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Hasbro has announced that it is creating a Dungeons and Dragons documentary co-directed by Joe Manganiello and Kyle Newman.

The untitled documentary will be released in 2024 to celebrate D&D' 50th anniversary and pull from more than 400 hours of early, never before seen footage of the game's creation in the early 1970s. Celebrity fans of the game will also feature in interviews.

Manganiello will also produce alongside his brother Nick Manganiello, Anthony Savini, and Cecily Tyler, while Tara Long and Geno McDermott will executive produce with D&D scholars Jon Peterson, Adam F. Goldberg, and co-director Newman.

Joe Manganiello - who's starred in films including Spider-Man and Magic Mike - is the official D&D ambassador and has previously written for the game and starred in Critical Role as a guest character. He's also the dungeon master of a star-studded Hollywood campaign that includes Vince Vaughn, Rage Against the Machine's Tom Morello, wrestler Paul 'The Big Show' Wight, and Game of Thrones co-creator D.B. Weiss.

"I couldn’t be more proud and excited to get back behind the camera for another documentary, this time with the D&D dream team of Jon, Kyle, and my brother and producing partner Nick," said Joe Manganiello.

"I lived through the rise and fall and rise again of this legacy brand that has not only meant so much to me but has served as the fountainhead of creativity for an entire generation of writers, artists, and creative minds, influencing so much of our culture."

The publisher of Nintendo Switch management simulator Let's Build a Zoo has shared how a strange eShop policy and "Argentina" made its game an accidental hit.

Mike Rose, company director at publisher No More Robots, shared on Twitter (below) that people using an eShop workaround to buy games cheaper by changing their region first looked to be a disaster for Let's Build a Zoo, but quickly became the key to its success.

Rose felt good when the game received lots of preorders, but after he saw they were coming from "Argentina", he grew worried. There were major problems with this, he said.

Let me tell you the story about how a little country called "Argentina" helped us to our biggest Nintendo Switch launch to date

I write "Argentina" in quotation marks because well... it wasn't really Argentina, was it?

Time for another classic Nintendo eShop thread: pic.twitter.com/vsVrJ12R94

— Mike Rose (@RaveofRavendale) October 13, 2022

"They obviously weren't really from Argentina. Clearly people were doing the easy region-swapping thing, setting their eShop region to Argentina to get the cheapest price possible. That 'cheapest price' was roughly $1.50, due to exchange rates."

Imagine if you had to stick your hands into a sink full of dirty, putrid-smelling water to fish around for clues to a mystery. You keep pulling out weirder and more confusing stuff, and you really don't want to go back in again – but what you've found so far makes you extremely curious about what other secrets may be hiding in there. That's the best way I can describe the overall experience of playing Scorn, a first-person puzzle game about exploring the ruins of a dead civilization. With a mesmerizing, biomechanical aesthetic inspired by the likes of H.R. Giger and Harlan Ellison's I Have No Mouth, and I Must Scream, it's far more disturbing and unsettling than it is horrifying. But the vibes it creates can be very potent.

The most impressive bone in this mangled skeleton is the macabre art direction, which creates a cohesive world even when each of Scorn's hubs are distinct in their upsetting grandeur. The architecture and weird puzzle contraptions exist in a space that's not so much a fusion of flesh and machine, but more like someone blended the two until you can't quite tell if anything you're looking at is alive or artificial. Soaring, alien spires mimic the shapes of bone and viscera, while foreboding tunnels give you the distinct impression of being swallowed whole.

There are few better ways to spend a day than building LEGO. Feeling the pieces click together as a pile of plastic bricks becomes an epic creation is incredibly satisfying in a way that digital representations haven't always been able to recreate. So while most recent LEGO games have instead found success as silly action-platformers with licensed tie-ins, LEGO Bricktales goes in a completely different direction. It ditches the pop culture characters and co-op combat in favor of an original story with building-based puzzles. It’s not quite the same as building LEGOs in real life, but it comes pretty close — even when you’re fighting with the camera or obscure mission objectives.

In LEGO Bricktales, you’re a brick person tasked with helping your eccentric grandfather power up the theme park where he apparently resides before it gets shut down for good. Think Doc Brown from Back to the Future, but instead of a souped-up DeLorean, Grandpa’s built a portal to transport you to faraway lands. Your mission: help out the locals across a handful of biomes and collect Happiness Crystals, which can be used as a power source for the theme park’s attractions. Helping an archeologist explore a jungle temple, finding a long-lost pirate vessel, and curing a kingdom full of poisoned peasants are all in a day’s work when you’re trying to restore Grandpa’s park to its former glory.

Cyberpunk 2077 players can now succumb to cyberpsychosis thanks to a PC mod that adds Cyberpunk Edgerunners' risk-reward system into the game.

As reported by Games Radar, Nexus Mods user DJ_Kovrik uploaded a Wannabe Edgerunner mod that adds a humanity stat into Cyberpunk 2077.

