Game Informer

Lies of P is one of the year's best games – read why in Game Informer's Lies of P review – and both critics and fans have enjoyed the Bloodborne/Sekiro-style take on the story of The Adventures of Pinocchio. Mustakro on Twitter has taken their enjoyment of the game's boss designs and turned some of Lies of P's toughest challenges into Cuphead-style bosses, and it rules. 

I came across Mustakro this morning, scrolling through my Twitter feed, when I saw a really awesome rendition of Lies of P's King of Puppets boss (one of the most difficult in the game) in the style of Rubberhose, which is that classic animation style popularized in the 1920s seen in Cuphead.

King Of Puppets in Cuphead/Rubberhose style! https://t.co/wI1aDcwZn1 pic.twitter.com/e7gTJZO43t

Reviewed on: PlayStation 5
Platform: PlayStation 5, Xbox Series X/S, PlayStation 4, Xbox One, PC
Publisher: Activision Blizzard
Developer: Sledgehammer Games
Release: November 10, 2023
Rating: Mature

After months of character reveals, Tekken 8 has announced the final fighter of its launch roster: Reina. This brand-new character sports a lightning-quick moveset, earning her the nickname “Purple Lightning," and has mysterious ties to the Mishima clan.

Bandai Namco states that little is known about Reina's history besides she’s a student of the Mishima Polytechnical School. For some reason, she really wants to fight Jin (move over, Hwoarang), and based on her gameplay trailer, she seems more than capable of taking him on. Check Reina out in action below. 

With Reina’s addition, the 32-fighter roster is now complete. Here’s the full list of characters, with new fighters denoted and links to applicable articles/trailers:

Amazon is laying off 180 jobs in its games division, hopping on the tragically overcrowded bandwagon of layoffs in the game industry this year. The news comes via Aftermath, which reports that the layoffs are focused in two areas – the Crown Twitch channel, which will reportedly be eliminated altogether, and the game growth teams. Employees were notified of the changes through an email from Christoph Hartman, VP of Amazon Games. This is the second wave of layoffs this division of the company has faced this year.

An excerpt of the announcement email can be read below:

The Game Awards air on December 7 at 4:30 PT/7:30 ET live from the Peacock Theater and host Geoff Keighley revealed the full list of categories and nominees, including the coveted Game of the Year. Voting is open now for fans at the Game Awards’ website, and here’s the full list of categories and nominees.

Game of the Year

• Alan Wake 2 
• Baldur’s Gate 3 
• Marvel’s Spider-Man 2 
• Resident Evil 4 
• Super Mario Bros. Wonder 
• The Legend of Zelda: Tears of the Kingdom 

Best Game Direction

• Alan Wake 2 
• Baldur’s Gate 3 
• Marvel’s Spider-Man 2
• Super Mario Bros. Wonder 
• The Legend of Zelda: Tears of the Kingdom 

Best Narrative

• Alan Wake 2 
• Baldur’s Gate 3 
• Cyberpunk 2077: Phantom Liberty
• Final Fantasy XVI 
• Marvel’s Spider-Man 2 

Best Art Direction

• Alan Wake 2 
• Hi-Fi Rush 
• Lies of P  
• Super Mario Bros. Wonder
• The Legend of Zelda: Tears of the Kingdom 

The Legend of Zelda: Tears of the Kingdom

Best Score and Music

Earlier this summer, developer Evening Star Studios and publisher Private Division revealed Penny's Big Breakaway during a Nintendo Direct. While the throwback 3D platforming adventure looked great in its own right, what caught a lot of people's attention was the team behind it. Evening Star's creative director and lead engine architect is Christian Whitehead, one of the lead developers behind 2017's Sonic Mania. Whitehead isn't alone, though, as various other Evening Star developers also worked on Sonic Mania. While we've still got some time before the game's release – it's due out sometime in 2024 – Game Informer has a special sneak peek at its music and can exclusively reveal three tracks from the game. 

Sonic Mania and TMNT: Shredder's Revenge composer Tee Lopes is scoring Penny's Big Breakaway and you can get a taste of his score below: 

Nintendo has announced that it will air an Indie World Showcase tomorrow morning. It will feature 20 minutes of new announcements and updates on previously announced indie comes coming to the Switch. 

