September 2023

In this exclusive hands-on preview, Game Informer's Alex Van Aken and Wesley LeBlanc fly to France to be the first journalists to play Assassin's Creed Mirage at Ubisoft Bordeaux's headquarters. The duo recaps several hours of playtime and discusses how developer Ubisoft Bordeaux aims to bring the series back to its stealth-based roots. Additionally, this video showcases never-before-seen gameplay of Assassin's Creed Mirage's contract missions in action – in accordance with the specific levels we demoed. 

We Flew To France To Play Assassin's Creed Mirage:

Check out the entirety of Game Informer's cover story hub if you enjoy this exclusive look at Assassin's Creed Mirage. Looking for more videos? Subscribe to our YouTube channel so you don't miss the next one. Special thanks to friend of Game Informer, TAETRO, for allowing us to use their "Crossed Wires" music track. 

As the new school year gets underway, there’s plenty of fun stuff to discover, from tech and threads to bring to class to games and toys to fill downtime to décor for your new dorm room or gaming setup. Check out our curated selections of new gear to ease your transition back into learning. Read the full story...

I’m about 27 hours into Starfield and nearing the story’s end. But I’m not quite ready for my first playthrough to be over. 

I’ve started to get some answers to the world’s intriguing questions and now that I see the end in sight, I’m not sure I’m ready to roll credits (although, like any Bethesda Game Studios RPG, the game continues after credits with faction questlines, side missions, and more). I could have last night, but my wife and I decided to watch a movie instead: Mission Impossible 4: Ghost Protocol (one of the best in the series). I’ve seen it but she hadn’t, so I picked up my Backbone controller device for my iPhone 14 Pro Max and booted up Starfield to continue playing. 

"We are the same company that has had launches that didn't go the way we wanted, and we don't quit or abandon stuff just because it didn't start right," he said. "The Elder Scrolls Online's PC launch was not flawless but we stuck with it. Now it's like this insanely popular multiplatform. It's the same with Fallout 76. Redfall is no different for us.

"Okay, we didn't get the start we wanted, but it's still a fun game… and we're going to keep working on it. We're going to do 60fps. We're going to get it to be a good game because we know, as a first-party studio, Game Pass lives forever. There will be people ten years from now who are going to join Game Pass, and Redfall will be there.

Paradox Interactive's medieval grand strategy game Crusader Kings 3 is celebrating its three-year anniversary by trumpeting 3m copies sold since launch and by releasing a bunch of statistics gleaned in that time, suggesting players' conflict resolution skills may need some work - or at least, a little less of a preoccupation with murder.

According to Paradox, a grand total of 50,159,539 murder schemes have been successfully carried out since Crusader Kings 3's arrival back in 2020. That's nearly 16m more murder plots than wedding celebrations, which currently sit at 34,480,042. And, of course, more than a few chaotic sorts have thoroughly muddied the waters between the two, with Paradox reporting a total of 7,790 bloody weddings have been masterminded by players who cleary weren't going to let a bit of murder get in the way of anyone's big day - or possiby vice versa.

Paradox's other shared stats don't open up quite such a fascinating window on player behaviour, but we do know 1,325,198 grand tournaments have been bravely fought since launch, and 1,037,787 grand weddings have also been held. In total, player have amassed more than 317m hours in-game, with nearly 1.4m players having joined this year alone.

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On September 1, 2023, Usada Pekora, a Hololive Vtuber, was part of a widespread misunderstanding on the social media platform X, formerly known as Twitter. For a moment, the way X handled some trending topics resulted in a pool of her Japanese audience being convinced she would be graduating. [Thanks, Inside Games!]

The Usada Pekora graduation misunderstanding began after she posted an announcement on her official social media account that she would be taking a break from streaming in order to rest her throat due to pain she was experiencing.

[embed]https://twitter.com/usadapekora/status/1697482759164559761[/embed]

Fans reacted by showing their support and understanding using the hashtag #了解ぺこ, or “Got it, Peko.” Once the hashtag became a trending topic, the associated hashtags “retirement” and “thank you for everything” were displayed directly underneath it.

