IGN Fan Fest is kicking off today, and as part of the celebration, we’re showing off a Spawn Warlock action figure that commemorates the anti-hero’s special collaboration with Diablo Immortal.

As revealed at Blizzcon 2026, Diablo Immortal is currently in the midst of a crossover event with Spawn, which runs from September 29 to November 1. This month-long extravaganza features a slew of new Spawn-themed challenges, abilities, and of course, a Spawn-themed cosmetic set.

The Warlock class version of this skin set is coming to the real world in the form of a seven-inch deluxe action figure from McFarlane Toys. Designed with ultra articulation and up to 22 moving parts, this figure has a full range for making cool poses. It includes a wired fabric cape, the Hellspawn Subjugator Sacrificial Blade, Demon Skull, and four alternate hands.

This figure also comes with an Elite Points card, which can be redeemed on the McFarlane Rewards website to snag rewards and one-of-a-kind prototypes, as well as a collectible art card.

Perhaps the most standout feature of this figure is Spawn’s wired cape, which manages to bring McFarlane’s signature, larger-than-life style to reality. The devil is in the details here (no pun intended), with every bit of in-game armor represented in the figure’s model.

Pre-orders are available now at McFarlane Toys’ official website and select retailers for $49.99. The figure is set to release in March 2027.

Diablo is having a big moment right now; on top of Immortal’s Spawn collaboration, Diablo V was announced at this year’s BlizzCon, which is scheduled for release in 2029. An animated show is also in the works at Netflix, though not much is known about the project at present.

We got the chance to interview the developers behind Diablo V to talk about the game, who confirmed that development is already in full swing. You can check out our conversation here, where they told us why this upcoming game is set 100 years in the future after Diablo IV and why they decided to announce the project so early.

Warhammer 40,000: Boltgun 2 wastes no time hooking you into its blistering, blood-soaked world. Seriously, there are only a few minutes of speedy exposition before you're sent diving through a battered spaceship, hurling bullets and slicing rogue enemy agents to pieces – all while shouting sanctimonious battle cries as innards slosh against the tarnished metal flooring. With a breakneck pace and plenty of pixelated gore, it's clear developer Auroch Digital isn't messing with the magic in this first-person shooter sequel. Instead, the team has elevated the original's frantic run-and-gun style with boosted enemy counts and demanding level objectives that'll have you shouting 'For the Emperor.'

Boltgun 2's story kicks off with a literal bang; your ship is destroyed at the hands of the Great Daemon Vashtorr. Hungry for revenge, you respond (somewhat reasonably by Warhammer standards, might I add) by launching a brutal intergalactic campaign, fighting through bile-filled swamps to demonic dwellings, frozen facilities, and beyond. Joined by a sassy Servo-skull companion to guide you through the crimson haze, your mission is all about survival, clearing out hordes of vicious heretics while collecting enough ammunition and health kits at a cadence that's unapologetically old-school. It's repetitive by its very nature, and the story can feel a bit like Warhammer word salad at times. Still, thanks to the mesmerising enemy designs and level variety, as well as the breakneck pace, it's easy to enter a flow state of slicing and dicing through some of Games Workshop's most imposing baddies.

There are four difficulty options to work through, ranging from Low, where your health is bolstered and your damage increased, to Exterminatus, which is about as terrifying as the term would imply. For those looking for more control, you'll also have your pick of game-modifying settings like the ability to disable head bobbing and screen shake, or toggle on invulnerability, too. While I opted to play on the recommended Medium difficulty – with the campaign taking around eight or so hours per protagonist – it's nice to see Boltgun 2 accounts for all kinds of player preferences here.

While there's a lot to shout about, my favourite new feature in Boltgun 2 is the addition of a second playable character. Joining the first Boltgun's Space Marine Malum Caedo is the badass Sister of Battle, Nyra Veyrath. While both are fanatical in their devotion, as often heard in their intense, toggleable taunts, the major difference between them lies in their combat styles. Where Caedo is akin to a hulking mech kitted out with a buzzing Chainsword and frag grenades, Veyrath is much more nimble, wielding a Powersword and hefty Melta Bomb. They feel pleasantly distinct in both their personalities and weaponry. Initially, I was enamoured with Veyrath's Fervent Slide attack, which lets you blitz forward and bisect any fodder in your way, but in playing Caedo's campaign, I was equally enamored by his Chainsword Lunge, which felt more decisive and controlled, great for dealing with squishy hordes. All this to say, there really is no wrong option when choosing your warrior, and the thrill of playing as either adds to the replayability of Boltgun 2, further emphasized by the campaign's branching level options.

As you complete levels, you'll make cartographical choices throughout Boltgun 2's campaign to determine your path forward. Alongside a few optional side missions, there are specific battle locations you'll have to choose between as you advance to the big finale. On my first playthrough as Veyrath, I had to choose between dropping into a dense rainforest overrun with blight or working through a fortified beachhead with enemies hidden in sandy trenches. While I initially opted for the former, it was energizing to know that on a second playthrough, not only could I choose an alternative character with a unique loadout, but I would also have entirely new levels waiting for me.

This dynamism extends into Boltgun 2's mission objectives, too, which often have you descending into a scourge-filled hellhole to manage a few rounds of gladiatorial combat and heroically escape. It sounds familiar on paper, but each level has tricks up its sleeve. In one location, I was blowing up blood tanks to weaken a Daemonic construct, and in another, I was working my way down a vertical chamber, breaking through panes of ice to drop enemies into the blades of a whirring fan. The surprising diversity of what you're tasked with does a good job of keeping progression fresh, mitigating the dreaded shooter fatigue from setting in.

That's not all, though, as each map has location-specific quirks to consider. Alongside Purges, which occur periodically and lock you into areas until you've painted the floor red, certain combat conditions introduce more complexity. This time around, you aren't always alone in battle, and are occasionally joined by friendly soldiers who help keep morale high and serve as convenient meat shields when the moment arrives. Additionally, there are plenty of physical hazards, from flaming pools to thick fog that clouds your vision. These moving parts not only amp up the chaos but also create ingenious cover for Boltgun 2's well-hidden collectibles: the combat-buffing Secrets and collectible Seals.

Though for all its guts and glory, Boltgun 2 unfortunately suffers from a handful of technical issues. Enemies can occasionally forget they're in a holy war and wander around idly like NPCs. While hardly a threat to survival, it does take you out of the action to see a roughed-up creep dawdling. Elsewhere, the infamous Purges sometimes wouldn't end, and despite killing every heretic, I found myself stuck waiting for an exit to unlock… but it never did. The movement isn't completely airtight either. It's suitable for dancing around a combat arena or jumping between and scaling platforms, but it can feel slippery when tackling the more ambitious platforming challenges that arrive in the latter half of the campaign. Though it's a list of annoyances that can give cause for concern, these issues are by no means dealbreakers when set against the slick shooting and spectacle that's so distinctly Warhammer.

I have to hand it to the art team at Auroch Digital because beyond the frenetic combat, Boltgun 2's strongest asset is by far its retro aesthetic. I've spent hundreds of hours toiling over miniatures and painting intricate details to make them pop, so perhaps I have a soft spot for these characters, but Boltgun 2 captures that digitised figure look with sharp precision. The way they appear and move fits the nostalgic boomer shooter dressing perfectly. And, while it's hard to pick favourites, I can't deny that the visually assaulting Daemonettes and the towering, beast-riding Bloodcrushers were particular standouts, their violent animations and vivid palettes both delightful and terrifying. If you pay attention, there's personality embedded in almost every character model, too. As you approach them in battle, you might notice a Tormentor flicking a knife around or a tiny Nurgling mooning you mid-attack. These kinds of fine details aren't necessarily essential and could easily be overlooked, but their incorporation speaks to an attention to detail at the core of Boltgun 2 that makes it such a compelling extension of the Warhammer universe.

The atmosphere is further heightened by adrenaline-bolstering, context-specific barks that your chosen protagonist can let off at the tap of a button. Rahul Kohli delivers an impressively commanding performance in his reprisal of Caedo, and Alanah Pearce's Veyrath is fittingly vicious. Similarly, I enjoyed the writing behind the aforementioned Servo-skull, my eternally irreverent companion who would lighten tricky combat situations with lines like, "Blood Ingress detected in the ocular module." It's one thing to engage me with combat; it's another to get a genuine laugh out of me – and Boltgun 2 manages to do both.

There are a lot of Magic: The Gathering cards coming out these days, and there are a lot of Magic players who think there are too many. But fans don't need to pay attention to every set — according to Magic game designer Mark Rosewater.