More specifically, the next Indie World Showcase will air at 9 a.m. PT/Noon ET tomorrow, on November 14. As usual, Nintendo kept the announcement of this showcase light on details – all we know is that it's set to run for roughly 20 minutes with both new announcements and updates to games we already know about. 

A new @IndieWorldNA Showcase is airing tomorrow, Nov. 14 at 9:00 a.m. PT! Tune in for roughly 20 minutes of new announcements and updates on indie games coming to #NintendoSwitch. #IndieWorld

Watch it live here: https://t.co/z39Mhr4n0K pic.twitter.com/2L7jUwk9eP

Netflix began building out its gaming efforts slowly before barreling quickly into a library that will soon exceed 80 games. Over the weekend, the subscription streaming service announced another lineup of games, including new releases like Shadow and Bone: Enter the Fold and Chicken Run: Eggstraction and titles previously released elsewhere like Hades and more. 

Some of these, like Oxenfree II: Lost Signals and Shadow and Bone: Enter the Fold are available right now on Netflix via mobile devices, but others like Hades and Braid: Anniversary Edition are "coming soon."

Here's the full lineup of games coming to Netflix via mobile devices either now available or coming to the service soon: 

This week on All Things Nintendo, we discuss the blockbuster news that Nintendo is making a live-action Legend of Zelda movie. After talking about the other news of the week, Brian and Wes dive into some recent Switch games they missed when they first came out due to how busy the fall release calendar has been.

If you'd like to follow Brian on social media, you can do so on his Instagram/Threads @BrianPShea or Twitter @BrianPShea. You can follow Wesley on Twitter: @LeBlancWes.

The All Things Nintendo podcast is a weekly show where we celebrate, discuss, and break down all the latest games, news, and announcements from the industry's most recognizable name. Each week, Brian is joined by different guests to talk about what's happening in the world of Nintendo. Along the way, they'll share personal stories, uncover hidden gems in the eShop, and even look back on the classics we all grew up with. A new episode hits every Friday!

This past weekend was a big one for Blizzard, as its yearly BlizzCon event brought news across several properties, including World of Warcraft, Overwatch, and Diablo. In the wake of the expansion announcement and seasonal reveals that rolled out about Diablo IV, we had the chance to speak with Diablo franchise manager Rod Fergusson and game director Joe Shely. We asked about the studio’s development processes post-launch, the specifics of gathering and responding to fan feedback and criticism, and the most critical priorities for Diablo IV in the months following launch.

If you've seen Netflix's Arcane League of Legends animated series, there's a high probability you really like it – the show's great, even for non-League of Legends fans. It tells the heartwrenching story of sisters Vi and Jinx and their struggle to come to terms with each other in the high-tech (and magical) utopian city of Piltover and its seedy underbelly known as Zaun. The first season hit the subscription streaming service in November of 2021and now we know that Arcane Season 2 hits Netflix this time next year. 

More specifically, Arcane Season 2 drops on Netflix in November of 2024. To coincide with the news, Netflix has released a short teaser featuring Jinx. Check it out below: 

Arcane. Season 2. November 2024. #GeekedWeek pic.twitter.com/SmPjKZKhOx

— Netflix Anime (@NetflixAnime) November 9, 2023

With roughly a year to go before Season 2, if you haven't yet watched Arcane, which features voice actors like Hailee Steinfeld, Yuri Lowenthal, Ella Purnell, and more, you've got plenty of time to do so – and it's well worth your time!

Update, 11:28 a.m. ET:

Following a Bloomberg report yesterday claiming Call of Duty: Modern Warfare III, which launched today, originally began as an expansion to last year's Call of Duty: Modern Warfare II before becoming a full game (with a 16-month turnaround to boot), developer Sledgehammer Games released a statement its X account seemingly indirectly refuting the report. A passage from the statement says,

We’re proud to be the team to lead the way on Modern Warfare III. We have worked hard to deliver on this vision which has been years in the making. Anything said to the contrary is simply not true – this is our game and we cannot wait to play it online with all of you.

You can read the full statement in the embedded post below.  

Statement from Aaron Halon, studio head, SHG.
“We’re incredibly proud of Modern Warfare III – both the full game experience at launch and the upcoming year of content we have planned for the community. On behalf of the extremely talented team across Sledgehammer Games and our…

— Sledgehammer Games (@SHGames) November 9, 2023

The original story continues below...

