IGN Video Games

IGN Video Games

Black PS5 Pulse 3D Wireless Headset Color Revealed

Posted: 15 Sep 2021 06:58 AM PDT

Sony has revealed a new Midnight Black edition of the PS5 Pulse 3D Wireless Headset, and it will be released in October.

The latest PlayStation Blog post noted that the new color option will match the same color scheme as the Midnight Black DualSense controller Sony released in June. The controller will begin rolling out globally at participating retailers next month. While the blog post did not specify pricing or release date, Sony's official website already has the headset up for preorder for $99.99 (the same as the white model) with a release date slated for October 22.

IGN reviewed the Pulse 3D Wireless headset, which received a 9/10 on our rating scale. We noted the headset goes beyond making PS5 games sound great; it makes the games feel more alive.

The announcement of a new color variant for the Pulse 3D headset comes the same day as the second major PS5 update rolls out, introducing a slew of new features to Sony's ninth-generation console, including a new equalizer control feature for the Pulse 3D headset and the option to expand the internal storage in your console.

With a Midnight Black controller, and a Midnight Black headset, many will now be wondering – when will we get a Midnight Black console to match?

Taylor is the Associate Tech Editor at IGN. You can follow her on Twitter @TayNixster.

Star Wars: Hunters Will Let You Play as a Jawa Standing on Another Jawa's Shoulders

Posted: 15 Sep 2021 06:51 AM PDT

Star Wars: Hunters, the free-to-play mobile game coming to Nintendo Switch and mobile devices, has released a new cinematic trailer that shows off a number of the game's playable characters, including a very unlikely duo.

Star Wars: Hunters has remained further off-radar than even the Dagobah system since its initial announcement as part of the February 2021 Nintendo Direct. With very few details shared at the Nintendo event aside from a short teaser trailer and the game's logo, fans' first real look at the title came during the release of its recent cinematic trailer, which can be seen below and shows off a number of characters in the game.

While the trailer predominantly depicts a close-fought encounter between the Sith warrior Rieve and her Mandalorian counterpart Aran Tal, it was the inclusion of another of the title's characters that really caught our eye. Stood one on top of another and dressed in a full-length trench coat, the real stars of the Star Wars: Hunters trailer are a pair of ungainly balanced Jawas known together as uTooni. Although the duo gets little screen time, the Outer Rim tag-team can be seen clumsily readying a grenade before the scene cuts away. With little else shown of the pair, fans will have to wait to see how the Tattooine scavengers adapt to arena combat.

Among other playable characters shown off in the trailer, fans received a more detailed look at Grozz, a Wookie warrior with a penchant for disarming droids; J-3D1, a suitably named droid programmed to believe that he has an affinity with the force; Sling Shot, an ugnaught controlling the husked out shell of a destroyer droid, and more.

In other Star Wars: Hunters news, a limited amount of gameplay footage was also shown off during last night's (September 14) Apple event as part of a showcase to display the capabilities of the tech company's new iPad Mini. While brief, footage from the game gave fans a glimpse at what they could expect from the title's combat and in-game HUD.

Star Wars: Hunters is set to release for mobile devices and Nintendo Switch sometime in 2022. To keep up with a range of the latest news from Star Wars: Hunters, make sure to keep checking back to our dedicated page for the game.

Correction: This article originally stated that uTooni were holding a switched-off lightsaber but, on closer inspection, it appears to be a grenade.

Jared Moore is a freelance writer for IGN. You can follow him on Twitter.

The Art of Halo Infinite: Exclusive Cover Reveal

Posted: 15 Sep 2021 06:49 AM PDT

Update: Alongside the standard hardcover edition of The Art of Halo Infinite, Dark Horse Books will also be releasing a Deluxe Edition version. The Deluxe Edition features an exclusive cover by Halo Infinite art director Sparth and a slipcase inspired by Master Chief's Mjolnir armor. The set also comes with a portfolio of several art prints showcasing the wide vistas of the Halo station.

Check out The Art of Halo Infinite Deluxe Edition below:

The Deluxe Edition is priced at $79.99 and will be available for preorder through Dark Horse Direct, Amazon, Barnes & Noble and other bookstores and comic shops. Both versions are currently slated for release on December 14, 2021, a month after the game arrives on the Xbox and PC.

The original story is below:

Halo Infinite is shaping up to be one of the most ambitious and graphically impressive games in the series. And if you want an insider look at the characters, worlds and technology of the game, Dark Horse Comics has you covered with The Art of Halo Infinite.

IGN can exclusively debut the cover to The Art of Halo Infinite, created by the game's art director Sparth. Check it out below:

Here's Dark Horse's official description for The Art of Halo Infinite:

The Master Chief is back in Halo Infinite, the biggest and most visually spectacular Halo yet. Halo Infinite will debut on PC, Xbox One and Xbox Series X, Microsoft's fastest and most powerful console ever. To take full advantage of its prodigious graphical prowess, 343 Industries built an all-new, next-generation game engine, giving their world-class artists the tools and technology to realize the beauty, mystery and wonder of the Halo universe in unprecedented style and fidelity. 343 Industries have given Dark Horse access to the art and artists who have brought Halo Infinite to vibrant, vivid life. It's all here in unparalleled detail, the heroes you've grown to love—the Master Chief, the brave soldiers of the UNSC, as well as the weapons, vehicles, villains and vistas—and of course, the eponymous and magnificent environments of Halo itself.

The Art of Halo Infinite is priced at $39.99 for the regular hardcover and $79.99 for the deluxe edition, and both are currently scheduled for release in Holiday 2020. You can pre-order the regular edition on Amazon.

We recently got a closer look at Halo Infinite at the Xbox Games Showcase. Find out more about the new story and villain details revealed, as why 343 Industries says there won't be a Halo Infinite 2.

IGN's Brian Altano and Max Scoville recently unboxed another art book from Dark Horse during Comic-Con@Home. Check out the video below to see what you get with the deluxe edition of The World of Cyberpunk 2077:

Jesse is a mild-mannered staff writer for IGN. Allow him to lend a machete to your intellectual thicket by following @jschedeen on Twitter.