The mechanic hails from the Cyberpunk tabletop RPG, but has recently been a big topic of discussion between fans thanks to the new Edgerunners anime. The mod has your humanity stat lower as you install more cyberware, kill more people, and use Berserk mode or the Sandevistan operating system from Edgerunners. Letting the humanity stat drop to zero will cause you to turn cyberpsycho.

While middling humanity only causes a few visual glitches and other minor side effects, entering full cyberpsychosis will cause heavy visual glitches to reflect the hallucinations seen in Edgerunners.

Players will gain the "positive" side effects too, though, getting buffs to their movement speed, armour value, and health regeneration. Again, just as it happens in the show, police will also arrive to take out the player if they go cyberpsycho.

Blizzard has offered players double XP, a weapon charm, and a free skin to make up for Overwatch 2's rough launch.

The developer apologised to its fans for the initial issues in a blog post, and also announced that it would run several double XP weekends for players to catch up after the game was often unplayable during its first week. For a number of days Overwatch 2 was plagued with long queue times, controversial policies, and the removal of certain heroes.

Anyone who logs in between October 25 and December 6 will also be given a new legendary skin for Reaper, the Cursed Captain, alongside a Health Pack weapon charm.

When #Overwatch2 launch is bumpy you make it up to players 😤

Besides making progress on bug fixes & stabilization, we've got goodies to share with all players

🚑 Health Pack Weapon Charm
🏴‍☠️ Cursed Captain Reaper
🎉 2x Match XP weekends

How to get em https://t.co/pU6b13P0ww pic.twitter.com/Pzs1RvnWFu

— Overwatch (@PlayOverwatch) October 11, 2022

"Since the launch of Overwatch 2, we’ve been blown away by your excitement, and incredibly moved by the sheer number of you experiencing our game. But we know we have run into some significant issues as well," Blizzard said in the post.

Square Enix has announced that its mobile battle royale, Final Fantasy 7 The First Soldier, will shut down on January 11 next year, barely a year after it was released.

Announced on the game's website, Square Enix said that it couldn't deliver the service it wanted to despite fairly regular updates to the game, and as a result decided to shut The First Solider down.

"After almost a year of jumping around on chocobos, mashing it up in melee battles, and sniping from the rooftops of Midgar Undercity, it is with a heavy heart that we are announcing the end of service for Final Fantasy 7: The First Solider," it said.

[End of Service Notice]

We are regretful to announce that we will be ending service for FINAL FANTASY VII THE FIRST SOLDIER at 07:00 UTC on January 11, 2023.

We would like to thank you all for all your support over the past year.https://t.co/XvNOVv2EVs#FF7FS pic.twitter.com/aNVI4iHle4

— FINAL FANTASY VII THE FIRST SOLDIER_EN｜FF7FS (@FFVII_FS_EN) October 12, 2022

"Despite all our efforts to bring you regular updates with fresh and exciting content, we haven't been able to deliver the experience that we were hoping to, and that you all deserve, so we have made the extremely tough decision to end service for Final Fantasy 7: The First Solider."

Meta and Microsoft announced during the 2022 Meta Connect conference the Meta Quest 2 is getting Xbox Cloud Gaming integration in the future, allowing users to stream Xbox games to the headset.

According to a post on the Oculus Blog, players will be able to stream "hundreds" of games to Meta Quest Store compatible devices, including the Meta Quest 2. This will work for games that aren't inherently VR compatible, as the setup will let you play these games on a 2D screen the company describes as like "having a private movie theater available at all times."

As of this writing, there’s no hard release date for when Xbox Cloud Gaming will be available on the Meta Quest Store. However, the Oculus Blog post says both companies will be announcing further details “as soon as possible.”

Xbox Cloud Streaming is already available for Xbox Game Pass Ultimate subscribers, and lets you stream Xbox games to mobile devices, Smart TVs, and even Xbox consoles. Earlier this week, Head of Xbox Phil Spencer posted a photo of what turned out to be a prototype for the Xbox-branded streaming stick codenamed Keynote. The company has since shelved the idea to pivot to other means of cloud streaming integration, such as bringing Xbox Cloud Gaming to the Meta Quest Store.

After teasing a new headset under the codename Project Cambria and leaked images surfacing online, Meta has officially unveiled the Quest Pro virtual reality headset. It's now available for preorder on Amazon.

The VR revolution is underway. We've designed an all-new headset packed with advanced tech and geared for productivity, creative work and collaboration. This is Meta Quest Pro, available 10.25. Pre-order today. https://t.co/YaFHvwYHlG pic.twitter.com/cBagf0TSGp

— Meta Quest (@MetaQuestVR) October 11, 2022

Revealed during the Meta Connect keynote, the Quest Pro features several improvements over the Quest 2, such as a new optical stack that replaces the Fresnel lenses found in the Quest 2. Meta also confirmed that the Quest Pro is the first device that is powered by the new Qualcomm Snapdragon XR2+ platform, which the tech giant touts is optimized for virtual reality to "run at 50% more power than Meta Quest 2 with better thermal dissipation."