Usada Pekora herself was surprised by the associated hashtags, responding with a post including a screenshot of the trending topic and a message that read “Peko!?!?!?!?!?”

[embed]https://twitter.com/usadapekora/status/1697528617461526991[/embed]

Good Smile Company announced a brand new PLAYMAX plastic model of Pochita from Chainsaw Man is being developed under the Max Factory brand. This small plastic model of stands approximately 3.5 inches tall once assembled and comes with two sets of facial stickers to create a smiling and angry face. Also, when Pochita's tail is pulled on, the chainsaw on his head will start spinning.

The Pochita PLAYMAX figure will release in January 2024 for ¥4,500 in Japan. Good Smile Company is targeting a Q2 2024 worldwide release date for the figure, and it will cost $30.99.

Good Smile Company released images of the upcoming PLAYMAX figure, which can be viewed below:

[gallery columns="4" ids="981982,981983,981984,981985,981987,981988,981989" link="file"]

SAG-AFTRA's current contract with companies like Activision Productions, Electronic Arts Productions, Insomniac Games, Epic Games, WB Games, and more was set to expire on November 7, 2022, but the two parties agreed to extend the talks another year. As of this writing, the talks between the two parties will resume on September 26.

SAG-AFTRA is looking for "an 11% retroactive increase in rates for video game performers, followed by increases of 4% and 4%." This is in line with the asks SAG-AFTRA has given the AMPTP. It also includes the previously mentioned protections from AI which the union says threatens both voice and performance capture artists. Furthermore, SAG-AFTRA wants rest periods, safety protections, an on-set medic, and a "prohibition against stunts during self-taped auditions."

And while the RPGang are still finishing Baldur's Gate 3, here's Starfield coming to claim another hundred hours of your roleplaying time. That's a whole lot of lives to live on top of an actual life. Starfield is out now for folks who bought the fancy special expensive editions, by the way, then hits Game Pass and all that next week. Anyway! What are you playing this weekend? Here's what we're clicking on!

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Emma's Adventures is a monthly column exclusively for Eurogamer supporters, written by Emma Kent, who has an uncanny knack for finding strange adventures in games. You can support Eurogamer for £3/€3/$3 a month to gain access to this plus a whole variety of things.

I'm ready to admit that Baldur's Gate 3 has given me complete and total brain worms, in many senses of the term, over the past few weeks. When I'm not playing it, I've been thinking about it. My poor family has been subjected to extensive descriptions of my cat-throwing antics and strange habit of putting bodies in my pocket to resurrect at a later point. (I ignored the expressions of mild concern on their faces.) Such has my obsession spiralled that I've been seeking out this fantasy role-playing experience in other games, where I can similarly shape my character's arc and set out on new adventures across dangerous fantasy realms.

From Software has confirmed it is "investigating" a save issue that is affecting Armored Core 6: Fires of Rubicon's PC players.

In a tweet posted to the studio's Japanese language player support X/Twitter account, the team confirmed the issue was affecting players who put their PCs to sleep whilst the game was still running. Consequently, it's now urging players to save and properly shut down Armored Core 6 before their PCs slip into sleep mode.

"In the PC version of 'Armored Core 6: Fires of Rubicon', there is a problem that save data is not saved properly under certain circumstances," the developer explained, as translated by Google Translate.

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Starfield includes a heartfelt tribute to – and from – a fan who died before the game was released.

Six months ago, Alex Hay posted on the Starfield subreddit to share his dismay that despite "following this project for years", he probably wouldn't live long enough to play Starfield following a lung cancer diagnosis at just 36 years of age.

Just a few weeks later, the thread was updated to confirm that Alex - who himself was an app developer - had indeed sadly died, but revealed that Hay had been a huge Bethesda fan and took great comfort playing games whilst under palliative care, calling his Xbox "a great form of escapism".

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Picture this: you’re sitting at your desk, trying to force your brain to figure out what the heck a “reduced relative clause” is all the while your sibling is watching the latest Jujutsu Kaisen episode in the next room having the time of their life. This is why products like The Jujutsu Kaisen English Learning Book appear in Japan.

When it comes to English-learning materials, it seems like Japan has been trying to incorporate as much pop-culture as possible to help inspire their youth to further their studies. (For example, there's a Hololive English textbook.) The latest attempt is a book using Jujutsu Kaisen materials. Now, instead of learning about modal verbs (whatever that is), you can learn the proper way to pronounce “Divergent Fist.”

I’ll be honest, when I first bought the Learn English with Jujutsu Kaisen book, I was skeptical. It’s hard to imagine there being any useful information for English learners to be gleamed from learning the sound effects “crackle, crackle, crackle.” While the book does cover some random things that the average English learner would likely never use, it seem like it would do a lot of good.

[caption id="attachment_981222" align="alignnone" width="1200"] Photo by Siliconera[/caption]

Space - the final frontier - an infinite playground shrouded in mystery and intrigue. Since the launch of Sputnik 1 in 1957, mankind has yearned to deepen our understanding of the cosmos - to explore the outer reaches of space. This infatuation with interstellar travel would manifest throughout literature and film in the years that followed but it is arguably the video game that shares the deepest connection with outer space. 1962's Spacewar, one of the earliest video games ever created, was built on this desire to dance among the stars. It was just the beginning. Now, 61 years later, those dreams of electronically powered galactic exploration have reached a new milestone with the release of Starfield.

Starfield is built on the latest iteration of Bethesda's in-house technology - known as Creation Engine 2, an updated iteration of their technology foundation boasting many improvements to facilitate the firm's most ambitious game yet. Featuring more than a thousand planets, Starfield is a rich space exploration RPG that builds on the concepts forged in Bethesda Game Studios' previous works while taking the scope to a new level. You'll travel across countless systems and planets, exploring a wide range of settlements, cities, and desolate plains in the process.

The media artists union SAG-AFTRA has voted to expand its ongoing Hollywood strike to encompass the games industry.

In a statement posted to its official website, the union confirmed its board had "voted unanimously" to "send a strike authorisation vote to SAG-AFTRA members" in interactive media ahead of its "forthcoming bargaining dates with video game companies".

Key issues up for negotiation include pay and conditions, but also "protections against unrestrained use of artificial intelligence", specifically the impact upon performance capture artists.

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Physical confrontation, financial responsibility, emotional insecurities–these are things I run away from in life. So why wouldn’t I default to role-playing as the coward that I am in Bethesda’s latest epic, Starfield? Unfortunately, space doesn’t seem all that welcoming to conflict-avoidant people, as Starfield…

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Baldur’s Gate 3 is an excellent game. The PC version of Larian Studios’ D&D epic will easily be a frontrunner in game of the year discussions come December, and the PlayStation 5 version is a comparable experience, at least if you don’t have a beefy enough PC to run the game well. That said, it definitely has more…

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If there is one hilarious discourse that appeared prior to the early access launch of Starfield, it was the one about its UI. More specifically, the title screen of the game. The massive space RPG has a rather simplistic start screen, showing the name, a planet, and your various menu options on the left. But what if I told you the start screen in Starfield isn’t the problem?

In fact, I would argue that the Starfield start screen is fun, simple, and attractive in its own way, despite certain developer opinions. While I immediately noticed how subtle it is when I first booted up the game, it by no means bothered me. However, there are other parts of the Starfield UI, which are arguably much more problematic.

[caption id="attachment_981591" align="aligncenter" width="1200"] Screenshot by Siliconera[/caption]

Good news, Diablo fans – Diablo 4 is running a bonus XP/Gold event, Mother's Blessing, to celebrate the (US - not for us in the UK, sadly) holiday weekend.

As Diablo's official Xitter account puts it, "only a fool refuses her bounty", which is a not-so-subtle hint to get stuck in and earn 25 per cent more XP and gold from now until 5th September.

