in form-fitting bodysuits that leave nothing to the imagination, Emma is dressed like an actual fighter who takes her job seriously. She also behaves like an actual, real character – unlike many similar heroes, her aloofness has a specific reason behind it which is slowly revealed. She even experiences character growth.

It's a good thing Emma's well armored too. Beast of Reincarnation has combat that is challenging from a very early stage. I was tempted to knock the difficulty down within the first hour or so, in fact – and if that works best for you, it's a perfectly good way to enjoy this or any other game – but, in my case, I'm glad that I didn't. There's a real sense of satisfaction to be had emerging from a tough fight battered, low on resources, close to death – but alive.

The combat system is deceptively simple. Emma carries a sword and (soon) two bows, and that's it for weapons. There is only one attack button for the sword, the depth coming from the mechanics around it. I'll make this clear now: parrying is an integral part of the game. I'm rather tired of the industry's obsession with parry mechanics, and I'm glad that it finally seems to be petering out, but here it works really well. I'm far from perfect at it, though. Many is the time I've hit the button too soon or too late, and been punished with a large chunk of health disappearing as a result. But when it works, it produces a beautiful flow, particularly in boss fights. Like Sekiro (with a touch of Nier), it's akin to a rhythm game, where you learn to parry to the tune of each enemy's unique attack pattern. Tap-tap-taptaptap—tap—tap and then you can unleash vengeance.

It's time to address the elephant – or, rather, the giant mutated dog – in the room. Koo (for that is his name) is another crucial slice of the combat pie. While you can order him to go on ahead to attack an enemy alone if you haven't been spotted, he otherwise acts and attacks independently. You're in charge of leveling up his attributes alongside your own though, and you decide which abilities and stat-altering charm to equip. It's in this way that you direct his presence in battle – particularly when it comes to Bloom Arts.

Koo will use items and abilities independently, but the more powerful Bloom Arts are dependent on points earned during battle, activated only when you command. Much like in Final Fantasy 7 Remake, communicating with Koo slows time to a crawl (even if no Arts are ready yet – useful for getting a breather) and you can choose from your currently equipped list.

A successfully executed Bloom Art will restore a little of Emma's HP, and also deal damage – but rarely very much. They're more useful for triggering effects, especially when you start unlocking modifications for them. While building up status, you can bloom a plant for Emma to close the distance, instantly triggering a sword's special effect that usually requires a parry; all these benefits and more are on the menu with Koo.

Blooming heck

Attacking and parrying will build up a gauge Emma can draw on for her own abilities, including (something I didn't upgrade and properly exploit until embarrassingly late in the game) the ability to briefly pause time so you can go absolutely wild with your attacks without interruption. As with the Bloom Art time-slow however, there's no grace period when you come out of it. If you try to use this in the middle of an enemy's attack, you'll feel very silly and very bruised.

Emma and Koo have a base of operations in the form of a mech, a space they share with a few others. It's a wonderful oasis of calm in the relentlessly hostile world, and I delight in soaking in the optional conversations. At the end of each chapter, I have a ritual. I chat with little Kagura, and then turn to Koo. I shower away the blood and grime we've accumulated (yes, he shakes himself off afterwards like a real doggy), I talk to him, and then I stroke him. Yes, you can indeed pet the dog.

The broad strokes of Beast of Reincarnation give the impression of something leaning all its weight on tired tropes. A post-apocalyptic world; a threat known as The Blight; a single hero (you of course) who is the only one that can put things right. Do not be fooled. The game surfs on waves of philosophy and existential questions that are thought-provoking but never, ever waved in your face.

I'll also add that this has the best ending I've seen in a game for a long time. Obviously I can't go into detail regarding why, but I think it's a beautiful ending to Emma's story that has just the right amount of trust in the audience with a generous sprinkle of 'open to interpretation'.

I love Beast of Reincarnation. I think you should buy it, if you can afford to; but there are just a few little things that held me back from calling it perfect. For one thing, on rare occasions the way forward isn't at all clear. Despite having the usual waypoint, it's a little too far off, More than once I end up stumped as between point 'A' and point 'B' is a seemingly impassable platforming section – one of these I got through by hopping around the edge of a mountain and making liberal use of Emma's ability to lift herself into the air, which I'm (pretty) sure isn't how the developers intended me to progress.

Beast in show

Also rare, but equally annoying, are combat situations that I'm happy to stick my neck out and say are just plain unfair. When a game has punishing combat that employs parry and dodge mechanics, if you find yourself surrounded by enemies at close quarters, this will be because you've done something wrong. I'm happy to accept that. But when that happens, you should be able to get out of the situation by relying more on skill than luck.

The issue is that the camera and the auto-targeting system (which I tried disabling in such situations to no avail) gang up on you like a pair of bullies whenever you have two or more enemies close by, so that it's often impossible to keep them both in view. This was no fun during the fights where two bosses occasionally rush you at the same time, let me tell you. Even on my best parrying days, I find it a little tricky to parry an attack I literally can not see coming.

Moments like those had me use some very interesting language that I'd get told off for trying to repeat here. Thankfully, such moments are rare and (usually) fairly brief, and so easy to forgive within the context of the wider game. On top of everything else, Emma's traversal abilities make wonderful use of space, and offer multiple options for enemy engagement while unseen. She can use her hair (don't ask, I don't know) as a grapple, a portable water spout to let her rise into the air, and a temporary bridge to walk onto from pretty much anywhere.

Beast of Reincarnation is a very linear game (areas are large and open, but it's not strictly open world), but the sense of agency afforded you by such traversal – as well as a wide range of Arts and swords with unique effects to unlock – help make the journey your own. New Game Plus offers one final sword and a couple of cool new, powerful abilities, which just might be enough to encourage me to do it all over again.

Beast of Reincarnation was reviewed on PS5, with a code provided by the publisher.

If you're looking for more combat, check out our best ARPGs ranking for plenty of action with a bit of RPG'ing sprinkled on top.

Cooking recipes and food in Beast of Reincarnation is a mechanic wherein Emma can create meals for stat bonuses back at the hub, though the game is a bit unclear about how this process works. Players are likely to be going through Beast of Reincarnation and finding recipes and food ingredients, but not have any real clarity about how those things are used and how you cook meals. In fact, it's not the player that's meant to do it, as there's an NPC you're meant to talk to that will cook these things for you, as I'll explain below.

How do you cook food in Beast of Reincarnation and use recipes?

To cook food in Beast of Reincarnation requires several steps, as it's not actually Emma who does this, but Kagura. Here's how it works:

1. Find meal recipes in the world or purchase them from merchants.
2. Go back to the Cleanse Walker hub and speak to Kagura, next to the workbench where you upgrade weapons in Beast of Reincarnation.
3. Choose "Cooking Research" from the menu and select the recipe you want her to learn permanently.
4. This will take time. Come back later and Kagura will have learned the recipe permanently.
5. When you next choose to rest in the Cleanse Walker, you'll be given a list of the recipes that Kagura knows. As long as she has the ingredients, you can choose that one.
6. Afterwards, you'll be shown a brief cinematic of Emma, Koo and Kagura eating.
7. The next day when she wakes up, Emma will gain a stat increase that varies depending on the meal she consumed.
8. Eating a meal for the first time grants a better enhancement. This should motivate players towards a diverse diet and to keep researching recipes.

It's worth clarifying that Beast of Reincarnation draws a distinction between the meals that Kagura cooks and the hunger-preventing rations that you can take with you out into the world. Kagura's meals provide stat bonuses, whereas the rations delay the onset of hunger for you and Koo.

Ingredients for meals can be purchased from merchants or grown in the Cleanse Walker at the room at the back next to the shower, where the option to grow vegetables and keep small livestock like chickens is presented to you. These both take time to produce ingredients, but it's good to have them going, and to research meals that require very little in terms of produce, so you always have something to eat.

Need more help? Check out how to handle the Beast of Reincarnation Rangifer boss, or find out all the best skills in Beast of Reincarnation!

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To upgrade weapons in Beast of Reincarnation (a system referred to as Weapon Enhancement) might seem simple at first, but it won't be long before you're running into obstacles that prevent you from further enhancing your swords and ranged weapons, even when you have the Amber to pay for it. Obviously increasing your damage can be done by boosting your strength, but weapon upgrades are an essential component of Beast of Reincarnation that need to be kept in mind if you're going to keep up with the various Malefects out there.

How do you enhance your weapons in Beast of Reincarnation?

To enhance your weapons and upgrade them can be done at the Workbench in your Cleanse Walker hub or through the Enhance Weapons options at camps, in which Emma can spend Amber (the game's main currency) to improve the damage of both her melee and ranged weapons, as well as increase ammo capacity and other similar enhancements.

The workbench is found behind Brad in the pilot's seat, and next to the kitchen section where you can cook recipes in Beast of Reincarnation.

However, you'll notice that after one or two upgrades, you'll hit a hard cap that prevents you from upgrading them any further. To continue upgrades, you'll need to upgrade the stats of the Cleanse Walker's programming, known as Bauera, to a certain level as marked on the weapon.

Bauera has three stats: Power (blue), Calculations (yellow) and Knowledge (green), and Power is usually the limiter that prevents further weapon enhancements. You can improve these stats by finding certain spoils out in the world while adventuring, usually the remnants of golems. Strongboxes and valuable item markers left by Koo are a likely source of these spoils, so make sure to pay attention to your faithful dog along the way.

Want more help against the Malefects? Check out the best skills in Beast of Reincarnation, or find out how to take down the Beast of Reincarnation Rangifer boss!

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Rangifer in Beast of Reincarnation is the first major Nushi, powerful Malefect boss fights that, in this case, manifest as an enormous stag/plant hybrid. You'll actually fight Rangifer twice, once in a crater and a second time in its lair, where it's more powerful and has access to a second stage. While it might seem tough at first, there's actually some pretty consistent strategies and weaknesses for you to exploit here, as I'll explain in our guide on how to beat Rangifer in Beast of Reincarnation.

First Rangifer boss fight

The first time you fight Rangifer in Beast of Reincarnation as part of the Prowling Nushi quest, it'll be at level 9, so you'll want to be at least level 6 or 7 for a fighting chance. If it's still proving difficult, find some nearby enemies to fight for the experience and come back when you're ready. Otherwise, here's some essential tips to know:

• Access the camp in the middle. In the centre of the Rangifer's arena is a tall building with a campsite on it, you'll definitely want to unlock that, as well as the armor up there.
• Start the fight with an assassination from above. From the camp, use the Hair bridge to stand above the Rangifer, then jump down to perform an assassination. This can remove a huge chunk of its health straight away.
• Use ranged attacks early. With Rangifer being mostly melee focused, the bow and crossbow are basically free damage if you can put some distance between you and it. Exhaust the ammo of both if you get the chance.
• Rangifer is weak to fire. For that reason, you'll definitely want to use Koo's Higanbana: Seeds skill, a series of fiery projectiles that can build up the burn status effect, and one of the best skills in Beast of Reincarnation.
• Parry the antlers. Rangifer's most common attack is to swing its antlers at you. Despite the huge size, you can absolutely parry this attack, and it's worth doing, as it'll build up Koo's FP for more fire attacks. This attack also leaves the head lowered, which is your moment for easy melee attacks.
• Practice your mobility. Mobility isn't as important in this phase, but it will be in later phases, so it's worth practicing this now, including the ability to create your own grapple points. Much of Rangifer's attacks are based around hitting downwards, so elevation can heavily compromise its ability to hit you.