Meta has announced that it has acquired Armature Studio, the Texas-based studio behind Resident Evil 4 VR.

Meta and Armature teamed up with Capcom to port Resident Evil 4 onto the Meta Quest 2 last year, which was rebuilt from the ground up to accommodate the play style. Resident Evil 4 VR proved to be a huge success, making $2 million on the Quest Store within the first 24 hours of release, according to Meta and winning Best VR/AR Game at the 2021 Game Awards.

Before Resident Evil 4 VR, Armature Studio also developed two other VR games, both original IPs — Fail Factory in 2017 and Sports Scramble in 2019.

In my review last year, I noted that it offered a fresh take on one of the most ported entries in Capcom's popular survival horror series. While it was missing a lot of content at launch, a few months after release, Armature rolled out a major update that included a Mercenaries Mode along with additional content, such as the option to obtain the Chicago Typewriter.

Today's Meta Connect 2022 event gave Quest 2 owners plenty to look forward to, as Facebook detailed a number of upcoming titles for its VR platform. IGN has you covered with every announcement from the show, including Marvel's Iron Man VR, Among Us VR, and the all-new Meta Quest Pro headset.

Meta Quest Pro Coming October 25, Costs $1499.99

The VR revolution is underway. We've designed an all-new headset packed with advanced tech and geared for productivity, creative work and collaboration. This is Meta Quest Pro, available 10.25. Pre-order today. https://t.co/YaFHvwYHlG pic.twitter.com/cBagf0TSGp

— Meta Quest (@MetaQuestVR) October 11, 2022

Meta unveiled its next VR headset, the Meta Quest Pro. The new device is coming on October 25 for $1499.99, which includes the headset itself, the Meta Quest Touch Pro controllers, stylus tips, partial light blockers, and a charging dock. The machine comes with 2GB of RAM, 256GB of storage, and 10 high res sensors. The Quest Pro has 37% more pixels per inch than Meta Quest 2, along with improved peripherals and colors. The company is calling it the first entry in the new high-end line of devices.

Among Us VR, the virtual reality port of the 2018 online social game, arrives on November 10 and will cost $9.99.

Initially announced at the 2021 Game Awards, Among Us VR allows you to play with up to ten players. You assume the role of either a crewmate or an imposter, with the former looking to complete all the tasks around the map while the player(s) posing as Imposter(s) try to kill all the crewmates without being detected.

Among Us is already a fun game, but the VR port adds a new level of suspense and chaos that will provide a fresh perspective for longtime players. In the gameplay trailer released back in April, you can see that the game shifts to a first-person perspective. Adding to the level of chaos is the inclusion of hands that you can flail around as you run or use to physically point fingers at an individual you feel may be the imposter in the group.

Our review of the non-VR version noted that Among Us "successfully transfers the devious gameplay of in-person cloak-and-dagger games to video game form."

Sony is producing way more PlayStation 5 consoles than it was last year with new figures showing a 400% increase in shipments to the United States year over year.

Senior analyst at MST Financial David Gibson shared the stats on Twitter (below), showing a huge spike in the number of units being shipped to the US in September.

Gibson noted that the increase will in part be to prepare for God of War: Ragnarok's launch on November 9, but the increase in shipments generally bodes well for those looking to buy a PS5 in the US over the holiday period.

Lots of reports of improved PS5 supply in the past few months, but no data until now. Import data into the US confirms that Sony Interactive (PlayStation) shipments in Sept were +400% YoY. Yes you read that right. Some of that will go into inventory for GoW launch for sure. #PS5 pic.twitter.com/SvC6xTPQxs

— David Gibson (@gibbogame) October 11, 2022

Sony's next generation console, alongside the entire tech industry, has suffered from severe production issues since it was released in 2020, caused by chip shortages and the knock-on effects of Covid-19.

Dwayne Johnson has promised that his DCEU character Black Adam will "absolutely" fight Superman in an upcoming film.

Speaking to Cinema Blend, Johnson remained confident that Black Adam is marking a new era in the otherwise struggling DC cinematic universe.

When asked if Black Adam and Superman will ever throw fists, Johnson said: "Absolutely. That is the whole point of this. There's a new era in the DC universe that's about to begin."

He went on to claim that DC is now listening to its fans and doing its best to meet their expectations, though warned that "sometime down the road" it may not be able to do so.

Johnson firmly believes that the DCEU - which began with Man of Steel and has since included the original Suicide Squad, Justice League, Wonder Woman, and so on - has been going through a transitory period and will begin again with Black Adam.

"So finally, after many months turned into many years, we ended up with what we ended up at," he said. "And the whole goal and intention now is to this new era, new time. Now let's build out."

A lot of the comedy in High on Life, the upcoming first-person shooter from Justin Roiland and his Squanch Games development studio, comes through the game's talking guns. You play a mute protagonist, so all of the conversations in this world happen between the goofy aliens you encounter, and the talking guns in your hands.