I Am Fish Review

Posted: 15 Sep 2021 06:00 AM PDT

I Am Fish is without a doubt the weirdest game I've played this year and appears to have been made by insane people. In other words, I really enjoyed it. It's an intentionally frustrating physics-based platformer and a literal fish-out-of-water story that challenges you to overcome ridiculous obstacles. Escaping captivity is not always as fair or forgiving as I'd hoped and sometimes can be downright infuriating, but overcoming its preposterous challenges is frequently a thing of beauty. As a glutton for punishment, I found I Am Fish to be a challenging, entertaining ride that had me laughing, cursing at seagulls, and occasionally sobbing uncontrollably on the carpet as I had to restart a section yet again.

This is a bizarre, over-the-top tale of a quartet of fish who eat sentient bread (which you might remember from I Am Bread) which awakens human-like sentience and intelligence in them. Naturally, they use this to wreak havoc on their human overlords and absolutely destroy entire towns, like a nihilistic retelling of Finding Nemo. It's truly one of the weirdest premises I've ever beheld and it kept me laughing and shaking my head in disbelief the whole way through – around 10 hours.

Perhaps weirdest of all is how I Am Fish develops and expands upon the stories from I Am Bread and Surgeon Simulator, giving lots of backstory and exposition to those games in what appears to be an incredibly ill-advised attempt to establish the BGU (Bread Gaming Universe, obviously). And honestly, I'm here for it. The completely absurd attempt to create a cohesive series out of a tongue-in-cheek bread game only adds to the charming stupidity that called to me in the first place.

You should expect to die a lot.

Like I Am Bread before it, the main obstacle you face in I Am Fish is that your playable characters are just really darn difficult to control, yet precision is almost always required. And when you're constantly under threat from everything, like cars running over you or, oh, I don't know – coming into contact with air for more than a few seconds, you should expect to die a lot. As I floundered to direct a rolling fishbowl or flopped my way into a body of water, I never felt like I was completely in control of the aquatic animals, which is equal parts annoying and hysterical. If I added up all the times I shouted something like "Oh, give me a break!" at the screen and gave you the number you'd probably think it was my least favorite game ever, but it's all by design. I cried tears of joy when I finally made it past a particularly annoying section where seagulls were trying to kill me while I rolled around in a glass bottle, and I cracked up as I was repeatedly run over by cars.

I Am Fish has four playable fish, three of which have unique abilities that must be mastered to solve puzzles. The piranha, for example, can bite and destroy just about anything in his path, while the flying fish can, well, fly. The introductory levels for each fish are total highlights, where your new abilities are fresh and puzzles gradually become more challenging as you learn to make the most of your latest set of fins.

There are some really stellar levels, like one where you're swallowed by a drunk man at a club and have to make him stagger to a bathroom from within his stomach before he barfs you up. Or when you roll your fishbowl over the rooftops of a town using the electrical wiring like guide rails. Figuring out how to think like a fish and overcome absurd obstacles is a completely worthwhile experience, even when you're dying a ton.

That said, not all the frustration thrown your way is fun; some sections cross that delicate line from being entertainingly annoying to just making me want to turn it off and play something more casual, like Demon's Souls or Battletoads (1991). The bottle sections in particular just feel downright cheap sometimes, as I found myself wriggling helplessly in a very unwieldy bottle while trying to navigate extremely precise landscapes. In another, I found myself painfully inhibited by my own AI-controlled allies who eagerly followed me wherever I went and constantly got in my way, causing me to die half a hundred times or so.

Parts made me want to turn it off and play something more casual, like Demon's Souls or Battletoads (1991).

These kinds of extreme and uncalled for frustrations actually made up a not-insignificant amount of my time with I Am Fish, enough for me to develop a kind of love-hate relationship with it. To make matters worse, some sections go way too long without a checkpoint, which forced me to replay parts repeatedly, each time more irritating than the last. It's unfortunate that it tried so hard to tick me off sometimes, because when things came together I didn't mind or even notice how much I was dying just because the obstacles thrown at me made me laugh. But I Am Fish pushes those limits pretty regularly and laughter is replaced with deep sighs and stress eating.

If the normal controls are somehow not difficult enough for you, there's also the Bossa control style, which makes you flap the thumbstick around like a fish's tail in one of the most insane control schemes I've ever used. For masochists interested in a swift kick in the pants, this can be pretty entertaining, though I can't see myself ever wanting to put myself through that kind of agony for longer than a level or two.

I Am Fish isn't very long, with only 13 levels that I was able to beat in 10 hours or so with a fair amount of goofing off, but there's quite a bit of replayability to it. Levels are mostly linear, but usually have a few different paths you can use to reach your goal. You can also chase star ratings by finding the fastest route through levels and completing speedruns with as few deaths as possible. Naturally, collectible pieces of bread provide an optional challenge – they're found on the most difficult or out-of-the-way routes to encourage further pain, if you're into that sort of thing. Collecting enough pieces of bread and earning higher star ratings also unlocks one bonus level, which makes replaying levels and honing your skills a worthwhile endeavor.

Nintendo Switch’s Latest Firmware Update Finally Adds Bluetooth Audio Support

Posted: 14 Sep 2021 05:35 PM PDT

The Nintendo Switch can now be paired with a Bluetooth audio device following the latest firmware update.

Starting today, Switch owners who update their Switch to the latest software can pair a wireless Bluetooth device to the Switch. Something the Switch was apparently able to do this entire time given the right software patch.

To do so Switch owners must download the latest firmware patch. From there, they can find a Bluetooth Audio option within the System Settings page. Once you select "Pair" the Switch will search for an available Bluetooth audio device and connect to one when found.

The Switch can only be synced to one audio device at a time but can save up to 10 devices on the system.

The latest firmware update also includes the ability to update the software on the Switch dock, but only the new docks with a LAN port included with the Switch OLED model.

It should be noted that when paired to a Bluetooth audio device, only two wireless controllers can be connected to the Switch at a time. Connecting an additional wireless controller will disconnect the Bluetooth audio device. Furthermore, Bluetooth microphones are not compatible with the Switch.

The wireless controller limit could be a reason why Nintendo never enabled this audio feature on the four-year-old device. As a result, some Switch owners resorted to third-party adapters to connect their Bluetooth headphones to the Switch.

Now that the update is out, you can freely connect your Apple AirPods or whatever other Bluetooth audio device you choose.

Matt T.M. Kim is IGN's News Editor. You can reach him @lawoftd.

Xbox Reveals Date and Time for Its TGS 2021 Showcase

Posted: 14 Sep 2021 04:56 PM PDT

​​The full Tokyo Game Show 2021 schedule was revealed last week and in it, we learned that Xbox would make a virtual appearance by way of a showcase. Now Microsoft has revealed when that showcase will air.

In a new blog post made today on Xbox Wire, the company announced that its Tokyo Game Show virtual stream will air on Thursday, September 30, at 6 p.m. JST, which is 5 a.m. EST/2 a.m. PST on September 29.

The company revealed a few details about what to expect during the stream too.

"As games close the distance between people, we invite our players to celebrate the joy and community of gaming with us," the blog post reads. "Similar to last year, this will be a show curated for our players in Japan and across Asia. Expect a celebration with our Asia community and local relevant updates, though no new global debuts should be expected."

Xbox also says to expect the "latest regionally relevant updates on previously announced games coming later this year." Basically, you probably won't be hearing "World Premiere" during the showcase.

That doesn't mean the rest of the Tokyo Game Show event won't feature premieres and the like, though. Last year's show featured the first gameplay of Hyrule Warriors: Age of Calamity, new Monster Hunter Rise gameplay, and more.

You can visit the official TGS 2021 site for the full livestream schedule if you're curious about what you can expect beyond Xbox's stream. The Xbox stream will be available as part of the main TGS 2021 show, but it can also be viewed on Xbox's social channels in Japan, Korea, and China.

While waiting for this TGS Xbox stream, check out everything announced during Xbox's latest showcase, which aired during Gamescom 2021. Read IGN's breakdown of everything announced during the Gamescom 2021 Opening Night Live showcase after that.

Wesley LeBlanc is a freelance news writer and guide maker for IGN. You can follow him on Twitter @LeBlancWes.

Star Wars: KOTOR Is Back...but Not on Xbox - Unlocked 511

Posted: 14 Sep 2021 04:36 PM PDT

Beloved original Xbox classic Star Wars: Knights of the Old Republic (aka KOTOR) is back as...a timed PlayStation 5 exclusive? We discuss the strange circumstances of this long-awaited revival, from the exclusivity deal to the developer behind it and more. Plus: we get psyched for Halo Infinite's next multiplayer test flight, Grand Theft Auto 5's next-gen edition gets delayed, and more!

Subscribe on any of your favorite podcast feeds, to our new YouTube channel, or grab an MP3 download of this week's episode. For more awesome content, check out our Halo Infinite Flight performance preview, which does a deep-dive tech analysis on the still-in-development slice of Halo Infinite multiplayer:

Oh, and you can be featured on Unlocked by tweeting us a video Loot Box question! Tweet your question and tag Ryan at @DMC_Ryan!

For more next-gen coverage, make sure to check out our Xbox Series X review, our Xbox Series S review, and our PS5 review.

Ryan McCaffrey is IGN's executive editor of previews and host of both IGN's weekly Xbox show, Podcast Unlocked, as well as our monthly(-ish) interview show, IGN Unfiltered. He's a North Jersey guy, so it's "Taylor ham," not "pork roll." Debate it with him on Twitter at @DMC_Ryan.

'No Plans' For Nintendo Switch Price Cut In United States After European Price Drop

Posted: 14 Sep 2021 04:33 PM PDT

With the Nintendo Switch OLED just around the corner, Nintendo recently saw fit to drop the Switch's price to £259.99 in the UK and €299.99 in Europe. It does not seem that a Switch price drop will be following suit in the U.S., at least not any time soon.

In a new statement, Nintendo told Axios reporter Stephen Totilo that there are "no plans" for a price drop in the U.S. It will remain at $299, at least for the time being.

"The trade price adjustment is for the European region only. There are no plans to change the Manufacturer's Suggested Retail Price for any Nintendo Switch model in the U.S," a Nintendo spokesperson said.

Earlier today, the NPD Group revealed that the Nintendo Switch was once again the best-selling console for the month of August, and remains the best-selling console of 2021. However, the PlayStation 5 currently has the Switch beat in terms of dollar sales.

With sales continuing to be strong, Nintendo clearly sees no reason to cut the price of the base model, even with the upgraded Switch OLED less than a month away.

First released in 2017, the Nintendo Switch is on pace to be one of Nintendo's most successful consoles ever. With some 89 million units sold, it has surpassed both the Xbox 360 and PlayStation 3 — not bad considering that the Switch has been on the market for four years, while the Xbox 360 and PS3 generation lasted nearly a decade. The Switch is currently closing in on the Nintendo Wii, which sold a little more than 100 million units in its lifetime.

The Nintendo Switch continues to thrive thanks to a mix of popular indie games like Hades and Nintendo exclusives like New Pokémon Snap. The holiday season will see the release of Pokémon Brilliant Diamond and Shining Pearl as well as Shin Megami Tensei 5, with Pokémon: Legends Arceus to follow in January.

Kat Bailey is a Senior News Editor at IGN.

An Attempt to Make Sense of the GeForce Now Leak

Posted: 14 Sep 2021 04:19 PM PDT

A recent "leak" that occurred Monday seemed to indicate that a lot of unannounced titles and anticipated sequels were on the way and also coming to PC.

It featured word of PC ports for previously console-exclusive titles and more, too. As first spotted on Reddit, software developer Ighor July performed a datamine of Nvidia's GeForce Now database and in doing so, discovered listings for a lot of unannounced games, sequels, ports, and more.