Pretty much all of these tips apply to your second fight with Rangifer as well, so make sure they're memorised! You'll also want to make sure that you upgrade weapons in Beast of Reincarnation, as this second fight is going to last a lot longer, and the gap between them will give you ample chance to earn the Amber necessary.

Second Rangifer boss fight

The second time you encounter Rangifer is in its sealed lair, having opened it up and leaving it nowhere to run. This is a two-stage boss fight, with Rangifer unlocking new abilities (and a new health bar) when you reduce it to zero health. Keep in mind that Rangifer is now level 12, and I really wouldn't recommend having this fight if you're not at least level 10 or higher, depending on your skill level.

• Rangifer remains weak to fire. Aside from Koo's attacks, you should now also be able to acquire Fire Arrows from Brad back at the Cleanse Walker. However, while still weak to fire, it's more resistant to the Burn status effect than last time.
• Look out for the stomp. If Rangifer rears up and stamps, now it does a small AOE impact with sharp roots rising. Make sure you clear space!
• If it glows red, look out! If Rangifer's body gains a red glow, it's about to do four antler sweeps, followed by a stomp. These are quick, do massive damage and are hard to parry, potentially able to KO Emma from full health. The best thing to do is either have Koo use a binding attack to interrupt it, use any grapple points you've made to escape, or just rapidly evade and dodge away.
• Rangifer can summon trees. If it backs away and yells before slamming its hea on the ground, it's about to create trees that erupt from the forest floor, marked by red circles.
• In phase 2, these trees last longer. In its phase 2, non-damaging trees also appear, which Emma can use as grapple points. You'll need these mobility boosts to avoid many of its attacks, so keep an eye on their location!
• If it summons a lot of trees and glows, attack it immediately! This happens roughly at the midpoint, wherein Rangifer draws energy from trees it summons to heal itself. Grapple to it and land a combo to end this effect.

For winning the encounter, you'll get the Bloom Art Sakura Javelin, which allows Koo to fire an electrified grapple point at an enemy, as well as the Sakura Blade Art/Finisher for Emma.

Reward yourself with a nice meal, and check out how to cook recipes in Beast of Reincarnation!

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The best skills in Beast of Reincarnation will vary depending on your preferred playstyle, but there's some pretty consistently powerful options to pick from for both the characters. Below I'll lay out the best skills to get early on for both Emma and Koo, which will give you a good selection to then build on and specialize as you progress though Beast of Reincarnation.

If you're determined to be as powerful as possible, make sure you check out how to upgrade weapons in Beast of Reincarnation

What are the best skills in Beast of Reincarnation?

Below we've broken down some of the early skills you should get off the skill tree in Beast of Reincarnation, for both Emma and Koo.

• Emma
  • Blade Art: Shakuyaku: With how often you'll use this basic attack, you should upgrade it early and often.
  • Sprout Shakuyaku (Hair): A combination attack, binding effect and grapple point that can be deployed in combat is a versatile option, though has limited impact on some bosses.
  • Tracking Shot: A massive damage and accuracy increase to ranged attacks that makes your ranged weapons much more viable in combat, with tracking, piercing and increased damage.
• Koo
  • Higanbana: Seeds: A simple basic attack that's worth upgrading, as the ability to inflict burning on enemies is very good against stronger enemies and works in most situations.
  • Mod: Swamp Summoner (Incantation): Slowing swamps that impede enemy movement are a good bonus for Koo to be throwing out, buying you time and control.
  • Taunt (Pounce): Koo draws in attacks from nearby enemies. Very useful against boss fights.

Considering that Koo is more of a controlled NPC and therefore skill-dependant than Emma, it's honestly arguably more important to focus on Koo's skillset than Emma's early on, as so long as Emma can parry and dodge, she can make her way through most of the early encounters. Still, you shouldn't neglect Emma - I'm only saying that if you have the skill points for one or the other, it probably doesn't hurt to prioritize Koo in the early phases.

As you defeat Nushi bosses and reach certain story milestones, you'll unlock more skills and powers that can be added to the existing skill trees, such as the Sakura Storm and Javelin, unlocked after the Beast of Reincarnation Rangifer boss fight. Make sure to consider these when progressing, as some are very good - the Javelin power in particular.

There's other ways to get strong - make sure you know how to cook recipes in Beast of Reincarnation!

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Alongside Microsoft's rumored disc-to-digital plan, the company is reportedly bringing Xbox 360 games to PC as part of an expanded emulation rollout this year.

A leaked roadmap shared online and corroborated by The Verge indicates that Xbox 360 games will be playable through emulation on next-gen console Project Helix, PC, and compatible handheld PCs.

The roadmap suggests PC backwards compatibility will fully launch in October, with Xbox 360 catalog integration coming in waves throughout 2027 and 2028. Bear in mind that it's unclear how these timelines may have shifted within Microsoft.

Last month, Xbox announced a new backwards compatibility program which, so far, has seen four classic Xbox games come to PC. This Xbox 360 program appears to be an extension of this work.

This follows word that Xbox Project Helix will play PC games and is even more PC-like in its architecture.

Microsoft's emulator on PC, regarded quite solidly by some in terms of sheer performance for the original Xbox games released so far, will seemingly handle all the legwork. The roadmap says Microsoft will handle certification and compatibility testing, store listings, player support, updates, and maintenance for "local PC execution" (not cloud or streaming) emulation.

Devs will seemingly only need to sort out commercial details like "price, Game Pass, promotions," and availability or opt-ins.

The same roadmap says public testing for the rumored disc-to-digital conversion, which would purportedly give owners of physical Xbox games an entitlement tied to their exact disc but stored in a digital library, was meant to begin in July – right alongside "Back Compat early access (Original Xbox titles)," which lines up with the aforementioned PC releases for those four classic games.

"Disc to Digital General Availability" is listed for an August 2026 launch for "all Xbox One & Series X owners," so if this timeline hasn't changed dramatically, we should be in for an announcement soon.

This Xbox push for digital availability comes on the heels of PlayStation declaring the end of discs. By abandoning physical games, fumbling its announcement, failing to address player concerns, refusing to act on digital rights, and generally playing the silent game, Sony has somehow handed Microsoft a shot at the kind of PR slam dunk that the PS4 enjoyed in the 2010s with the notorious Xbox One DRM fiasco.

It would be stupid to celebrate one calamitous company and praise another in the same breath, and a lot of questions remain unanswered here, including about Microsoft's own future physical game support. Yet with expanded emulation, availability, and digital ownership, Xbox may well be off to a better start than PlayStation.

"There has to be a reason for people to buy an Xbox": Making sense of Microsoft's messy return to console exclusivity.

Devora Wilde appreciates the similarities between her Clair Obscur: Expedition 33 character Clea and Baldur's Gate 3 githyanki maneater Lae'zel, partly because someone has to defend Lae'zel from being players' least favorite ex-girlfriend.

"One of my favorite lines was, 'What an auspicious start,'" Wilde tells IGN about Clea, "because it's like Lae'zel when she says, 'Auspicious.' I don't think that was done intentionally, but I love that it was a little throwback." Wilde notices a connection between the two RPG characters, too, in that they are both problematic mean girls.

Dessendre heir and talented painter Clea is a cold, clever, and highly irritable person. The warrior Lae'zel is similar in that she pursues what she thinks is right with frosty discipline, and she's quick to inform a well-meaning person that they're wasting her time. If it weren't for her offensive sense of githyanki superiority, Lae'zel would probably enjoy hanging out with Clea and discussing how everyone else is an idiot.

"Interestingly enough," says Wilde, "what I found is that, even though Clea is a questionable character, people have been willing to give her more grace – a lot more grace than people have with Lae'zel."

"I find that so fascinating," she continues, "like, reading comments and people's reactions to Clea is like, 'Well, yeah, but she's justified. She's actually the only sane member of the family. She does this because of this.' With Lae'zel, people are just like, 'No. She's just mean. She's just bad, she's mean.'"

That fan reaction could come from the fact that Lae'zel is a romance option, so her sharp words seem pointed directly at your heart, and are therefore less tolerable.

Clea, instead, mostly aims her disgust and disinterest at her own family members that disappoint her – so, while she could probably stand to drop her defenses a bit and admit things like "I'm scared," or, "I miss you," Clea's harshness is easier to relate to than a grump with green skin. But, you know, it's not Lae'zel's fault that she's so beautiful.

Baldur's Gate 3 Lae'zel actor almost broke up with the character during her playthrough, but "didn't have the guts to go through with it."

Single Player Tarkov, the unofficial offline version of extraction shooter pillar Escape from Tarkov, is shutting down after the development team received a trademark violation notice from creator Battlestate Games.

A notice announcing an end to work on SPT was posted to the game mode's official Discord server on August 1. SPT been around for years, gradually iterating on the promise of "a fully offline experience – no more server downtime, cheaters, or forced PvP."

Senior moderator DrakiaXYZ explains that Battlestate sent a notice and, shortly afterward, "certain users have decided to leak internal communications and push their own narrative as if it were the truth and final outcome, so we are forced to make an announcement before we were ready, and before a final decision was made about what we plan to do with all parts of the project."

Putting it clearly, they add, "This is the end of the SPT Project under the current team, and in its current form. However all of the source code will remain available if a future team wishes to continue from where we left off."

While "this leak has played a large part in the decisions that staff and maintainers have made in regards to this trademark violation notice," per DrakiaXYZ, it is not what forced the team to shutdown SPT outright.

Another SPT staff member, RaiRaiTheRaichu, writes in a follow-up post: "Leaks' are not the reason why SPT is not continuing development, 'leaks' are why the Github organization is not being directly passed on to anyone."

Many users reacted with confusion, wondering why the SPT team, in the absence of an actual cease and desist order from Battlestate, doesn't simply remove any mentions of the Tarkov name from the project.

RaiRaiTheRaichu affirms that SPT update 4.1, released just days ago, "has always been the intended last version of SPT from us." Additionally, the project cannot continue, they say, because "it is not as simple as 'just rehost it'/'just change the name,' also not as simple as 'give the website to someone else' – partly because why the heck are we going to hand over your passwords, DMs, emails, etc. to anybody."