Roiland plays your first talking gun, the pistol-like Kenny (who sounds quite a bit like Rick's high-pitched teenage partner-in-space-adventures in Rick & Morty). Curb Your Enthusiasm's JB Smoove voices the shotgun-esque talking gun Gus. Comedian Betsy Sodaro plays Sweezy, the Halo-Needler-like gun you can see in our exclusive 12-minute gameplay video from earlier this week. Tim Robinson, from Netflix's I Think You Should Leave, plays Creature. We exclusively revealed the rest of the voice cast last week. Take a look at each of the guns (plus your melee weapon, Knifey) in the concept art gallery below.

Founded in 2020, PlayStation Studios Malaysia is the newest first-party PlayStation studio to be created from the ground up by Sony. Until recently, very little has been known about the projects this studio is working on – but now we know the answer. They’re working on everything.

Speaking during a panel at Level Up KL in Kuala Lumpur on Thursday, PlayStation Studios Malaysia head Hasnul Hadi Samsudin and Neil Ingram from PlayStation’s San Diego-based Visual Arts team explained how Sony’s newest internal startup studio has been involved in working on first-party games like The Last of Us Part I and MLB The Show 2022, as well as playing a role in many other first-party titles.

Sony paid $3.5 million to put Ark: Survival Evolved on PlayStation Plus for one month, while Microsoft paid $2.5 million to put it on Xbox Game Pass for six months.

As spotted by Kotaku reporter Ethan Gach on Twitter (below), a filing with the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission by Snail Games USA (the parent company of Ark developer Studio Wildcard) revealed the values paid by each company to feature the game in their "free games" line-up.

Ark appeared on PlayStation Plus in March 2022 and was therefore free for subscribers in the five week period ranging from March 1 to April 4, a deal that Sony paid $3.5 million for.

Sony paid $3.5 million to make ARK: Survival Evolved a March PS Plus game.

Microsoft paid $2.5 million to keep it on Game Pass for the first half of this year, and $2.3 million to bring ARK 2 to the service when it launches.

Via September SEC filing. https://t.co/dl1VZOpXE8 pic.twitter.com/RSouPcAfyZ

— AmericanTruckSongs8 (@ethangach) October 11, 2022

Neither Sony or the developers involved have previously revealed how much these deals go through for, and while this could be a complete outlier and not representative of a standard agreement, its the first insight into the financial backend of PlayStation Plus that we've had since it began in 2010.

It’s well documented that the history of the video game movie adaptation has been a mixed one, to say the least. But, with recent hits such as Netflix’s Arcane and Castlevania series, as well as a promising(?) looking Super Mario movie on the horizon, we may have finally turned a corner.

With a brighter future ahead of us, I’ve decided to attach directors to 12 dream video game movies and TV shows, that I think Hollywood would be frankly foolish to pass on. Sure, most of these games would probably benefit from being left exactly as that, but let’s have a bit of fun, shall we?

James Cameron’s Titanfall 2

Let’s start big. And blockbusters don’t get much bigger than when Terminator, Aliens, and Titanic director James Cameron is at the helm. Arguably the best first-person shooter campaign ever created, Titanfall 2 would be an incredible sight to see in his hands - a time-travel subplot, one man’s heartbreaking relationship to a sentient AI, a shit ton of mechs - it has all the hallmarks of a Cameron action movie. We’d need him to hurry up and finish his 17 Avatar movies first, but I reckon it would be well worth the wait.

Kathryn Bigelow’s Call of Duty 4: Modern Warfare

Publisher 2K has confirmed that players' personal information was obtained in the hack that affected its support section last month, though there is "no indication" that financial data was taken.

An update on 2K's support website revealed that details including users' email addresses, gamertags, and console details were stolen and put up for sale. "There is no indication that any of your financial information or password(s) held on our system were compromised," it added.

2K has been emailing users affected by the hack, which itself saw emails sent from its official support section that contained malicious links asking for personal information. The publisher immediately shut down its support website and asked users not to open these emails but, as they were from the official account and not just a spoof account spending fake emails, some users did.

pic.twitter.com/yOXC8pC4SV

— 2K Support (@2KSupport) September 23, 2022

Though it doesn't believe the hack accessed information from linked accounts like PlayStation or Xbox profiles, 2K still warned users to "look out for suspicious activity across your accounts and be vigilant for unauthorized third parties trying to leverage the incident to harm you."

First announced as “Project-V” at the end of 2020, Vela Games has finally lifted the veil of mystery on their forthcoming debut, Evercore Heroes. The team, composed of veteran developers, describe how their multiplayer online co-op game – or “MOCO” – combines the depth and strategy of a MOBA with the cooperative PvE challenge of an MMO raid.

So why this particular combination? Rather than working within a specific genre, the team focused on the player experiences they wanted to create. In a typical MMO, of course, the most rewarding challenges often require significant effort and time investment to access. You’ve got to earn your place in the raid party, and the dungeon door policy is strict – you won’t get in if your shoes don’t have impressive enough frost resistance.

No need to spend hours sewing together a magical cloak made of salamander giblets before playing a MOBA, though. Everyone begins each match at level 1, gradually becoming more powerful by obtaining resources throughout the game. Rather than investing your time into obtaining better gear, you develop your skill and game knowledge, and are rewarded for your mastery of notoriously complex characters.

A team of MOBA heroes contending with a raid-esque PvE environment sounds like a promising combination. But Vela Games CEO and co-founder Travis George describes how something was still missing from the formula,

“As we started testing Project V with the community, the game was developing really well. But we got the feeling, every time we played the game, that it wasn’t as great as we wanted it to be.”

Google's ambitions to make gaming-focused Chromebooks are now coming to fruition.

In a new press release, Google announced that it has partnered with Acer, Asus, and Lenovo to make these gaming-focused Chromebooks designed for cloud gaming subscription services like Nvidia GeForce Now and Xbox Cloud Gaming.

DICE was forced to turn off Battlefield 2042's The Liquidators limited-time event less than one hour after it went live due to serious bugs.

The event went live on time at 9am UK time, but it was soon n offline after DICE discovered that its progression system wasn't working.

"We are temporarily disabling The Liquidators mid-season event", the official Battlefield Direct Communication account said on Twitter. "We're seeing that the unlock rewards and progress for the event are not tracking correctly, and cannot be equipped when showing as unlocked."

The issue has since been resolved.

Update #2:

We have been able to resolve the issues that were encountered when we set the Liquidators Event live earlier this morning

The event will return at 1400 UTC / 16:00 CEST, approximately 1 hour's time

We'll keep you updated here as we deploy our changes

— Battlefield Direct Communication (@BattlefieldComm) October 11, 2022

Battlefield 2042 hasn't had the smoothest first year on the market, only launching its Season 1 in June (seven months after launch) as it was delayed to focus on more pressing issues such as including a scoreboard, but this update was also delayed.

Blizzard has been forced to temporarily remove Bastion and Torbjörn from Overwatch 2 due to both characters causing serious bugs.

Bastion has been removed from the game entirely due to its ultimate being completely broken. A glitch allows the robot's Ultimate, which usually lets players fire a powerful blast up to three times within seconds, to be shot as many times as players can within that time.

Torbjörn is still available in Quick Play but has been removed from every other mode, with a tweet from Overwatch's official account (below) saying that both heroes have been removed "while we iron out a few bugs in their ability kits".

🚨 QUICK PSA 🚨

Bastion and Torbjörn will be taking a quick trip to the workshop while we iron out a few bugs in their ability kits!

🛠️ Bastion will be unavailable in all modes during this time, while Torbjörn will still be playable in Quick Play. pic.twitter.com/ghjLL5KV7b

— Overwatch (@PlayOverwatch) October 10, 2022

It's unclear how long the characters will be absent from the game, but Blizzard followed up on its dedicated Overwatch 2 Known Issues support page that it will provide an update on the timescale soon. The were first removed on October 10 at 3pm Pacific.

Nintendo has announced that its trio of Splatoon 3 Amiibo will be released next month on November 11.

Announced on Twitter (below), the Inkling (Yellow), Octoling (Blue), and Smallfry Amiibo will be available as three separate figures unlike some previous Splatoon Amiibo sets that came as a triple-pack.

A new trailer also showed some of the in-game customisation options available for the Amiibos, which will also unlock players their own set of unique items.

SRL here with a scoop from our Materials division. They're the biggest collectors at SRL (you should see their "science closet") and they've informed us that Splatoon 3 amiibo will be launching on Friday, 11/11! Check out this video for more info. pic.twitter.com/mwywFohLKy

— Splatoon North America (@SplatoonNA) October 11, 2022

Their appearance in Splatoon 3 can be fully changed with what appears to be dozens of customisation options, and players can then roam around the Splatsville hub area for photoshoots and more.

The new figures will join the 13 other, quite rare Splatoon Amiibo available so far, plus one extra if the Super Smash Bros. Ultimate Inkling Girl is included. Nintendo don't typically produce high numbers of Amiibo so collectors will likely want to preorder quickly, but it's currently unclear exactly where or how to do so.

Amazon Prime Early Access is finally here, and there are some absolutely incredible deals to check out at the moment, especially if you're a gamer. PS5 owners, strap yourself in because these SSD deals are legitimately incredible. A quick reminder that these are Black Friday equivalent deals, and won't be cheaper during the Black Friday sales.

My favourite deal is definitely on the Crucial P5 Plus 1TB for just £81.99. This is a fantastic deal, and would be perfect to slot into your PS5. I'll also leave a quick TL;DR below with all the links you need to the best deals (and remember, you'll also need a heatsink).

