The minds behind Invincible VS are open to collaborations with other genres and IPs, specifically in regards to welcoming potential guest characters from the Mortal Kombat franchise.

We got the chance to sit down with Invincible VS’s Game Director, Dave Hall, and its Lead Combat Designer, Bau Bautista, at Evo 2026, where we asked them about the possibility of adding guest characters from completely different properties a la Street Fighter 6 and Tekken 8.

Both Hall and Bautista enthusiastically welcomed the idea, but made sure to preface that the characters would have to reasonably fit within Invincible's world for such a crossover to make sense.

“I think for us, the Invincible universe is just such a beautiful, violent universe that they would have to fit that. I wouldn't want to put Mario or Luigi in there. That'd be cool, don't get me wrong, but I don't want to rip his head off,” Hall laughed.

This, of course, prompted us to suggest characters from the equally bloody Mortal Kombat universe, which received eager nods of approval from both developers. “NetherRealm, they’re the best. That would be incredible,” Hall said. “If there's an opportunity, I'm not going to say no to Scorpion," Bautista added. "One of the things to keep in mind is, Invincible has a ton of guests and crossovers throughout the comics, so it's not outside the realm of possibility. If we have that opportunity, yes, I'm going to take that.”

Guest characters are a hot topic within the fighting game community as of late, with Tekken 8 revealing Yujiro Hanma for Season Three and Fatal Fury: City of the Wolves adding Kenshiro to the fray this summer — not to mention Final Fantasy VII’s Tifa Lockhart making her way into Street Fighter 6 in early 2027. Mortal Kombat itself is a franchise famous for bringing in wild guest characters from other media genres, including the Xenomorph from Alien, The Boys' Homelander, and even Omni-Man himself.

It’s a trend that’s sweeping across the entire fighting game landscape right now, and one that the Invincible VS team is clearly open to joining if the stars align. And with the groundwork already laid in Mortal Kombat 1, it's not a stretch to assume this crossover might come to fruition on Skybound's side.

Atom Eve Almost Had a 'Revive' Mechanic at Launch

Outside of potential guest characters, the devs also let us in on a few more details regarding the game’s future, including the addition of more single-player content, continuing its story mode, and even adding new mechanics to characters from its base roster down the line.

More specifically, Hall and Bautista mentioned Immortal’s 'revive' technique in keeping with his canonical status as, well, The Immortal. They revealed that they’d initially intended on giving such a mechanic to Atom Eve prior to launch, but simply felt that she wasn’t in a finished state to add yet another tool into her kit at the time.

“Some of the issues that we ran into early on with some of the other characters that are similar to Immortal, like Power Plex and even Eve, was that she was supposed to have a revive mechanic,” Bautista explained.

“But there was too much to work through. I didn’t know if we could do this to the level and the quality that we needed to in time. So we were like, ‘Okay, let's focus now on what we can achieve and make sure she's solid as heck, and then come back to this mechanic.’

When asked if this was something they’d be willing to adding to her kit in future updates, Bautista seemed open to the idea once the game’s meta gets solidified by its playerbase.

“There’s always potential, especially once our meta starts to get more established,” he told us. “Who knows where we're going to push the game? There's all sorts of crazy opportunities. But one of the things we ran into is, once we shipped, our focus has been all about solidifying the foundation of the game. And so now that we're in a pretty solid state, now is the time for us to push things. We're like, ‘Hey, guess what? We've got a pretty solid roster of characters. We can push some new mechanics and ideas.’ And Universa and Immortal are the perfect opportunity for that.”

Yes, the Invincible VS Devs Are Reading What You Say on Twitter

On top of adding new characters and mechanics to the game, the devs assured us that they are hyper-aware of any and all community feedback, whether that be comments sent from players in their official Discord server, posts on social media, and even suggestions in their DMs. “We listen to everything that's happening out there," Hall said. "We're constantly on top of every board, everything, and they're directly messaging us on many apps, so it's important for us. We need the players’ feedback. That's what we thrive on.

“We're very quick. We're kind of a real-time developer and if we see something's wrong, we're going to fix it as soon as we can. We're going to do a hot patch or anything of that nature. What we're kind of focused on right now is giving more to the players. So this is why we're going to keep pushing and getting more characters out there, getting some modes out there, getting our tournament scene going a little more. We're here for the future right now.”

Invincible VS Devs Promise More Single-Player Content

Speaking of “getting modes out there,” the two devs assured us that they are “not done” with publishing more single-player content for Invincible VS, promising to add more content down the line.

However, Hall admitted that they couldn’t give “any reassurances” about continuing the cinematic story mode, which notably ended on a cliffhanger.

“We are definitely working on things to get more single-player experience,” he said.

“It's an important thing for us to kind of push forward on. Like I said, we're trying to keep building the game. We're not done. We're moving as fast as we can to get more and more content out there for the players. Something to keep in mind, too, is that we're a tiny team. We're 50 people, so there's only so much we can do, but at the same time, we're trying to prioritize getting the most bang for our buck.”

Virginia (she/her) is IGN’s News Editor. With ten years of experience reporting on games and entertainment, she’s got a storied background in the fighting game community, influencer news, and viral online trends. Find her on Twitter at @TheeMissGlaze.

Rockstar Games fans seem to be paying eBay scalpers extra for pre-order copies of GTA 6 – even if there isn't much of a reason to.

Listings for pricier versions of Rockstar's new Grand Theft Auto game have already started popping up on the auction website after pre-orders went live for all on June 25. While the retail price for the standard edition is currently locked in at $80, some scalpers have managed to successfully flip their pre-ordered copy for around $90, with some going for even more.

It's something that usually wouldn't come as much of a surprise in the gaming space, especially considering this particular release is one fans have anticipated for more than 13 years. What many already know, however, is that there isn't actually anything stopping players from pre-ordering GTA 6 without an inflated price.

Much to the dismay of physical game collectors everywhere, GTA 6 will only be available as a digital title after Rockstar announced it was ditching discs for its November launch. For those who just need to have that box in hand come this fall, you can still purchase a physical edition, which only comes with a download code inside its case.

That effectively means players won't have to deal with stock shortages since all versions of the game will be available digitally anyway. Even supply for the physical box seems to be holding up, too, as major retailers like Amazon, Best Buy, and Target suggest fans can check out their online marketplaces to pre-order code-in-box copies at the time of this story's publication. For some reason, players – and scalpers – are still heading to eBay.

Interestingly, these eBay listings seem to include both physical boxes and digital copies of the game, with some sellers pointing out that those who buy the latter will not need to pay any shipping fees when the launch arrives. Those purchasing physical copies via this method will also be subject to delivery fees on top of the already steeper price they're paying.

Whether you're buying directly from Rockstar or purchasing a copy for a little extra on eBay for…some reason, GTA 6 has a release date of November 19, 2026, for PS5 and Xbox Series X | S. Meanwhile, a new report has claimed that Rockstar has no plans to ever release a disc for GTA 6. For more on scalpers, you can see how some are trying to flip Valve's new Steam Machine.

Michael Cripe is a freelance writer with IGN. He's best known for his work at sites like The Pitch, The Escapist, and OnlySP. Be sure to give him a follow on Bluesky (@mikecripe.bsky.social) and Twitter (@MikeCripe).

Street Fighter 6 is now three years old and still going strong, with more than 2,000 entrants at this year's Evo in Vegas, a fresh batch of new faces on the horizon in the upcoming fourth character pass (including the much anticipated figthing game debut of Tifa from Final Fantasy 7), and a lively online competitive scene.

To talk about the current state of the game, along with its plans for the future, IGN sat down with Director Takayuki Nakayama and Producer Shuhei Matsumoto at Evo 2026, where we covered topics ranging from the significance of Yasmine's inclusion as the first Filipino character in Street Fighter history, the future of single player content now that regular World Tour updates have ceased, and a little tease of what players can expect out of Arjun, Tifa, and Bosch's playstyles.

IGN: So, to start, you all previously confirmed that there will be no future World Tour updates, at least at this point, but also indicated that Street Fighter 6 is aiming for a 10-year lifespan. Can you talk a little bit about what kind of things that you're planning on adding to the game to keep that life cycle going, apart from just new characters?

Shuhei Matsumoto, Street Fighter 6 Producer: To take a step back real quick, one thing that we do want to make clear in this interview is that there may have been a small misunderstanding in terms of the future plans of Street Fighter 6. Rather than there being a 10-year life plan, like a 10-year roadmap, from our perspective, we try to tackle Street Fighter 6 as a game that could last up to 10 years. And there's no sort of confirmation that this is going to be a 10-year project. Rather, we went into the development with the mindset that we would love to have Street Fighter 6 operating and expanding for 10 years. So, I just want to make sure that's clear.

Takayuki Nakayama, Street Fighter 6 Director: And in terms of what we want to do moving forward from here, there's a lot. Specific details that we can share at this moment is going to be quite difficult in terms of World Tour. This is something that we wanted to continue expanding upon. But besides from that, there are other things that we are currently looking into, and hopefully we'll have more to share at a later date.

So, it's safe to say that the future of single player content is still bright?

Nakayama: Yeah. I mean, there's a lot of things that we want to do. Certain things are out of their control. Just because we want to do something doesn't necessarily mean they can be realized. But we hope that we can deliver – and there's a lot new players – So we hope that we can accommodate to those people's needs.

With development resources presumably being freed up from not having to do World Tour content for every character that comes out, do you envision there being any change in either the frequency or the offerings of DLC in the future of Street Fighter 6?

Nakayama: So, to clarify, while there may have been people working on World Tour in the past, and just because those people's, I guess, bandwidth may be freed up, doesn't necessarily mean that they could easily transfer those resources into something completely different, because the World Tour development required a completely unique skill set, and those skill sets may not necessarily transfer over to the content creation of other things. So it doesn't necessarily equate in that sense.

Speaking of other content, I know people have been really excited about new costumes. Now, I know that when Ingrid was introduced, there were jerseys for all characters, but are there any plans to sort of maybe focus on new costumes or bringing more outfits for the characters anytime soon?

Nakayama: Yeah. So, we do plan to deliver and create outfits and costumes in an equal amount for all the existing characters. We have a high quality benchmark that we're trying to achieve and make sure that we reach that. So, we hope that we can get by the patience of the players out there, but this is something that we’re striving for.

So, we're getting to see Yasmine here at Evo today, but the remaining DLC characters of this pack are all new to the series. And thus, we don't really know or have an idea of how they will play. Could you give us a little tease of the archetypes or just generally how Arjun, Bosch, and Tifa will play in Street Fighter 6?

Nakayama: So, in terms of the fighting styles and what you can expect about their play style, we can say that they definitely feel unique and different from the existing roster.

Arjun is a very unique character that's going to feel very different from everyone else. And we can't go into specifics, but I will say that there will be some kind of dancing element to his gameplay.

In terms of Tifa, he did speak on this previously at SGF, but she will utilize some sort of like Materia aspect from the FFVII series. And she will be different, but have a fighting style that kind of translates from the world of Final Fantasy VII into Street Fighter 6.

And for Bosch, for those who did enjoy World Tour, he was one of Luke's disciples. And while you were able to fight against him and you were able to see his fighting style through World Tour, he will have a completely different style from World Tour. So, you can expect something unique, different from that.

I know when previously we spoke, there weren't any plans to introduce any new mechanics because you're pretty happy with how the game is now. It seems like the player base, at least in the West, is wanting some changes to the Drive system, specifically Drive Rush. Are there any plans to sort of tweak that particular mechanic? And how much do you take player feedback into consideration when you do balances or patches?

Nakayama: So, in terms of any sort of major adjustments to system mechanics, the Drive system, as of now, there's really no plans to make any sort of changes. And to answer your question in terms of how much we listen to user feedback, it is something that we do pay attention to. We see people make comments on social media and, I don't know, surveys and whatnot, and that's something that we do listen to. And while we do take into consideration, we have a pretty large Battle team to actually analyze those requests and test through several battles through the Battle team to determine whether it is right or not.

Matsumoto: And not only that, we also pay attention, not just to pro tournaments, but also casual tournaments, kind of like influencer, or the New Challengers Tournaments maybe, stuff like that, and we make decisions based on the wide spectrum of how that could affect things.

Bringing things back to Yasmine for a second. I think a lot of people really are excited about this character because of the Filipino representation. Can you talk a little bit about the significance of having a Filipino character in Street Fighter and whether there was any sort of unique work that was done to make her feel authentic to the culture?

Nakayama: So, I guess the genesis of how this character was created all started with the desire to want to introduce a first-time Filipino character into this series. And we want to do that because it's the first time that we can have this kind of representation, but also there's a pretty significant amount of people within the FGC who kind of have this kind of Filipino roots, and so we wanted to kind of hype up the scene with this particular audience. And beyond that, we wanted to introduce a brand new martial arts style that many people with Filipino or Indonesian backgrounds are maybe familiar with. So we did a lot of research and homework and even asked for help for professional martial artists who use that Filipino style for the mocap. And beyond that, we even talked internally to people who do have that kind of background, Filipino background, and learn more about their culture and what they value and how important family is to them.

I think visually, Yasmine's design seems to pull from a lot of different aspects of Filipino culture and the area itself. I know some people were speaking about how her hairstyle seems to be inspired by the hawk or the eagle or even the flag, how they turn it upside down during wartime. Is all of that correct? And how deep did you go into bringing these little details to her visual design?

Nakayama: So, yeah, we're definitely paying attention to some of the theories, the hypothesis made by the players out there, and analyzing the Tagalog movement and stuff. Actually, Yasmine, compared, in relation to some of the other characters within the roster, they made a lot more design attempts of this character. A character like Arjun, actually, they came up with relatively quickly, and they were able to solidify his final design at an early stage. But with Yasmine, even though they started off as setting up a school girl in the Philippines, they did a lot of different attempts to see what could actually work for her character design.

And in terms of design direction, we wanted her to... maybe make her stand out, almost, within the Year 4 roster and almost feel like a protagonist or like a main character in, like, a Japanese manga or something. And yeah, we put a lot of effort into her.

This character pack is all new characters to Street Fighter 6. And I was just wondering from the development side, in your opinion, do you enjoy the process of creating a character from scratch for a game like Street Fighter 6, or do you like the challenge of taking an existing character and molding them into kind of the Street Fighter 6 mold?

Nakayama: Yeah. So, they're both difficult in different, unique ways. Obviously, making a brand new character is difficult. But in terms of how we determine what past characters are, the game system of the game that we're working on is so important, right? Like, Street Fighter 2, 3, 4, 5, 6 all have very different game systems, and sometimes it may not work for a certain character that appeared in a past game to come into a game like Street Fighter 6. But by creating new characters, we feel like they're able to kind of expand the world a little bit. And if they have an unlimited amount of budget and time, they'll continue to try to bring everyone back. But yeah, we do what we can.

Virginia (she/her) is IGN’s News Editor. With ten years of experience reporting on games and entertainment, she’s got a storied background in the fighting game community, influencer news, and viral online trends. Find her on Twitter at @TheeMissGlaze. Mitchell Saltzman is an editorial producer at IGN. You can find him on twitter @JurassicRabbit

Director Craig Gillespie says he credits DC Studios co-CEO James Gunn for helping choose the song used in the slow-motion Supergirl fight scene that has caused a stir on social media.

Warning! Spoilers for Supergirl follow.

The filmmaker spearheading the latest live-action DCU installment spoke about the process of choosing tunes for the movie during a conversation published by Rolling Stone yesterday, June 26, 2026. One topic of discussion involved a late-story moment where Kara Zor-El (Milly Alcock) defends her companion, Ruthye (Eve Ridley), from an onslaught of Brigands and their leader, Krem (Matthias Schoenaerts).

This specific moment, featured in some trailers, sees Supergirl using all of her Kryptonian power as audiences are treated to a slow-motion scene that serves as the film's final major action sequence. What pre-release footage didn't reveal is that the moment is also backed by a cover of Jimmy Eat World's "The Middle" performed by Kelty Greye and KidMotel.

Gillespie and screenwriter Ana Nogueira recall that choosing the song was far from a simple process. Ultimately, after looking at "about 45 songs" to fit the scene, the director says it was Gunn who he credits for helping with the final call.

"Oh, God. It went ’round and ’round, didn’t it?" Nogueira said. "There were a lot of options."

"That was probably the biggest discussion," Gillespie chimed in. "And it was down to the very last week, and I gotta give James credit for that one."

It would make sense that the DC executive and Superman director would have a hand in such a pivotal point in Supergirl. Unfortunately, it's not a call that seems to have played out well for the film, at least online.

Fans aren't sure what to make of the second DCU movie as it swoops through its first weekend in theaters, but this song choice, specifically, has left many scratching their heads. Many have taken to social media to dicuss its implementation, making it one of the prevailing talking points currently surrounding the project. Even a few who enjoyed the film – including some who like The Middle cover on its own – aren't sure what to make of it.

"I largely thought the movie was fine to pretty good most of the time but I just…. WHY did they use that version of the song?" one fan commented. "Why didn’t they just do the normal one?"

Made with love, but I had to do it. pic.twitter.com/QCQfCdIfv2

— HiTop Alex (@HiTopFilms) June 26, 2026

"If you are considering 45 songs for a needle drop don't do a needle drop," another said. "A good theme for her would have been better than any needle drop."

"The one thing I noticed about Supergirl reviews was the comment about a final song not fitting," another fan argued. "I’m sorry but that song was absolutely perfect. Kara’s gonna be alright.

Supergirl premiered June 26, 2026. While we wait to see how fans are taking Alcock's take on Kara, you can read IGN's 6/10 review. You can also read about how one of our writers feels about the film's final act.

Michael Cripe is a freelance writer with IGN. He's best known for his work at sites like The Pitch, The Escapist, and OnlySP. Be sure to give him a follow on Bluesky (@mikecripe.bsky.social) and Twitter (@MikeCripe).

Valve has finally opened Steam Machine reservations, and like clockwork, scalpers have already taken to eBay to sell the new tech for more than double its retail price.

The Half-Life and Steam company began allowing eager buyers to sign up for a random chance to buy one of its four Steam Machine reservation options earlier this week. Emails notifying users whether they successfully ended up in the "reservation queue" or the "waitlist" started going out over the last few days.

Stock for the already expensive gaming device, which is priced at $1,049 for its controller-less 512GB model, was always expected to be quite limited, which is why Valve opted for what it called a "less frustrating and more fair" randomized reservation system. Although requirements for the system aimed to get Steam Machines into actual players' hands with less "friction" than a standard purchase rollout, it looks like plenty of scalpers managed to gain access to the launch, too.

Steam Machine reservation listings on eBay have popped up in the hours since Valve started sending those emails, with prices ranging from a few hundred dollars more than the retail listing to more than double the price. One successful listing for the 512GB option with a controller, which is priced by Valve at $1,128, sold for $1,500 – a nearly $400 mark-up.

An eBay listing for the 2TB Steam Machine with a controller (retail $1,428) sold at a $670 mark-up for a total of $2,100. A pricier example of a sold eBay listing saw the 2TB model sell for $2,899 without a controller – more than double Valve's asking price of $1,349. Don't forget to calculate potential shipping costs, too.

It's far from unexpected, especially when it comes to a Valve release. Just last month, similar scalper listings showed up online in the wake of the pre-order battle for the new Steam controller. Originally priced at $99, some listings sold for more than $250.

Meanwhile, those willing to wait are unsure when Valve will notify them that it's their turn to purchase a Steam Machine for its standard price. As the company works to make more of its pricey PC-and-console hybrid into players' hands, you can check out IGN's 8/10 review of the device.

Michael Cripe is a freelance writer with IGN. He's best known for his work at sites like The Pitch, The Escapist, and OnlySP. Be sure to give him a follow on Bluesky (@mikecripe.bsky.social) and Twitter (@MikeCripe).

Whatever kinds of games you favor, you’re probably aware of Age of Sigmar, Games Workshop’s flagship fantasy battle game, thanks to its stores' up and down global high streets. You may be less aware of its kissing cousin, Spearhead which uses a stripped-down version of the rules and fixed army lists to allow faster, more furious fights that are also more newbie-friendly. It’s proved extremely popular.

Now there’s a new starter set for the format, Spearhead: City of Ash, with pretty much everything you need to play in one single box.

What’s in the Box

Like most Games Workshop products, the initial lid-lift reveals a disappointing sea of grey plastic sprues. Also like most Games Workshop products, once you’ve spent considerable time with sprue cutters, hobby knife and plastic glue, your disappointment will vanish as you stare at battalions of extraordinarily detailed and dynamically posed miniatures, bringing a fantasy battlefield to life as few other publishers can.

To add even more spice to the mix, almost all of these models are brand-new. So if you like either of the two represented factions - the stalwart human warriors of the Cities of Sigmar, or the devious rat-man assassins of the Skaven’s Clan Eshin - you might want to pick up Spearhead: City of Ash just to add to your collection. In addition there’s some really lovely ruined building scenery that will look great in any fantasy battle game you care to add it to.

If you’re interested in this as a starting point for the Games Workshop hobby though, a note of warning: some of the figures are quite difficult to assemble, particularly some of the Skaven. They’re flexibly posed and fragile and it’s worryingly easy to damage bits while you’re cutting them off the sprue and trimming the flash, and frustratingly difficult in some cases to understand how the bits fit together, or to access the necessary surfaces.

Beneath the sprues there’s the nuts and bolts of the game: two rules handbooks, some decks of cards and a double-sided base board to fight your battles on. The books are great, glossy and filled with inspirational photos of fully-painted armies, although for some inexplicable reason the build guide for the miniatures is inside one rather than printed as a separate pamphlet, and it won’t lie flat for easy consultation as you trim and glue. The cards are functional but ordinary and while the board looks great it’s unmounted, so requires a judicious amount of back-bending to lie flat.

Rules and How it Plays

If you’ve ever played one of Games Workshop’s core games before, you’ll be familiar with the basics. Players take turns in an I-go, you-go structure running through the phases of each turn like movement, shooting, charge and melee. Each model has a range of stats: a movement distance in inches, a number of attacks, and target values to hit, wound and armor save. In combat you roll dice equal to the total number of attacks for all models of the same type fighting, trying to equal or exceed the hit value. Those that succeed to roll again, trying to equal or exceed the wound value. Then the target unit gets to try and equal or exceed its armor save value to nullify some of the hits. Anything that gets through this process inflicts a wound which is normally enough to kill a standard trooper model, although elite units and heroes can take greater punishment.

Obviously, this process uses a lot of dice and is highly random. And we haven’t even mentioned the importance of charging where you get a two-dice bonus to your move in an attempt to reach an enemy unit, but stand uselessly still if you roll badly or misjudge the distance. Throwing buckets of dice around is tremendously satisfying and often very exciting, generating lots of critical moments during the battle, but it can also be frustratingly swingy. Instead, Spearhead wants you to engage your head in different ways.

For starters, you don’t win simply by slaughtering all the opposition. Each side of the game board, which is a quarter of the size of a full Age of Sigmar battlefield, has a number of objectives printed on it. Models that touch the objective can contest it by adding up their “control” value: if you have higher control on an objective than your enemy, you control it. The more objectives you control, the more points you’ll get in each of the game’s four rounds, after which they’re totalled up to find a winner.

Although the board is relatively small, and there’s a temptation just to pile in toward every objective from the off, this system encourages planning and forethought. Both generals, for example, have special abilities that allow other units to make surprise moves, allowing for some surprising additions to contesting an objective. Like other Games Workshop games there’s also a strong element of rock-paper-scissors in terms of what units are good against facing off others and this calculus is particularly important when deciding what objectives are worth contesting with what units at different points during the battle.

Spearhead thrives at throwing these kinds of curveballs at the player, altering the parameters of play and the strategies you need. Relics litter the battlefield, lending surprising abilities to nearby units, like a barricade that protects from shooting, or caltrops that are very risky to maneuver near. Like objectives, these can very much be worth fighting over. Each turn also sees a new “twist” card revealed from a small deck, with examples including increasing the value of particular objectives, or allowing units to have the tremendously powerful ability to both move and charge but only if they stick to the roads.

Card play more broadly forms another plank of what makes Spearhead work. Players start with a hand of three cards, each of which has two effects: a “tactics” option to score a substantial amount of extra points, and a “command” text that offers a one-off special effect. The former might involve a foray deep into enemy territory, or slaying the enemy general. Examples of the latter include minor stat buffs or the ability to explode a relic, causing damage to models in the vicinity. You re-draw at the start of each turn, so there’s real use-it or lose-it motivation to engineer situations where you can benefit, further influencing your thinking.

Between dice, cards and maneuver, cramped in by that ever-looming four-turn time limit, Spearhead: City of Ash has a cinematic knife-fight quality that’s highly engaging. The unexpected is always around the corner, forcing you to adapt your plans on the fly and spot possible openings for your cards and special powers to really make a difference. And of course, the twists and turns of fate and strategy also make for an excellent storytelling medium, with lots of memorable highlights, accentuated by the fantastic physicality and detail of the miniatures and terrain.

However, all that narrative drama comes at a price. The cost of so many possible things that can happen in a battle is that you need rules for them. While this is certainly more accessible than the full Age of Sigmar experience, and although the rulebook gives you a very helpful step by step set of tutorials to learn the ropes, there’s a lot of complexity to master. In particular you’ll need to grapple with all the rules for the enemy units as well as things like relics and cards if you want to play well. Don’t mistake this for something you can just pick up and play on occasions you feel like it. Between building fiddly figures and mastering all the special rules, Spearhead requires you to dedicate time to it.

The One Flaw

For enthusiasts, or even those who are new to the Games Workshop hobby, Spearhead: City of Ash has one particular unfortunate flaw. In Spearhead you don’t pick units for your army, but choose one of a number of different pre-selected forces to fight with. In theory all the options are supposed to be roughly balanced, but in practice there’s a fair amount of disparity. The Sentinels of Embergard included here are one of the weaker options around and their opponents, Crixxit's Kill-Pack, are among the stronger. In time, Games Workshop may well tweak the unit stats through FAQs and its online app but right now this is not a fair fight.

Where to Buy

Matt Thrower is a contributing freelance writer for IGN, specializing in tabletop games. You can reach him on BlueSky at @mattthr.bsky.social.

PlayStation has notified users that it will soon delete more than 550 digital movies from users' PSN accounts due to a licensing agreement with Studio Canal.

Sony began sending out its warning message via email earlier this week. X/Twitter user @somatyk was one of the first to share the notification, which says the move affects "any" Studio Canal content they may have purchased (via Kotaku).

PlayStation lays it out clearly: "The content will be removed from your video library." The movies will be deleted September 1, 2026. You can see the 551 digital titles affected in a list posted on PlayStation's website.

PREVIOUSLY PURCHASED
$7.535B 2025 profit, but Sony are quite happy to shaft their customers, given half the chance. pic.twitter.com/2QVpSJ7e9D

— somatyk (@somatyk) June 25, 2026

"From September 1, 2026, due to our content licensing agreements, you will no longer be able to access your previously purchased content from Studio Canal, and it will be removed from your video library," Sony's message says bluntly. "Thank you, PlayStation Store."

If you have ever purchased digital movies through the PlayStation Store, you might want to go check out that list. There are plenty of lesser-known films that may not affect many PSN users, but there is a healthy number of popular titles, too.

Some digital versions of movies you may recognize include Apocalypse Now: The Final Cut, Attack the Block, Evil Dead, Highlander, Hot Fuzz, Paddington, Rambo: First Blood, RoboCop (2014), Sharknado, Terminator 2: Judgment Day, and The Beatles: Eight Days a Week – The Touring Years. There are some TV shows on the list, too, including American Gods Season 1 and Below the Surface Season 1.

For now, there is no sign of refunds or alternatives for those who purchased any of the movies on the list. IGN has reached out to Sony for comment.

This isn't the first time Sony has made an announcement regarding the sudden removal of digital movies and shows from the PlayStation Store. In December 2023, the company revealed that Discovery content would be pulled from purchasers' accounts with a message almost identical to the one shared today.

It resulted in quite a negative reaction from those who expected to maintain ownership of titles they had purchased. Just weeks later, Sony reversed course, saying that Discovery titles would no longer be deleted. It said the change of plans was the result of "updated licensing arrangements," thanking fans for their "ongoing support and feedback." At the time, that secured the ability for users to access their purchased Discovery titles "for at least the next 30 months." That 30-month timeline came to an end this month, June 2026.

Sony announced it would "no longer offer movie and TV purchases and rentals on the PlayStation Store" back in 2021. As it moves to delete movies from PlayStation accounts with only a few months' heads-up, fans online are once again discussing what it means to "own" a digital product. It's a topic Time Extension explored in a guest column in 2024. As the fight for digital, movie, TV, and game ownership continues, you can read about why many Grand Theft Auto 6 players are upset with Rockstar Games' latest physical release plan.

Michael Cripe is a freelance writer with IGN. He's best known for his work at sites like The Pitch, The Escapist, and OnlySP. Be sure to give him a follow on Bluesky (@mikecripe.bsky.social) and Twitter (@MikeCripe).

A new weekend has arrived, and today, you can save on Nioh 3, Dragon Quest I & II HD-2D Remake, AirPods Pro 3, and more. Check out our top picks for Saturday, June 27, below.

Dragon Quest I & II HD-2D Remake for $38.99

Full spoilers follow for Supergirl.

Pretty much since the dawn of superheroes, one of the longest standing debates has been whether or not they should kill. Back in the day, vigilantes (even Batman!) carried guns, and coming from the “masked man” tradition, there wasn’t a lot of waffling about whether murdering a killer clown for the greater good was an issue. After all, it was a natural extension of the Westerns that had preceded them, with their good, their bad, and their ugly. But over time, that debate — both with readers and eventually viewers, as well as with the characters in the books, TV shows, and movies — has become a central facet of superhero lore. Should a superhero kill? If they kill, will they be going too far, thus losing their essential heroic nature?

Supergirl, now in theaters, dives head-first back into the debate with a plot that focuses on the title character (Milly Alcock) pairing up with a young girl named Ruthye Marye Knoll (Eve Ridley) who wants to kill Krem of the Yellow Hills (Matthias Schoenaerts) — a brigand, human trafficker, and piercing aficionado who murdered Ruthye’s entire family. Supergirl, meanwhile, wants to track down Krem because he has the antidote to a poison he used on Krypto the Superdog, and they now have 72 hours before the pup painfully dies.

Over the course of the one hour and 48-minute runtime, Ruthye swears she’s going to kill Krem while Supergirl repeatedly urges her away from that path, explaining that killing won’t make the pain go away; it will, in fact, ruin your life. There’s also a lot of discussion about the difference between being nice and being good, as well as perfect and kind… but all that gets thrown away when Supergirl murders Krem at the end of the movie.

To be 100% clear, this is less about the act of killing and whether that’s right or wrong than if killing a villain is supported by the movie that led to this act of extrajudicial execution. Supergirl’s whole character arc in the film is learning to let her actions match her words. She’s telling Ruthye that you have to stand for something, and that letting go of your pain — in the Maid of Might’s case, it’s the death of her own parents by kryptonite poisoning and loss of her childhood home, Argo City — isn’t an option; it’s how you learn to live with loss that matters.

When we re-meet Supergirl at the top of the movie, she’s partying under a red sun in order to dampen enough of her powers to stay absolutely wasted all the time, and struggling with finding a place she can call home. She doesn’t want to wear the “S” suit like her cousin Kal-El (David Corenswet), and she knows she can’t earnestly believe in people the way he does, because she wasn’t raised by good people in Kansas who are still alive. When she arrives on Earth, it’s too noisy, too strange, and doesn’t feel like home. Her journey isn’t about loving all this, but about accepting her destiny as someone who can inspire others to be better, even as she still has work to do on herself. She’s not perfect, but she can be kind, and she may not be nice, but she can be good.

At least until she stabs Krem… twice.

After throwing Krem far away from a fight and saving Ruthye from an attack by the villain’s Brigands, it’s clear that Ruthye has put her revenge aside and taken Supergirl’s words to heart. Meanwhile, Supergirl flies off to confront Krem, where he does a classic “you’ll never stop me, I’ll keep coming no matter what” speech. So Kara looks at him, stabs him as she says, “This is for my dog,” and then stabs him again straight through the throat, killing him, as she says, “And this is for the little girl whose life you ruined.” Not insignificantly, while this happens, Lobo (Jason Momoa) — who has been encouraging Ruthye to kill Krem in direct opposition to Supergirl’s influence — hungrily says “Yes!” in the distance as he watches on his space-bike. Basically, Lobo’s philosophy that “revenge=good” has won out in the end, not Supergirl’s philosophy that revenge doesn’t take the pain away.

Perhaps even more mind-boggling is the second line here, because so much of the movie is pushing back on the view of both Supergirl and Ruthye as “mere” little girls, as well as how they are not ruined: Their respective trauma is part of who they are and always will be. It’s not about being ruined; it’s about learning to live with the hurt and how it impacts your decisions that makes you who you are.

This ending is also diametrically opposed to how it plays out in the source material for this film, the comic book Supergirl: Woman of Tomorrow by Tom King and Bilquis Evely. The graphic novel is told at least in part through narration by Ruthye, which we discover towards the end of the eight-issue series is a book written by Ruthye which she calls “fictitious fiddle-faddle” when Supergirl visits her about three centuries after the main events of the comic. This future-set scene takes place directly after Supergirl, whittled to a nub by their adventure tracking down Krem, explains to Ruthye that she was trying to teach her how to make the right choices over their adventures, but it didn’t work, so now she has to kill Krem. Ruthye shouts that she was listening, she did hear, and she did learn; they instead put Krem in the Phantom Zone, where he indeed learned his lesson over 300 years of imprisonment. Released at last, Krem begs for the older Ruthye’s forgiveness. Then she conks him on the head, seemingly killing him.

That in itself is a heavily debated moment of the book, but contrast Supergirl backing off killing in favor of reform at the end of that comic, and Ruthye (at least initially) choosing redemption over revenge. Funnily enough, we’re also told via that “fictitious fiddle-faddle” narration that Ruthye had Supergirl stab Krem to death with her sword, which we, the reader, know didn’t happen. So perhaps one could look at the movie as an adaptation of the book Ruthye wrote later, except that in the movie, there’s no narration, no future-set scene — just Supergirl impaling Krem and watching him bleed out in the dirt.

All of this calls to mind another highly debated, highly optional murder in a Superfamily movie — specifically, Superman (Henry Cavill) killing Zod (Michael Shannon) in Man of Steel. While far too much ink has been spilled about this already, it’s eerily similar to how things play out in Supergirl, with Superman holding Zod in a chokehold while he blathers about how Superman will never stop him, etc. Instead, Superman snaps Zod’s neck, killing him. There Superman feels pretty bummed out and screams, and the ostensible excuse is that this is a fresh-faced, younger Superman (who is 33) that hasn’t yet learned murder is bad. The argument in the other direction is that the whole point of Superman is to shove him into impossible situations like this and see how he does the right thing regardless.

That in essence is what Supergirl is trying to teach Ruthye — and by extension herself — throughout the newer film. She knows she’ll never be the nice dork her cousin is (Corenswet version), but she can find her own moral compass for good. So how does killing Krem satisfy that closure other than for movie audiences who would potentially be less than satisfied watching Krem get thrown into a rectangular prison?

Perhaps it’s something they’ll deal with further in the DCU, as the movie ends with Superman welcoming Supergirl back home to Earth and tentatively asking without asking if she’s okay. The DCU, too, has drawn the line between other heroes and Superman, with the Man of Steel stopping the Justice Gang from going too far in his self-titled movie, only for Hawkgirl (Isabela Merced) to gleefully kill a baddie while Superman is busy elsewhere in the climax. So maybe in the upcoming Man of Tomorrow, which also features Supergirl, we’ll see her either further inspired by Superman’s actions or breaking with him entirely. They’re different characters after all, despite the similar red-and-blue suits.

Just in terms of the movie Supergirl in theaters now, however, the title character’s final act in the film completely undercuts all the emotional development that has come before in service of a “hell yeah” moment in the theater. If anything should be killed, it’s the “should heroes kill” debate, because as Supergirl keeps stating over and over, death is never the answer.

Five Nights at Freddy's 3 has reportedly tapped It and Annabelle scribe Gary Dauberman to write its script.

Blumhouse Atomic Monster and Universal seem to have made their first real move for yet another sequel in their series of video game-to-movie adaptations, according to Dread Central (via The Hollywood Reporter). It's a sign not only that work on the next FNaF movie is underway but that the team is looking to spice up Freddy Fazbear's Pizza this time around.

Dauberman's resume includes credits on projects like the 2017 It reboot, its sequel, and 2014's Annabelle. He also helped write The Nun and last year's Until Dawn movie and is attached to the upcoming Street Fighter and Helldivers films.

The first Five Nights at Freddy's film, which premiered in 2023, was co-written by creator Scott Cawthon and director Emma Tammi. Its sequel then followed in 2025 and was written by Seth Cuddeback. It's unclear if Dauberman will write the new script alone as Blumhouse and Universal attempt to reanimate the franchise's terrifying animatronic for Five Nights at Freddy's 3.

Five Nights at Freddy's 3 has not been formally announced, but it wouldn't be a surprise to see it get the green light. The first two movies were tremendous successes, with the first quickly becoming Blumhouse's biggest ever at the time, and the sequel bringing in a solid opening haul, too. Global box office totals saw Five Nights at Freddy's 1 finish with $291.5 million and Five Nights at Freddy's 2 finish with $238.5 million, according to Box Office Mojo.

The Hollywood Reporter says that, should work on Five Nights at Freddy's 3 move forward, Tammi, who directed the first two films, is expected to return. Cawthon is also expected to be involved as a producer. Although stars like Josh Hutcherson, Piper Rubio, and Elizabeth Lail have not officially signed on for another installment, the site says "many are expected" to return, too.

Even as audiences have flocked to see Freddy, Chica, Foxy, and Bonnie hit the big screen, the movies have been notoriously panned by critics. Movie review aggregator Rotten Tomatoes has the first currently sitting at a 33% critic score and 85% audience score, with ratings for the second at 17% from critics and 82% from audiences. IGN gave FNaF 1 a 4/10 and FNaF 2 a 3/10.

Blumhouse Atomic Monster and Universal may be hoping to even out those scores as Dauberman gives Five Nights at Freddy's 3 some fresh blood. For more, you can check out our worst-reviewed movies of 2025.

Michael Cripe is a freelance writer with IGN. He's best known for his work at sites like The Pitch, The Escapist, and OnlySP. Be sure to give him a follow on Bluesky (@mikecripe.bsky.social) and Twitter (@MikeCripe).

If the average person was asked to name some of Disney’s most influential animated classics, you’d probably hear names like Snow White, The Little Mermaid, Beauty and the Beast, or The Lion King. Far less likely would be Atlantis: The Lost Empire, which was released 25 years ago this month on June 15, 2001. Coming off what is widely considered one of the studio’s strongest eras with the Disney Renaissance of the 1990s, Atlantis was an attempt by the team behind The Hunchback of Notre Dame — directors Gary Trousdale and Kirk Wise, producer Don Hahn, and screenwriter Tab Murphy — to chart a new course for Disney theatrical animation, one styled after Adventureland at Disney’s theme parks.

Sadly, that attempt didn’t fare so well. Atlantis flopped at the box office, and was met with mixed to negative reviews. You might think that would be the end of the story, but sometimes, movies have longer shelf lives than their initial reception would suggest. Atlantis developed a strong cult following after making its way to home video, and has been far better received now than it was on its original release. But more than that, the film has arguably helped shape the entire direction of North American theatrical animation by essentially being the road not taken for animated features. How did this happen? Let’s take a look...

Atlantis Is Waiting

When it comes to the eras of Disney animation history, the period after the much-lauded Disney Renaissance — generally considered to have ended with Tarzan in 1999 — has rarely been placed in the same conversation. Yes, there were some not-great movies released during that period, but Atlantis has always gotten the short end of the stick given the pedigree of talent involved. Gary Trousdale and Kirk Wise directed Beauty and the Beast and The Hunchback of Notre Dame, two of the most artistically resonant animated movies of the 1990s, and Tab Murphy had penned the screenplays for both Hunchback and Tarzan. The film has a strong cast, sharply directed action sequences, a beautiful musical score by James Newton Howard, and a gorgeous art style based on the work of famed Hellboy comic artist Mike Mignola. This was not some low-rent production lacking in major talent, and the strength of those artists and their vision is why the film maintains a fanbase to this day.

I spoke to Trousdale and Murphy about the film, and asked them what they think has kept Atlantis alive in the popular imagination.

“I like to think that it's a decent film,” said Trousdale. “That it's entertaining and fun, and the characters are fun. I mean, we kind of patterned it after the live-action Disney films from the late '50s and early '60s, the Jules Verne 20,000 Leagues Under the Sea, that kind of action adventure film… it didn't do as well with the adults who were expecting talking lions and singing mice and all that. And there was gunfire and there were no songs. We found out that the kids really enjoyed it, but they didn't really have a voice."

Murphy agreed, saying that “a lot of kids watched it on home video and wore out VHS tapes. So there was this growing fanbase [that] I think myself and a lot of the filmmakers were unaware of, because there's no way to track home video, how the fanbase grows out of sharing a VHS or ultimately the DVD and all that stuff.”

The sense of adventure and exploration with a vivid group of characters that the film manages to convey in a tight 90-minute runtime is one of its best aspects. Trousdale elaborated on how the creative team convinced the studio to move away from the Broadway musicals that had defined the last decade of Disney films.

“I think it might've been Kirk or maybe it was Don that came up with the notion that when you go to Disneyland and you're headed straight for Cinderella's Castle, you go through it and you're in Fantasyland. And that's the movies that we're doing for the last 70 years. But if you hang a left, you're in Adventureland. It's still a Disney land. And that's what got the executives to go, ‘Oh yeah, you're right.’”

Add in evocative location, vehicle, and creature design — the Leviathan is still one of the best monsters to ever appear in a Disney film — and you have a movie that has continued to charm both older audiences revisiting it and newcomers who discover it. But the timing of its release caused a lot of problems; Atlantis was a 2D animated adventure at a time when 3D animated comedies were becoming the new model for theatrical animation... and that’s where everything started to fall apart.

Nothing Personal

Atlantis is a flashpoint in film history because it sits right on the dividing line between 20th century and 21st century theatrical animation. It’s a 2D animated adventure film with some 3D elements — a blend of two styles that would largely become segregated in the years to follow. It’s not quite akin to the films of the Disney Renaissance, yet it’s also not quite what feature animation would become after the turn of the millennium with the rise of Pixar and Dreamworks’ 3D movies that would change the industry forever. Atlantis is fascinating because it was part of a small wave of 2D/3D hybrid adventure features — Atlantis in 2001, Treasure Planet in 2002, and Sinbad: Legend of the Seven Seas in 2003. These movies, all of which bombed at the box office, ran in parallel to the mode of storytelling popularized by the likes of Toy Story and Shrek.

When asked about the impact of 3D movies on Atlantis, Trousdale said “I kind of pin it on the first Shrek for putting the nail in the coffin of 2D animation. And there's still a big appetite for it, but not as much in this country as say Japan or Italy. It's almost like a boutique kind of medium here to see 2D animation because 3D animation has taken over.”

Murphy echoed the sentiment, saying “there was a new kid on the block, a new toy glistening in the movie theaters, and that was CGI, that was Shrek. And so Atlantis got released at a time when all eyes were sort of moving off of Disney a bit onto DreamWorks.”

Not only was Shrek a massive success that spawned a long-running franchise, it opened the door for Dreamworks Animation to become a major player in the theatrical space with projects like Madagascar, Kung Fu Panda, and How to Train Your Dragon. While Disney struggled until around 2010 to find a new direction for its main animated division, Pixar was in its golden age in the early 2000s with movies like Monsters Inc, Finding Nemo, and The Incredibles.

That Atlantis stood in such contrast to emerging industry trends — that it was staunchly not part of the "new way" of doing things — is both what has made it so distinct in retrospect and so out of step with what audiences were coming to crave in 2001. Atlantis was simultaneously behind the curve and ahead of its time, featuring old-fashioned pulp serial sensibility in a market that longed for the novelty of fully computer-generated features and an easygoing comedic flavor. Yet those same creative instincts that condemned Atlantis’ theatrical prospects are exactly what has kept it alive as a cultural artifact a quarter century later. In the same way that Event Horizon doomed space horror movies for the foreseeable future only to become a touchstone for the format because there were so few other examples, Atlantis is one of the only entries in a subgenre that never really was: the blockbuster animated action adventure.

Atlantis’s financial failure, alongside its siblings Treasure Planet and Sinbad, didn't just cause Disney to abandon the Adventureland experiment, but also heralded the almost complete disappearance of 2D animation from the theatrical space by the 2010s.

Our Way of Life is Preserved

The speed at which 2D animation fell out of favor in North America post-Atlantis is startling when you actually look at the timeline. Even with Pixar’s release schedule being nearly annual, Disney’s main theatrical division started making the transition to 3D in earnest as early as 2005, putting out Chicken Little, Meet the Robinsons, and Bolt in quick succession (they’d done a one-off 3D experiment in 2000 with Dinosaur). Disney’s last 2D animated film was 2011's Winnie the Pooh, with every single theatrical movie since then being 3D. That’s not to say that Atlantis was the only reason for the industry's reinvention, but the movie not doing well theatrically did result in a massive shift in Disney’s operational strategy since the film was being groomed to be the next big franchise in the studio’s catalogue.

Atlantis’ creative team did have a concept for a theatrical sequel which was separate from the direct-to-video sequel that was actually produced. Trousdale confirmed that Helga Sinclair would have returned as the villain.

"There were maybe a couple outline pages written. I don't think there was ever a script, but yeah, it was an idea that Milo and Kida are exploring the other cavern networks and seeing who else is down there. And they run into Helga and she's a video game boss now. She's a steampunk cyborg who's crystal powered and she has this band of pirates and rogues.” Trousdale also discussed Disney’s plans for Atlantis theme park attractions, saying that “they were going to build an Atlantis ride in Florida. They were going to retrofit the submarine ride in Anaheim, California… they were going to put the Leviathan down there and change the architecture. But yeah, all that fell through.”

Murphy had his own idea for a potential follow-up to Atlantis — a prequel.

"My preference would've been to actually tell the story of Princess Kida from princess to warrior, and the movie would end when Milo and the team arrived… I thought there would be a great story in there, her story.”

Instead, none of these things — including the planned Team Atlantis television series — would come to pass. Atlantis has since largely been ignored by Disney, to much frustration from those who love the film.

“One of my current gripes," said Trousdale, "is that Disney has kind of elevated all the Disney princesses to this new level, and there's all the princess girls, and Kida isn't one of them. They don't count her. It's like, ‘come on guys, she's literally a princess. She's a queen for Christ's sake.’"

Murphy also spoke about the impact Princess Kida had on his interactions with fans: “I can't tell you how many women and how many Black women have come up to me and said, ‘That movie made such an impression on me, for that character alone, because it was the first time I sat in a theater and I looked up as a little girl and I saw somebody that looked like me as a character in a Disney movie.’”

Disney doesn’t acknowledge Kida as an official Disney Princess despite the fact that she was a Black princess who preceded Tiana from The Princess and the Frog by nearly a decade, but as Trousdale said: “We didn’t make enough money. That was the bottom line.”

Regarding the ramifications of Disney ultimately moving away from 2D, Trousdale said that “we've lost a lot of the expertise, a lot of the crews, the people that did the animation, the actual animators, the cleanup artists, the cel painters. Well, they didn't paint cels anymore. It was on a digital screen… most of those people have retired or died off or just moved on to other things. And every so often you'll hear of a studio or you'll hear of Disney going, ‘We're going to bring back 2D animation.’ And my reaction is usually like, ‘Well, good luck. You got to find the people to do it now. You had the people and you let them all go and they're gone now.’” As for how Disney as a company would be different if Atlantis was successful, Trousdale said “they might still have a 2D division because it had been theoretically proven that the 2D was still viable and was still marketable, so they probably wouldn't have ditched all of the 2D. That genre of picture, the action adventure, the non-musical, might have a little bit bigger space in the building.”

Atlantis: The Lost Empire was a crucial junction for Disney. It represented a moment in time where the company was open to moving in a new creative direction after years of success. That direction was cut short by Atlantis failing at the box office, and the consequences — not just for Disney, but the entire animated film industry — are still being felt to this day. But while Atlantis may not have found its audience on release, it has in the years that followed. It may not be the success it needed, but it has at least received the love it deserves.

Carlos Morales writes novels, articles, and Mass Effect essays. You can follow his fixations on Twitter.

Earlier this year, LEGO released the first batch of official LEGO Pokémon sets. They’re all excellent sets, but the pièce de résistance of the bunch was LEGO Pokémon Venusaur, Charizard, and Blastoise, a $650 set featuring evolved versions of the Kanto starters. It’s a remarkable set in a number of ways, and a gorgeous display piece for adult Pokémon fans. It was a LEGO Store exclusive — until now. Amazon has put up a listing for the big one, and it's available now.

LEGO Pokemon Venusaur, Charizard and Blastoise at Amazon

Viral social media posts and articles claiming a physical disc copy of GTA 6 is in the works are incorrect.

Various articles and social media accounts reported that GTA 6 would launch on an actual disc by the end of this year after an image featuring comments from Rockstar Support went viral, garnering millions of views. The support email said: “You will be able to acquire a physical copy during the following months.” While the email is legitimate, it does not indicate a disc version is in the works.

The Hollywood Reporter confirmed that the support email was a genuine response to a ticket filed to Rockstar Support asking for a disc version of GTA 6, and that while the response was poorly worded, it did not announce any change in policy, nor confirm a disc release was in the works.

THR said “a source with knowledge” of Rockstar’s GTA 6 launch strategy told it there are “no plans” for GTA 6 discs to be printed, “not at launch, and not months after.”

When Rockstar Support mentioned a “physical copy,” it was referring to the physical version the company has already announced — the one that comes with just a code in the box. “The following months,” just means following preorders going live this week and all the announcements that came with it, not the following months after GTA 6 goes live in November.

Now, plenty of people have questioned Rockstar’s announcement language here — should we really be calling it a “physical version” if there’s no disc? But the upshot is there is no disc coming. So, if you want to play GTA 6, you’ll need to download the game.

There were also headlines this week based on a report from a Polish website and its “insider” who claimed a disc version of GTA 6 was due out in December. While the report provided fans with more hope, it was wrong, too.

Why has Rockstar decided not to go with a disc version of GTA 6, and risking angering core gamers in the process? There are a number of reasons, analysts told IGN this week, and they all make commercial sense. Meanwhile, some retailers are refusing to sell GTA 6 because the physical version lacks a disc.

Yesterday, IGN reported on the results of our own poll where we asked if you’re going to buy the $100 Ultimate Edition or the $80 Standard Edition. Somewhat surprisingly, over 70% of you intend to buy the more expensive version.

Wesley is Director, News at IGN. Find him on Twitter at @wyp100. You can reach Wesley at wesley_yinpoole@ign.com or confidentially at wyp100@proton.me.

If you've got the budget for it, there's nothing on the market that's better than an OLED TV. And among OLED TV brands, I wouldn't recommend any over LG now that it has dropped in price on the final day of Amazon Prime Day. The 2025 65" LG Evo C5 OLED Smart TV is currently $1,099.99, which beats yesterday's already low price of $1,199.99 and makes this the best deal we've ever seen for this excellent OLED TV.

65" LG Evo C5 4K OLED TV Drops to $1,099.99 for Prime Day

It's still Amazon Prime Day for a few more hours, with the steepest discounts ending tonight. If you're like me, you haven't actually bought anything from the sale yet and have been waiting until the last day. Procrastination aside, it's not too late to find discounts on pretty much everything you can think of. From the gaming and collector side, there's some decent video games still on sale, plus book box sets, Blu-rays, LEGO, and KPop Demon Hunters Squishmallows, to name a few.

As much as I want to buy dozens of Blu-rays to add to my movie collection, I'm being pretty frugal about what I'm willing to spend money on right now. And since it's summertime, I'm switching gears to focus on how I can best beat the heat and have some fun outside over the coming weekends. I'm talking new swimming gear, camping gear, portable fans, cold treats and everything in between. See what summer-themed deals I found below.

Summertime Prime Day Deals

As you shop for your own cooling gear, don't forget about keeping your pets cool this summer, too! The Bedsure cooling blanket above is just one of many options for your fur babies.

Ice Cream is 50% off at Whole Foods for Prime Members

It’s the final day of Amazon’s Prime Day Sale. If you were waiting for the best time to buy a TV, chances are good you won’t see discounts like these again for a while. That means you need to take advantage of these savings while you still can. To help narrow your search, I’ve highlighted several of my favorite Prime Day TV deals. All of these TVs are under $1,000, and only one of my picks is exclusively for Prime members, so that everyone can get in on the action.

TL;DR - The Best TV Deals Under $1,000

Whether you’re looking for a cheap TV to throw in a spare bedroom or want all the bells and whistles, there’s an under $1,000 TV deal for you. Even IGN’s top gaming TV, the Samsung S90F, is on sale. Or, maybe you want a display that won’t be an eyesore in your space? Both Samsung’s The Frame and its budget rival, the Hisense CanvasTV, have dropped to their lowest prices on Amazon this year. Check out all the awesome discounts below:

Score the 55" Samsung S90F for $998

The 65" TCL QM6K Is Down to the Lowest Price of the Year

The 65" Hisense U7 Hits a New Low

Save $500 on the 65" Samsung The Frame

Save $180 on Amazon’s 55" Ember 4-Series

Get A Samsung The Frame Alternative for Cheap

$400 Off the 55” Roku Smart TV Pro Series

65” LG C5 Down to Lowest Price Ever

Physical media collections are all the rage again. Whether you're hoarding books, 4K Blu-rays, or video games, the allure of having a beautifully curated shelf is quite tempting. And if you're looking to add a bit of magic to your little library for cheap, I highly recommend adding a book nook kit into the mix.

Book nooks have been getting more and more popular as physical media collections have started growing again and there's a surprising variety of brands to choose from. If you're anything like me, though, you're likely going to want to go with a fantasy theme to match all of your fantasy books. Amazon has a number of really cool options that fit that style perfectly, all of which are on sale for Prime Day right now.

Fantasy Book Nook Kits on Sale Today

If you aren't already familiar with how book nook kits work, you should know that this is a DIY project. You aren't purchasing a fully assembled shelf filler, you're buying various wood or cardboard components and putting them together. Think of these as a sort of LEGO alternative that doesn't come with the same high cost as plastic bricks. You will need to provide your own silicone glue and batteries, but that's it.

As for what book nooks I recommend checking out, my top pick is The Gate of Wonderland book nook. This is one of the cheapest ones I could find that still had good reviews and I honestly think it looks awesome. You've got some sort of wizard, a dark magical forest, and a portal to an unknown realm all rolled up into one thing. There's even an LED light that brings the whole thing to life once it's all complete. Amazon includes a build video on the product page that appears to be trying to connect it to the Harry Potter books for some reason, but the kit itself isn't actually HP branded at all.

The other book nook kit I recommend checking out first is very obviously trying to look like The Lord of the Rings. It's got a dragon, medieval architecture, and even an actual ring hanging right in the middle there. Since it isn't technically licensed LotR merch, the name for this book nook is actually Spirit Valley of Magic Rings. If you can look past all of that nonsense, though, it's actually a really cool kit.

If you are looking for an actual Tolkien-themed book nook, there is an officially licensed option available at a slight discount right now. The LEGO Balrog book nook showcases Gandalf's epic "You shall not pass" moment from the movies and is actually quite a cool set. The only problem is that even with the discount, it's still over $100. So going with the cheaper off-brand kit is definitely an option worth considering. You could also get a pair of cool LotR bookends instead for about half that price and those require no assembly at all.

These Prime Day deals end tonight

Book nooks get discounted fairly often throughout the year, but Amazon Prime Day is arguably the best time to buy them this cheap. These discounts are currently set to expire at midnight tonight, so if you're interested in grabbing one as a gift for yourself or a loved one, you should do so now. There are also a number of fantasy books on sale right now if you need to add more novels to your shelf.

Jacob Kienlen is a Senior Audience Development Strategist and Writer for IGN. Born and raised in Portland, Oregon, he has considered the Northwest his home for his entire life. With a bachelor's degree in communication and 10 years of professional writing experience, his expertise is spread across a variety of different pop culture topics -- from TV series to books and the latest Pokémon games.

I’ve always liked Dead or Alive – unfortunately, that sentence usually has to be followed by a “but,” lest people think you’re some kind of weird pervert. “Not like that!” you might yell. “I think the Triangle System is rad!” It’s tiresome, and Dead or Alive 6 is a mechanically rich fighting game that deserves better than that stuff dominating the conversation around it. That said, while everything that made it special in 2019 still holds up today, Last Round specifically just doesn't feel worth the cash if you already own the original – and there are several things missing from it that really should have been included in a re-release of a seven-year-old game.

Before we jump into the ring and throw some punches, let's set some ground rules and establish what Last Round is (and unfortunately is not). Last Round is Dead or Alive 6 bundled with five of the seven DLC fighters previously released for the original game (Nyotengu, Phase 4, Momiji, Rachel, and Tamaki), five new costumes each for Kasumi, Ayane, Marie Rose, Honaka, and NiCO, a new Photo Mode, and some small but solid visual updates. That’s it.

What is not included are several hundred DLC costumes (this is not a joke; the Steam page currently lists 440 pieces of DLC, though some are bundles and character unlocks), although you can import most of what you already own if you've previously bought an outfit in the original release of DOA6. What you do not seem to be able to transfer are unlocks for the guest characters Mai Shiranui and Kula Diamond from The King of Fighters series – you'll have to buy them for $11 each, even if you already owned them. Yikes.

And that's Last Round. There are no new characters or returning stages from older games, as there were in Dead or Alive 5 Last Round. There is no cross-platform play, no rollback netcode, and no Tag Battle, despite fans begging for these additions for years. Team Ninja has promised additional characters and costumes down the line, but this threadbare re-release is absolutely baffling. Dead or Alive 6 is seven years old. If all the existing DLC were included for free or some impactful new feature were added then maybe you could justify it. But as it is, Last Round just feels like an excuse to sell more costumes. Those costumes are nice, sure, but there’s really no excuse for why they weren’t just new DLC.

I’m a Fighter

That's a bummer, because Dead or Alive 6 is still a great fighter. The Dead or Alive series has always been extremely simple: one button for punches, one for kicks, one for throws, one for holds, and a “new” (as of the 2019 original) special attack button that performs a Fatal Rush autocombo and unlocks special meter moves. But more than a lot of fighters, Dead or Alive is, at its best, a chess match. Using what’s known as the Triangle System, every move invites a countermove – strikes beat throws, throws beat holds, holds beat strikes – and every attack is also an opening, if you’re good enough.

What makes this fighting system great has always been the holds. See, you can counter essentially any strike by pressing hold and the direction you expect the attack to hit (high, low, or mid, though mid punches and mid kicks require different directional inputs), potentially stopping any offensive in its tracks. Holds are inherently risky, though. They won’t stop throws and still lose to strikes if mistimed or if you don’t use the right one – but land a hold right and you can swing an entire round. It’s absurdly satisfying to pull off, even against the computer.

The mind game that creates rules, and it’s still here in Last Round, but it doesn’t change that Dead or Alive is also incredibly easy to pick up. It’s not quite as deep as, say, Virtua Fighter, but anyone can play Dead or Alive 6. Getting good at it involves really digging into moves and countermoves, knowing how both the character you’re playing and the one you’re playing against work, and using that knowledge to pick the right option at the right time. It feels great when you land a hit, and hurts to take one.

When you’re getting smacked around and watching your health bar go the way of the dodo, it stings. But it should. That means you made a mistake. Shouldn’t have mistimed that hold, ya know? But when you max out your Break Gauge in order to hit a Break Blow – think Critical Blows from Dead or Alive 5 – or get just enough Break Gauge to pull off a Break Hold and turn the tables with a nifty counter, the Triangle System sings. Adding a meter to a 3D fighter is always risky (just ask Tekken fans how they feel about Heat in Tekken 8), but I think Dead or Alive 6’s implementation has managed to stand the test of time.

Dead or Alive 6 Last Round also feels absurdly good to play on PC. Hits carry weight and impact, characters feel agile, and matches are quick and engaging. You can pull off some truly sick combos if you know how, but matches still revolve around risk-reward decision making and execution. I'm also still a big fan of the Danger Zones, which range from overtly silly things like “you got blasted into a pterodactyl egg and now the pterodactyls are Big Mad at you” to “it's funny when someone falls down a really big hill and hits everything along the way.” Positioning, poise, and proper timing are elements of any fighting game, but it’s hard to overstate how simple and clean and good Dead or Alive's moment-to-moment game feel is. Everything just flows.

As someone who played a lot around the original’s release in 2019 but didn’t keep up with every update since, one of the benefits of Last Round is getting to use the five included DLC characters I hadn’t tried out. I enjoyed them all, but really clicked with Momiji, Rachel, and Phase 4. Momiji trades power for speed and aggression, while Rachel is all brute strength through short strings that turn into lots of damage, which tracks if you’ve played as either of them in Ninja Gaiden. Phase 4, well… she can do a little bit of everything – one of those “feels immediately good to play” kind of characters, at least for me. I definitely want to spend more time with her.

What’s Old is New Again

Dead or Alive 6 is otherwise the same game I remember – and though that’s disappointing for a $40 re-release, it’s mostly a good thing when it comes to the actual game stuff. It still has excellent teaching tools, including an incredibly detailed tutorial, command training, your standard training mode (complete with frame data), and combo trials for each character. If this is your first Dead or Alive, it's easy to find your footing, and if you’re knocking off some rust, these things still help a lot.

I'm also a big fan of DOA Quest, a challenge mode that puts you into a fight and gives you up to three tasks to complete, like doing X amount of damage in a combo or hitting an enemy while they're sidestepping. The best part is that if you don’t know how to do something, you can press a button and be immediately taken to the appropriate lesson in the tutorial, practice to your heart's content, and then go back to DOA Quest when you're done. Incredible. Fighting games are hard to learn and anyone who tells you otherwise is lying, so good teaching tools are essential to getting people in and keeping them around. DOA6 may be seven years old, but it got this stuff right, and that’s a big deal.