A third Discord message from SPT lead Refringe, who says they were "personally sent the legal notice," hammers one final nail in the coffin.

"The plan right from the start was always for another team to pick up where we left off," Refringe writes. "That's why I packaged up all the GitHub repositories, including their history and issues, and shared with everyone on the staff and development team. It's also why I intend to keep sharing whatever data I can morally justify handing over (excluding anything involving user information) with people I trust to carry this forward responsibly."

Future development and availability for Single Player Tarkov is tough to make out through the legal and community drama in the air. It doesn't appear that the fan game mode will up and disappear – if only in the sense that nothing ever truly leaves the internet once posted, as plenty of people already have this offline mode installed and backed up – but there's no telling if or when it will find new shepherds, and I don't see a change of hands magically resolving Battlestate's complaint.

Earlier this year, Steam charts were rocked by Road to Vostok, a so-called "single player Tarkov" FPS by a solo ex-military dev who says "the past 24 hours have been absolutely insane."

Baldur's Gate 3 actors, from Astarion's Neil Newbon to Shadowheart's Jennifer English, are well-known for playing their own characters in Larian's award-winning 2023 RPG, and it's always fascinating to hear how they interact with their virtual fantasy avatars. Lae'zel actor Devora Wilde documented her own playthrough a couple of years back, but she's now revealing some conflicted feelings about the character she played so famously.

"When I'm playing, the experience I'm having with Lae'zel is as if it's somebody else," Wilde tells IGN. "I think it's because the voice is quite different to mine, some of the mannerisms are different to mine, because obviously we created a character. So, I'm just getting to enjoy it, and I don't have that feeling of, 'Oh, that's me.'" Because it doesn't really sound how I sound. I think I'm quite bubbly and quite enthusiastic."

Wilde adds that she "nearly broke up with her the other day," but ultimately, "didn't have the guts to go through with it."

Hearing Wilde talk about Lae'zel is like listening to a loving parent acknowledge their child's, uh, differences compared to other kids. She references a hilarious exchange between famous rivals Shadowheart and Lae'zel in which Shadowheart asks if they've "buried the hatchet," and Lae'zel takes it completely literally. "Shadowheart's like, 'Girl, I'm just trying to get you to bury the hatchet, you know what I'm saying?' But she doesn't get it. She's just a sweet little queen lizard."

Wilde also invokes one of my all-time favorite lines from Baldur's Gate 3, in which Lae'zel drops one of the sickest burns of all time on Tav, who she says has a "large, fleshy nose" that looks "like a mistake."

"You never say that in real life, do you? You shouldn't," Wilde says.

It's true that Lae'zel can be a little tough to get along with, and if you're Shadowheart, specifically, you want to tread very carefully, but she also has one of the most rewarding storylines in the game if you choose your dialogue wisely. Wilde says one of her favorite scenes involves the romance path with Lae'zel and, without spoiling anything you might not have experienced yet, it is genuinely one of the most beautiful, heartfelt scenes in the whole game. Don't judge a Githyanki by the cover, and all that.

After Baldur's Gate 3, Divinity scholar tries to unmask Larian's next big RPG villain by painstakingly translating ancient symbols from behind-the-scenes footage.

GameSir initially revealed its revived Tarantula controller range back in April, but we haven't heard a peep about it since. It now seems the first two of the Series are ready to drop, as the 8K polling rate model for PC players and the officially licensed Xbox model are now available to buy via GameSir's store and at Amazon. The best PC controller rival is a reworked version of the GameSir Tarantula Pro that adorned the shelves a few years ago.

The GameSir Tarantula 8K PC model follows the suit of more advanced TMR controllers that have launched since the original Tarantula Pro's sudden retirement. The Razer Wolverine V3 Pro's PC variant and an updated GameSir G7 Pro both have 8,000Hz polling rates, which the PC version of the new Tarantula will also feature.

Two of the three new Tarantula controllers are now here, but we're still missing the Ultra model, which gives vibration motors and an 8K polling rate to PC players. There's no word on when this one might appear.

Of course, this gamepad is known for its symmetrical TMR sticks, which this time are updated with Gen-2 Mag-Res TMR tech. In my review of the G7 Pro 8K, I found these sticks to be excellent, but the 8K polling rate made them highly sensitive, which takes some getting used to.

The new Tarantula Pros are priced at $69.99 / £79.99 at Amazon, but as has been the case with a lot of the brand's new launches in 2026, stock at Amazon and other retailers is yet to come. Based on previous launches, I'd expect it to arrive in a month or two.

Upgrading from the original Tarantula Pro, the face buttons, D-pad, and trigger stops of the new PC model feature clicky microswitches that have a quoted lifespan of up to 5 million clicks.

GameSir says this iteration of the Tarantula has been built for competitive players, with that 8K polling rate and a lightweight design at the forefront of its development. It weighs 180g with a 0.25ms latency. It also has six-axis gyro controls for those who prefer that method of aiming. The Xbox version will work on PC but will be limited to a 1,000Hz polling rate.

Interestingly, both the Xbox and PC versions seem to be limited to wired play only, which is a step down from the original Tarantula Pro's wireless play on Switch and PC.

The new Tarantula Pros carry over the two back buttons from the original, as well as mappable face buttons (including a touchpad button). There are now two additional shoulder paddles for you to assign and use as well.

The 8K PC model has a vibrant orange colorway and a special edition MenaRD version. Judging by the continual colorway support of the brand's G7 Pro controllers, I'd expect more to follow in due course.

An ultra model with a slightly heavier weight due to the inclusion of vibration motors is also confirmed to be coming soon. If you prefer a heftier feel in the hands, that's the one I'd wait for.

Also see the best PS5 controllers, best Switch 2 controllers, and the best joysticks.

It can be hard to maintain a healthy perspective in the games industry. You're always vying for more players and a better position to keep the lights on. More devs could take a page out of the book of Palworld publisher Pocketpair, which seemingly views anyone else in its periphery as another pal rather than a competitor to be quashed.

A Twitter account dedicated to news and updates around survival games recently shared some information on the new spin-off for monster-collecting series TemTem, called TemTem: Pioneers, which brings in more crafting and resource management. Another Pokémon-esque adventure for PC, there are some surface level similarities between TemTem and Palworld, regardless of how they work mechanically.

The account calls the game a "Palworld rival," a term John 'Bucky' Buckley, the head of publishing and communications at Pocketpair, disagrees with. "TemTem are not our rivals," he says. "We respect all developers and their games! We’re all just making games for fun!!"

This is characteristically upbeat and well-meaning of Buckley. Generally speaking, when he isn't promoting or commenting on Palworld, he's talking about the games he's loving and trying to encourage people to do the same, whatever those releases may be.

Tribalism around Palworld is as pointless and toxic as it is in every discussion. Despite the Pioneers spin-off introducing more survival elements, TemTem was around for a number of years before Palworld, entering early access in 2020 before going 1.0 in 2022, and it's got its own community as a result.

TemTem's official account agrees with Buckley. "We don't wanna be Palworld's rival!" a response reads. "We deeply respect their game and work, and we just aim to be another option for fans of the genre."

There may be overlap in ideas, but these are distinct games with distinct fanbases, and it's much healthier to treat them as such. Besides, neither of them are getting anywhere near the reach of those ever-popular pocket monsters, that's for sure.

A Palworld MMO is coming this year: Palworld Online brings "original story elements," but not from Pocketpair.

While sailing was a massive part of the Assassin's Creed Black Flag experience, the devs say it was a trial to get it working in the first place.

While sailing was technically introduced earlier in the series thanks to some segments in Assassin's Creed 3, it became the whole basis of the next game in the series. Speaking to Retro Gamer magazine, Jean Guesdon, creative director on Black Flag, explains, "One of the first key decisions was to reuse everything we could."

Despite a test-run in AC3's American Northeast the year prior, Guesdon says it wasn't quite as simple as bringing that over into the next game. This was mainly thanks to the scale of the sailing being expanded. He adds, "We had a lot of teething difficulties trying to move from focused naval missions to a seamless naval experience."

Of course, it wouldn't be the end of sailing, as Ubisoft would soon go into the Skull and Bones mines for about a decade before releasing that to… being released. But its development probably helped in the creation of Assassin's Creed Black Flag Resynced this year, so piracy lives on once more.

While I'm admittedly not really into Ubisoft's biggest series, I have always had a very big soft spot for Assassin's Creed 4: Black Flag. Maybe it's because, in many ways, it really doesn't feel like an Assassin's Creed game as the pirate fantasy elements take center stage. I don't even think I finished it entirely as I just enjoyed sailing the high seas and singing with the fellas too much.

If you're yet to play it yourself, you can read our Assassin's Creed Black Flag Resynced review to see how it compares to the best Assassin's Creed games.

Halo: Campaign Evolved had a strong launch day in the US, but you may or may not be surprised to hear that it appears to have been more popular on its home turf than on PS5.

According to analyst Mat Piscatella, Circana's player engagement tracker shows that on July 28 – Halo: Campaign Evolved's proper release date after leaving its advanced access period – it came in fourth place on the US's ranking of daily active users on Xbox. Although it might have missed out on the bronze medal, Piscatella notes that "8% of total Xbox players on that date launched the game," which is obviously an enormous number.

These percentages go down when you look at the game's day-one performance on Steam and PS5. Piscatella reports that its daily active users placed it in 14th place on Steam, with 2% of daily active users launching it, while it was in 29th place on PS5, with 1% of daily active users giving it their time.

Of course, while the figures might appear smaller, it's worth noting that they're not totally comparable. Different platforms have varying user bases – 1% of daily Steam users isn't the same number as 1% of daily PlayStation users, for example. It does give an indication of each platform's priorities, though – clearly, the US-based Xbox user base has a larger proportion of folks who care about Halo enough to play it on day one than the US-based PlayStation fandom.

According to Circana's Player Engagement Tracker, on July 28th Halo: Campaign Evolved ranked 4th in US DAU on Xbox platforms (8% of total Xbox players on that date launched the game), while placing 14th on Steam (2% of actives) and 29th on PlayStation (1% of actives).

— @matpiscatella.bsky.social (@matpiscatella.bsky.social.bsky.social) 2026-08-03T16:18:39.471Z

What is easier to compare is the amount of time players on different platforms spent playing the game. "The average console player engaged with Halo: Campaign Evolved for over 2 hours" on its main release date of July 28, Piscatella says, while your average Steam player spent "a little over 1 hour in the game."

Piscatella gets ahead of one console war-fuelled interpretation of these stats as he says: "The game is currently at the top of the PlayStation Store's best-sellers list, so it's doing fine on PlayStation. What this does show is the massive challenge for new games in an environment dominated by the live service behemoths."