What Gamers Are Saying

It didn't take long for this leak to take off. The original post on Reddit has nearly 2000 comments. The top comment is "No Bloodborne? It must be legitimate," and it comes by way of redditor KingBroly. It's a fun poke at the desire many have to see Bloodborne come to PC and there are many other comments like it. However, many of the commenters are taking this leak as 100% true. There are also some, like redditor howmadstha, who note that titles like Bioshock 2022 seem fake and take away some of the credibility that this datamine found real games, though.

The most common takeaway from the commenters on that original reddit post is that if this turns out to be huge, it might be one of the biggest leaks in gaming history, but that there's a good chance this isn't what it seems. Over on Twitter, things are hovering between "THIS IS NOT A DRILL [INSERT GAME] LEAK CONFIRMED" and "ehh who knows, these might just be placeholders." There's also those taking this opportunity to make a good meme or two out of the situation.

To be fair, the leak did appear quite believable at first glance. It wasn't a shoddy screenshot of a game playing on a monitor or a supposed list of things to come — it was a list of game listings made within Nvidia's GeForce Now database. GeForce Now is Nvidia's games streaming service not unlike Google Stadia or Amazon Luna. Surely the leak must be legitimate if it's coming by way of such a massive, prominent, and most importantly, credible company, right?

Nvidia's Response to the Datamine

On the surface, it seemed that way, but now we know that's not necessarily the case. Nvidia responded the following day on September 14 that the list of datamined games were listings "used only for internal tracking and testing," adding that some titles included are "speculative" and don't constitute "confirmation nor an announcement of any game."

Nvidia said in a statement to IGN that it took immediate action to remove access to the internal list and that "no confidential game builds or personal information were exposed." So that's that, right? Well, in the landscape of games, it doesn't take much for a leak, rumor, or datamine finding to take off and this week's Nvidia datamined listings are no different.

Why The Listings Aren't All That They Seem

However, there might be more to this. Sure, there are some listings in the datamine that quite obviously read as "no way" — looking at you Bioshock 2022, which seemingly alludes to the new Bioshock game announced in late 2019 as coming from 2K's new Cloud Chamber studio. There's always the chance that Bioshock 4, or whatever it's called, could come out in 2022, but that seems extremely unlikely. Just a couple of months ago, they were hiring a writer for an open-world setting.

Let's put some puzzle pieces together: 2K created a new studio in 2019 called Cloud Chamber to create the next Bioshock game, which was announced at the time as now in development. That game is reportedly open world and it's also still hiring writers. Considering Bioshock's bread and butter is often its writing, it would seem a story for Bioshock 4 is not even set in stone yet. You can see why a brand new Bioshock game that's reportedly open world and still hiring writers for a brand new studio announced in 2019 doesn't seem likely for 2022, right?

Perhaps that's a placeholder, or maybe it's a spinoff or remaster. A spinoff seems unlikely considering 2K announced Cloud Chambers as essentially the Bioshock studio. All three Bioshock games were technically remastered with 2016's Bioshock collection by Blind Squirrel Games (a studio known for its remasters), too. However, the Nvidia datamine does mention a "Bioshock RTX Remaster" (alongside Mirror's Edge RTX and Batman: Arkham Knight RTX remasters as well).

Maybe that's what "Bioshock 2022" in Nvidia's listings is supposed to be, but that also seems unlikely because "Bioshock 2022" and "Bioshock RTX Remaster" are separate listings.

Making Sense of What's Probably Not Real

There are a lot of other titles in the datamine that seem more like guesses akin to Bioshock 2022 than actual titles we can expect to see anytime soon. "Kingdom Hearts IV '' is another title in the datamine that reeks of a guess. Kingdom Hearts 3, the latest numbered title in the series, was first announced in 2013. It didn't release until 2019. A fourth sequel doesn't seem like something happening anytime soon given the franchise's track record either. There are spinoffs to be had first, after all.

Other titles we deem a guess include Titanfall 3 (that one might even be wishful thinking on Nvidia's behalf because Respawn said last year that no new Titanfall games are in development), Metro Next, which seems to be a reference to a possible sequel in the Metro series, Crysis 4, likely added to the list by Nvidia due to the recent Crysis trilogy remaster announcement, and Gears 6.

Making Sense of What's Probably Real

Elsewhere in the datamine, there are games that we already know are happening so a listing in Nvidia GeForce Now for internal use makes sense. Titles in the datamine we're going to categorize under "games we already know are coming" include GTA 3, Vice City, and San Andreas remasters (reportedly coming together in a single trilogy remaster), Uncharted: Legacy of Thieves collection, which PlayStation announced is coming to PS5 and PC in its most recent showcase, Payday 3, which was announced years ago, and Resident Evil 4 Remake, which is reportedly in the works, amongst others.

Then there's the titles whose inclusion in the Nvidia GeForce Now list is what we'll call questionable. For example, Dragon's Dogma 2 was revealed through a massive Capcom leak that occurred in 2020. Nvidia likely added that title to its list as a result rather than actual knowledge the public is not currently privy to.

Another title that's questionable is Final Fantasy 7 Remake — a recent datamine of Epic Games Store backend data revealed that the PC storefront will add this game to its offerings.

That hasn't been confirmed yet but that same backend datamine revealed a potential Alan Wake Remaster and that has since been confirmed. That confirmation makes a PC version of Final Fantasy 7 Remake seem much more likely and there's a chance Nvidia is already aware of such a version. Nvidia might also have simply created a placeholder after the Epic Games Store datamine though.

The PlayStation Effect

Perhaps the most interesting aspect of this entire Nvidia GeForce Now leak is the mention of God of War (2018), Returnal, and Demon's Souls for PC. None of those games have been announced as coming to PC, but it wouldn't be surprising if such an announcement occurred. That's because Sony has been slowly but steadily bringing its previously exclusive-to-PlayStation titles to PC.

Horizon Zero Dawn was added to PC last year and Days Gone was added to PC this year. We know Uncharted 4: A Thief's End and Uncharted: Lost Legacy are coming to PC next year and on top of all of this, PlayStation recently announced that it had purchased Nixxes, a studio that specializes in PC ports.

Put all of this together and God of War, Returnal, and Demon's Souls coming to PC doesn't seem all that unlikely. To add fuel to this datamine fire, the leak says there's no mention of Insomniac's Spider-Man or Bloodborne.

If Nvidia was just taking guesses, it seems odd to not include Spider-Man and Bloodborne, right? What makes Nvidia think God of War, Returnal, and Demon's Souls would be coming to PC but that Spider-Man and Bloodborne would not join them. Purely speculating, perhaps Nvidia knows that the three aforementioned titles are, in fact, coming to PC.

Making Sense Of It All

Speculation, leaks, and datamined info aside, all of this adds up to one murky conclusion though: Nvidia might know some things not currently public and some of these games, be it ports, sequels, or brand new IP, might be real. It's just as probable that Nvidia is guessing based on what it's seen and heard, much like this piece speculates on things based on information out in the wild too.

The reality of the situation is that we'll likely never know. These listings might be a big look at unannounced games and ports that weren't meant to be seen by the public just yet. They might also be speculative guesses and placeholders. Quite literally, only time will tell.

Wesley LeBlanc is a freelance news writer and guide maker for IGN. You can follow him on Twitter @LeBlancWes.

Lost in Random Review

Posted: 14 Sep 2021 04:10 PM PDT

Imagine stepping into an original D&D setting that's been lovingly written and DM'd by Tim Burton or Shel Silverstein. Instead of elves and dwarves, you have a giant card shop that's also a person, a decadent duke, and a scary-looking upside-down guy who only dreams of being able to rhyme – just to give a few examples. That's the wildly creative premise of Lost in Random, a wholly original action-adventure game that thinks outside the box. Its combat wears thin, but exploring its worlds never does.

You play as Even – one of two twin sisters, Even and Odd – who are fated to roll the Queen's mystical six-sided dice at age 12. The resulting roll determines which of the six worlds in the kingdom of Random they'll spend the rest of their lives in. Long story short: Odd is sent off to the Queen's world but Even isn't willing to let her go without a chase.

The world-spanning adventure that ensues after you manage to escape the dreary starting zone of Onecroft, takes plenty of nods toward films like The Nightmare Before Christmas, Corpse Bride, Coraline, and other similarly gothic-inspired stop-motion films. Despite the entirety of Random being drenched in dark hues of black and green and gray, each world still offers completely unique and decadently layered settings.

The other, equally otherworldly characters of the world react to them in weird and unexpected ways that keep you guessing.

For example, Two-Town's denizens feature two directly opposite personalities that can shift each time the Queen rolls her dice. This has resulted in the construction of a separate Two-Town, called the Upside-Downtown, which completely obscures the town's skyline, kinda like that one scene out of Inception. It makes Two-Town feel that much more immense, and you can tease apart as much or as little of the zone's background story as you'd like through side quests, or by speaking to the many interesting NPCs hanging around town before moving on.

Meanwhile, Threedom and its people are trapped in a perpetual state of war over a series of petty squabbles between the three outlandish Triplets. The other, equally otherworldly characters of the world react to them in weird and unexpected ways that keep you guessing.

For instance, you're constantly told about Lost in Random's appropriately named and visually terrifying Shadowman. You hear snippets about this terrifying monster that stalks the shadows and snatches lost children who wander too far from home, but when you finally meet him he's frustrated that the war is too distracting and no one's paying attention to him. This is just one of many ways that Random feels lived-in and richly detailed.

These otherwise creepy characters are made lovable through the genius of Lost in Random's writing.

And these otherwise creepy characters are made lovable through the genius of Lost in Random's writing. Incredibly memorable characters like Mannie Dex, Seemore, Herman, Ooma, The Nanny, and so many others make moving to the next world kind of like watching the next movie in a 20-hour series of timeless holiday classics.

Then there's the semi-real-time combat, which as you probably guessed from the name, leans heavily on dice rolls and cards. It's sort of like Final Fantasy 7 Remake's combat system, but it's a bit simpler once you get used to these very random rules. You start each battle with your trusty slingshot, which allows you to shoot crystals off of the faces and bodies of your foes. Once you've collected enough of them, a new card is added to your hand – up to a total of five cards.

The part that makes this interesting is the fact that each card in your hand is randomly pulled from your much larger deck – which lets you store up to 15 cards at a time, including duplicates if you want a few cards to show up more regularly than others – and you have no way of predicting which cards will appear when you roll your dice. Don't worry if this sounds too weird, because most of the cards you can equip in your deck include the usual mix of swords, healing potions, and bombs. The real-time part of combat kicks in when you spawn a weapon and button-mash your foes to death or until your weapon breaks.

All of this "cards" business would shuffle Lost in Random's real-time combat around and make it more appealing than the average button-masher if the enemy's AI wasn't so easy to outsmart with such minimal effort.

There are two issues here. The first issue is that you're never prompted to select a difficulty level unless you go digging into the menus after already having spent some time playing. The other issue is that, on the default difficulty mode, each foe is packed with a lot of hit points, and a single battle might still take about 20 minutes or longer – simply because of how many of them will spawn before you're finished. Regardless, each of these enemy types are pretty slow and predictable, and it's easy to use any damage-dealing card to beat them down without thinking too hard.

It feels great for the first few battles, especially when you're playing with interesting card combinations like Blacksmith's Blink and Crystal Curse – the former giving you the ability to deal damage when you dodge roll your way through enemies, which causes crystals to break off of them, and the latter giving you the ability to deal damage each time you break those very same crystals – but the novelty does eventually wear off. Combat encounters end up appearing a bit too often, slowing down the pacing of the otherwise excellent story and dialogue sequences that make Lost in Random truly shine.

NBA 2K22 Review

Posted: 14 Sep 2021 02:56 PM PDT

When a basketball player gets into "the zone," people say it can feel like time slows to crawl. They can see things before they happen, every little detail about their opponent stands out, and the rim seems to get bigger and more inviting. NBA 2K22 never quite managed to get me all the way into the zone, but the improved gameplay and breadth of content of this iteration get it closer than it's been for the past few years. From important changes to how stamina impacts shooting to a City filled with diverse ways to improve your MyPlayer character, 2K22 feels like a breath of fresh air compared to 2K21.