Original story, 8:19 a.m. ET:

Valve has unveiled its first upgraded iteration of the Steam Deck. Dubbed simply the Steam Deck OLED, the new handheld features several technical and form factor improvements, and it goes on sale next week.

As the name implies, the device boasts an HDR OLED screen to produce more vibrant colors. It also boasts a larger battery for an increased charge – 30-50% more battery life depending on the game, with Valve pointing out that the OLED screen consumes less power.

The device also includes an updated and more efficient AMD APU and Wi-Fi 6E, resulting in downloads up to three times faster for increased bandwidth and lower latency. Steam Deck OLED also runs cooler thanks to its bigger fan and improved thermals. Overall, the device is 5% lighter than the original model.

In this week's episode of The Game Informer Show, Alex and Marcus break down our latest cover story featuring Avatar: Frontiers of Pandora and chat about their multiple play sessions thus far. However, prior to our cover story discussion, we call out this week's layoffs at Ubisoft, during which the company laid off over a hundred employees. Later in the show, we chat with Charles about his positive Nickelodeon All-Star Brawl 2 review before diving into a new puzzle game, The Talos Principle 2, and Fortnite OG, the popular battle royale's latest season that's smashing records.

Watch Or Listen To The Game Informer Show:

Follow us on social media: Alex Van Aken (@itsVanAken), Marcus Stewart (@MarcusStewart7), Charles Harte (@ChuckDuck365)

In August 2020, it was announced that the 2008 indie classic Braid would be getting a modern remaster in the form of Anniversary Edition. Originally slated to release in 2021, the project has quietly remained in limbo for years, but developer Thekla Inc. has revealed that it’s finally arriving on April 30. 

Braid was first released for Xbox 360's Live Arcade on August 6, 2008, and stars Tim, a boy searching for a princess captured by a monster. The 2D platformer centers on time manipulation mechanics that players utilize to solve puzzles and locate/assemble jigsaw pieces. The strong mechanics combined with its contemplative writing made Braid a critical hit, with many hailing it as a masterpiece. Braid has since been credited as the primary title that brought widespread interest and awareness to the indie gaming scene. 

This remastered update features enhanced visuals in the form of repainted graphics by original Braid artist David Hellman, animated brush strokes, and smoother animations with additional frames. You can also switch between the updated visuals and the original presentation on the fly. The audio boasts improved sound and new mixes and variants of the soundtrack by Martin Stig Andersen (Control, Inside) and Hans Christian Kock. 

Sony announced it was acquiring Destiny 2 maker Bungie for $3.6 billion in January of 2022. A week later, in a quarterly financial results briefing, Sony CFO Hiroki Totoki revealed that PlayStation planned to launch more than 10 live service games by March 2026, with Bungie helping the company in the space. In an earnings call held today, Totoki stated that of its 12 live service games, it will only release six by Fiscal Year 2025, which ends March 2026, as reported by VideoGamesChronicle. 

Marvel's Spider-Man 2 hit PlayStation 5 exclusively on October 20 – read Game Informer's review here to find out why we loved it so much. It turns out plenty of others enjoyed developer Insomniac Games' latest superhero effort, too, because Sony has revealed that in just 11 days, it sold through more than 5 million copies, making it one of the year's best-selling games.

For context, Marvel's Spider-Man 2 outsold Super Mario Bros. Wonder, which is the fastest-selling Super Mario game after selling through 4.3 million copies in two weeks. Marvel's Spider-Man 2 was named the fastest-selling PlayStation Studios game just three days after its release, too. 

Earlier this summer, amid an incoming typhoon, Game Informer visited the Bandai Hobby Center Shinkan, the 132,000-square-foot factory where the entertainment company manufactures its iconic Gundam model kits. If you purchase a new Gundam model kit at your local store today, it originated in this facility in Shizuoka, Japan. The factory contains 35 plastic color-molding machines – 25 electric and 10 hydraulic – all helping produce millions of models yearly.