TL;DR - Best Prime Early Access PS5 SSD Deal

You'll need to be an Amazon Prime member to take part in the Prime Early Access Sale (or Prime Day 2 as some are calling it). But you can easily get a 30-day free trial at the moment if you want to jump in and grab some sweet discounts (just remember to turn off auto-renewal).

Prime Early Access Sale: Crucial P5 Plus PS5 SSD Deal

Amazon's Prime Early Access Sale event is now live, and there are plenty of great deals to check out at the moment. Similar to Amazon's annual Prime Day event; a variety of video games, movies, board games, and more will be heavily discounted during this Early Access Sale event.

Some standout board game deals include Twilight Imperium, The Lord of the Rings Journeys in Middle-earth, and CATAN 3D Edition. In addition to strategy board games, a variety of card games and expansion sets are also discounted for the Amazon Prime Early Access Sale.

The Best Amazon Deals on Board Games

Most Popular Amazon Early Access Deals on Board Games

The Best Deals on Strategy Games

Amazon Early Access Deals on Strategy Board Games

Family-Friendly Board Games on Sale

The Best Card Game Deals - Amazon Early Access Sale

Card Games on Sale at Amazon

I’ll cut to the chase: Street Fighter 6’s closed beta was the best fighting game beta I’ve ever played. And I’m not even talking about the quality of the game – even though that too is really good. I’m talking about everything from the presentation, to the stellar netcode, to the gorgeous battle hub, to the ease of finding matches, to the sheer number of options and modes accessible, most important among those being a training mode, which really should be standard at this point in fighting game betas. Street Fighter 6’s closed beta checked all of the boxes, then added new boxes, and checked those too.

Let’s talk about the actual game first. I’ve gotten to play Street Fighter 6 at a number of gaming events over the last few months, and the strong first impression it left has more than held up now that I’ve played many hours of the beta. Street Fighter 6 feels fantastic. It’s hard hitting, fast paced, and it’s powered by the excellent Drive system that opens up a whole world of new tools and options for every character.

Meta Connect 2022 is happening today, and we are expecting the highly anticipated Quest Pro headset to be unveiled at the show. According to a press release from Facebook, CEO Mark Zuckerberg will be opening the event with a keynote where he will share updates about the VR developer ecosystem, a new VR headset, and the metaverse.

Meta Connect will be livestreamed today and is free for anyone to watch online. If you're looking for details on when and where to watch the stream, we've got you covered with everything you need to know -- including how to watch in VR.

How to Watch Meta Connect 2022 Live

Meta Connect 2022 kicks off on Tuesday, October 11 at 10 a.m. PT / 1 p.m. ET. You can watch the stream live at that time directly from the Reality Labs Facebook page. The event will also be available on that page after the stream concludes where you can watch it afterwards if you missed it live.

How to Watch Meta Connect Live in VR

If you have a Meta Quest 2 headset and want to watch the event in VR, you certainly can. Here is a quick guide on how to set up your VR headset for that:

Lady Dimitrescu will be playable in the upcoming Mercenaries mode in the Resident Evil Village expansion. Still, to get her into a playable state the developers at Capcom had to pull a few tricks, including shrinking her just a smidge.

In an interview with Polygon, Resident Evil Village Winters’ Expansion director Kento Kinoshita revealed that the team wanted to keep Lady Dimitrescu’s core attributes when turning her into a playable character, namely her height.

And while she will be taller than any other character in Mercenaries mode, they did shrink her from her canonical nine-foot-six-inch height.

“Lady Dimitrescu’s height brought up a lot of challenges during development, but in the end we were able to implement her with a giant stature, taller than any of the other characters,” Kinoshita revealed.

“For The Mercenaries, it’s necessary that the player can control their character easily, and to make that possible e did adjust her height to a little under nine feet tall.” Kinoshita says that at that height “the player just barely avoids bumping into the ceiling.”

The Mercenaries mode has long been a popular bonus game in the Resident Evil series where you can play as various Resident Evil characters in a high-score time trial mode. Alongside Dimitriscu, players can also select Heisenberg or Chris Redfield.

Platinum Vice President Hideki Kamiya has given his stamp of approval for the Nintendo Switch. But even though he's a legendary game designer, Kamiya's reason for loving the machine is is quite simple: he likes to play games while on the go, or when lying around the house.

Speaking to VGC, Kamiya said he hopes Nintendo sticks with the home console/handheld hybrid approach. "Personally, this is a very lifestyle-oriented preference for myself, but right now I feel it’s really difficult for me to actually 'sit' still in front of the TV and play games," Kamiya said.

"For me, I lie down and play games in portable mode and I enjoy games that way, and that’s the biggest reason why I like the Nintendo Switch. Whenever the new hardware that Nintendo decides to launch next arrives, I personally do hope that they still have this portable element so that it can support my lifestyle of playing games as I lie down!"