NBA 2K22 has made some important tweaks to the on-court action that help make it play like a more realistic game, most noticeably how it handles stamina loss while dribbling. In 2K21, it was easy to run at a defender on the perimeter, hit a Curry slide, and drain a three without breaking a sweat. Against the CPU, that tactic was almost undefendable, especially in MyTeam where player cards were quickly made ridiculously overpowered. With 2K22, you can still employ tactics like that, but the stamina loss you suffer from sprinting and doing dribble moves is made much more significant to balance out its effectiveness.

As your player gets more tired their shot meter will shrink, making it tougher to hit shots. That leads to a game that initially seems slow compared to 2K21 – but if you play under more control and don't just hold that sprint button, you'll actually have an easier time putting the ball into the bucket because of your larger shot meter. It may not seem like an important change at first, but it leads to a playstyle that feels closer to real life than 2K21 ever did.

Fatigue leads to a playstyle that feels closer to real life than 2K21 ever did.

Without three hunting and rim running, you're forced to play team basketball. The pick and roll is your best friend, especially offline. Learning how and when to use your dribble skills and speed to get past defenders off of a pick will make all the difference. Or, if you'd rather do damage as a big man in the paint, use the pick and roll to force a switch and go to work against the smaller defender. These tactics are a little overpowered at times, but they're countered by improvements on the defensive side of the ball.

Additionally, Visual Concepts has completely redone its systems for contesting shots and blocking. Not only does this mean snazzy new snatch blocks and volleyball spikes, but I felt like a true rim protector when roaming the paint. Like the pick and roll, it can start to feel like you have too much power; however, the offense is much more likely to drain open jumpers, meaning you can't just sag off and rely on a late contest. Steals have also been improved with new animations based on your player's steal rating, so trying to swipe the ball with a low-rated player is sluggish, while guys like Jimmy Butler and Matisse Thybulle will rip the ball with authority.

On top of that, I've noticed some of the more notorious legacy issues not popping up as much. Things like bump steals aren't gone completely, but I certainly haven't seen them happening as much as last year. The tweaks on the defensive side of the ball have also seemingly gotten rid of the speed-boosting that plagued 2K21. That could, of course, all change as people get more familiar with 2K22, but for now, I'm happy to see Visual Concepts taking steps to iron out some of those more annoying tactics. And while there are still quite a few instances of weird animations that took me out of the experience, those too are lessened from previous years.

I'm happy to see Visual Concepts taking steps to iron out some of those more annoying tactics.

Improved gameplay doesn't mean much if you don't have good places to take advantage of it, but fortunately, so far Visual Concepts seems to have provided plenty of things to do throughout its selection of modes. Whether you want to build your own baller from scratch in MyCareer, assemble a dream team of past and present NBA stars in MyTeam, run your own team in MyNBA, or dominate the womens' game in The W, NBA 2K22 has you covered.

MyCareer takes us back to the vast world of The City. Here, you'll step into the shoes of a budding NBA superstar and help lead him into the Hall of Fame. Or, you can forget all of that fame and fortune and take your game to the streets to play against other players in modes like the Rec Room and Pro-Am. Either way, you'll have to contend with the confusing teammate rating AI.

This rating helps dictate how much Virtual Currency (VC) you earn at the end of each game, making it very important if you're not looking to spend real-world money to improve your player (which, of course, 2K would very much like us to do). Unfortunately, the AI too often decides that something that isn't your fault is something it should penalize you for. For example, if I correctly switched on a pick and roll to pick up the ball handler, the AI would sometimes decide that I should've stuck with my man and docked me points if he scored when my teammate didn't switch to cover him. It also switched me from one man to the other at random several times, forcing me to sprint across the court to stop losing points for "leaving my assignment." It's a frustrating experience – one that you're probably familiar with if you've played any NBA 2K game in recent years.

The second you step into multiplayer matches on the street or gym, microtransactions begin to rear their ugly head.

If you stick to your NBA career, you probably won't notice the monetization problems that The City is full of. The second you step into multiplayer matches on the street or gym, however, they'll begin to rear their ugly head. It's nearly impossible to hop in without either spending money or going through a massive grind to raise your player's overall level. I routinely matched up with other people whose players' overall rating was in the low 90s, and my 65 OVR small forward simply couldn't hang. It may not be "pay to win" by the strictest definition because you can grind it out, but it's aggravatingly close.

Meanwhile, Visual Concepts has put a major focus on off-the-court activities in MyCareer. Early on in my playthrough, I was picking up coffee for my pal, The Game, to help kickstart my rap career. Later, I hooked up with Jake from State Farm for some absolutely shameless brand promotion. The City is full of product placement, to the point where I could only laugh at how ridiculous it became. However, the core of building up your personal brand is an adequate diversion when you want a break from the grind of an NBA season.

Over in MyTeam, 2K22 is home to similar highs and lows. The good news is that it provides more than enough content to keep you busy, which means you don't need to open your pocketbook for pesky microtransactions if you don't want to. If you want the best of the best players right away, you can, of course, spend money for the chance to get them. However, in my experience, there are plenty of free options that make you competitive – you just have to put the time in to unlock them.

NBA 2K22 has also added a few new features like the Shoe Builder and a Card Grading system. However, these feel mostly tacked on and don't add much to the gameplay. The real problem for MyTeam is its lackluster multiplayer options.

There are free options that make you competitive – you just have to put the time in to unlock them.

Unlimited and Limited modes are back with basically no changes. That means most people will probably never sniff the top tiers of Unlimited rewards, and Limited continues to be a luck fest in terms of rewards. Visual Concepts has also changed Triple Threat Online to something it's calling "The 100," but as far as I'm concerned it's a significant step down. The idea is that you start a round with 100 points, and after each game your opponent's score will be subtracted from that total as you work your way up the prize board until you hit zero points. That could've been a great casual option since you're guaranteed to at least make it to the second tier on the prize board, but in practice, it's unrewarding compared to the single-player modes for casual players and more annoying for the more dedicated players who will now have to struggle to get to the top tier of the board much more than in previous years.