It'd also be totally understandable if Campaign Evolved did have more players on Xbox than PlayStation – while the novelty of Halo coming to PS5 is very cool, chances are that most diehard fans of the series already own an Xbox console, and the game is playable via a Game Pass Ultimate subscription to boot, making it even more appealing to those already subscribed to give it a whirl at no extra cost. It'll certainly earn more fans via its PS5 release, but they're probably more likely to be new ones than returning veterans.

Secret Halo: Campaign Evolved ending strongly hints that another Halo 2 remake is in the works – "See you in the sequel."

While we eagerly await the next drop of information for the upcoming Divinity game from Larian Studios, one fan believes they've uncovered a secret hidden in plain sight. Some behind-the-scenes footage of the first trailer appears to contain a byzantine clue about who the RPG's major antagonist will be.

This line of investigation comes from WolfheartFPS, an RPG aficionado on Twitter. They noticed that the symbols on the crown of the man who's immolated in the teaser are different in the making of clips shared by studio Unit Image, who oversaw the CG announcement trailer. Through a bit of digging, they realized the symbols are derived from Elder Futhark, an ancient alphabet.

"It's tough to decipher as Elder Futhark is significantly more phonetic than modern English, and there are also several variant systems," they explain in the post. "You can't directly translate to modern English."

But being a dedicated fan who's determined to see if this actually goes anywhere, Wolfheart sat down and, over the course of five-and-a-half hours, managed to discern something resembling a cohesive message. In the version of the crown in Unit Image's video, you could interpret the words as, "Chaos is coming."

I say interpret, because there's a certain amount of guesswork here - long-dead languages weren't designed for modern internet sleuths - but this phrasing works because the Lord of Chaos is a figure in the Divinity lore. He goes right back to Divine Divinity, in fact, and as Wolfheart points out, a prevailing theory among the fanbase is that you'll finally face him in this next installment.

That's definitely one way to ramp up the stakes after the Original Sin games and Baldur's Gate 3. As yet, the trailer and this newer production footage are all we have to go on. Larian recently teased we'd be hearing more about Divinity in the near future. Whatever's coming, don't expect much sunshine or rainbows.

Baldur's Gate 3 hits its lowest price ever as Larian celebrates 3 years of RPG greatness: "This is the price of having a nice time with your friends"

It's easy for me to say this as a gamepad reviewer who has never tried to make one, but I really don't think designing a great mobile controller is that difficult. So many brands have tried, but they've focused way too much on portability, or making it feel bespoke to a phone, or trying to fill really niche areas in the market that haven't been catered to yet. It just doesn't need to be that complicated, and a simple, on-the-go mobile controller shouldn't cost the $160 some companies will charge you. Just take a regular-sized gamepad, cut it in half, and that should really be the end of it.

The ELO Vagabond seems like it understands all of this. Why downsize a regular controller when that will almost always hamstring comfort? Why charge so much when this is almost always going to be a secondary peripheral people won't have a massive budget for? Why change the shape and design of controller grips that people have been enjoying for decades now?

At $99 / £74, the ELO Vagabond provides the best overall package in the mobile controller market. It isn't as affordable as the GameSir G8 Galileo I awarded 5 stars and the top spot on our buying guide, but it improves on its best features without charging as much as Razer. If mobile controllers have always felt a little imperfect to you, read on.

Design

Perhaps more than any other wrap-around mobile controller I've come across, the ELO Vagabond really does resemble a pro PC Controller sliced in half. Even on larger options like the Razer Kishi V3 Pro or the Razer Kishi Ultra, the grips feel a bit stumpy and compacted compared to the brand's full-sized Wolverine V3 Pro. The GameSir G8 Galileo has a chunkier, more comfortable form factor than the Backbone One and its imitators, but it's still clinging to a mobile controller design ideology that holds back its comfort compared to full-sized gamepads.

The ELO Vagabond makes a real statement with its grip shape. They feel almost lengthened and pointed at their ends to spite the rest of the market. Holding the Vagabond is almost similar to holding a GameSir Tarantula Pro or DualShock 4. Maybe not in a rounded shape kind of way, but in the sense that it caters to your pinkie fingers with ample room.

I wouldn't say the build quality of the ELO Vagabond is the best, and in fact, in my two weeks of testing, I'd say durability is the only emergent flaw that really jumps to mind in this review. The grips have a dotted texture, and they're pretty solid - no problems there. But away from that texture, I do start to notice a bit of a hollow feeling. The springs within the triggers can be heard when pressing them, which is not attractive in the slightest for a $99 peripheral. What's worse is that if I flip the controller over, I can hear something falling around inside the chassis. Again, not ideal for a product you want to take on the go with you and frequently shove in a bag.

I'd say the grips are the defining design point of the Vagabond, but something I really like is that it's learned from the competition. The pivoting USB-C connector from the GameSir G8 is one of my favorite, tiny design flourishes on pretty much any gaming accessory I've tested - mobile or otherwise. The Vagabond carries it over, which makes it so much easier and safer for your phone to remove and connect from the controller's cradle.

The Vagabond itself uses your phone's battery to charge, but there's a passthrough USB-C port on it for power delivery, and ELO even makes a high-speed cable so you can keep up with your game's power demands. Also a nice addition is a 3.5mm headphone jack if you're using a wired audio device.

Features

The Vagabond features Hall effect thumbsticks, but there are ways to upgrade them too. As an add-on, you can get thumbstick toppers to bring more height and accuracy into your gameplay; these do cost extra, and although they're a nice thing to have, I found plenty of FPS enjoyment without them.

There are four microswitch face buttons laid out in the Xbox configuration. These are microswitch, clicky buttons, but they still have a deep-feeling actuation allowing for plenty of feel if you're mainly looking to play singleplayer games.

The Vagabond also features two back buttons, which are placed ever so slightly too high for my liking. With grips that make a statement by being a bit longer than other mobile pads, I'd argue ELO should make use of them by placing the back buttons lower down. Hell, give me a second pair if you want to? If you're not a big fan of back buttons, these are lockable via a pair of switches.

Like Backbone before it, ELO has made a central app to let you configure all your mobile games and launch them from. This is fine, but as someone who mainly uses mobile play for remote play of a PS5, SteamLink, or Game Pass Cloud Streaming, these always feel a bit extra to me. For those mobile gamers who do use this sort of app, it seems just as conclusive as Backbone's.

Performance

Build quality hesitancy and trigger spring volume quickly become a non-issue when I'm playing games with the ELO Vagabond. It's a proper controller you can play mobile games with, and maybe besides the much more expensive Kishi V3 Pro, it's one of the only ones I've used I think I'd actually not mind using as a PC controller if I needed to.

Its long grips and Hall sensor sticks give it plenty of scope for shooters, especially if you click the stick upgrades on and really start whipping your crosshair around. The comfort of the grips makes it a joy in third-person games, and the clicky buttons make it responsive in fighting games and platformers. It's versatile, and that only makes it a better on-the-go gaming solution because even if you have specialist hardware at home for one genre of gaming, the Vagabond is going to do a pretty good stand-in job while you're away.

That doesn't mean that it's perfect though, and although the Vagabond does a fantastic job replicating the gamepad experience with a phone, there are a few ways I wish it would take things further.

I've talked about it before, but most mobile controllers fail because they adopt the Switch's Joy-Con curse; putting the face buttons and thumbsticks right underneath one another. This invites thumbcramp and discomfort into the equation because you're constantly having to flex your thumb down the way to reach a stick, and thumbs move much more accurately and much faster side to side. It helps make a controller more portable, but it doesn't make one more comfortable or as satisfying to use.

The Vagabond does a good job of giving you more to grip onto, but I think if there was a Vagabond 2, I'd love to see more of a horizontal separation between the thumbstick and face buttons/D-pad. This isn't bad as is, but it isn't quite as comfortable as on a regular controller, and I think on a pad like this it could be.

The other option is looking at the Scuf Nomad and taking a leaf out of the Steam Deck's book. Is there anything wrong with placing the thumbsticks symmetrically at the top of the controller? In my eyes, absolutely not, because even if it isn't conventional to a console player's eyes, they'll soon appreciate the comfort it brings.

If I get really nit-picky, I think there's an argument to be made for the D-pad being a little less rigid. I'd prefer a circular/8-wayt D-pad to make it a little easier to actuate at speed when it's placed a little awkwardly, but that might just come down to preference.

Something to celebrate is how practical the Vagabond is despite not trying to be as portable as the Backbone One or the foldable Asus ROG Tessen. It might not be as easy to shove in a bag or a pocket, but I got a new phone case while testing it, and the ELO didn't care. I never had to do any annoying swapping or case removal to fit my phone into it. That's all I really require from an on-the-go peripheral; I don't really have any need to fit it in my pocket.

Should you buy the ELO Vagabond?

I'm going to try and put this review in perspective with a personal anecdote. I have an Asus ROG Ally X that I've been using for all my on-the-go, portable gaming needs. Handheld gaming PCs obviously have their appeal because they're strong enough to run games natively and they can be docked for home play too. But for me, comfort is king, and something that drives me up the wall about the original Ally X is that Asus now offers similar handheld consoles with Xbox branding and full controller grips. In fact, all the handheld PC makers are now out here admitting through more ergonomic handles that their first iterations were rubbish for your hands.

I just don't find the ROG Ally X very comfortable, and it annoys me to the extent I don't use it as often as I want to.

With the ELO Vagabond wrapped around my phone, I'm much, much more inspired to take my gaming on the go because it's comfortable to hold for longer periods of time. Yes, it means streaming my PC games via SteamLink and dealing with lesser visuals and worse performance, but it's comfortable enough for me to play with, immerse myself in a game, and not think about how I need to regrip while playing every 5 minutes.

For me, that's a sign that the ELO Vagabond has succeeded in its mission. It's a really well-designed mobile controller that doesn't mean you compromise on comfort. It's also priced really well in the market. For me, this is the best mobile controller you can buy right now.

How I tested the ELO Vagabond

I tested the ELO Vagabond for over two weeks, using it for all my portable gaming and remote play needs. I tested it with and without its upgradable thumbsticks, and in plenty of gaming genres. I compared it closely to the GameSir G8 Galileo, the more recent Razer Kishi V3 controllers, and other mobile gamepads.

For more on how we test controllers, take a look at the GamesRadar+ hardware policy.

If you made it this far, I'd also recommend reading up on the best TMR controllers, the best PS5 controllers, and the best Xbox Series X controllers.

Mistfall Hunter's big idea is to mix the Soulslike with the extraction shooter. And while it's not the game's only idea, it's pretty darn close. There's a tense and moreish experience to be had here, but one that currently struggles to stand out from its influences. Though I suppose having a user interface that's about as friendly as a swarm of angry wasps is one way to stand out…

If your least-favorite part of Dark Souls was being able to lock onto your enemy, then boy is Mistfall Hunter the game for you. Everyone else will probably spend their first hour with it inventing new curse words as they attack empty areas right next to monsters over and over. Otherwise, Soulslike veterans will mostly feel right at home. Choose your class between warrior, mage, archer, and more, then dive into a world of brutal combat, limited heals, awkward jumping and flavor text on items you have no time to read because something is busy killing you.