"Rise, wanderer, and stand triumphant before your hoard of spoils," Blizzard says. "An alluring glow descends across the land, increasing the clarity and temperament of all stalwart warriors. Scholars have unlocked new secrets in their ancient tomes, while coffers threaten to burst with gold unearthed from long-forgotten crypts.

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Horror master Supermassive Games has revealed that the reason Little Nightmares 3 only features online co-op is to ensure playing with a friend doesn't detract from the horror game's signature "atmosphere and immersion".

Whilst co-op was "the most requested feature from fans" and something the team was keen to implement, Supermassive said that it needed to balance the fun of sharing the spooky happenings with ensuring playing with a pal didn't ameliorate the tension.

"Co-op was the most requested feature from our fans, so it was really important for us to give them that," Bandai Namco producer Coralie Feniello told GamesRadar. "I do think that it will add a layer to the game as well, by letting you experience it with a friend.

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Viz Media decided to do something special for the Death Note 20th anniversary. It honored the occasion with a convention-exclusive edition of the manga. So if you head to a special event, you might find yourself able to pick up Death Note 20th anniversary volume 1. It’s an incredibly subtle way to honor the hallmark occasion, as well as remind people of the series’ beginnings.

First of all, I’d like to thank Viz Media for helping to dig my grave. It’s bad enough that sometimes I find myself mentioning a game on the NES, SNES, or even N64, realize a coworker or friend wasn’t even born yet when those came out, and feel myself start to crumble to dust. Seeing the Death Note 20th anniversary volume 1 proudly proclaim that across the cover just hastens my eventual desiccation.

Speaking of which, the cover is the thing that makes this edition of the Death Note manga special. The hallmark here is that it replicates the art from Shonen Jump’s January 1, 2004 issue. It features Takeshi Obata art of Light and Ryuk in monochromatic tones. In the case of Light, we see a shadow of Ryuk behind him, foreshadowing his use of the Death Note to become this god of death on earth. The text is entirely in a metallic silver print. It really stands out, with the words being as striking on the cover as they are on the spine. Not to mention, I appreciate the difference in the texture between the matte cover and the smoother lettering. That subtle difference really makes it feel a little more special.

Bethesda hired noted Skyrim clutter mod creator Emmi "Elianora" Junkkari to help design Starfield's delightfully cluttered environments.

The news came from Elianora themselves, who confirmed that they feigned surprise at each new teaser and press release because they're secretly been working on the game at Bethesda all this time.

"I have been deceiving you. I have been lying. I have been faking. I've kept secrets and pretended, "Elianora teased in a recent Facebook update.

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Welcome to the latest edition of the Giant Bomb Community Spotlight! I, @zombiepie, am once again honored to be your host as we look back at the latest great works from the community.

After a well-earned vacation, Dylan aka @dtoast is back. After having a meeting with him, there's news to share about some of the issues on the site.

The new news is that Dylan has moved all of the missing podcasts or videos issues and problems with the feed to a Tier-1 Priority. This means that the executive staff will be included in your support requests. If you flag these problems, and ping him on the site or Discord, they will now be classified as the highest possible priority for a fix. Also, here's the link to the support ticket site.

It begins. Starfield is out and while its official modding tools aren't yet available, that hasn't stopped its community from getting to work. For example: if you're getting distracted by Bethesda's latest throwing up XP and location-discovery messages in big fonts at the centre of the screen during combat, the BetterHUD mod should help.

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Earlier this week, Dota 2's summer update was released and included new tools for filtering toxic and unwanted players fromy our matches. Now Valve have taken an extra step of their own by declaring that "smurfing is not welcome in Dota," and permanently banning 90,000 accounts involved in the practice

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Actors' union SAG-AFTRA have voted "unanimously" to send a strike authorisation vote to its members, ahead of resuming negotiations with video game companies including Activision, Epic and Take Two. The vote could extend the actors's strike which has shut down filming on film and television productions to the video game industry.

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Vampire: The Masquerade - Bloodlines 2 has had a troubled development to say the least, but it has now risen from the dead once more. The first-person RPG sequel is now being made by Dear Esther developers The Chinese Room, it looks different from the last time we saw it, and it's aiming for release in autumn 2024. Watch the trailer below.

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The new Vshojo Vtuber debut on September 2, 2023 revealed formerly independent Vtuber GEEGA is now part of the company. Her joining the company first ended up teased on August 28, 2023. A special video with an invitation appeared. After that, an exact time and part of a silhouette showed up. There's also new merchandise to celebrate her joining the company.

GEEGA held her VShojo debut stream on September 2, 2023 starting at 5pm PT/8pm ET. It appeared on Twitch, and a number of other Vtubers from the company appeared. For example, Ironmouse, Haruka Karibu, Pikamee, and Zentreya all showed up.

In retrospect, there were some signs GEEGA might have been the new Vtuber about to debut with VShojo. On social media, she tweeted about the VShojo Candy Pop concert. She’s also participated in collab streams with current members like Haruka Karibu and Zentreya before. She's been active since December 2020.

As for the merchandise, there are eight items to get.

During Square Enix's Voices From Valisthea panel at PAX West 2023, Producer Naoki Yoshida teased the Final Fantasy XVI PC port and DLC. There will be two add-ons released. Both of them will be paid. Also, the PC port is, as he mentioned before, in development.

There was no insight about what to expect from the Final Fantasy XVI DLC. So it is uncertain if they will be new stories or other sorts of experiences. No insight came up on what the PC port could entail either.

Here's the official reveal:

Here's a special video message from Final Fantasy XVI producer Naoki Yoshida. #FF16 pic.twitter.com/MjyKzQXHRN

— FINAL FANTASY XVI (@finalfantasyxvi) September 3, 2023

At PAX West 2023, Square Enix announced a Final Fantasy XVI free update with character costumes will be available as on September 2, 2023. This update is twofold in terms of cosmetic options. Five characters get new looks. In addition, there will be weapon skins for Clive.

Editor's Note: There will be spoilers for Final Fantasy XVI characters when the patch adding costumes is discussed.

While the weapon skins were shown briefly, the presentation did involve a brief glimpse at them. The skins are essentially glamour options. So if someone liked one of Clive's past swords, they can choose its appearance, but use a more powerful one. There will also be an Onion Sword weapon to get after the patch is installed.

With the outfits, there are five designs. Only three were named in the trailer. Here are the Final Fantasy XVI characters getting outfits in the free update:

• Ambrosia
• Clive Rosfield: Burnt Black
• Jill Warrick: Snow White
• Joshua Rosfield
• Torgal: Icy Blue

Square Enix also shared the full trailer for the new content. It also cites additional improvements to the game, but didn't detail all the specific changes.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=40ivdiYRu7A&ab_channel=FINALFANTASY

During the Square Enix Voices from Valisthea PAX West 2023 panel, Theatrhythm Final Bar Line FFXVI DLC songs ended up announced. This will be an 11 track pack. It will be a part of Season Pass Volume 3 or sold separately. It will debut on November 1, 2023. The add-on will cost $5.99 on its own. As a reminder, the third season pass is $14.99.

During the presentation, the pack was discussed. Only eight FFXVI songs were going to show up at first. However, during the panel it was revealed the team couldn’t design on which songs would need to be cut. As a result, it turned out that 11 tracks would be a part of the pack instead.

Here are the songs that we will get to see in the game when November 2023 rolls around.

• ”Ascension”
• ”Away”
• ”Control”
• ”Find the Flame”
• ”Hide, Hideaway”
• ”Logos”
• ”My Star”
• ”No Risk, No Reward”
• ”The Riddle”
• ”Titan Lost”
• ”To Sail Forbidden Seas”

This was one of multiple announcements tied to Final Fantasy XVI at the event. Producer Naoki Yoshida confirmed news about DLC and the PC port would arrive in 2023. There's also a free update out now.