Platinum has created multiple titles for Nintendo Switch, including Astral Chain and the upcoming Bayonetta 3. A handful of the studio's other games have made their way to the platform, with Switch ports of Bayonetta 1 and 2, The Wonderful 101, and Nier: Automata.

Sideshow Collectibles may not have attended New York Comic-Con, but they did launch their own virtual event called Sideshow "New York" Con. Even from thousands of miles away, their booth was easily one of the highlights of the past weekend.

Check out the slideshow gallery below to see everything featured during Sideshow's event, including a very impressive lineup of Marvel, DC and Masters of the Universe statues and figures:

Sideshow "New York" Con was a showcase for Sideshow's recent and upcoming releases, like their 1:6 scale Clone Wars figures and Marvel and DC-themed Premium Format Figures, as well as partner companies like Tweeterhead, Premium Collectibles Studio and Damtoys (the makers of that eerily lifelike Vito Corleone figure).

PCS is quickly carving out its own niche in the crowded Marvel arena with a new line of 1:6 scale statues inspired by games like Contest of Champions and Insomniac's Spider-Man series. That includes a very dynamic statue of Spidey in his Advanced Suit and a truly epic Ghost Rider on his flaming motorcycle.

Tweeterhead's display was also one of the standouts, particularly thanks to their ongoing DC statue line. Tweeterhead showed off their newly revealed Aquaman statue and offered another look at their Joker on Throne Maquette, a piece that may just be the best Joker collectible ever released (though Sideshow's latest Joker Premium Format Figure offers some stiff competition).

I’ve known there are other monster-hunting games out there besides the quintessential Monster Hunter, but none have really grabbed my attention and hooked me quite the same. Perhaps until now. More needs to be seen before I can say for sure, but after playing more than 10 hours of Wild Hearts, I can say this just might be the one. So far, Wild Hearts looks like an exciting mash-up of challenging hunting, crafting, beautiful semi-open-world environments, and snappy building mechanics that makes it stand on its own four legs.

First, some housekeeping - generally, what everyone wants to know: Wild Hearts is set to be released on February 17, 2023 for the PC and next-gen consoles. Yes, crossplay is supported for its three-player co-op – which is huge for a cooperative-focused game like this. That may sound like an odd number - but during the digital presentation, EA Originals executive producer Lewis Harvey said getting two friends together is easier than three, and balancing for four players didn’t work well because of the building mechanics. We already know there are no restrictions to joining friends, too - hop in whenever, regardless of how much of the story you’ve completed.

Developers are continuing in their quest to make the original Doom playable on every object to ever exist, and it can now be played on Windows' Notepad app.

As reported by The Escapist, developer Sam Chiet has created a fully operable version of Doom in a completely unmodified version of text editor Notepad.

Chiet posted a clip of the game running on his Twitter (below) and his YouTube page, promising that he'll publicly release the Notepad version of the classic FPS soon. "It'll take some work to polish NotepadDoom into something releasable, but it'll almost certainly happen over the next couple days," he said in a follow-up tweet.

i got DOOM running inside Notepad at 60fps pic.twitter.com/EQFuRu4N0r

Atlus has announced that a Persona 5 Royal cooperative card game is being developed in partnership with Pandasaurus Games.

Century: Eastern Wonders and Foundations of Rome designer Emerson Matsuuchi is creating the game, and is targeting a Q4 2023 release date. While this could mean anywhere from October to December next year, a graphic on the announcement post explicitly states it will arrive on October 21.

"Players will take on the roles of their favourite Phantom Thieves and fight to change the world in this cooperative card-based strategy game," said Matsuuchi. Little else about the game was revealed, but it will likely be a standalone release instead of a collectible product given the company's roots in board game products.

It will seemingly let players explore and interact with various locations from the game, including at the very least its supernatural side, according to co-owner of Pandasaurus Games Nathan McNair. "As a diehard fan of Persona 5 Royal, I cannot wait to bring the Palaces, Velvet Room, and world of Persona 5 Royal onto tabletops everywhere in 2023," he said.

Despite Persona 5 Royal initially being released in 2020 (and Persona 5 being released in 2016), the game has recently grown in popularity again thanks to its imminent release on Xbox, Nintendo Switch, and PC on October 21.

Lara Craft Go developer Square Enix Montréal has been rebranded as Onoma following its acquisition by Embracer Group earlier this year.

As reported by GI.biz, a post on the developer's new website explained that "Onoma is Greek for name and names offer endless possibilities", symbolising that players "can be anyone, achieve anything, and go anywhere".

The post continued: "As game makers, we are inventors of new worlds, of new possibilities. Names are the beginning of stories - of our story as individuals and as a community. Stories are invitations to other worlds where the unknown, the impossible, and the magical become reality.

"At Onoma, we are creators, inventors, and storytellers, and the experiences and ideas that we bring to life connect us to each other and to players."

The rebrand marks the beginning of a new chapter for Onoma, which was acquired from Square Enix alongside Crystal Dynamics and Eidos-Montréal back in August.