Last night, Rosewater posted to his Tumblr to answer a question from a fan about the product fatique players feel from having six Magic sets every year. He replied: "We did some research on this. It turns out a very small minority of Magic players feels a need to track every newly released card. Obviously, this audience tends to be very enfranchised, so they’re over represented online."

"The game already has over 33,000 unique cards," he added. "We’re well past the mark where any one player can mentally track everything."

And it doesn't seem like Wizards of the Coast plans to slow things down any time soon, even if some enfranchised players — myself included — are sometimes fatigued by the sheer amount of cards that come out every year.

In the same blog post, Rosewater added: "Limiting how many cards we release per year to how many cards this small group can comfortably mentally track just doesn’t make good business sense. Our upper limit needs to be guided by what players are purchasing and playing, not by how easy it is to track everything new." So, essentially the deluge of new Magic cards will continue as long as sales support them.

Of course, there were a lot of these 'enfranchised' Magic players who didn't love Rosewater's answer here. Over on Reddit, the post was shared to the tune of over 1,300 upvotes, and while there are definitely some who agree with Rosewater's approach, there were a lot of people who were upset by it. User GunTotingQuaker replied: "I embraced the 'every product isn’t for everyone' thing years ago. There are going to be 5,000 new cards a year, deal with it or don’t. My issue is it feels like every time I dust off a 1+ year old EDH deck to see what I might update… it’s like half the f***ing deck."

MTG player Amarsir was also upset, but this time by how the volume of cards affects the Standard format. "Does he not remember Standard?" they asked. "I mean I can understand forgetting it exists. But the whole concept is knowing each new set. Commander players don't need to know every card. But they didn't go from 8-set Standard to 18-set to affect Commander players now did they?"

However, there were plenty of folks who did agree with Rosewater, with some, like user MoO, simply saying: "Folks should take the same attitude towards Magic releases as the news: unplug for a bit when it’s too much, it’s healthier."

Others questioned how many cards anyone has to realistically pay attention to at any one time, like TunefulTunic, who asked "can standard players tell me, do you really need to know every single card that comes out in a set like a lot of people here claim?", to which Kanin_usagi replied "The lands are important to know I suppose, and then familiar with planeswalkers and the major archetypes. Otherwise most sets really only have like 25-ish cards that will see any major play. Right now I’m not even sure Final Fantasy or Ixalan have any non-lands that see play."

Either way, it doesn't seem like Magic sets are slowing down any time soon. There were seven total sets in 2026, with Reality Fracture being the most recent, and with the Star Trek crossover launching next month. 2027 will be a bit slower, with only six sets, but they should all be full sets, where both Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles and The Hobbit this year were smaller sets with fewer cards.

Wizards of the Coast recently announced its first Universes Beyond set for 2027 at New York Comic Con, but unlike 2025's Spider-Man or 2026's Marvel Superheroes, Darkhold Destiny will see the Magic team creating its own Magic-flavored story with Marvel characters.

Nintendo just dropped a new overview trailer for the Ocarina of Time remake, offering a fresh look at revamped environments, characters, and combat. We had the chance to play some of the game ourselves, and were surprised by just how many changes Nintendo is making to the iconic N64 release.

While Nintendo previously announced two new amiibo figures tied to the remake - Young Link and Young Zelda - the new overview trailer also confirms support for all existing Zelda amiibo. It doesn’t go into too much detail about what that support will involve, but the trailer shows Link receiving a number of helpful items, including healing hearts, Green Potions, and a Deku Stick.

Your quest through the vast kingdom of Hyrule begins when The Legend of #Zelda: #OcarinaOfTime comes exclusively to Nintendo Switch 2 on Nov 5.

Pre-order now: https://t.co/FNWvsJDFej https://t.co/peIRfkTMJh

— Nintendo of America (@NintendoAmerica) October 14, 2026

It appears players can tap existing Zelda amiibo for helpful consumables and items, but not necessarily any exclusive cosmetics or weapons. This is similar to how non-Zelda amiibo worked in Tears of the Kingdom, which allowed for daily “bonus” scans of general Amiibo once per day.

The previously announced Ocarina of Time amiibo, which are up for preorder with varying levels of stock across retailers, will net players wearable masks for Zelda and Link.

Nintendo first launched the amiibo product line with the Wii U. Each amiibo comes with a small figure as well as a card that you can scan from Nintendo consoles, netting players various unlocks and bonuses across games.

Every mainline Zelda release has been accompanied by new amiibo. Breath of the Wild and Tears of the Kingdom Amiibo offered in-game weapons and gear in addition to daily rewards.

Where to Buy Out of Stock Amiibo

Amiibo frequently sell out in the lead-up to big game releases, and Zelda is about as big as it gets. While the Switch 2 generation of amiibo continues to be in stock at most retailers, some of the older releases have pretty much disappeared from the internet.

For those who are desperate to get their hands on an older release, GameStop offers tons of pre-owned amiibo with a solid ‘Pre-Owned’ guarantee for peace of mind. You’ll also find third-party resellers at Target, Best Buy, and eBay, though it’s always worth comparing prices to a figure’s MSRP at release.

Epic has revealed a newly refreshed version of the Epic Games Launcher, its Steam-like platform that provides access to the Epic Games Store, your games library, social features, and a developer’s hub. In keeping with the company’s interest in and push for AI-assisted development, this new version of the launcher has been created using generative artificial intelligence.

“Programming is hard,” wrote Epic in a new blog post. “So, instead of doing that, we vibe coded a new Epic Games Launcher that’s way faster and more responsive than the current one, and has a new look.”

The term “vibe coding” is often used in a joke context to describe code developed entirely through AI prompts, rather than actual coding expertise. It’s interesting, then, to see Epic use the term in an announcement for its own product. But just how has the company approached the build of its new app?

During an interview with IGN, vice president and general manager of Epic Games Store Martin Keely discussed how the technology has been used. “We have used AI as a tool as part of our development process,” he said. “It's obviously an issue that's of high visibility at the moment across the industry, but for us, it made us more efficient and allowed a small team to rewrite the code base and be able to launch it faster across platforms, support Windows and Mac, and we're going to have a Linux version as well.”

Bloomberg’s recent report claims that developers at Epic have been encouraged to use Anthropic’s AI assistant, Claude, and that work on an upcoming Star Wars/Marvel crossover project should be conducted with "no more hand-written code.” Meanwhile, Epic’s founder and CEO, Tim Sweeney, said on X/Twitter that the company is "moving developers around to retool for maximum AI acceleration."

When asked to clarify the extent of Epic’s use of artificial intelligence on the new launcher, Keely said that “it's been focused on code efficiency and the architecture, and allowing us to basically build features more quickly. It hasn't been about the artwork or the design style. There are some updates and changes, but that's been managed by our normal Epic Games design group.”

It’s interesting that this line has been drawn for the launcher, as Epic has been pretty open about how it’s used generative AI to help create Fortnite skins. The studio’s in-development Star Wars and Marvel crossover shooter is also reported to be using AI for its artistic assets, with Bloomberg’s report noting that all art for the project would be "generated with full AI workflows."

We’ve known about Epic’s plans for a new launcher for a while – we previously spoke to Keely’s predecessor, Steve Allison, who said that the app “should feel fast and snappy and just be what you expect, frankly” in our extensive interview. Of course, Epic also faces a cultural battle, as most PC players have been embedded in Valve’s Steam ecosystem for decades, with some convinced that the Epic Games Store will never be as good as Steam.

In case you missed the memo, physical copies of The Legend of Zelda: Ocarina of Time are currently discounted at the likes of Amazon and Walmart. There's a $10 discount at both major retailers in the US, bringing the game down to $59.88 instead of $69.99.

I’m taking a look back at each of the core Grand Theft Auto games and replaying them in the lead-up to the arrival of Grand Theft Auto 6. What we’ll be putting together won’t be traditional re-reviews, and they won’t come with any new IGN score, but they will re-examine what made each GTA remarkable upon the time of its release. By the end of the project, using GTA’s previously six-star wanted level, you should be able to get an idea of where each of these games roughly rank in my long-term love for this series.

Today it’s time to revisit Liberty City in Grand Theft Auto IV.

Grand Theft Auto IV is smaller than GTA: San Andreas. Significantly so, if you exclude water, as its land area is reportedly around only one-quarter the size of San Andreas’s physical real estate. GTA IV also has markedly reduced vehicle variety, with much fewer of them overall and zero car customisation. It has no asset management, less mission variety, no RPG-inspired skill system, a pretty paltry list of cheats, and the only thing you can alter about lead character Niko Bellic is his outfit. In fact, if you weren’t around for the arrival of GTA IV, I think it’s fair enough that you may actually find yourself a little confused about its place in the series pantheon. That is, how could this apparently smaller game with overtly fewer features than its predecessor have instantly become not only the highest-rated GTA in the history of the series, but one of the highest rated games of all time, full stop? Well, the devil is in the details. Countless, unprecedented, incredible details.

For all his faults as an Eastern European war veteran with a shady past and a short temper, who may or may not have spent 106 minutes trying to kill Owen Wilson back in 2001, Niko Bellic has actually carved out a place as one of the most likeable and accessible characters in the franchise. Lured by his cousin Roman’s lies of wealth and opportunity, it’s easy to both sympathise with Niko’s disappointment at his first encounter with the American Dream, and share in his distaste for the various bastards of Liberty City who seek to exploit him.

Released in 2008, GTA IV was the first game in the series to be set in the present day since GTA III. In 2026, it’s an interesting snapshot of the world just prior to the smartphone takeover – back when the internet was still a destination you took time out to visit on a computer, social media was still a novelty rather than the worst thing to happen to humanity since disco music, and your radio would always let you know you were about to receive a mobile phone call. However, despite the 18 year gulf between its setting and today, GTA IV doesn’t feel remotely as retro as something like GTA: Vice City did in 2002 – even though there were only 16 years between its setting and the time of its release. The aesthetic distinctions between the ’80s and 2000s are, of course, profound. What are the visual differences between the 2000s and now, other than the fact The Rock used to have hair? It’s not a long list. Monoculture is dead, fashion is looping, and – as remarkably detailed as GTA IV is – I don’t think there’s anything Rockstar could have done to dodge this phenomenon, Dwayne Johnson’s shaven skull notwithstanding.

Flashing Lights

However, even though the feeling I glean from GTA IV being a depiction of a specific moment in time may not be as strong as that elicited by either GTA: Vice City or GTA: San Andreas, there is no denying what a victory it is in terms of its capacity to represent a true sense of place. GTA IV’s Liberty City wasn’t just one of the most convincing virtual cities of its generation; I honestly don’t think it’s an overstatement to say its commitment to tiny details still stands up to scrutiny today.

Revisiting GTA IV’s Liberty City in 2026 – a game that my Xbox 360 play data indicated to me I haven’t touched in around 14 years – I’m immediately reminded of how fastidiously crafted every corner of this world is. Yes, it’s a smaller environment than that of San Andreas, but it’s one that is so much more crowded, dense, and dripping with depth. It’s more immediate, more authentic, and more intimate than anything that came before it – and it’s still a more credible and convincing city than those in most of the open-world action games I’ve played since.

Strolling though Star Junction – Liberty City’s glitzy Times Square proxy – I find myself in tourist mode. I’m too engaged by the fact there’s something to see, read, or admire everywhere I point the camera to be distracted by the temptation of causing anti-social chaos. Hoofing it through Hove Beach – inspired by Brooklyn’s Brighton Beach – and I’m once again impressed at how much mileage Rockstar extracts from the seemingly mundane. Garbage strewn on the sidewalks. Individualised storefronts that are faithful to the demographics of the area and are never repeated elsewhere around the city. Places with stories you’ll never get to the bottom of. Like, who is Mikey Pissroll, and how much better at pool is he than Anal Alan?

The architecture, the lighting, the lived-in grime; Liberty City here feels more than real. It feels aged. Rockstar didn’t just build streets; it built them, and then assaulted that asphalt with decades of simulated wear. As a result, those streets are a patchwork of potholes, road plates, and sporadic strips of more recently re-surfaced segments. The custom signwork, the bespoke graffiti – the fact that no piece of the city looks like any other. A multitude of elements combine to create what was an unprecedented sense of immersion at the time, and absolutely still holds up today. Sure, there’s an unavoidable murkiness to playing GTA IV on original hardware like the Xbox 360, where you’re obviously beholden to the resolution limitations of its age. It results in a soft and rather muted image, and one that’s admittedly exacerbated by the overly cool and slightly washed out colour palette Rockstar opted for. However, it’s still a stunning place to simply explore, whether walking, driving, or using public transport – which is a viable and realistic way to move around this tightly-packed urban metropolis.

One Vision

While Rockstar was committed to rebuilding its famous riff on New York City as realistically as possible within the fidelity it could muster at the time, it also placed an enormous emphasis on physical realism. The beating heart of this approach was NaturalMotion’s procedural character-animation technology, Euphoria – an animation and physics solution that completely transformed how people moved, reacted to impacts, and interacted with their surroundings. It wasn’t just a trivial technical flourish; it fundamentally altered the way the game felt to play, whether you were cutting enemies down with a barrage of bullets, or mercilessly bouncing them off the bonnet of an automobile. It reinvented GTA.

Traditional animation relies heavily on pre-authored movements, with developers creating and canning specific sequences that characters will perform in particular circumstances. That is, fill them with lead and they’ll sink to the ground the same way every time. Strike them with a car and they’ll fly up and flop down identically, regardless of the forces at work. Euphoria does away with all of this and, in 2008, it felt like a stunning glimpse of the future. Ditching those pre-determined animations, characters in GTA IV react realistically – both based on the forces impacting them, and the world within arm’s reach of them. A spray of gunfire may stagger an enemy into a railing behind, which they can tumble over dramatically. A well-placed shot may cause someone to lose their balance and fall off a ledge. Clipping someone in a car will skittle them in a totally different way to clobbering them head-on. One too many drinks may make putting one foot in front of the other temporarily tricky.

The results are often wildly slapstick – like when Niko flies through the windscreen after neglecting to use a seatbelt, or when NPCs insist on clutching the door handle of your car as it begins to peel away. I still live for these moments. In fact, I’ll often hesitate before getting on the throttle to allow carjacking victims a brief window to grab on before I take them on a brief trip to destination road rash. I don’t know what that says about me. Nothing good, probably.

So much of the endless experimentation on offer in GTA IV is a direct result of Euphoria, and the fact no two encounters will ever really play out the same way twice. But it also works because it’s part of a much wider commitment to granular realism. That is, what good is a world that oozes so much character and authenticity if the people feel painted on? Like they’re skating through it rather than actually inhabiting it? Everything about GTA IV is engineered to immerse us into its world; like we’re just another living, breathing citizen of Liberty City.

Goodbye Horses

Despite the incredible critical acclaim GTA IV accumulated, it remains one of the more divisive games in the series. While I am quite partial to the slower nature of its more pragmatic story and straightforward missions as a change of pace, it wasn’t to everyone’s tastes, nor was the relationship system. It was a smart way to disseminate rewards for fostering relationships with your in-game friends, but it admittedly could’ve benefited from a larger range of activities to do with them around the city – and preferably ones that were a little more fun, too. As it stands, the relationship system is too chore-like, requiring you to repeat the same cycle: pick them up, head to one of a couple of venues, and drive them home.

Similarly, GTA IV’s extremely weighty driving physics are another controversial topic. For mine, I’ve actually always been quite partial to the feel of GTA IV, particularly in certain cars where I think the exaggerated body roll and sluggish steering makes sense – like muscle cars and beefy 4x4s. I would’ve liked some more sharpness in its range of sports cars and supercars – they should have stiffer suspension as they ought to be the cars with the firmest rides – but I do much prefer GTA IV’s approach to damage modeling over GTA V.

There also doesn’t seem to be any real consensus regarding the radio stations, either, with sentiment that swings between high praise for the outright station variety to claims the song list is the most forgettable in the series. I have to concede I lean towards the latter; coming off the immense highs of Vice City and San Andreas I remember being a little underwhelmed at the time – although the soundtrack expanded and improved quite noticeably following the arrival of The Lost and Damned and The Ballad of Gay Tony, the two smartest pieces of DLC Rockstar ever produced.

But that’s a topic for a different day.

Verdict

Sentimentally speaking, Grand Theft Auto IV isn’t my favourite of the series – but I would say it’s the one I respect the most. It was bold to dial things back from the unhinged freedom of San Andreas in favour of a slower paced and more grounded crime saga, but it was a decision that allowed Rockstar to establish the importance of having a city so detailed it became a character itself, as well as flex a tech solution for character animation that has gone on to be a defining pillar of the series’ brand of emergent, slapstick fun. Obsessively detailed and impressively timeless, GTA IV is the prototype for modern Grand Theft Auto.