The other single-player modes are good, too. Say what you will, but I like the enjoyably silly if disjointed story mode. Sure, it's about tournaments and evil corporations and global conspiracies and ninjas and cyborgs and all sorts of crazy stuff, but it’s also very endearing. Where else can you see a guy yell “Hey, ninja man!” at an actual ninja before throwing a steel drum at him and immediately thereafter watch two women bond over their love of fighting, and then watch a couple of kids cheer on a New York street fighter after a sparring match? Not many places, and I would much rather play through this than something like Street Fighter 6's World Tour, or just watch a movie like in Guilty Gear Strive.

It’s also nice to see a fighting game campaign that puts women in its lead roles instead of relegating them to supporting parts like most others do. The boys play their parts and get their moments, but this show mostly belongs to Kasumi, Helena, Ayane, Honaka, Laifeng, and Hitomi. They make choices, have agency, and solve their own problems in a way people who have only ever seen them playing beach volleyball might not expect. And sure, the story is a little Looney Tunes, but every fighting game’s is. Ever paid attention to Street Fighter lore? There’s a guy who thinks he’s a car, and that might not even be the weirdest part of it. Dead or Alive even makes a hell of a lot more sense than something like Mortal Kombat (and I say this as someone who likes MK's nonsense), and while the overarching plot can be messy, the individual scenes and character interactions work well and are a lot of fun.

Of course, that’s not the reputation Dead or Alive is typically known for, and because one of the selling points of Last Round is new costumes and a Photo Mode, I suppose I now have to talk about the thing that consumes every piece of criticism ever written about this series: how everyone looks and moves. Yes, the women look Like That™. Yes, many of them are very bouncy. Yes, you can change their hairstyles, give them glasses, and even dress them in revealing outfits if you’re into that (though you’ll still need to pay extra for the truly egregious stuff). Personally, I’m here for the punching.

If we’re being honest, there is no shortage of sexy characters in fighting games; Soul Calibur’s Ivy is quite literally a dominatrix and Capcom’s sexy outfits for Chun-Li sell so well that the last couple Street Fighters made the GDP of a small country. If anything, fighting games have only gotten hornier as time has gone on. I mean, have you seen the Guilty Gear cast? Or Street Fighter’s Juri, who is now Foot Fetish: The Character? Compared to some of that stuff, Dead or Alive 6’s brand of horny feels kind of… quaint? Some of the outfits here are tacky or tasteless, yeah, but I also don’t have to purchase or use them, or let them define my entire perception of Last Round. And if someone does use one of the ones I dislike online? All the more reason to kick their ass.

In fact, many of the visual improvements that were dismissed in 2019 as Team Ninja “being weird” actually hold up quite well. It rules that characters sweat during combat and you can see cuts and bruises on their faces and bodies when they’re doing their win poses. You should be a little sweaty and beat up after a fight, and it doesn’t feel like those details have been added with purely exploitative, leering intentions. Fighting is a brutal, bloody business. I like that Dead or Alive 6’s characters look like they’ve been in a brawl after a knock down, drag out fight. Don't get me wrong: you'd never mistake Dead or Alive 6 for a fighter made today. It looks like a very pretty PS4 game, which it functionally is, but it at least holds up really well.

So yeah, Dead or Alive is still Dead or Alive, but you have to take the good with the bad, and there is certainly good here. Even with the DLC issues, I’d kill to have this many costume options in most modern fighters, and it’s nice that you can unlock so many of them just by playing as characters and spending in-game cash. Some of them are tacky, but I’d rather put Helena into one of her many fabulous dresses than a swimsuit anyway. There’s also an impressive visual variety across everyone’s designs, especially in an age when we’re seeing a lot of the same face shapes and body types be recycled. I want to be clear: I’m not saying Dead or Alive 6 is immune to criticism. Some of it is absolutely deserved; but spending time with it after a few years away also makes me think there’s stuff here that deserves more praise than we previously gave it credit for. I hope we can be normal about that.

Rollback Netcode, My Beloved

As for other single-player modes, well, there's no shortage. The lack of Tag Battle in this release is lousy, but there’s still plenty to do, like standard versus, arcade, and survival modes, a replay theater, a library with lore entries and trivia, and a music room (in addition to the aforementioned story mode and DOA Quest). Even if you never want to play online, there’s lots here to occupy you.

I even like the new Photo Mode (despite the fact that it will inevitably be used for evil). It’s easy to pick your characters and stage and go through their move list frame by frame in order to get the shots you want. I wish there was more freedom when it came to moving the camera; it's largely locked in place, though you can zoom in and out and rotate the characters to compensate. Photo Mode also doesn't work quite as well on a fightstick as I'd like because some options are mapped to the right analog stick, but it’s solid enough.

Finally, let's talk about online play. The lack of cross-platform play in 2026 is completely inexcusable, but the lack of rollback, while equally maddening, is easier to understand because it's famously difficult to implement in 3D games. That said, Last Round's netcode worked surprisingly well when I tested it. I live in New York and played someone in Texas and our matches were, aside from one minor instance of stuttering, incredibly smooth. However, we were both on wired connections. Now, I'm of the opinion that people who play fighting games on wireless connections are ninja dogs who will never see heaven, but the fact remains that a lot of people play that way and it's going to impact matches. It's wild that Team Ninja had the opportunity to implement a rollback solution here (which they could have then refined in future games) and simply chose not to. Is it gamebreaking? No. But it's an incredibly disappointing choice.

The hugely popular Space Marine 2 did a great job of delivering third-person action, but what about a big-budget first-person Space Marine game? So far, that doesn’t exist, but the latest Warhammer 40,000 animated show from Games Workshop gives fans an idea of what it might look like.

During Games Workshop’s Big Summer Preview showcase, the UK company revealed the debut trailer for a new animation called The Butcher’s Nails, which is due to hit the company’s streaming platform, Warhammer TV, soon. The gory clip stars a World Eaters Berzerker called Makrath, who joins forces with members of fellow Chaos Space Marine faction, the Iron Warriors, during an assault against loyalist Space Marines backed up by soldiers of the Astra Militarum.

The trailer shows Makrath ripping his enemies to shreds from a first-person perspective, giving us an idea of what a World Eaters Berzerker sees from within his helmet. There are cool, Space Marine HUD elements — the kind you’d expect to see in a first-person Space Marine video game. Makrath’s Bolter is positioned at the bottom of the screen, just as you’d expect in a first-person shooter. You even see the outlines of enemies as if they’re marked, just as you can in so many sci-fi first-person shooters. I particularly like the moment Makrath executes an Imperial Fist with a Bolter shot to the face. Very Doom.

Yes, it very much looks like a first-person Chaos Space Marine game to me, which, now I think about it, I very much want. Space Marine 2 is wonderful, don’t get me wrong. But there’s something about a first-person perspective that I think would make for a more intense experience, and playing as a Chaos Space Marine would be a welcome palate cleanser.

And the World Eaters would be the perfect pick for such a game. For the uninitiated, the World Eaters are the angriest Space Marine legion (their primarch is called Angron!). The Butcher's Nails, after which this animated show is named, are implants that turned the World Eaters into crazed gladiators, and helped them along the path to Chaos. In the current Warhammer 40,000 setting, the World Eaters rampage across the galaxy, slaughtering pretty much anything and everything in their way without rhyme or reason. Angron, now the Daemon Primarch of Khorne, is angrier than ever. Blood for the Blood God! Skulls for the Skull Throne! And so on and so forth.

And so, yes, the World Eaters would be the perfect fit for an ultra gory, relentlessly violent, fast-paced first-person melee shooter hybrid, one where you speed towards those righteous Space Marines and squisky Guardsmen and tear them apart.

Hammer and Bolter: The Butcher's Nails Trailer | Big Summer Preview 2026! pic.twitter.com/Noq5SmzQNJ

— Jesus 40k Worldview (@40kWorldview) June 26, 2026

And yes, I know the excellent Boltgun exists, and a sequel is on the way. But I'm talking about a first-person Space Marine game that isn't a boomer shooter and isn't all about making the Ultramarines flex their muscles like the Warhammer 40,000 poster boys they are. Don't get me wrong, Boltgun is great, but what I have in mind is different. It's, well, it's this animation in video game form.

Perhaps The Butcher's Nails will have to do for now. In a post on Warhammer Community, Games Workshop said “much of the action is from Makrath’s perspective — literally depicting what he sees from inside his helmet.” On top of that, “The action is relentless — the entire episode is almost a single non-stop fight scene.”

In other Warhammer 40,000 news, it emerged this week that popular Tabletop Simulator Steam mods that recreate the in-person Warhammer 40,000 game have received takedown requests from Games Workshop, sparking a backlash within the community.

Wesley is Director, News at IGN. Find him on Twitter at @wyp100. You can reach Wesley at wesley_yinpoole@ign.com or confidentially at wyp100@proton.me.

Amazon’s Prime Day has some incredible gaming deals, but if you are unsure of what games and accessories to grab right now, you may want to pick up a gift card instead. Both PlayStation and Xbox $10 eGift Cards are discounted by 5%, and you don’t need to be a Prime member to enjoy those savings. Sure, it’s not a huge price cut, but every little bit counts. You can also save 10% on a $10 Nintendo eShop Gift card.

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Save 5% on a $10 PlayStation Store Gift Card