Your journey in Broken Roads, an isometric RPG set in the post-apocalyptic wastes of Western Australia, begins with a test. Akin to the Voight-Kampff of Blade Runner, it poses a series of hypothetical situations and asks how you’d respond. What would you do if you discovered that a man being taken for execution was probably innocent? How would you deal with scavengers looting from a place you found first? How would you treat a captured bandit who raided your home? Each of your answers is plotted on a literal moral compass, a persistent and permanent mechanic that will shape your character’s worldview across the next 25 or so hours.

That compass is split into four segments - humanist, utilitarian, nihilist, and Machiavellian - and your location on that spectrum dictates what dialogue and actions your protagonist can perform. A humanist character, for instance, will be locked out of saying the most heinous responses simply because they’d never consider saying them. But experiences shape us, and your character’s worldview can gradually shift over time. A utilitarian could slowly find their heart and become a humanist, or slip down a slope of manipulation and end up a Machiavellian. Sometimes your world view widens to take in multiple perspectives, opening up more dialogue options. Other times it will narrow, locking out options but also granting you special abilities that pay off your dedication to a specific worldview.

For the most well-known rally raid event in motorsport, there really haven’t been that many console or PC games based on the Dakar Rally over the last 40-odd years. There appear to be just five, actually – and one of those is an 8-bit, 1988 fever dream where your car has guns and you get from France to Africa by driving… under the sea avoiding giant starfish, lobsters, and many torpedoes. Perhaps adapting the Dakar into a game is as difficult as winning the thing in real life? This would certainly explain Dakar Desert Rally, where I’ve been zigzagging between enjoying its genuinely immersive moments of brilliance and cursing its bugs, uneven performance, odd design choices, and often unresponsive handling, which have effectively counteracted just about everything it does well.

Arkane Studios has officially confirmed that Deathloop takes place in the future of the universe first built in the Dishonored games.

This confirmation comes by the way of Deathloop director and Arkane Lyon studio director Dinga Bakaba, who appeared on The Official Xbox Podcast alongside Arkane Austin studio director Harvey Smith.

Xbox's Jeff Rubenstein asked Bakaba about the rumors and hints that Deathloop is connected to this larger universe. While Rubenstein said he didn't have to confirm anything, Bakaba went above and beyond and not only confirmed that this was true, but he also discussed the thought process behind making it so.

"Not everyone has seen the same thing," Bakaba said of Deathloop. "Not everyone has heard the same song that you might have heard hidden somewhere. Not everyone has seen every room, et cetera, et cetera. So, it was nice to see the community peek at the little clues we did sprinkle everywhere that, yes, indeed, we envisioned Deathloop to be happening in the future after [Dishonored 2's standalone expansion] Death of the Outsider."

Bakaba said the team didn't want to make this connection too obvious and front-facing as it wanted Deathloop to have a story and identity that stood on its own, but that didn't mean it couldn't use the game to explore what would happen after the events of Death of the Outsider.

Between the popularity of the Edgerunners anime series, the improvements in the latest patches, and the recent milestone of having sold 20 million copies, there’s no doubting the fact that CD Projekt Red’s take on ‘roleplaying in the dark future’ is finally living up to much of its original promise – even if it took a bit longer than expected.

What we didn’t necessarily expect, however, was that CDPR would be so quick to announce their plans for another installment of the Cyberpunk series. Details are admittedly sparse – all we really know for certain is that plans for it exist, and that it’s being made by a brand new studio. But given that I’ve already dumped 200+ hours into 2077 and god knows how many more into the original tabletop RPG, it’s never too early to start thinking about how the next chapter of the Cyberpunk saga could benefit from a few lessons learned on its journey so far.

Don’t Announce (or Release) Too Early

Let’s put the cyber-elephant in the room outside first, yes? Lesson One is don’t announce your game a full four years before it even goes into development.

Persona 4 Golden and Persona 3 Portable will officially be released on Xbox Series X/S, Xbox One, PS4, PC, and Nintendo Switch on January 19, 2023.

Atlus announced the news on Twitter, saying, "Persona 3 Portable and Persona 4 Golden release for modern platforms on January 19, 2023." The image features logos for Xbox Game Pass, Xbox Series X/S, Xbox One, and the Windows Store on PC, but it was previously revealed that these games will also arrive on Nintendo Switch and PS4. Persona 3 Portable will also be released on Steam and will join Persona 4 Golden and Persona 5.

🌙 Special Announcement! 📺

Persona 3 Portable and Persona 4 Golden release for modern platforms on January 19, 2023! #P3P #P4G pic.twitter.com/OrAx46j8XG

— Official ATLUS West (@Atlus_West) October 8, 2022

These two re-releases were announced alongside the news that Persona 5 Royal would arrive on these same platforms, in addition to PS5, on October 21, 2022.

Persona 3 Portable may be one of the most notable ports of the bunch as it has been much harder to play since it was originally released on PS2 in 2006. It was last officially released on PSP.