Bandai Spirits employee Miyuki Nakagiri, the subject matter expert on how exactly the factory operates, escorts us through the building. Our translator during this tour is Atsuo Yoshimura, a video game production manager who’s worked at Bandai Namco for the last 17 years. Notably, Yoshimura worked on last year’s Elden Ring – Game Informer’s 2022 Game of the Year, and most recently, Armored Core VI Fires of Rubicon. Additionally, Yoshimura was instrumental in helping to coordinate Game Informer’s recent Armored Core VI cover story trip. 

Watch Us Tour Japan's Gundam Factory:

Marvel's Spider-Man 2 hit PlayStation 5 exclusively last month and quickly became Sony's fastest-selling first-party game. We loved the game – read Game Informer's Marvel's Spider-Man 2 review here – but players and critics alike have discovered bugs and issues leading to laughs, in some cases, and progress impediment in other cases. Developer Insomniac Games released a patch last week that addressed a handful of issues and now, it has released a new update that fixes even more bugs and issues. 

Avatar: Frontiers of Pandora introduces three brand-new clans to the Avatar universe: the Aranahe, Zeswa, and Kame’tire. Each tribe calls one of the Western Frontier’s three biomes – Kinglor Forest, Upper Plains, and Clouded Forest, respectively – home. Ingratiating yourself with each one by learning their ways is an important step in your journey to reclaim your Na’vi culture, as well as garnering enough support to push back against the exploitative mining of the villainous RDA.

For a heads-up on what to expect as you try to warm up to each clan, here’s a breakdown of the culture and personality.  

Aranahe 

The first clan you encounter resides in the Kinglor Forest. Like the Omatikaya clan from the first film, the Aranahe live in a Hometree and have a symbiotic relationship with Kinglor, large moth-like creatures. That’s because the clan primarily consists of weavers and artisans, so these Na’vi rely on the Kinglor’s silk to create extravagant and intricate fabrics. The silk’s strong fiber is also applied to weapon crafting, such as making powerful bow strings. In return for these gifts, the Aranahe serve as caretakers for the Kinglor. 

Nintendo isn't quite ready to say goodbye to the Switch, its second best-selling console ever. According to a new financial briefing from the company, it plans to support the Switch seemingly long after the release of rumored new-gen hardware expected to launch next year. 

It's been a big week for Nintendo, with the company revealing that Super Mario Bros. Wonder is the fastest-selling Super Mario game in the series and that a live-action Legend of Zelda movie is on the way. We also learned yesterday the Switch has surpassed 132 million units sold on the heels of great results for The Legend of Zelda: Tears of the Kingdom and Pikmin 4. Now, Nintendo has pulled back the curtains a bit on its approach to the Switch platform moving forward. 

Yesterday, we learned that the Nintendo Switch had surpassed 132 million units sold on the heels of great results from recent first-party releases like The Legend of Zelda: Tears of the Kingdom and Pikmin 4. Now, Nintendo has revealed that its latest first-party release, Super Mario Bros. Wonder, is the fastest-selling game in the Super Mario series. It achieved this record after selling more than 4.3 million units in two weeks. 

"Super Mario Bros. Wonder, which was released worldwide on October 20, achieved global cumulative sales of 4.3 million units within the first two weeks," Nintendo's financial briefing reads. "This makes it the fastest-selling Super Mario related title. Super Mario related titles also tend to sell consistently over a long period of time. We anticipate this title will be an appealing choice for consumers during the upcoming holiday season and will continue to sell next year onwards as well." 

BioWare, the developer behind EA's Dragon Age and Mass Effect franchises, has released a new trailer for its next Mass Effect game and it teases a connection to the original trilogy and the Andromeda sequel, and maybe even a new protagonist. Since yesterday was November 7, known as N7 Day in the Mass Effect community as a reference to the N7 Systems Alliance military in the series, BioWare launched a countdown on a special Mass Effect "Epsilon" web page. 

A decoded message says the following on the site now:   

/////ACCESS CODE: EPSILON

/////ACCESS CODE ACCEPTED

/////SECONDARY ENCRYPTION DETECTED

/////VJBSVU-XXXX-XXXXXXXX

/////ANDROMEDA DISTRESS SIGNAL DETECTED

/////YEAR SENT: [REDACTED]

/////AUDIO TRANSCRIPT: ALTHOUGH THEY SHOULD KNOW BY NOW NOT TO UNDERESTIMATE HUMAN [REDACTED]

Rockstar Games will release the first trailer for its highly anticipated sequel to 2013's Grand Theft Auto V, which became the most profitable entertainment product of all time in 2018, next month. As of August, Grand Theft Auto V has sold more than 185 million copies since its release 10 years ago. 