The new Draft mode is definitely the star of the multiplayer show. At least, it should've been, had real-world money not become part of the equation. Visual Concepts made the decision to ask us to pay to enter once you use up the limited tickets you can earn. Adding that cost to entry really puts a damper on what could be a fun, casual mode. I would really like to see them switch to in-game currency for entry, even if it means a slightly steeper time cost.

Finally, MyNBA has spent the offseason making improvements to how you build your coaching staff and train players. These are neat additions for those who want to really dig into running a franchise, but are hardly game-changers. And The W feels like an afterthought of MyCareer. Sure, you don't have to go through a ridiculous grind to build up your player, but Visual Concepts essentially took all of its ideas from MyCareer and turned them into basic menus. It certainly isn't the treatment that fans of the WNBA would want.

Activision Blizzard Employees File NLRB Suit Accusing Company of Union Busting, Intimidation

Posted: 14 Sep 2021 02:49 PM PDT

Employees of Activision Blizzard under the banner of the ABK Workers Alliance, with the support of the Communication Workers of America guild (CWA), have filed an unfair labor practice suit with the National Labor Relations Board (NLRB) alleging the company has engaged in union-busting and intimidation of workers.

In a press release sent out by the groups today, ABK Workers and CWA accuse Activision Blizzard of "using coercive tactics to attempt to prevent its employees from exercising their rights to stand together and demand a more equitable, sustainable, and diverse workplace."

"It is their right as workers to organize for a work environment free from abuse, discrimination and sexual harassments, and this right is protected by federal labor law," it continues.

The complaint itself alleges that Activision-Blizzard has threatened employees, told them they cannot discuss wages, hours, or working conditions, "maintained an overly broad social media policy" and then both engaged in surveillance and enforced its policy against employees who "engaged in protected concerted activity."

One anonymous employee reportedly told Vice that some of the more outspoken employees at the company had recently been told their work performance was not up to standards, despite it being good previously. Another said the company had recently been "hemorrhaging people" in the wake of the harassment lawsuit against Activision-Blizzard.

Said lawsuit was filed by the California Department of Fair Employment and Housing earlier this year, alleging that Activision-Blizzard fostered a "frat boy" culture in which female employees were subjected to sexual harassments, unequal pay, and further unfair, discriminatory, and harassing treatment over the years.

The subsequent weeks saw an industry-wide outcry against the company's culture, including numerous current and former employees sharing their stories of mistreatment at the company on social media and with the press, and an employee walkout. The ABK Workers Alliance was formed during this time in response to the suit, with the purpose of demanding better from the company for its workers.

Activision Blizzard has since made some moves to address the issues, including the termination of a number of employees accused of bad behavior, the removal of in-game references to multiple people named in the suit and other accusations, the replacement of former Blizzard president J. Allen Brack with co-leaders Mike Ybarra and Jen Oneal, and just today the hiring of former Disney VP Julie Hodges as its new chief people officer.

However, ABK Workers say the company has not meaningfully addressed its published demands, which include new recruiting, hiring, interviewing, and promotion policies, publication of representative data on employee compensation, a third party audit of the company's HR, reporting processes, and executive staff, and an end to forced arbitration.

To the latter point, ABK Workers tweeted today that "if the NLRB rules in our favor, the ruling will be retroactive and we will set a precedent that no worker in the US can be intimidated out of talking about forced arbitration."

Rebekah Valentine is a news reporter for IGN. You can find her on Twitter @duckvalentine.

Call of Duty 2022 Will Reportedly Be a Modern Warfare Sequel About the Drug War

Posted: 14 Sep 2021 02:05 PM PDT

Activision Blizzard is currently facing serious ongoing allegations of harassment and mistreatment of marginalized workers. To learn more, please visit our timeline as well as our in-depth report on the subject.

Next year's Call of Duty game will be a sequel to 2019's Call of Duty: Modern Warfare, according to new reports.

Industry insider Tom Henderson tweeted that Call of Duty 2022, codenamed Project Cortez, is expected to be a sequel to 2019's Modern Warfare reboot.

VGC also reports that Modern Warfare 2 is on the way next year and that it will include a campaign featuring U.S. special forces fighting Colombian drug cartels. Project Cortez was part of this week's GeForce Now datamine, with Infinity Ward slated to be the developer.

In IGN's Modern Warfare 2019 review, we called the game "great," saying, "Modern Warfare's gorgeous new Realism mode, the large-scale Ground War, and quick and dirty Gunfight help mix things up for a good time." It would make sense for the series to follow up the 2019 reboot since Modern Warfare broke multiple sales records at the time of its release.

This year, it's Sledgehammer Games' turn to release the new Call of Duty, with Call of Duty: Vanguard set to come to PS5, Xbox Series X|S, PS4, Xbox One, and PC on November 4. For more, check out our Call of Duty Vanguard multiplayer beta impressions. Or, read about how Call of Duty banned 100,000 accounts in a single day.

Logan Plant is a freelance writer for IGN. You can find him on Twitter @LoganJPlant.

Destroy All Humans! 2 Remake Announced Seemingly By Mistake

Posted: 14 Sep 2021 01:33 PM PDT

It appears a remake for Destroy All Humans! 2 is real and in development.

In a now-deleted tweet, PlayStation officially announced the Destroy All Humans! 2 - Reprobed noting the game will come to PS5. A trailer was also shared in the tweet as well but mentioned no release date. The end of the trailer also notes that THQ and Black Forest Games are tied to the remake; the latter also developed the remake for the original Destroy All Humans!

The tweet has since been deleted ahead of a planned THQ Nordic 10th-anniversary livestream set for later this week.

Destroy All Humans! 2 was originally released back in 2006 on PS2 and Xbox. Set 10 years after the original game's events, players control Crypto-138, a clone of the first game's protagonist, Crypto-137. A remake for the game was originally teased earlier this year, but not much info was shared other than Destroy All Humans! senior producer Martin Kreuch saying that there may be more details shared "soon."

IGN reviewed the 2020 remake of Destroy All Humans!, which received a 7 on our review scale calling the game "simple but satisfying." While we do not have a release date for Destroy All Humans! 2 - Reprobed, we do know that THQ Nordic is part of Embracer Group, a holding company that has said it has 150 games in development; 70 of those games are to be completed by March 2022.

Taylor is the Associate Tech Editor at IGN. You can follow her on Twitter @TayNixster.

Watch Mario from Super Mario 64 Take Over Minecraft

Posted: 14 Sep 2021 01:30 PM PDT

A modder has put the Super Mario 64 engine inside of Minecraft, creating a playable version of Mario in the game.

@pdxdylan posted on Twitter, showing off his work to get the polygonal plumber inside the blocky world of Minecraft. You can see Mario running around multiple biomes, showing off his triple jump, long jump, swimming, climbing, and more moves straight from the classic N64 title.

IGN spoke to Dylan, who says he was inspired to make this project, simply because he knew it was possible, and that it would look a bit funny.

"I've done other work with Super Mario 64 before on other engines, but the thought of Mario in a completely different game intrigued me, so I decided to do it as a fun project," Dylan said. "I've always been into tinkering with games, figuring out how they work, and making mods for them."

Dylan says that this project was made possible by the n64decomp community, a group of fans and modders who reverse-engineered Super Mario 64 to decompile the source code. However, due to Nintendo's history of issuing cease and desist orders for fan projects, Dylan doesn't have any plans to release the Mario Minecraft mashup.

"I really do wish I could release it to the community. There's a lot of potential for this mod, especially ideas like players being able to build their own courses for Mario to run around in, or speedrunners trying to beat Minecraft as Mario in the quickest time," Dylan said. "However, due to Nintendo's strict enforcement on fan games and mods, I don't believe it will ever reach that point."

Dylan says his personal end goal is to make Minecraft playable from start to finish as Mario. In a follow-up tweet, he also said he'll continue posting videos of the project online, to keep giving the community glimpses of this fun mod.

For more wacky Super Mario 64 mods, you can watch the gameplay of Peach's Castle as a playable level in GoldenEye 007. Or, for something Nintendo encourages you to build and modify yourself, check out the recently-revealed LEGO Super Mario 64 playset.

Logan Plant is a freelance writer for IGN. You can find him on Twitter @LoganJPlant.

Ren & Stimpy Join Smash Bros.-Like Nickelodeon All-Star Brawl

Posted: 14 Sep 2021 10:52 AM PDT

The iconic Ren & Stimpy are joining the roster of Nickelodeon All-Star Brawl, the upcoming platform-fighting game that takes definite inspiration from Super Smash Bros.

Similar to Ice Climbers, Duck Hunt, and Banjo & Kazooie from Nintendo's fighter, Ren and Stimpy will play as a single character in Nickelodeon All-Star Brawl.

As detailed on the PlayStation Blog, the developers say Ren and Stimpy, "have a knack for using each other as weapons, which really helps the slapstick comedy of the show come to life."

Each move is inspired by a scene from the TV show, including throwing a bouncing log, the 'Happy Happy Joy Joy' song, and more. During movement, Ren rides on Stimpy's shoulders, which slows the duo down. To make up for that, they can often both attack at once, dealing higher total damage than other fighters on the roster.

Nickelodeon All-Star Brawl takes characters from all eras of Nick, and Ren and Stimpy definitely fit in with some of the other classic selections. The show had five seasons, airing from 1991-1995. Ren and Stimpy join a roster that includes characters from SpongeBob, Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles, CatDog, Danny Phantom, and more.

For more, you can watch Smash God Mango's reactions to Nickelodeon All-Star Brawl's gameplay. And, check out how the Nickelodeon All-Star Brawl release date may have leaked on Nintendo's website.

Logan Plant is a freelance writer for IGN. You can find him on Twitter @LoganJPlant.

Ghost of Tsushima's Director's Cut Release Made It One of the Best-Selling Games Last Month

Posted: 14 Sep 2021 10:16 AM PDT

In July, Ghost of Tsushima was the 110th best-selling game by dollar sales in the US — not even worth a mention in a sales roundup. In August, thanks to the Director's Cut release, it shot up to No. 2.

According to The NPD Group, it was second only to Madden NFL 22, which took the top spot in its launch month for the 22nd year in a row and became the fourth best-selling game of the entire year so far. For the year, it's currently sitting behind Call of Duty: Black Ops Cold War, MLB The Show 21, and Resident Evil: Village, though if history is any indication we'll see Call of Duty: Vanguard blast past them all later this year.

Humankind debuted in August as the best-selling PC game and the fourth best-selling game overall, while The Last of Us Part 2 jumped from No. 23 to No. 10 thanks to various retail promotions.

On the hardware side, sales in August were up 45% from last year to $329 million — once again not a shocking increase given that this time last year everyone was holding off on buying consoles while waiting for the new ones. That said, the last time sales were that high was in 2008, a few years after the release of the Wii, PS3, and Xbox 360.

The Nintendo Switch was once again the best selling console for the month in unit sales and remains the best-selling console of the year so far, though the PS5 beat it in both categories if you look at dollar sales and remains the fastest-selling PlayStation console ever.

Accessories spending was flat at $164 million, with the Xbox Elite Series 2 Wireless controller as the best-selling accessory for the month. The PS5 DualSense Wireless Controller White remained in the top spot for the year so far.

In total, spending on all games hardware, content, and accessories in August was up 7% from last year to a total of $4.4 billion.

The following are the top ten best-selling games for August 2021 by dollar sales. As always, keep in mind that this does not include digital sales of several major game publishers, including Take-Two Interactive and Nintendo, and only counts physical sales for those games, meaning some games may have sold more than they appear to:

  1. Madden NFL 22
  2. Ghost of Tsushima
  3. Call of Duty: Black Ops Cold War
  4. Humankind
  5. Marvel's Spider-Man: Miles Morales
  6. Mario Kart 8
  7. The Legend of Zelda: Skyward Sword
  8. Minecraft
  9. Assassin's Creed: Valhalla
  10. MLB: The Show 21

Rebekah Valentine is a news reporter for IGN. You can find her on Twitter @duckvalentine.
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