After a preparation phase I'll moan about later, you take a boat ride to one of two areas for some monster-slaying and loot-snatchin'. You've got limited time to explore before the gyldenmist, a gold-plated take on Fortnite's deadly storm, closes in. You might not even live to see that, as the map is full of rank-and-file monsters, elite beasts, and some very nasty bosses.

Treasure is everywhere, as are simple missions that are assigned to you by the cocky crow who also serves as the game's not-always-welcome narrator. You want to kill enough enemies to rack up experience points, find the best loot possible, maybe tackle a mission or two, and then escape alive so it wasn't all for nothing.

Complicating matters is that there are other players somewhere on this map with you. Spot each other, and you might just jump up and down (the universal multiplayer language for 'please don't hurt me') and break out the wave emotes. But it's far more likely you'll engage in a brutal fight to the death, considering how high the rewards are for killing another player. Even if it turns out they were carrying nothing but crap, you'll still get a good chunk of XP for it. Mistfall Hunter clearly isn't trying to be the next Arc Raiders. It incentivizes you to play mean.

You rang?

This is most clear during escapes. After a few minutes, you can use set points on the map to summon a sentient bell monster (but of course). Successfully beat the bell black and blue, and you can ring a bell of your own over its corpse that turns it into an escape route. Naturally, ringing a bell isn't exactly quiet behaviour. You might as well be yelling "Hear ye, hear ye! I'm escaping!"

An escape point can also only be used once. So if you and another player decide not to kill each other, well, one of you is still going to have to stay behind and wait several in-game minutes until that summon point can be used again. Unspoken camaraderie can quickly turn into brutal backstabs in seconds and I love it. It means successfully escaping is always a tense affair that has never once felt routine.

Leveling up gives you more skills to choose from and talent points you can refine them with. I chose the stealth class and can switch between a dagger and a pair of far more lethal swords. I can also turn invisible. Game-breaking? Not at all, thanks to about a million caveats. My invisibility only works for a limited time, has a horrible cooldown, and disappears if I climb a ladder, open a door, or so much as look at the game funny.

Oh, and turning invisible must be incredibly exciting, because my heart goes wild. If there's an invisible player nearby, you'll hear a booming heartbeat getting louder and louder the closer they are. It's a clever way of balancing invisibility without nerfing it completely.

I also get the ability to summon a swarm of crows, and once I sink a talent point into it, my murder of crows will also stun anyone unlucky enough to be caught in the swarm. Outstanding. It's great to see a skill tree full of clever toys I actually want to unlock and play with, which isn't always a given in this kind of game. It also means that even a disastrous run won't leave you completely empty-handed, as experience for kills isn't lost.

Hallowgrove, the opening area, is nicely varied, with different enemy types in each region, and lots of hiding spots and smartly hidden treasures. But, it's also all very seen-it-all-before. Grunts are just FromSoftware leftovers, right down to the way their corpses ragdoll upon defeat. Considering Elden Ring and its better imitators love getting creative with enemy design, it's disappointing. I play the best Soulslike games because I'm excited and terrified to see what lurks around every corner. That diminishes way too quickly here.

Re-quest log

The hub area is an absolute mess. Imagine Dark Souls 2's Majula, if it were bought out by Amazon. Shops, auction houses, blacksmiths, wineries, storage, a mystical tree, a mystical pool, a goddess statue, a… oh Christ, what is this for again? All the good work Arc Raiders did stuffing all this nonsense onto a few menu screens has been forgotten. It's a chore to explore, a relentless pack of exclamation mark icons screaming for your attention.

Navigating all this on PS5 is no picnic, either. Translating tons of PC inputs onto a DualSense can't have been fun, but there's a sloppiness to it that frustrates. 'Press the touchpad to open the map!' it says, but it won't let me open said map because it thinks I'm using the command for 'never show this tooltip again' that's also on the touchpad. There's a lot of 'hold R2 and up on the d-pad simultaneously' which will be familiar to anyone who broke their fingers trying to play Baldur's Gate 3 on this machine.

At least Baldur's Gate 3 rewarded that finger-snapping nonsense with a stellar RPG. Mistfall Hunter is drowning in currencies, marketplaces, daily rewards, seasons, events, etc. You could argue this is all expected in our extraction games and it's certainly not launching content light. But, it's overwhelming and drowns out what little narrative there is. Mistfall is clearly more invested in the cynical hooks, like daily log-in bonuses, than in immersing you in its world or story.

Actions that should be simple are ridiculously convoluted. You can down a glass of wine before entering the fray to buff yourself (don't try that at home, kids). So you have to talk to the wine lady, confirm you want a standard glass, choose what buffs you want, confirm those are the buffs you want, and skip a cutscene of her pouring said glass. Every. Single. Time. "Why haven't you selected your glass of wine first?" asks the game when I try to just play it and skip this nonsense. It's enough to make one burn down a vineyard.

There's currently two areas to explore. The opening map that you do solo, and a far deadlier prison that you have to explore as a trio. There's also deadlier variants of both maps, but I'd say they were both struggling to hold my interest after about a dozen hours of play. The story and its world doesn't have enough to hook me in, leaving the extraction loop to do all the heavy lifting.

That might be enough if you love extraction games and want to try a Soulslike take on it. The foundations are strong and with regular updates and a massive UI overhaul (let a girl dream), this could become something special. For the moment Mistfall Hunter is fun enough, but a bit of a Mist Opportunity.

Mistfall Hunter was played on PS5, with a code provided by the publisher.

Check out our best online games recommendations for more to play!

Knowing the Big Walk release time is important information, if you're keen to start exploring the wide-open world of House House's latest quirky adventure. This is especially true here as the game is launching globally at different times, depending on whether you're playing on PlayStation 5 or PC and Nintendo Switch 2, and if you're based in the United States or elsewhere. To help you fathom out when your journey can begin, I've rounded up all of the Big Walk release times and explained the differences.

You can't play solo, so we've also got the lowdown on Big Walk crossplay to help you join your friends whatever their platform.

What time does Big Walk come out?

The game launches on August 4, but by checking the various regional PlayStation Stores and SteamDB information I have identified two separate Big Walk release times depending on your location and format. These are broken down as follows:

• PS5 (EU Store)
  • 9am BST
  • 10am CEST
• PS5 (US Store)
  • 6am PDT
  • 9am EDT
• PS5 (AU/NZ Store)
  • 6pm AEST
  • 8pm NZST
• PC (Steam)
  • 6am PDT
  • 9am EDT
  • 2pm BST
  • 3pm CEST
  • 11pm AEST
  • 1am NZST (August 5)

It appears that globally Big Walk will release first on PS5 in the UK/EU and Australia/New Zealand, then five hours later it will launch on PS5 in the US alongside a simultaneous worldwide release on PC via Steam. There is currently no information available about the Nintendo Switch 2 release time, though based on previous third-party launches this is likely to mirror the Steam timings.

Unlike with the Xbox, there is no "New Zealand trick" on PS5 to switch your internal clock to NZST so you can get access sooner, which means if you're based in the United States then the only way to play Big Walk early is to purchase it from the UK/EU or Australia/New Zealand PSN Store. Given the difference is only 5 hours and it's happening overnight, the best option is to wait until it becomes available in your region – especially if you're picking it up for free via PlayStation Plus!

© GamesRadar+. Not to be reproduced without permission.

Something about the best GTA games dig into your brain. Whether it's the gleeful moments of parody that send up American crime classics, the freedom to go on a rampage across an open world urban sandbox, or little cinematic touches that remind you Rockstar's characters go beyond surface level, it's almost impossible to forget. And here, we're snitching on the best GTA moments, from the series' greatest heists to the pettiest robberies.

It's impressive in part because every Grand Theft Auto is huge. Even if you go back to the very first game on PS1, you'll find a sweeping, expansive ambition that remains incredibly moreish, your path through a city very much your own. And yet, so much sticks with you. As we barrel ever-closer to the launch of GTA 6, we've cracked the window on every game in the series in order to rummage through all those shiny memories, and stashed the best of the best in our trunk for you to look at.

This Top 100 list will be updated each week with a new batch of entries, kicking off with our first twenty below. Let us know your favorites in the comments!

100-91

100. Taking Chop for a walk

Game: GTA 5
Released: 2013

Easily the strangest protagonist in GTA history – briefly controllable in single-player, and during a GTA Online Halloween event – Chop is a rottweiler notable for his loyalty in a game full of double-crossings. In fact, the only crossing he does is over the roads near the Clinton Residence should you throw his ball too far. His companionship is welcome when the plot starts blowing up, even if he's behaving badly because you didn't bother to train him via the iFruit app.

But go the other way and you can put plenty of time into building the bond between man and best friend, making sure that Franklin shows love and care to his stalwart companion. Ditch all the crime and take a trip down to Vespucci Beach where you can go for walkies and play fetch.

While some of GTA's detractors will call the series a hedonistic sandbox that brings out the worst in players, it's hard to believe that after we've spent a good hour hanging out with our canine pal. For as sinful as your GTA life can be, it can also be quite mindful. Why not put the weapons away, dutifully park your convertible, and hit the sands with Chop while you take in some digital sun?

99. Getting a call from your cousin Roman

Game: GTA 4
Released: 2008

"Niko! It's Roman. Let's go bowling." The phrase became notorious among Grand Theft Auto fans in the years following the fourth game's release – one of the truly enduring early game memes alongside the arrow to the knee and the cake being a lie. While writer Dan Houser later protested that those calls didn't happen nearly as often as players believed, they were new and significant – a calling card for a relationship system. An important step forward not just for this game, but for many others too. And you'd better enjoy bowling. Strike!

98. Watching an actual comedy set in Liberty City

Game: GTA 4
Released: 2008

Ricky Gervais appears at the Split Sides comedy club in Liberty City. Not someone we'd pay to see, but back on PS3 and Xbox 360 the idea of being able to actually drive to a club and take in a proper show was novel. It's an idea Rockstar has revisited a few times, most recently in Red Dead Redemption 2 where you can watch full theater performances that change every week night. What will we be able to watch in GTA 6?

97. Blasting your ice cream van's jingle

Game: GTA: Vice City
Released: 2002

In Rockstar Games' satirical take on Miami for GTA: Vice City, even the most innocent occupation is a paper-thin veneer concealing rampant corruption and criminality. So it proves when Tommy Vercetti buys the Cherry Popper Ice Cream Company (*sigh*), and discovers a burgeoning drug distribution operation. The juxtaposition of sing-song chimes with the sight of grown adults running from the sidewalks for their favourite white-coloured, tooth-wrecking fix remains one of the most grimly comic scenes in the entire series – which really is saying something.

96. Driving past Deliver Me Timbers

Game: GTA 4
Released: 2008

Just a straight-up great name for a company in the business of logging and logistics. You'll spot it on a passing van, and that's about it. A throwaway line, and funnier for it. If you ever needed proof that beyond the grim depiction of a world rife with crime is some very silly comedy, all you need to do is pay attention to the rich detail. No opportunity is missed for a chortle.

95. Discovering the coral reef

Game: GTA 5
Released: 2013

The act of hitting the ocean bed near Los Santos in your submersible might be driven purely by greed – as hazardous as it might be, nuclear waste fetches a high price, and that means more moolah to put towards your next field hangar or golf club. But once you're down there, you discover that some of Los Santos' beauty lies there, below sea level, brightly coloured and alien. It's the lone chunk of on-land coral reef, however, found halfway up a mountain, that has bewitched players – for nine years and counting.

94. Sniping the moon to change its size

Game: GTA 3
Released: 2001

Shoot for the moon, so the saying goes. In GTA 3 if you do, you won't land among the stars as the rest of the saying claims, but it will get bigger. It's a bizarre fact of life in Liberty City that presumably has dramatic knock-on tidal effects for the planet as a whole. But don't worry – snipe enough times and it'll return to its usual size. That this bizarre Easter egg was ever discovered is testament to the sheer amount of time bored teenagers spent in GTA 3, taking potshots at the scenery.

93. Taking the Pisswasser

Game: GTA 5
Released: 2013

Simple gags can be the greatest. 'Wasser' is German for water, and you can work out the rest. Cheap lager made for export, with the slogan 'You're in for a good time'. You're in. Yep. If that's not enough, you can even invest money in the company using Bawsaq (more on that later), and deck out sports cars with the logo like it's a racing sponsor.

92. Turning a GTA Online session into a Frank Ocean listening party thanks to Blonded Los Santos 97.8 FM

Game: GTA Online
Released: 2013

Frank Ocean and friends play spaced-out, soulful music that runs the gamut of contemporary genres, while riffing on the surrealism of GTA's casual ultraviolence between songs. Proof of Rockstar's cool, and evidence that smart curation is still a major part of this online sensation's backbone that makes it a world worth inhabiting and messing around in.

91. Watching Michael's movie at the cinema

Game: GTA 5
Released: 2013

The premiere of the film Michael 'produces', or rather enforces, over the course of GTA 5 goes awry on the red carpet, when another of its backers orders a hit on his family. That's Hollywood, baby, possibly even more vicious than a life of crime. But you can head back to the cinema at a later date and watch Meltdown in full. What you'll find are 11 and a half minutes of oddly watchable Wall Street pastiche, impossible car physics, and driving monkeys. And who said gaming isn't a storytelling medium?

90-81

90. Attempting to steer in cinematic cam

Game: GTA 3-5
Released: 2001-2013

There are a couple of entertaining yet unusable camera options in GTA. There's the '90s-style top-down view that's a recipe for flipped vehicles, but best of all is the cinematic camera – a favourite feature of Rockstar North's co-founder and president Sam Houser, who was adamant that Grand Theft Auto should look and feel like the crime movies of his childhood. The view periodically switches between various cool and flattering angles, all pretty much guaranteeing a gnarly crash. The cinematic camera is the very definition of style over sense, which is classic GTA.

89. Knowing why Sex Club 7 is funny because you're a fan of '00s British pop

Game: GTA 3, GTA: Liberty City Stories
Released: 2005

You had to be living in the UK between the years of 1998 and 2003 to know why Liberty City's bunny girl-adorned club was naughty – it's a reference to post-Spice Girls pop group S Club 7. Grand Theft Auto is a pastiche of American pop culture, but plenty of tongue-in-cheek UK references get a look in too. Originally Paulie's Revue Bar, you see the Leones take it over as missions progress and Luigi Goterelli comes in as an owner. Guess he's a 'Bring It All Back' fan.

88. Becoming Ammu-Nation's top customer

Game: GTA 3
Released: 2001

Rockstar North's outsider perspective on the US has served it well, and you can't argue with this simple, damning jab at the country where there are 120 owned guns for every 100 citizens. Frequent visits to the shop over the years have become comfortable and familiar – which is worrying in its own way.

87. Hot Coffee

Game: GTA: San Andreas
Released: 2004

All it took was a fan combing files to find cut content to cause one of gaming's biggest-ever controversies. On the trail of unused animations, 'hot coffee' turned out to be a cartoonish sex minigame, in which CJ has to rhythmically spank his girlfriend to elicit maximum excitement. Chaos ensued as, though the mini-game was inaccessible to the casual player, the incomplete files had been buried on the disc rather than deleted outright. Many fingers were pointed, and Senator Hillary Clinton called for new legislation to ban the sale of violent and sexually explicit games to American children, with a $5,000 fine for retailers in breach of the law.

86. Getting really into talk radio

Game: GTA 3-5
Released: 2001

The nascent Rockstar North dabbled in surrealist comedy radio in GTA 2, but it was only when the series went 3D that it dedicated entire channels to the kind of weird, rambling dialogues you can hear on local phone-in shows in real life. Eventually, the madness seeps in, and you find yourself sitting quietly in a sedan as a mafioso vents about his overbearing mother. "I do a man's job and all," sighs Toni, "but she treats me like a little boy."

85. Any scene with Samuel L Jackson's Officer Tenpenny

Game: GTA: San Andreas
Released: 2004

For those too young for Pulp Fiction, Sam Jackson will always be villainous Officer Tenpenny: a gangster with a badge. He brings his screen presence into the digital role here, crafting a character you love to hate. This is one of the meatiest roles in the series for a celebrity.

84. Walking away from the Chainsaw Masquerade

Game: GTA: Liberty City Stories
Released: 2005

Manhunt was a recent memory when Liberty City Stories came out, and there are a couple of creepy echoes during the latter's runtime. First, a character covertly films you taking out Sindacco goons so that he can use the footage in a snuff film. And second, Rockstar Leeds stages a survival horror showdown in the bowels of a cargo ship. The tension builds in the hollow vessel, until you're ambushed by baddies carrying more power tools than your local hardware store. Brr.

83. Thinking Heavenly Radio is a fantastic joke, then getting weirdly into it

Game: GTA 2
Released: 1999

The home of Hare Krishna conversion, and the only place playing "the sounds of whale love to help Saturn's moon squeeze through Neptune's tight red eye." Strange comedy that really helped to set the tongue-in-cheek comedy tone even before the series fully embraced 3D, classic GTA's radio stations oozed personality even with the generation's limitations.

82. Driving your 'Mini Cooper' wild in Hyde Park

Game: GTA: London
Released: 1999

By setting this early spin-off in a very specific time and place, Rockstar basically promised a playable Italian Job – and it delivered. The Myni, as it's called, may only be 135 pixels from its bonnet to its boot, but offers the best acceleration in the game. That's no small matter when yet another head-on collision takes away all your momentum.

Looking to test drive it? There's ample room at the centrally located Hyde Park, and the pigeons there present little resistance. It might seem quaint now, but the simple rendition of London was a joy to putter around in frenzied style, thanks in part to the design of UK cities, and also the novelty of having a game set in my home country for once. It'd be nice to have the series visit the UK again one day. God knows there isn't a lot more to lampoon now.

81. CJ goes cycling

Game: GTA 5
Released: 2013

Most series veterans quickly realised they were playing in CJ's backyard during the Hood Safari campaign mission of GTA 5, but few noticed him riding by on his BMX with Sweet and Big Smoke. It might not make sense as a canonically sound crossover, but it's a pretty neat nod to how far the series has come since the PS2 days.

We'll be updating this list each week as we approach our number one pick as part of our Countdown to GTA 6 coverage!

There have been some stark differences between the Final Fantasy 7 Remake trilogy and the original game thus far, and the conclusion could be another place where creative liberties are taken. That said, don't expect any hints from overseer Naoki Hamaguchi, who's playing coy in the hopes people choose to just enjoy the journey instead.

"I have never told any media outlet about what kind of ending Final Fantasy 7 Revelation will have," he tells Automaton.

"I don't want people to focus just on the ending," he adds. "I’m aiming to create a game that will make people feel 'I'm glad they made the Remake series,' or 'I'm glad I was able to see the Final Fantasy 7 Remake series through to the end' when they look back on the whole trilogy."

Considering he and his team will have one PlayStation release into three blockbuster games on modern hardware, I can understand his perspective. That's a decade-plus of development, redesigning, and restructuring the narrative to offer hundreds of hours of gameplay, all while celebrating and maintaining the legacy of a game that shook the industry.

But as we approach the third and final installment, the big question is: Should we expect it to end like the 1997 version, or is Hamaguchi planning the curveball of curveballs? He's saying nothing.

"The ending might be fully faithful to the original, or it might end up being something completely different," he explains. "Or perhaps, it might go in a direction no one could have imagined in the first place. I’d like everyone to experience it for themselves."

Those are big words. The climax of Final Fantasy 7 is right up there when it comes to memorable scenes in the sci-fi adventure. I'd probably place it third behind Sephiroth burning Nibelheim and the death of Aerith in set-pieces that always give me goosebumps.

I mean, Cloud doing Omnislash? And then the lifeforce coming to protect the planet? It's pure cinema. I can't see your final limit break being removed - it's just such a perfectly timed moment - but Hamaguchi hasn't done me wrong yet. I trust him, and I'm ready for what Revelation has to offer.

Final Fantasy 7 Revelation director says each character in the RPG only has 4 jobs because making games is so much harder now

There isn't much better advertising than having a direct connection to what is one of the biggest movies ever. Thanks to Spider-Man: Brand New Day absolutely smashing the box office, two of Insomniac's games starring the wallcrawler are charting very well on Steam.

That's right, not one, but two of the masked menace's biggest video games have climbed the charts. J Jonah Jameson will be furious. According to the Steam Top Sellers list on SteamDB, Spider-Man 2 is fifth on Valve's platform, while the first is at ninth.

The two of them in the top ten is a nice little bit of synergy. Brand New Day just started its theatrical run in the US, Britain, and many other major territories, bringing in an obscene $927 million over the course of the weekend.

Watching Peter Parker's latest Hollywood outing clearly inspired at least a few fans to go home and look into if there are any games that have the similar energy. Lo and behold, there are several, and Insomniac's releases are at the top of the pile.

It's impossible to say for certain, of course - the well-timed discounts may have convinced a couple of buyers as well. But between the film and Spider-Man 2 being 33% off, it's hard to imagine any other causes for such a clean jump up through the ranks.

It won't hurt that there's a costume based on Brand New Day now as well, for maximum synchronicity. Insomniac's first Spider-Man is down by 60% too, letting you pick up both for the price of a completely new release at full price.

If you're someone who's made these purchases, might I suggest Miles Morales - Spider-Man as well? It's considered something of a sidequel, since it effectively bridges the other two Spidey games from Insomniac, but it's as good as either, if shorter and more contained. Don't gloss over it - Miles is a worthy successor and partner to Peter, and you'll learn exactly why by playing.

Marvel's Spider-Man 2's new cel-shaded suit is a lot cooler in theory than it is in action as fans tear it apart for looking like cheap CGI: "It reminds me of Spy Kids"

Final Fantasy 14 is finally crossing over with the Final Fantasy 7 Remake trilogy sometime next year, but before the collaboration was set in stone, FF7 Remake director Naoki Hamaguchi was careful to not step over the MMO's patch cadence.

Speaking to GamesRadar+ about the crossover and Final Fantasy 7 Revelation, in an interview from Fan Fest Berlin, Hamaguchi reiterates that developers on the Remake trilogy were "heavily involved" in the upcoming crossover event. Not only is original Final Fantasy 7 writer Kazushige Nojima serving as a story supervisor, the rest of the team is collaborating on assets that'll be used in an Evercold raid series.

What tends to happen when Final Fantasy 7 Remake has a collaboration in the works is that the outside team will get "really excited," Hamaguchi says via a translator, and "come up with all these ideas" that can sometimes be quite lofty. "But at the same time we have to be really careful that it's not impacting the FF14 patch release schedule, because then that would be putting the cart before the horse," he adds.

To make sure things didn't get out of hand, Hamaguchi and Final Fantasy 14's Naoki 'Yoshi-P' Yoshida had to remind their really excited team members to "calm down" and "be reasonable, guys." Hamaguchi remembers telling his devs to "look at our bandwidth to see what's realistic and to make sure that they can do their best work," in order to stop either team from getting too derailed.

Yoshi-P and Hamaguchi were still "running around and touching up everything around the sides, seeing what's going on [and] making sure that everything's in place." That was on top of directing Final Fantasy 14 Evercold and Final Fantasy 7 Revelation, I should add, the mad men.

Final Fantasy 7 Revelation director says each character in the RPG only has 4 jobs because making games is so much harder now

A wildly new ambitious MMO called SEED sees the entire player base touch down on a freshly-colonized planet, build a couple Seedlings who aren't too far off your typical The Sims characters, and collaborate to "build real, functional societies" that run even when you're not looking.

"SEED is a persistent, player-driven life and MMO simulation," developer Klang's website explains. But the nitty gritty details are what make SEED seem really exciting. You essentially build autonomous characters, each with their own personalities who will go about their routines whether you log in or not. Before long, they'll have built up societies that mirror our real life, only this time on a faraway planet. It's basically Rimworld but it's always online and borrows from The Sims.

Players can choose to either join one of "thousands of burgeoning societies" or begin anew, making your Seedlings go out for crafting materials to build almost everything from scratch. Bed rooms, houses, factories, pubs, hospitals - all with your expertly tuned interior design skills, of course. The coolest part is that societies exist in the same world no matter what, which I imagine could lead to some cool political drama as the game inches closer to 1.0. Even when you're not logged in, you can check in and text with your Seedlings on your real-world phone.

The trailer down below dives deeper into the juicy details: "How societies run is up to the players. They can form everything, from a top-down aristocracy to grassroots democracy, and then elect leadership, draft laws, levy taxes, and do everything modern governments do today on every scale." There's even a working real estate system, political elections, and inter-community trading.

"We're launching in Early Access because real society needs real people! Join early and get a chance to be one of the first to shape this ever-evolving new world," the developer writes. For now, the game's only available through the standalone SEED launcher on the company's website. A Steam launch is planned for later in the year.

For more, check out the new games of 2026 and beyond.

With GTA 6 close on the horizon, the gaming industry is set to have a new standard thrust upon it with all the grace of tossing a molotov cocktail at your own carefully assembled traffic jam. It's not the first time Rockstar Games has shaken the medium by its shoulders. Arguably, they've been doing so since the very first Grand Theft Auto gave us an unprecedented amount of top-down criminal freedom.

Though, perhaps, it wasn't until the rightfully legendary Grand Theft Auto 3 crystallized the open world genre on PS2 that a standard was truly set, one the developer has committed to one-upping time and time again. By the end of the PS2 generation, it had been redefined again. Then, onto the next one. Here, we take a trip through each era of Grand Theft Auto, exploring what's defined each, and how they've pushed open world gaming forward. We're poised to see how GTA 6 will do it again.

1997-1999: It's in their DMA

Games released: Grand Theft Auto, GTA: London 1969, GTA 2

Back in 1997, when Rockstar North was still known as DMA Design, it released a PS1 game called Grand Theft Auto, and a gaming legend was born.

This top-down crime-'em-up was spread across three locations: Liberty City; Vice City; and San Andreas. Yup, all three have been GTA canon from the beginning. You may not be surprised to learn that the series, and its reliance on crime and violence, caused controversy from the very beginning. There was much red-faced bluster about the first game in the House Of Lords, and many people wanted the game banned from sale (which never happened).

1999 saw the release of two new games. Grand Theft Auto: London 1969 was an expansion pack developed by Rockstar Canada, and was set in – you guessed it – London. Over here, the expansion got a bigger, standalone release (bet you can't guess why). You could tell that it was set in the UK, because when you were arrested, the screen would shout NICKED at you instead of BUSTED. Alas, the series never returned to London or any other real-world setting.

The fully fledged sequel was released in the same year as the cockney-flavoured expansion pack for the first game. GTA2 introduced many things that carried through to the rest of the series in one way or another, such as a health bar, manual saving, side-missions, vehicle modding, and – for better or for worse – a large number of things to collect hidden throughout the city. A solid foundation for future games to build on.

2001-2004: 3D or not 3D?

Games released: GTA 3, GTA: Vice City, GTA: San Andreas

2001's GTA 3 was the final game to be developed under the name DMA Design (with help from Rockstar's New York division) but that, of course, is not the most notable thing about it. This was the first game in the series in full 3D, making the open world gameplay more enticing than ever.

The protagonist causing havoc in Liberty City was mute, but the NPCs weren't. The fully-voiced story boasted high-profile actors in the cast, including Kyle MacLachlan and Michael Madsen. It must've been costly to develop, but it paid off; GTA 3 was the best-selling game of the year.

The next game in the series arrived just one year later. The legendary GTA: Vice City was also the best selling game of its year, and it's little surprise, really. Not only was it riding on the phenomenal success of the previous game, the excellently curated licensed soundtrack and neon-happy visual design practically screamed 1980s at players. Another all-star cast certainly didn't hurt, with actors including Gary Busey, Dennis Hopper… and the late Ray Liotta as Tommy Vercetti.

In 2004 came the big one (literally); in terms of map size, GTA: San Andreas was much bigger than anything that had come before, over twice as big as Liberty City and Vice City put together. Despite this, there were – unlike in the previous two games – no loading screens while exploring the open world. Some still treasure it as the best GTA, and it was certainly met with a warm welcome on release. As is tradition for the series by now, it outsold all other games that year. It introduced stealth, hopping over walls, and the ability to swim. It was the first game in the series to feature character customisation via haircuts and the like, and RPG-style skill improvement.

2005-2009: Time to pocket the profits

Games released: GTA: Liberty City Stories, GTA: Vice City Stories, GTA: Chinatown Wars

Spin-off GTA: Liberty City Stories was released as a PSP exclusive in 2005. It was ported to PS2 in 2006, but the latter version was actually missing some really cool features from the original handheld release, namely the multiplayer mode and the ability to create custom soundtracks from your own music. (Now that's something we wish the series still had.)

2006 then saw GTA: Vice City Stories for PSP (also later ported to PS2). Although the Stories games and their recycled maps were filling a gap before the next 'proper' GTA, they were still pretty good, and retained some of the stars of the games that they drew from.

GTA: Chinatown Wars in 2009 never made the jump from DS/PSP to PS2, which is a shame, because it's absolutely brilliant. Using a similar top-down view to the original games, it had a retro feel while being a much sharper experience than those 1990s titles.

2008-2010: Relax at the Niko cafe

Games released: GTA 4, The Lost And Damned, The Ballad of Gay Tony

As the first GTA designed from the ground up for a new generation of consoles, GTA 4 wowed the industry when it launched for PS3 in 2008.

Liberty City looked better than ever, and the game featured a number of improvements and features that would return in the next entry in the series. These include the importance and functions of your phone, TV programmes that you can watch in the protagonist's home, the ability to make decisions at certain points during the story, and (a small but very neat thing) the ability to hail a cab and just sit in the back, enjoying the ride.

Two expansions, The Lost And Damned and The Ballad Of Gay Tony, were released individually for Xbox 360 in 2009, but in a single standalone package for PS3 in 2010. The Lost And Damned gained notoriety for briefly showing a man's 'unholstered pistol' (ahem) in a cutscene.

2013-Present: Five is live (service)

Games released: GTA 5, GTA Online

GTA 5 was released in 2013. And 2014. And, er, also in 2022. We're pretty sure that Rockstar is done making new versions though, if only because it's run out of PlayStation consoles to make it for. The game’s certainly stood the test of time; the PS5 story mode is essentially identical to the original PS3 one – yet despite this, it very much feels like a current-gen experience.

We don't have the space or the time to list everything the latest instalment introduced and improved, but multiple playable characters, the biggest map in the series to date, an optional first-person perspective, and complex heist missions are certainly worth mentioning. Then, of course, there is GTA Online.

Grand Theft Auto Online, which launched a month after the offline component in 2013, initially suffered from severe technical issues and arguably limited content. It soon recovered, however, and Rockstar has been constantly improving and adding to it ever since. The repeated rereleases saw some casualties along the way, though; PS3 updates were stopped in 2015, and PS3 servers were shut down completely in 2021.

The game as it stands today is crammed with content, so much so that a standalone version was released earlier this year. It has a full story with expansions, players can race with one another, set up businesses, take part in multiplayer heists, enjoy stunt races, and more. Up to 30 people can play together, yet much of it can still be enjoyed as a solo experience.

Is Rockstar's dedication to GTA Online updates a sign of how important online features will be to the next game? Even if it's not, each instalment has offered something new, and there's no reason to think GTA 6 will be any different.

But which one should you play while waiting for GTA 6? Our best GTA games ranking has the answer!

The office that developer Sandfall Interactive works out of is actually a whole manor that looks exactly like the one found in the studio's breakout sensation, Clair Obscur: Expedition 33, but the similarity was purely coincidental.