Official news of this trailer from the Rockstar Twitter account comes less than a day after a Bloomberg report that states Rockstar will reveal the sequel, presumably titled Grand Theft Auto VI or Grand Theft Auto 6, this week with a trailer for it arriving sometime next month; Since the release of this report yesterday, Rockstar has confirmed a trailer for the next Grand Theft Auto will, in fact, be released in December. 

Revenant Hill, the next game by the makers of Night in the Woods, has been canceled. The reason is that the game's narrative designer and artist Scott Benson is battling a severe illness that has forced him to step away from the project.

Benson reveals on his personal X account that he’s been suffering severe heart failure over the past 12 months, which has greatly limited his ability to work. You can read his post below. 

So. Over the past 12 months or so I got very sick and it didn't go away. Eventually I was diagnosed with severe heart failure, most likely from a virus. It will continue to greatly limit me for the foreseeable future and as such I've had to stop working in the manner I once did.

Nintendo and Arad Productions Inc. have announced the start of development on a live-action Legend of Zelda movie. The movie will see Nintendo legend and Zelda creator Shigeru Miyamoto return to the role of producer following The Super Mario Bros. Movie, which was released earlier this year. He is joined in the producer role by Avi Arad, who has produced films like 2004's Spider-Man 2, 2008's Iron Man, and 2023's Spider-Man: Across the Spider-Verse. Arad has also produced a couple of video game adaptations including Uncharted in 2022 and Borderlands, which is slated for a 2024 release.

Wes Ball, who directed the Maze Runner movies as well as Kingdom of the Planet of the Apes, has signed on to direct the film The movie will be co-financed by Nintendo and Sony Pictures Entertainment (with more than 50 percent being handled by Nintendo), with the theatrical distribution being handled by Sony Pictures Entertainment. 

I have asked Avi-san to produce this film with me, and we have now officially started the development of the film with Nintendo itself heavily involved in the production. It will take time until its completion, but I hope you look forward to seeing it. [2]https://t.co/2H9lzzS5Pv

Today, Ubisoft is the latest developer to join 2023's wave of layoffs. According to IGN, the company laid off a total of 124 employees. 98 of them were based in Canada, which IGN calculates as roughly 2% of the company's Canadian workforce. The cuts included administrative and IT workers, some of whom were employed at the Hybride VFX studio, a company that has worked on shows like Ahsoka and The Mandalorian.

"These are not decisions taken lightly and we are providing comprehensive support for our colleagues who will be leaving Ubisoft during this transition," the company told both IGN and Kotaku. "We also want to share our utmost gratitude and respect for their many contributions to the company. This restructuring does not affect our production teams." Another quote obtained by Kotaku claims that the layoffs are to allow Ubisoft to "to optimize its resources to be more sustainable in the long term."

If you subscribe to the digital edition of Game Informer, you can now learn all about Avatar: Frontiers Of Pandora! Following the cover reveal our digital issue is now live on web browsers, iPad/iPhone, and Android devices. Alongside the cover story, you will also find big features on gaming and AI, accessibility in the world of fighting games, our holiday gift guide, and much more. We've also got previews Banishers: Ghosts of New Eden, Judas, a retrospective piece about the development and legacy of Papers, Please, and much more!

Individual issues are also now available for purchase at this link or in any GameStop store.

You can download the apps to read the issue by following this link.

If you tuned into our announcement earlier today, you know that this month's cover story is all about Avatar: Frontiers of Pandora. To kick off the month of exclusive coverage, we sat down with game director Ditte Deenfeldt and associate game director Drew Rechner and flooded them with questions: How does co-op work? Can your ikran be killed? What's the difference between an Avatar and a fursona? Get the answers to all that and more in the video below.

Watch The Avatar: Frontiers of Pandora Interview:

For more exclusive coverage of Ubisoft's next big open-world adventure, check out the banner below. If you want to get a copy of the magazine later this month, you can do so here.

Massive Entertainment is best known as the team behind Tom Clancy’s The Division, but it’s tackling a different beast in Avatar: Frontiers of Pandora. This open-world action game unfolds in a new section of James Cameron’s wildly successful Avatar universe, and this new chapter in the mythos graces Game Informer’s cover this month. 