For more reflections on the incredible Grand Theft Auto series, you can read our new Legacy Reviews of Grand Theft Auto, Grand Theft Auto 2, Grand Theft Auto III, Grand Theft Auto: Vice City, and Grand Theft Auto: San Andreas.

Epic has released a new version of the Epic Games Launcher, with a preview version of the company’s refreshed Steam competitor available to download now.

This new Epic Games Launcher, which was built using AI and “vibe coding”, is currently in the early stages of development and so is “light on features” according to a new blog post from Epic. The preview version features the core components you’d expect from a launcher, including store, library, and social panels, as well as the Unreal-focused developer page.

“It's been rebuilt entirely from the ground up,” explained Martin Keely, vice president and general manager of Epic Games Store, in an interview with IGN. “So this is a completely new tech stack, a complete new rewrite of both the shell, which has the download manager, library, and the app itself, as well as the new store architecture. So features like discover and product detail pages, those have all been rewritten.”

In terms of improvements, for this first phase of the rebuild the big focus has been on speed. Epic says that the launcher boots from cold in 5.47 seconds, which it claims is 46% faster than Steam. When re-opening the app from the system tray, it takes just .36 seconds – 14% faster than Steam. These times will surely vary depending on your system specs, but in ideal conditions it does appear the new app is much speedier than its sluggish predecessor.

“The library loads 30 times faster [than in the previous launcher],” said Keely. “The startup is twice as fast. And it's a small footprint, only 300mb. That was another thing that we wanted to continue to make as small as possible to support the wide range of hardware that players have.”

For this new version of the launcher, Epic is supporting Windows, MacOS, and, for the first time, Linux. That also means that Fortnite is coming to Linux, although it’s not available quite yet – Epic first needs to rebuild its Easy Anti-Cheat system for the platform. “Once it’s working with a critical mass of distro maintainers, we’ll bring Fortnite to Linux via the Epic Games Launcher,” explained Epic’s blog post.

Beyond the speed and platform upgrades, the new launcher features some much-needed quality of life improvements, such as better customisation – the new top bar can be adjusted to display the tabs in order of preference, and the library can be filtered using a variety of categories.

In terms of what future updates will offer, Keely revealed that “the other piece that we're going to be working on is how to improve game discovery in a way that is relevant to each player. We have a pretty large library and sometimes there's great games that will be relevant for someone, so making sure that we continue to improve the merchandising components of how we make game discovery more possible and make that more social so that people can recommend games to each other and make that easy to share.”

Epic had previously detailed its plans for a new launcher earlier this year, where it said that its efforts would result in five times faster boot times. Of course, while speed is an issue, it may well take more than that to convince players – some remain convinced that the Epic Games Store will never be as good as Steam.

Amazon has just dropped exciting new discounts on the physical PS5 and Xbox Series X copies of Borderlands 4, bringing them down to just $19.91.

That's a massive 60% discount off their list prices, but more importantly, it's the lowest price to date for each of them at the retailer. That's a very exciting price cut to see, especially ahead of big upcoming sale events like Black Friday.

I played more than an hour of The Legend of Zelda: Ocarina of Time remake on Switch 2, and as someone who’s finished the original several times, I noticed a lot of small changes that shine some light on the thought process behind recreating this adventure.

It seems everything was on the table when considering what to tweak: altered puzzles more closely fit the modern controls, redesigned miniboss fights spice things up across each round, and new shortcuts and context clues make navigation more intuitive. If you’re dying to learn every detail you can about Ocarina of Time before its November 5 release date, I’m going to list a bunch of notable differences I saw when comparing it to the N64 original. Before we start, a couple of notes:

First, this article is not my official preview – you can check out my more formal first impression of Ocarina of Time here, and watch this week’s Nintendo Voice Chat where I dive even further into it.

Second, this is far from an exhaustive list of differences. I’m mostly leaving out the really obvious things like controls, art style, and voice acting (you can read up on things like that in the prequel to this piece), and this would take far too long to write if I catalogued every difference there is. I’m only bringing up a change I already pointed out if I was able to officially confirm it through gameplay or learned something new worth sharing.

Third, we’re restricted on how many screenshots we’re allowed to publish for this preview period, so for this piece, you’ll have to rely on the written word alone. We’re going old school!

Finally, and most importantly, there will be spoilers for the original Ocarina of Time as we dive into the changes I saw in Kokiri Forest, Inside the Great Deku Tree, Hyrule Field, Castle Town, and the Forest Temple. It’s kind of hard to discuss changes without explaining the source material! If you don’t know the original, don’t want to be reminded of it, or don’t want to see how some things play out differently, this is not for you! Okay, that’s more than enough preamble – let’s get started.

Kokiri Forest

1. Link’s wallet can hold 200 rupees from the very beginning, as opposed to the N64’s starting limit of 99.

2. Jumping across the stone platforms next to the Kokiri Forest shop no longer rewards you with a secret five rupees. Instead, additional blue rupees are scattered throughout the forest.

3. Speaking of the shop, there’s a new scarecrow training dummy to the right of the counter. A villager uses it to run you through a quick tutorial on raising your defenses.

4. The challenge to obtain the Kokiri Sword has been overhauled. The treasure chest used to be tucked in the back corner of the room; now it’s placed high on a platform in the middle. You have to jump to it instead of practicing reorienting the camera to reach it. I dive into more of the philosophy behind this change in my preview.

Inside the Great Deku Tree (Child Link Dungeon)

5. In the room where you get the slingshot, a second, smaller treasure chest used to hold a random recovery heart. It was always kind of a disappointing reveal, in my opinion. Now, it holds a few Deku Nuts. I think that’s a slight improvement!

6. You fight a lot of Skulltulas in the Great Deku Tree, and their attack patterns have changed. Rather than just deciding to occasionally reveal their weak spot to you, whacking them with your sword sends them spinning around, exposing their soft underbelly. This fits in line with Ocarina of Time’s newfound focus on logic: an enemy doesn’t give you an unearned opening anymore -- you have to trigger it.

Hyrule Field

7. On N64, Lon Lon Ranch kind of looked like an impenetrable fortress from the outside, with high walls you couldn’t really see over. Now, it’s more naturally woven into the environment, and you can spy the horses grazing from outside.

8. Peahat enemies decorated the corners of Hyrule Field in the original, but on my way to Castle Town, I ran into a few that were more centrally located. A Hyrule Field populated with more enemies is a good thing in my book.

9. Near the new Peahats, I saw a cracked piece of the ground that looked perfect for a bomb. Most entrances to hidden rooms in the original were completely invisible to the naked eye – this is a much clearer hint towards a secret area. I can’t wait to see what those sparse caves look like now.

10. In my last “Biggest Changes” piece for Ocarina of Time, I noticed a new sign right outside of the Castle Town gate. I was wondering if it would provide new lore surrounding the history of Hyrule, the events of Skyward Sword, or something like that. But, it’s just a large sign pointing you in the direction of Hyrule Field’s biggest landmarks. Not really what I was hoping for, but a noteworthy change nonetheless.

Castle Town

11. The biggest difference in Castle Town is its perspective shift. It’s no longer restricted to fixed camera angles; it’s in third-person with complete camera control the whole time. You can even seamlessly walk all the way from the town’s entrance to the Temple of Time with no loading screens or camera breaks.

12. Upon entering Castle Town, I spoke to a new NPC: a blonde woman who warns Link not to spend all his money, even though there are so many exciting options at the market. This is just the first visit to the town, so I’m hopeful she’ll have some sort of additional quest or dialogue later on.

Forest Temple (Adult Link Dungeon)

Last spoiler warning here – some of the puzzle changes in the Forest Temple are fairly significant!

13. There are a ton of minor changes to how the Forest Temple looks and functions, and it starts right at the entrance. Instead of hookshotting onto a tree branch, Link aims at a more traditional hookshot target above the temple’s front door. Pairing this with a similar example, where in the Great Deku Tree Link shoots an eyeball target instead of a ladder, it seems the remake is more intent on teaching us how to use these items on recognizable, intended targets rather than parts of the world players might not think to interact with.

14. After completing a puzzle that involves pushing blocks and climbing ladders to get to the top of a room, you can now activate a brand new elevator that makes it so you don’t have to walk through all the same tunnels and climb the same ladders on repeat visits.

15. Floormasters – the iconic disembodied hand enemies that stalk Link from the ceiling – are now telegraphed by a bright spotlight that shines on Link and changes color just before the hand swoops down. It’s very cool, and fits this remake’s theatrical vibe I dive into in my preview.

16. This one is also from my preview: “An arena where Link fights a Stalfos used to have a giant hole in the middle. Link needed to avoid it or risk falling to the floor below, but the Stalfos could defy gravity and hover over the gap… Here, that hole has been exchanged for a shallow pool of acid. The skeleton enemies can still walk in it – they don’t have any flesh to lose – while Link takes damage if he enters it. This means the fight plays out the same as it used to: the Stalfos has access to the whole room while Link is constrained to its edges, but the way it’s constructed is more logical.”

17. The rooms and hallways on the side of the mansion with the red Poe have red carpeting and stained glass windows, while their counterparts on the side with the blue Poe have blue carpeting and windows. This really differentiates how otherwise similar rooms look and feel, and makes it so you are probably less likely to get lost.

18. A torch puzzle that used to involve spinning platforms has been redone without the rotating elements.

19. In the room where a giant block crashes onto the floor, guard rails have been added to prevent Link from leaping onto the block before it rises back to the ceiling. You couldn’t jump at the press of a button on N64! I imagine the developers had to rethink a lot of the world’s geometry now that Link can jump at any time.

20. The encounters with the final two Poes have been remixed. The sliding block puzzle to reveal the green Poe no longer has a time limit, but the extra block that’s meant to fake you out is slightly more interesting now. The moments leading up to the fight with the final Poe, and the fight itself, have been fleshed out. There’s an entirely new cutscene, and each round of the fight is unique, rather than having the exact same pattern repeat itself three times.

21. The final room before facing the Forest Temple’s boss used to be about rotating the inner wall of a cylinder to gain access to specific rooms on the outer wall. That concept is still intact, but it now involves torches as well.

General Changes

22. I really noticed the expanded dialogue from characters throughout my preview session. Everyone had more to say: Link’s friends seemed to know him a bit better, the Kokiri shopkeeper had beef with Mido, Castle Town villagers seemed more enthralled with this mysterious forest boy, and a few cutscenes I saw had voice acting. There are also more dialogue choices than before that are reminiscent of Link’s snarkier tone in Breath of the Wild and Tears of the Kingdom.

23. When casting the Din’s Fire attack spell, the whole world would come to a stop on N64. Now, the spell is cast in real time, meaning you need to make sure you’re not at risk of getting hit before using it.

24. Like the 3DS remaster, you can quickly open a songbook when playing the Ocarina to remind yourself of the button prompts for each specific song, rather than having to go all the way into the pause menu.

25. The original Ocarina of Time had four empty bottles to collect. On the remake’s inventory menu, there are clearly five slots for empty bottles. I confirmed this extra slot when playing, meaning there’s an additional bottle involved somehow in Link’s quest.

26. Speaking of the inventory screen, here’s a fun fact: the top left quadrant is reserved for items only Child Link can equip, while the top right quadrant is for Adult Link’s tools. The bottom half has items both of them can use, and there are dividing lines clearly separating these three areas.

27. When the hookshot lines up with an enemy it can strike, the target reticle color changes from blue to red, giving you an easy way to see that your shot will land.

28. A quest log lightly guides you where to go next (if you need it – I wasn’t required to open it a single time), and adds flavor text to the adventure. Quest descriptions are written like old legends – “There once was a boy named Link…” – which I find very fitting.

29. Lastly, I have to shout out the music, which was just a joy to listen to during my preview. From the bright Kokiri Forest theme to the adventurous Hyrule Field tune, hearing these classic songs brought to life by recordings of real musicians was a treat. I can’t wait to hear the rest of the soundtrack.

And that’s it! If you can believe it, we’re just over three weeks away from playing the Ocarina of Time remake for ourselves. Before you go, remember to check out my official hands-on preview and this week’s episode of Nintendo Voice Chat. Also, this piece is exactly 1998 words, which is the year Ocarina of Time originally released on Nintendo 64. There’s one more fun fact for you!

Key Preview Takeaways:

• This is not a 1:1 remake: Expanded dialogue, revamped puzzles, and a detailed new art style prioritize adding depth.
• Some structural changes convey a more logically constructed world.
• Hyrule is a stage: The remake embraces a theatrical style, which reminds me of one of Ocarina’s original inspirations.

Taking my first steps out of Link’s treehouse and into Kokiri Forest, The Legend of Zelda: Ocarina of Time remake came to life. Zelda series producer Eiji Aonuma described this as a “faithful interpretation” of the Nintendo 64 original, and that term stuck with me as I explored Hyrule for more than an hour. This is far from a 1:1 remake: I found familiar rooms containing redesigned challenges that change how the world and player function. I spoke to old friends who had new things to say that added texture to Hyrule and its people. And, I unpacked how its updated controls and detailed art design redefine its old-school combat and puzzle solving for the modern day. This remake isn’t about scope; it’s about depth. The Zelda series is full of old stories, and the Ocarina of Time remake presents itself as a legend retold, with clear theatrical inspirations that have completely changed how I’m approaching it.

First, a quick word about spoilers. I know some of you have never played the N64 game, meaning Ocarina of Time will be a wholly new experience. So, I’m only going to talk about explicitly what I saw in the three chunks I played during the preview. Two sections were split across the first 90-ish minutes of the adventure, while the third and largest section was set in the first dungeon you play as Adult Link, which happens at roughly the one-third mark of the story. So, there will be no spoilers for anything outside of what Nintendo chose to show us.

Back to Kokiri Forest. Not counting last-gen upgrades or spinoffs, this is the series’ proper Nintendo Switch 2 debut, and the leap forward in quality immediately drew me in. Rays of light poke through the trees; moss and mushrooms thrive on the withered bark; our hero’s tunic is decorated with handwoven flourishes – and it’s all running at a crisp 60 fps. A pleasant musical performance recreates the forest’s original MIDI theme with what sounds like just a handful of real musicians. Hyrule has never felt more intimately realized than this.

That applies to the dialogue as well. Later, a Castle Town citizen gawks at Link’s outfit, treating him as some foreign outsider from the distant forest: “Intricate stitching that implies the whole ensemble is handmade!” he excitedly says. The forest’s shopkeeper apologizes to Link for his empty shelves, blaming the stubborn Kokiri ringleader Mido for blocking the path to the Great Deku Tree, where the staff goes to restock.

No matter how hard I try to juke Mido, he won’t let anyone pass without a sword and a shield. Here, the remake shows its willingness to change up Ocarina’s level design. After crawling to the secret area that contains the Kokiri Sword, I find that the challenge to reach it has been overhauled. The treasure chest used to be tucked away in the back corner of a maze with a giant boulder – now it’s perched on a high platform in the center of the room, with the boulder rolling around it. The fact that it’s different is interesting on its own, but the way this change impacts what this room is now asking of you reveals a lot.

The GTA 6 leaker has allegedly released a new unauthorized gameplay video which reportedly shows parts of the ending of the story, sparking significant spoiler concern among fans online. IGN will not report on the details of the leaked video.

Meanwhile, Cyberleek — the person or group responsible for the high-profile GTA 6 leaks that began in the summer — has suggested they will now stop leaking the game. They also claim they will not risk releasing an alleged 200GB build of GTA 6 because their memecoin failed to hit the $30 million market cap target that had been set for its release.

However, Cyberleek claims to have a "dead man's switch" for story spoilers, which they have reportedly threatened to flip if they are threatened, presumably by either Rockstar Games or parent company Take-Two.

Yesterday, we reported on how GTA 6 fans were celebrating the crash of the Cyberleek memecoin after the leaker had tied various types of gameplay leaks to its market cap, ranging from $5 million to $25 million. The leaker also threatened to release a build of the game — supposedly over 200GB in size — if the memecoin hit a $30 million market cap.

Earlier this week, a number of gameplay clips were reportedly leaked after market cap goals were hit, including gameplay that allegedly shows Lucia fully naked, and, more recently, the alleged leak of a “Lucia closeup 4k” video.

Cyberleek then threatened to release a new unauthorized GTA 6 gameplay video every day, assuming the memecoin market cap targets were met, and launched yet another gameplay poll designed to encourage spending on the memecoin.

However, the Cyberleek memecoin crashed, with a current market cap of $1.2 million, down from a high of $7.8 million on October 11. With those targets now pretty much impossible, it sounds like Cyberleek's crypto scheme has come to an end.

In a new message reportedly posted to their website, Cyberleek declared "the end of the road." In the post, Cyberleek defended their actions from crypto scam allegations, and said Take-Two was "punished enough." "The ending stays unpublished," Cyberleek allegedly insisted in the message. They claimed that while the latest leak does show clips from the final missions of the game, out of context they do not spoil the story.

It's fair to say many fans have taken issue with that suggestion, and are already taking steps to avoid spoilers online.

Cyberleek's message also suggests that the build of GTA 6 they allegedly have access to will not be released because the $30 million market cap was not reached. Cyberleek had said they were raising funds for some mystery project, although many didn't believe the claim. "Uploading 200+ GB anonymously is a serious risk," they said, "worth it only if the milestone funded the secret project." They said the memecoin should have been considered a "donation," not an "investment," and hit out at "influencers" who claimed otherwise.

Then, the upshot: "The leeks stop here. For now."

Of course, Cyberleek may release further gameplay and continue with their crypto scheme anyway. They may even release the build they allegedly have. For now though, the more pressing concern is avoiding spoilers sparked by today's leaked video.

Fans had spent the last week calling on people not to spend money on Cyberleek, pointing out the leaker cashed out back in August and is likely to do so again ahead of GTA 6’s official release date, if they haven’t already. Analysis of cryptocurrency transactions in late August pointed to the GTA 6 leaker cashing out having earnt around $270,000.

Earlier this week, IGN reported on fan skepticism around the alleged leaked gameplay that reportedly showed both Jason and Lucia fully naked. A previous leaked gameplay video allegedly showed a tank spawning into the world, which suggests access to a dev menu of some kind. The leaked videos allegedly showing both Jason and Lucia fully naked also show NPCs failing to react to nudity in any way, which suggests this effect was achieved with either a dev menu or cheats and won’t be possible in the official release.

One theory is that Cyberleak was able to access this state for both Lucia and Jason because in at least one mission players will see both characters naked, perhaps in a nudist resort. As it stands, this is all speculation, and it is unknown if GTA 6 will feature either character naked at any point — officially at least.

Cyberleek appeared to go dark after a spate of high-profile GTA 6 leaks in August that sparked an investigation from Take-Two. The company issued subpoenas to the likes of Discord as part of the hunt for the person or group of people responsible. But Cyberleek reemerged last week with the release of a 24-minute GTA 6 gameplay video that reportedly showed cutscenes, story beats, playable characters Jason and Lucia naked (in the case of Jason, full-frontal nudity), and a first-person camera.

It remains unclear how the gameplay footage, or any potential build of the game it's taken from, escaped the confines of Rockstar's infamous tight security. Recent developments suggest Cyberleek remains at large and defiant in the face of potential legal action.

In August, Rockstar addressed the GTA 6 leaks, describing the situation as "heartbreaking" for its development team and "unfortunate" for fans. At the time, the developer acknowledged that its intended experience for players "may now be impacted by some spoilers," but reiterated GTA 6's previously-confirmed launch date of November 19.

Whether the culprit or culprits are ever caught may rest on how successful Take-Two's legal team and the relevant authorities are at forcing social networks or crypto exchanges to divulge any personal details they hold on those responsible.

Rockstar has insisted GTA 6 did not cost more than $1.5 billion to make, countering an online rumor, but it’s still probably the most expensive video game of all time.

In a sweeping report by Bloomberg into the making of GTA 6, Rockstar head of publishing Jennifer Kolbe insisted a rumor that GTA 6’s budget was more than the $1.5 billion spent on Dubai’s Burj Khalifa was wrong, although she failed to confirm the game’s exact budget. This rumor appears to have emerged from a July 2025 article by Gulf News, which claimed “Dubai's landmark is said to have cost $1.5 billion but the game is thought to have a $2 billion budget.”

Earlier this year, Business Insider suggested a $1-1.5 billion budget based on industry analyst estimations as part of an interview with Strauss Zelnick, boss of Rockstar parent company Take-Two. Zelnick wouldn’t say how much the company had spent on GTA 6 so far, but did admit “it was expensive.”

While GTA 6 did not cost more than $1.5 billion to develop, according to Rockstar, it is considered the most expensive video game of all time. The only video game that might claim to come close to GTA 6’s budget is space sim Star Citizen, although its now over $1 billion budget comes from ongoing sales of space ships. Bungie's recently released extraction shooter reportedly had a budget of over $250 million, for example. Concord's initial development deal was around $200 million, according to a report by Kotaku. In 2023, documents submitted as part of the Xbox Federal Trade Commission case accidentally revealed The Last of Us: Part II and Horizon Forbidden West each cost more than $200 million to develop. Last year, the astronomical development budgets of the Call of Duty games were revealed for the first time after a court document confirmed Activision pumped $700 million into Black Ops Cold War alone, although that was over the shooter's life cycle. GTA 6, clearly, surpasses them all.

As part of Bloomberg’s report is the confirmation that Rockstar now has 4,711 staff across 12 offices, up from the 2,441 staff it had when Red Dead Redemption 2 came out in 2018. The company has doubled in size over the last eight years, which will have increased costs significantly.

As Bloomberg points out, GTA 6’s enormous budget is likely to pay off pretty quickly, with some predicting an eye-watering 40 million sales and $3 billion in revenue in the first four months of the game going on sale in November. The standard edition of GTA 6 costs $80 — a $10 hike on the standard price of a triple-A video game. The Ultimate Edition, which some consider to be an essential purchase, costs $100. Then there’s the expected launch of online multiplayer next year (maybe tied to the launch of the PC version, which is reportedly due out Q1 2027), which will surely boost revenue even further. In short, even if it’s just shy of $1.5 billion, GTA 6’s budget doesn’t feel like much of a risk.

In July, Newzoo analysis suggested GTA 6 generated approximately $180 million in digital preorders across the U.S. and the five biggest European markets during the last week of June (GTA 6 preorders went live at midnight, June 25). The analytics firm used GTA 5’s player distribution (around 69% of GTA 5's lifetime console players sit within those six markets) to then estimate global first-week preorder spending for GTA 6 at approximately $260 million. Based on comparable preorder curves, GTA 6 is currently tracking toward $3.25 billion to $5.2 billion in cumulative sales by the end of launch week, it said.

GTA 5 set records for generating $1 billion in three days after going on sale back in 2013, making it the fastest-selling entertainment product in history (Marvel Studios’ Avengers: Endgame ran it close, making $1 billion at the global box office in five days). GTA 6 seems certain to hit the $1 billion mark faster than both. GTA 5 went on to become the second best-selling video game of all time, with nearly 230 million units sold-in to date. Only Minecraft is ahead of it. Could GTA 6 eventually surpass even Minecraft's 400 million sales?

In other GTA 6 news, Bloomberg reported that Rockstar has promised its next game won’t take another eight years to develop, although we don’t know what it will be.

Magic: The Gathering’s Universes Beyond crossovers remain contentious within the community, but there’s no denying they bring more eyeballs to what is, by any measure, a very fun and deep card game.

If Marvel Super Heroes has drawn you in, you’re in good company. It’s a big step forward from last year’s Spider-Man-centric set, bringing the Avengers, Fantastic Four, and plenty more iconic characters into the game. And with Wizards of the Coast already announcing Marvel: Darkhold Destiny for April 2027, featuring a darker, supernatural side of the Marvel Universe, there’s plenty more to look forward to if you’re enjoying this latest crossover.

Whether you're looking to build your collection, crack open some booster packs, or jump straight into a preconstructed Commander deck, we've rounded up the best deals on Magic: The Gathering's Marvel Super Heroes set.

The humble Play Booster is the backbone of any Magic: The Gathering set, offering one of the more affordable ways to build up your collection. Over at Amazon, you can save 28% on a Play Booster box, bringing it down to $147.95 from $209.70. That works out at $4.93 per pack, rather than the usual $6.99 MSRP, and you're getting 30 of the things in one fell swoop. Not bad at all.

Play Boosters are much less likely to cough up the big-money cards in Marvel Super Heroes, mind you. If you're hoping to strike gold, you'll want to look at the pricier Collector Boosters instead, currently back in stock at Amazon for $44.99 each, or $449.99 for pricey booster display box.

While we're on the premium options, as well, I'd like to call out the Collector's Edition Commander Decks, which are now down to $448.26. That's below market price compared to TCGplayer ($487), and a fairly good deal if you don't mind paying about $112 per deck. Seems like a lot, but it's still much better than paying the $640 ($160 per deck) that it was listed for before the sale.

If you want to find the most valuable cards in the set, you'll need to pay a premium to find them.

Amazon doesn't have individual Play Boosters available right now, but there are a couple of alternatives worth a look. The Marvel Super Heroes Gift Bundle includes nine Play Boosters and a Collector Booster, and it's currently $10 off, bringing it to just under $80. The Play Boosters alone would set you back around $63, so you're essentially getting that Collector Booster for a much more agreeable price.

Then there's Draft Night, which is currently discounted by 25% at Amazon. You get 12 Play Boosters for a spot of sealed Magic, plus a Collector Booster thrown in for good measure. At $89.99, we've crunched the numbers, and you're effectively paying just $6 for the Collector Booster. That's a pretty tidy deal.

If you'd rather skip the Collector Booster altogether, the Marvel Super Heroes Bundle is 27% off. Think of it as the modern equivalent of the old Fat Packs, giving you a nice stack of boosters without having to commit to a full box or settle for just a couple of packs.

Of course, Commander remains one of the most popular ways to play Magic: The Gathering, and three of the four Marvel Super Heroes preconstructed decks are discounted right now. Sorry, Black Panther fans.

I'd start with Avengers Assemble, which features familiar faces like Captain America and makes for a fun way to learn the ropes. It's currently $54.90, down from $74.99.

I was less taken with Doom Prevails, but there's still plenty to like if you're a fan of Marvel's villains and fancy adding them to your collection. It's currently 10% off at $67.38. With Wakanda Forever missing out on a discount, I'd personally go for Fantastic Four instead. It's had a full $30 knocked off its MSRP, bringing it down to $44.99.

Marvel: Darkhold Destiny

What makes Darkhold Destiny particularly interesting is that Wizards of the Coast has more room to tell its own story with Marvel's characters and settings.

Rather than simply transplanting familiar comic book heroes into Magic, the set looks to be building something that feels more at home in the game's multiverse.

That's a promising direction for Universes Beyond, especially for those who'd like these crossovers to feel like more than a collection of recognisable faces on Magic cards.

We'll have to wait until April 2027 to see how the full set comes together, but Darkhold Destiny is already shaping up to be an intriguing next step for Magic's Marvel crossovers. And if Marvel Super Heroes has been your gateway into the game, there could be plenty more to look forward to.

For more on Magic: The Gathering, check out our thoughts on how The Hobbit set compares with The Lord of the Rings, the most valuable cards in Reality Fracture, and the latest update on the postponed Monster Hunter Secret Lair.

Battlefield 6 has come under fire from fans after its latest battle pass was found to include new character skins with some pretty clear design flaws.

The first that stands out is the soldier wearing some kind of Batman mask, but minus the ears. He has five pistols attached to the chest pockets of his tac vest, for when you positively, absolutely have to go Shiva mode on some clowns. “Because switching to your pistol, secondary pistol, tertiary pistol, quartenary (sic) pistol, and quinary pistol is faster than reloading, soldier!” one Reddit poster joked.

💀 BRO IS CARRYING 5 PISTOLS! WHO APPROVED THIS SKIN? 😭

#Battlefield6 https://t.co/b6o94OkV1o

— Battlefield Intel (@BattlefieldInte) October 13, 2026

Illogical pistol placement isn’t the only thing weirding fans out. Some are convinced some of the skins were actually created with generative AI, after noticing weird spelling errors and other inconsistencies. One of the skins has a patch that says “secuty” on it, which is presumably supposed to say “security.”

Secuty 😭 It's AI

#Battlefield6 https://t.co/8DVphghCSU

— Battlefield Intel (@BattlefieldInte) October 13, 2026

"I believe it’s almost impossible to deny anymore that EA/DICE is using AI for the skins in #Battlefield6,” said one X / Twitter poster. “At least in the concept phase — and then anything that looks even remotely 'cool' just gets rubber-stamped.”

IGN has asked EA for comment.

Another skin features a bomb disposal juggernaut with thick body armor and a completely exposed head, like a cheeky little turtle poking out of its shell. Imagine aura farming when the shrapnel starts flying. It doesn’t help that he’s carrying magazines for small game hunting rifles that don’t exist in Battlefield 6.

“Fps .22s probably take like 2 full mags to kill someone,” one X / Twitter user said. “Not to mention he's carrying super finicky mags for a .22 varmint rifle,” joked another.

While it's possible that these skin issues are the result of human error, fans aren't giving DICE the benefit of the doubt. Perhaps that shouldn't come as much of a surprise; AI is perhaps the hottest topic in the video game industry, and with the likes of Fortnite developer Epic Games going all-in on generative AI, there is an intense scrutiny and a healthy dose of skepticism around video game assets that contain clear errors, particularly when they cost money to buy.

Elsewhere, fans are feeling misled over the inclusion of more whacky cosmetics. As well as a reactive weapon skin, there are crossover cosmetics with other EA series, allowing Battlefield 6 players to do some Dead Space cosplay. These land ahead of the Battlefield 6 Dead Space event.

It’s not quite Nicki Minaj, but the inclusion of these skins goes back on what the developers said prior to launch. Developers at DICE had gone on the record to say Battlefield 6 won’t feature goofy, immersion breaking skins.

Rockstar has promised that its next game following GTA 6 won’t take as long to come out, although it failed to hint at what it might be.

GTA 6 finally launches in November, eight years after the release of its last game, Red Dead Redemption 2. In a new report by Bloomberg detailing the challenges Rockstar has faced during GTA 6’s development, company leadership said whatever’s next won’t take as long because the work done for GTA 6 provides a foundation for following it up faster.

“The engine, the tools and the team we’ve built during this project will allow us to do things more quickly,” Phil Hooker, co-head of development, said.

“I feel confident that we can build on top of this and go more sideways than upwards to build more compelling content.”

“We foundationally changed a lot of stuff on this project,” co-head of development Aaron Garbut added. “But now it’s done, and we’re not going to rip it apart.”

The question fans have is, what will Rockstar’s next game be? Bloomberg compares the release of GTA 6 to GTA 3, in that the first 3D GTA game paved the way for the quickfire release of Grand Theft Auto: Vice City, which launched a year later in 2002. Could Rockstar soon follow GTA 6 with another GTA game, perhaps focused on another city?

Many hope and expect Rockstar to make Red Dead Redemption 3, although Rockstar itself hasn’t indicated it has plans to do so. A year ago, Rockstar Games co-founder and former lead writer Dan Houser said RDR3 “will probably happen.” In 2023, Roger Clark, who played Arthur Morgan, the main playable protagonist of Red Dead Redemption 2, said he was “certain” fans would see Red Dead Redemption 3 “one day,” but qualified that statement by saying he had no idea when that would be. Clark also ruled out the return of Arthur Morgan in the game, should it come to be. If you’ve played Red Dead Redemption 2, this might seem like stating the obvious, but there’s always the chance Rockstar may consider another prequel of some kind.

“I’m certain we will see Red Redemption 3 one day,” Clark said. “When that will be — I have absolutely no idea. Don’t count on Arthur’s involvement either. His story has been told, I feel.”

In a subsequent interview with IGN, Clark expanded on his thoughts: “Yeah, that got really picked up! I would have thought that was obvious though. Wouldn’t you? And it’s not like I have any insider information whatsoever, but of course there’s going to be another Red Dead. It sold over 60 million copies!”

He continued: “Strauss Zelnick, the CEO of Take-Two said it himself. He said GTA and Red Dead are prominent franchises for Rockstar Games and that they will be returning to them in the future. So there’s no doubt there will be another Red Dead. But if Arthur Morgan will be involved? I highly doubt it, to be honest. And I think it’s going to be quite some time before we even see a snifter of anything new Red Dead related. I have no idea how it would pan out, but I wouldn’t bet on Arthur being a part of it.”

In April this year, Hollywood star Jack Black revealed the character he’d love to play in Red Dead Redemption 3, should Rockstar make the game: Jack Black. In lieu of a Red Dead Redemption movie, which Black said he’d very much love to star in if the opportunity ever came his way, the Bowser actor would love to star in Red Dead Redemption 3. And it turns out there’s a character called Jack Black he’d love to play.

"Red Dead Redemption 2 takes place around the turn of the century, right?" Black told Polygon while promoting The Super Mario Galaxy Movie. "There was a character around that time named Jack Black, who wrote an autobiography called You Can't Win. I would kinda like to play Jack Black in Red Dead Redemption 3."

Delta Reign preorders only started dropping at Pokémon TCG retailers last week, with the Booster Bundle at best being $74.95 on Amazon as of last Friday; to my surprise, though, a third-party seller on Walmart has been quick to drop prices and even go well under market price.

At Walmart right now, seller Cataclysm Games has knocked the price of Delta Reign’s six-pack Booster Bundle to only $54.49, after slicing off $25.50 from its original $79.99 price tag.

Activision has confirmed the global release times and preload details for Call of Duty: Modern Warfare 4, which launches in various parts over the coming weeks.

Modern Warfare 4 (full game including Multiplayer) officially launches on October 23 across all platforms, but you’ll be able to play the campaign a week before that with Early Access, which kicks off on October 16. DMZ, Modern Warfare 4's extraction mode, is available from October 20.

Whether you’re playing Modern Warfare 4 on PC, PS5, Xbox Series consoles, or Nintendo Switch 2, this post will cover everything you need to know about getting those boots on the ground: release times, preload details, Early Access launch, and more.

Call of Duty: Modern Warfare 4 global release times:

As I said above, Modern Warfare 4 officially comes out on October 23, but what time you’ll get access depends on whether you have Early Access and what platform you plan to play on.

Modern Warfare 4 players on PC will be able to jump on at midnight local time on the morning of October 23. Wherever you’re based, the game will unlock at midnight. If it doesn’t trigger straight away, fully close and exit Steam — a relaunch should trigger it.

• Los Angeles: 12am PDT
• Mexico City: 12am CST
• Bogota: 12am COT
• New York: 12am EDT
• Brasilia: 12am BRT
• Accra: 12am GMT
• London: 12am BST
• Warsaw: 12am CEST
• Cape Town: 12am SAST
• Kyiv: 12am EEST
• Beijing: 12am CST
• Seoul: 12am KST
• Tokyo: 12am JST
• Melbourne: 12am AEST
• Auckland: 12am NZDT

When does Call of Duty: Modern Warfare 4 Campaign Early Access start?

Campaign Early Access for Modern Warfare 4 begins on October 16, 2026, for players who digitally preorder the Standard Digital Edition or Vault Edition of the game. For people who bought physical, there’s no Early Access for preorders of the Standard Edition.

When does Call of Duty: Modern Warfare 4 DMZ Access start?

Additionally, players who preordered will get Early Access to DMZ mode, which kicks off on October 20.

Here’s a look at the Modern Warfare 4 editions:

• Digital Standard Edition:
  • Campaign Early Access: Yes.
  • Includes full game and digital pre-order bonuses.
  • Can upgrade to the Vault Edition.
  • Price: $69.99.
• Digital Vault Edition:
  • Campaign Early Access: Yes.
  • Includes full game, both Operator Packs, Signature Weapon Collection, one season of BlackCell and the DMZ Deployment Bonus.
  • Price: $99.99.
• Physical Standard Edition:
  • Early Access: Not included.
  • Includes full base game.
  • Cannot upgrade to the Vault Edition.
  • Price: $69.99.

What are Call of Duty: Modern Warfare 4’s preload date and times?

Preload for Modern Warfare 4 will begin rolling out on October 14 at 9pm PT. Here’s how that looks for other regions:

• Los Angeles: 9pm PDT
• Mexico City: 10pm CST
• Bogota: 11pm COT
• New York: 12am EDT
• Brasilia: 1am BRT
• Accra: 4am GMT
• London: 5am BST
• Warsaw: 6am CEST
• Cape Town: 6am SAST
• Kyiv: 7am EEST
• Beijing: 12pm CST
• Seoul: 1pm KST
• Tokyo: 1pm JST
• Melbourne: 2pm AEST
• Auckland: 5pm NZDT

During setup, you can choose which content to download, including whether to install Warzone alongside Modern Warfare 4. The new version of Warzone will not be available until the launch of Season 1.

Xbox players should be able to circumvent regional restrictions with the New Zealand trick, where they change their in-game timezone to New Zealand in the settings, tricking their console into letting them pre-install and play early.

How much space will you need for Call of Duty: Modern Warfare 4?

According to the official Modern Warfare 4 system requirements, the game will need 115GB of available SSD space on PC. Console versions may vary — and it’ll depend what content you decide to download — but they’ll likely be somewhat similar.

Modern Warfare 4 minimum PC requirements:

• CPU: AMD Ryzen 5 1400 / Intel: Intel Core i5-6600
• RAM: 8GB
• GPU: AMD Radeon RX 470 / NVIDIA GeForce GTX 970 / 1060 / Intel Arc A580
• Video memory: 3GB
• Storage: SSD with 115GB of available space

Modern Warfare 4 recommended PC requirements (90fps, High Settings):

• CPU: AMD Ryzen 5 3600 / Intel Core i7-8700
• RAM: 16GB
• GPU: AMD Radeon RX 6600 XT / NVIDIA GeForce RTX 3060 Ti / Intel Arc B580
• Video memory: 8GB
• Storage: SSD with 115GB of available space

The cuts and studio shutdowns continue at Ubisoft, this time with layoffs hitting the developer of Skull and Bones and the closure of Trials maker RedLynx.

GamesIndustry.biz reported that Finnish studio RedLynx will close down, with up to 52 people losing their jobs. Meanwhile, Ubisoft Singapore, developer of pirate game Skull and Bones, will lose 70 staff. In a statement, Ubisoft insisted Ubisoft Singapore “remains an important part of Ubisoft’s global production organization.” GI said 70 staff represented around a fifth of Singapore’s total headcount, which suggests 280 staff are left.

Skull & Bones suffered a notoriously choppy development that stretched out over years. After a series of delays, it eventually launched early 2024 with a $70 price tag that Ubisoft boss Yves Guillemot justified by describing Skull & Bones as a "quadruple-A game." Year 3 Season 2, titled Crimson Waters, launched in August.

RedLynx, meanwhile, was gobbled up by Ubisoft in 2011 having enjoyed enormous success with the likes of Trials 2, Trials HD, and Trials Evolution, games that challenged players to navigate increasingly difficult side-scrolling courses on a bike. But after the launch of Trials Rising in 2019, RedLynx became a Ubisoft support studio.

It’s a sad end for RedLynx, once one of the most high-profile Xbox Live Arcade developers in the business. I have many fond memories of playing Trials HD and Trials Evolution on lunch breaks with colleagues at my previous stomping ground, Eurogamer, where we’d laugh and shout our way to the finish line in local competitive multiplayer. Trials was Infuriating — of course it was, it’s called Trials — but so much fun.

Ubisoft is of course still cutting costs left, right, and center across the business as it reorganizes itself into a leaner operation focused on fewer games. Multiple studios have closed down in recent years, many staff have lost their jobs, and games have been canceled.

Most recently, Natalie Francis was appointed Studio MD of Massive Entertainment, with Thomas Andrén’s becoming General Manager for Ubisoft’s Creative Network. Massive Entertainment, based in Malmö, Sweden, is currently leading the development of The Division 2 and The Division 3, operates development on the Snowdrop game engine, and works on Ubisoft Connect.

The beloved co-op adventure game, Peak, has been leaked for PS5 by the ESRB.

Last year, an adorable, cheap co-op game known as Peak blew up on Steam. In the game, players unite with their friends to pass through a wide variety of deadly obstacles in order to climb absurdly tall mountains. They must use the power of friendship and a handful of tools to overcome the odds, often resulting in hilarious deaths, injuries, and hijinks. As of August 2025, Peak has sold over 10 million copies, partially thanks to the fact it only costs $8 and is an easy sell to a group of friends.

It seems like the game will likely only continue to grow its audience, as the ESRB has rated Peak for PS5. Historically, ESRB leaks are incredibly accurate, so it seems like only a matter of time before an official announcement is made. As of right now, it's unclear if Peak will also come to Xbox and Nintendo Switch 2, but it would be surprising if this remained console exclusive to PS5.

Unfortunately for new players, Peak ended its post-launch support earlier this summer. As a result, you probably shouldn't expect the game to receive any significant content after it releases on console. It's also unclear if it will enjoy the same exceptionally low price when it does hit consoles, but it would be surprising if the team behind the game changed it. Following the game's release, the team noted that there's a psychology behind pricing a game that low.

“We had this joke of, like, 'How much is a game really?'" said Peak co-creator Nick Kaman. "In a player’s mind, what does it mean to spend five bucks? Well, that’s five bucks. But six bucks? Well, that’s still five bucks. Four bucks is also kind of five bucks. Three bucks is two bucks. And two bucks is basically free. So we’ve got these tiers: You know, twelve bucks… that’s ten bucks. But thirteen bucks is fifteen bucks. And we found that eight bucks is still five bucks. It doesn’t become ten bucks. Seven ninety nine, that’s five bucks, right? So, eight bucks going to five bucks is the biggest differential we could find in pricing, so we found it very optimal.”

It's unclear when an official announcement might follow, but if there's an ESRB rating, it typically means that the game isn't too far away from a release.