"I wouldn't call it big, it's not super big," creative director and Sandfall CEO Guillaume Broche says of the manor while speaking to Automaton. "But the office space we'd used before, when we had around 10 people on board, was quite… let's say bad quality. And very, very small. "

When Sandfall Interactive finally got into cahoots with publisher Kepler Interactive and began building a bigger team, the Montpellier government hooked the developer up with the building they now call The Manor. "When we visited, we'd already made the manor in our game, and when we opened the door, we just went 'It's the same!' That's why we just had to take it," Broche says.

You can see brief glimpses of the gorgeous work space from 2025's Xbox Developer Direct showcase, embedded below, which gave us a look at the game and the team behind it prior to its release.

"Our philosophy was, if you come to the office, it shouldn't feel like coming to an office, it should feel like entering a house where you're just making games with friends," Broche continues. "We wanted it to feel warm. So now, we have this manor, though it's not like a massive manor with crazy gardens and everything. It's quite small, but everybody's close to each other, which makes it easier to communicate. We also have a garden now where we play Pétanque and Ping Pong regularly."

Off the back of Clair Obscur's phenomenal success, the team at Sandfall could theoretically find someplace bigger to call home, but keeping a tighter space is "really important" for Broche and his ambition to "keep this independent spirit" that made the team's debut game in the first place.

"To have an office that's just like a house where everybody feels welcome and good, and where everybody finds it easy to joke around."

Clair Obscur: Expedition 33 took inspiration from Attack on Titan and Bleach's instantly recognizable characters: "It's an absolute masterpiece for me"

Each character in Final Fantasy 7 Revelation's ragtag party will be able to equip four different classes, called FITS here in this game, and director Naoki Hamaguchi says the process of making them reminded him how tough game development has gotten in recent years.

Final Fantasy 7 Revelation might be remaking the last act of Final Fantasy 7, but it's reaching even further back into Final Fantasy history with a job system called FITS (deep breath, Function Integrated Tactical Suitwear). Each character has four FITS that'll change their combat capabilities and give them a snazzy new outfit - so far, we've only seen Cloud dressed up as a Warrior and TIfa in a Black Mage fit.

"It did make me realize all over again how hard it is to develop games these days. When you look at some of the early Final Fantasy games that have job systems, you could put a lot in there," Hamaguchi tells GamesRadar+ in a recent interview from Final Fantasy 14 Fan Fest Berlin.

He's definitely not wrong. Take Final Fantasy 5, one of the series' classic pixel art games that let you mix-and-match each party member with over 20 jobs. Games have only gotten way more graphically intensive over time, and every playable character in Revelation's cast has their own bespoke animations. A far cry from the days where the pixels that represented an FF5 character all awkwardly shimmy forward to attack.

These days, wanting to have 20 or 30 jobs isn't really feasible for a standalone game, Hamaguchi continues via a translator. In fact, it's "just insanely difficult" unless you're an "ongoing title" that's adding content "bit by bit," as is the case with MMORPG Final Fantasy 14.

Still, the jobs that are available in Final Fantasy 7 Revelation apparently do a lot of heavy lifting to shake up the trilogy's combat. "The FITS system has four different outfits for each character, and each of those is quite a defined role. In the end, that has added quite a lot of breadth of strategy for players to engage with, so I think it has resulted in a really good addition to the battle system," Hamaguchi explains. "Even though we only have four FITS, we have a lot of characters, so it was quite a lot of work."

Final Fantasy 7 Revelation director is "serious about concluding the series" at the end of the JRPG, and any DLC will focus on "untold stories"

When I heard Owlcat Games turned 10 in June, I was surprised. Not because of its age, but lack of. Within a decade the developer has already become a household name for CRPG fans, thanks to its sprawling isometric games set in the Pathfinder universe and 2023's excellent Warhammer 40K: Rogue Trader.

Looking further afield, Owlcat is set to launch its debut third-person RPG, The Expanse: Osiris Reborn, in 2027; while upcoming CRPG Warhammer 40,000: Dark Heresy already looks promising. That's on top of getting into publishing. "We're kind of speedrunning this," jokes Andrey Tsvetkov, head of publishing at Owlcat. "We managed to ship three games in 10 years, while some studios worked on a single project in that time."

Joining me to reflect on Owlcat's first decade and the future ahead, Tsvetkov says the studio owes a great deal to its fans. He's being surprisingly literal: the longer we chat, the more it becomes clear that Owlcat Games' relationship with players, and authenticity to its craft, are the studio's greatest assets.

Taking initiative

Through the 2000s and early 2010s, the RPG genre seemed to be moving in one direction. Increasingly dominated by third-person action RPGs, from Fallout and The Elder Scrolls at Bethesda to BioWare's Dragon Age and Mass Effect, it seemed CRPGs had settled away from the spotlight. Then veteran developer Obsidian Entertainment crowdfunded RPG Pillars of Eternity in 2015, saving itself from dire finances with a return to '90s-style isometric RPGs.

"It showed us that the market didn't move away from these kinds of products," says Tsvetkov. "Everyone was talking about multiplayer back then, and suddenly Pillars of Eternity became a great hit [...] The core team of ours always dreamed of making this kind of game, and that was a good opportunity to do so. So it inspired us to start working on the concept of a game like this – and it turned out to be Pathfinder: Kingmaker."

Pathfinder: Kingmaker was made through crowd-funding, with 18,351 backers raising $909K – far more than the original $500K target. Raising funds for a sequel, 2021's Pathfinder: Wrath of the Righteous, more than 35,000 backers pledged two million dollars. Having found an audience Owlcat funded its last titles internally, but continues to work with fans from early stages, with pre-release builds for Warhammer 40,000: Rogue Trader and its follow-up Dark Heresy helping to shape their vision.

Tsvetkov points to the inception of Warhammer 40K: Rogue Trader as an example. "We were thinking of what kind of story we wanted to tell, what might be the next studio we'd work on, and more than half of the studio explicitly told us [they] want it to be Warhammer. 'We just want to work with Warhammer!'

So we approached Games Workshop and found common ground really fast, and started working on an RPG based on the Warhammer universe. It wasn't to achieve some target, or to expand the community, or whatever. We just wanted to make a Warhammer game."

That passion, says Tsvetkov, is a large part of why Owlcat has been able to release games so quickly.

"There is a list of things that the creative team would like to do, and we try to chase them [...] We're not working on a single game for five or six years. One of the key reasons is because the creative team behind our games wants to try different things before we get too old, before we retire and live somewhere peacefully and quietly. We want to try different things, so for us, it's an opportunity. We built the studio in a way that we can work on several projects at once. Some of them are in the full production schedule stage right now. Some are in early pre-production, just concepts we've been doing, but it allows us to bring more creative ideas to life – and that really drives people in the studio."

Developers at the studio are ambitious, yes, but Tsvetkov argues that the team's sincerity is its greatest strength. "Most of the team who are working on the Warhammer games collect miniatures themselves. They know the lore at the level as the best lore masters. I don't want to say anything bad about Games Workshop, but at some of those meetings, we were on the same level of knowledge for Warhammer lore as those guys. That's a compliment!

"We tend not to work with things we don't actually love," he adds. "We don't enjoy ourselves."

Other worlds than these

Owlcat's RPGs have an old-school level of depth, but Tsvetkov doesn't feel the studio is beholden to its ancestors. The team holds quarterly meetings to assess whether "old design ideas" are still relevant, can be improved, or hold them back in any way. "We shouldn't, as we say, become like a bronze statue," he explains. "A studio is a living, breathing organism. We have to make sure there's room for new ideas to grow."

"We don't want to repeat ourselves, right? We know that players already know, like the original Baldur's Gate one or two. They played Icewind Dale, they played Pillars of Eternity, Wasteland, etc. They played through all of these games, and they have all this experience with them. They [don't want] repetition. They want something new."

With veteran studios – think Obsidian, Larian – still around and making games, Tsetkov believes striving to be original is crucial to standing out in a crowded genre. He again points to community as a "core" strength. "They act as game ambassadors who spread the word [...] The further we go with this kind of competition, the bigger the community's role. If you have a community supporting you, you can be sure that you [can] survive the harsh reality of game development."

Owlcat is already a mainstay in the CRPG space, but it's seemingly on the cusp of breaking through to the mainstream. Think of how The Witcher 3, Kingdom Come: Deliverance 2, and Baldur's Gate 3 put their respective developers on the map for broader audiences. With a now-sizable audience backing Owlcat, Warhammer 40,000: Dark Heresy could blow the floodgates open. As could The Expanse: Osiris Reborn, which is Owlcat's third-person debut and likely to strike a chord with starved Mass Effect fans. Tsvetkov is modest about the possibility, but admits there's a lot the team would still like to push forwards.

"We're working on a new project that is unannounced, and it will be quite different from what we've done in the CRPG genre before," he says. "We still have room for experiments."

As Owlcat looks ahead, it remains open to tackling other familiar worlds – not just Pathfinder and Warhammer. "There are still a lot of things that we would like to do with some universe that we love," Tsetkov says, adding there are "ongoing conversations with various IP owners that might result in something interesting."

While the studio will continue to make RPGs set in familiar worlds, its "top creative leaders" also want to make a wholly original setting – eventually. The idea sounds distant, but some things are more certain. "We like to do the things that we love to do," Tsetkov says. "So we won't be quitting the CRPG genre."

Still drinking your coffee? Last week's Saturday Read was on the future of MMOs

A now infamous hacker is reportedly going around Call of Duty: Black Ops 2 lobbies and bricking players' accounts in the game's new PlayStation ports.

Activision recently ported the first two Call of Duty: Black Ops games to PS4 and PS5 consoles, but the original games' vulnerable infrastructure seems to have been unchanged, which already led to years-old exploits remaining intact.

Things have gotten slightly worse in Black Ops 2's multiplayer, as a hacker who goes by the name 'C Isn't Sharp?' has been showing up in lobbies and messing with other people's accounts in various ways. Streamer TimTheTatMan fell victim to the hacker, who pushed his account to Level 55 and Prestige 16 - a Prestige level that doesn't even exist in the game proper. (Good spot, IGN.)

Some players have reported that being hacked has also left them unable play online matches at all since the game apparently keeps crashing thereafter. Certain players also claim their progress in other areas of the game have been reset after a chance run in with the hacker.

Right now, the only apparent fix is to look out for C Isn't Sharp's bright green name in lobbies and immediately close the game to stop your account from being altered. Hopping out of the lobby seemingly doesn't stop your stats from messing up, no matter how quick you are.

15-year-old exploits and now a boogeyman hacker haven't done much to turn public opinion around on the new Black Ops port, which were already getting side-eyed thanks to their $40 price tags - no to mention the $30 extra that it'll cost you for the map packs.

Despite all the commotion, Call of Duty is doing what Call of Duty always does: sell. Last month, both Black Ops games landed within the best-selling PlayStation games chart in the US.

Activision admits Call of Duty matchmaking used to be better, updates Black Ops 7 with a new system inspired by "classic games" like Black Ops 1 and 2