Avatar: Frontiers of Pandora – Exclusive Coverage Trailer

We visited Massive’s studio in Malmö, Sweden, to play a couple of hours of the game set in the Kinglor Forest, one of Frontier’s three regions. Our 12-page story also includes an exclusive breakdown of the game’s other two regions, the Upper Plains and the Clouded Forest, which we got to tour during our visit. We interviewed the game’s key design leads to learn how Frontiers of Pandora came to be, what it was like working with James Cameron’s production studio Lightstorm, and get answers to some of the burning questions surrounding the game. Be sure to also visit our coverage hub by clicking the banner below as we'll have exclusive online features and videos throughout the month. 

Our cover art features the game’s customizable protagonist alongside their ikran taking the fight to the RDA. 

Cord Smith has worked at Compulsion Games, Ubisoft, Square Enix, and Sega. He's now founded a new studio called Inevitable Studios and the team's first game is a narrative-based action platformer called Always in Mind. In it, players must escape their own mind using special powers gained from living out their family's stories of the past.

It's currently available to wishlist on Steam, indicating a PC release, but there's no word about consoles. However, the announcement comes with news that a Kickstarter for Always in Mind is coming soon.

Watch the Always in Mind announcement trailer below: 

As you can see, the world of Always in Mind is quite trippy, with a unique visual style to boot. Players control Teddy, a 12-year-old in the hospital in a coma whose only hope of waking up comes in the form of Proxy, a long-dormant AI implant. Teddy is aware of his situation because of Proxy, but in order to regain consciousness, he must "self-realize." 

At Apple's keynote event last September, everyone expected them to announce the new iPhone, but nobody expected them to announce that multiple Resident Evil games would be headed to the device. Resident Evil Village hit the App Store just last week, and today, Capcom has let us know when Resident Evil 4 Remake is coming to the platform: December 20. You can see some screenshots from the Apple port below. 

Reviewed on: PlayStation 5
Platform: PC
Publisher: Keen Games
Developer: Keen Games

When the original Nickelodeon All-Star Brawl came out in 2021, it was a relatively bare-bones experience, but those bones were solid. Despite lacking many single-player modes, items, and even character voices, the core gameplay was good enough to keep the game afloat until it received refinements via online updates over the next two years. Nickelodeon All-Star Brawl 2, however, comes packaged with all those improvements and more. Developer Fair Play Labs has learned its lessons, and while the game isn't without its faults, it's a more-than-worthy follow-up.

Nickelodeon All-Star Brawl 2 starts you off with 25 characters, which is the same amount currently available in its predecessor if you include DLC. A surprisingly large number of characters do not return for the second entry, however; only 14 fighters return, meaning 11 were replaced. If one of your favorites was cut, you have every right to be disappointed, but it's a blessing as well. For one, notable exceptions from the first game, like Squidward and Jimmy Neutron, are included here. A new roster also means the team at Fair Play has more opportunities to be creative with character mechanics, and the game feels more novel, even though the basic gameplay is similar.

Lords of the Fallen, the spiritual successor to 2014's Soulslike with the same name, hit PlayStation 5, Xbox Series X/S, and PC last month – you can read Game Informer's Lords of the Fallen review here. After a recent patch a few weeks ago that made the game easier and added in some Halloween festivity, developer Hexworks and publisher CI Games have released its schedule of content for the game and it includes new questlines, two new events, more armor and weapons, and more. 

The roadmap also includes a "regular weekly cadence of updates focusing on bringing further stability, performance optimization, and balancing improvements to the game, including its online crossplay experience." 

Remedy Entertainment launched Alan Wake 2, its Alan Wake sequel 13 years in the making, last month to the delight of both critics and fans – you can read Game Informer's Alan Wake 2 review here. Since its October 27 release, Remedy has released three updates, including its biggest yet last week, for the game so far. And now, a fourth update is live and while it's one of the smallest yet, it fixes a few key issues.

Alan Wake 2 Update 1.0.9 

• PlayStation 5: Update 1.00.09
• Xbox Series X/S: Update 1.0.0.9
• PC: Update 1.0.9

Xbox Series – A workaround fix for the issue where the audio cut out intermittently in the Prologue. We are expecting a full fix for this issue in an upcoming update.

Room 665 – Fixed an issue (again) with the Echo scene not aligning and unlocking correctly (this was fixed in the previous update, but Echo hell still persisted)  

Local Girl – Fixed an issue with a mouse (with a big presence) blocking progress.

The Switch continues to inch closer to becoming Nintendo's best-selling hardware ever, as it has now surpassed 132 million units sold. It did so thanks to great software sales for new first-party games released this year like The Legend of Zelda: Tears of the Kingdom and Pikmin 4. 

This news comes from Nintendo's Fiscal Year 2024 second quarter financial results, which ended September 30. In it, we learn the Switch has officially reached 132.46 million units sold, getting it closer to the company's best-selling hardware, the Nintendo DS at 154.02 million units sold. The only other console above the DS overall is the PlayStation 2 at roughly 158 million units sold. 

PlayStation integration with X (formerly known as Twitter) is ending for PS5 and PS4 next week via a new update. That means users will no longer be able to directly upload screenshots and video clips from the console to the social media site.

An announcement update posted to the PlayStation Support page states that on Monday, November 13, X integration will end, which includes the ability to “view any content published on X on PS5/PS4, and the ability to post and view content, trophies, and other gameplay-related activities on X directly from PS5/PS4 (or link an X account to do so).”

Click to enlarge

While a bummer for those who make frequent use of this feature, which offers a simple method of posting gameplay content to the platform, there are a couple of more involved alternatives depending on your platform. If you’re a PS5 user, you can still use the PlayStation mobile app to upload gameplay captures to then post on X. You can read how to do that here. PS4 users have to rely on ShareFactory and do a bit more work, and you can read those steps here.

Blizzard Entertainment has revealed that the first expansion for Diablo IV is called Vessel of Hatred, and it hits the game late next year. The Diablo team revealed this news over the weekend during BlizzCon 2023, which is also where we learned about three new World of Warcraft expansions and three new Overwatch 2 heroes coming to the game. 

During BlizzCon 2023, Blizzard kept Vessel of Hatred details light, stating it will share more details next summer. As for what to expect, it features a campaign that continues the dark tale that began in Diablo IV. "Vessel of Hatred brings players back to learn the fate of the prime evil Mephisto and his demonic plans for Sanctuary," a press release reads. "Travel to the lush jungles known by the locals as Nahantu." 

Check out the Diablo IV: Vessel of Hatred expansion announcement trailer for yourself below: 

Blizzard says Vessel of Hatred will allow players to traverse an exotic new region, vanquish new evils, and perhaps most excitingly, explore fresh ways to kill demons and loot chests with a completely new Class "never seen before in the Diablo universe." 

Kachow! Cars' Lightning McQueen is joining Rocket League tomorrow, November 7, with special decals, Goal Explosions, and more. Lightning McQueen is also an extra special release. Beyond being a big collaboration between the vehicular soccer game and Disney and Pixar, it's the first car in Rocket League to feature dynamic expressions. 

Like in the Cars Pixar franchise, Lightning McQueen will look around the pitch while you cruise the Arena, narrow his eyes as you focus his speed, and react with each score. "With the Lightning McQueen Mega Bundle, you'll be able to play as three different versions of the Route 66 icon," a blog post reads. "First up is the Rust-eze Decal. With number 95 on the side and a flashy lightning bolt, you'll be taking the winner's podium with plenty of style to spare." 

There's also the Cruisin' Decal and the Dinoco Decal, and you can see both in action in the gallery below: 

Blizzard Entertainment has revealed the next three heroes of Overwatch 2, including Mauga, a new duel-wielding tank hero that hits the game next month. Plus, the Overwatch 2 team teased a new DPS hero and Support hero hitting the roster sometime down the line. 

Mauga was actually playable for free as a part of a limited-time trial run for the tank hero this past weekend, but he's already out of the game; his real debut happens alongside Overwatch 2's Season 8 launch on December 5. "Equipped with two chain guns (Gunny and Cha-Cha), Mauga is ready to bash through the front lines of his opponents and tear through anyone that stands in his way with tons of fire-power," Blizzard says about the hero. 

Watch the official Mauga gameplay trailer below: 

Here are some additional Mauga screens from Overwatch 2: