Modder ‘instanity’ has released a 4K pack for Grand Theft Auto 5 Enhanced Edition that overhauls all of the game’s story characters. In total, this pack improves over 70 characters. As such, it’s a must-have for everyone who is currently playing it. Going into more details, the mod improves the body, head, and clothes of … Continue reading GTA 5 Enhanced Mod Adds 4K Textures To All Story Characters→
Super Mario creator Shigeru Miyamoto has discussed how his role has changed after stepping back from leading development on Nintendo's most famous video game series.
In a new interview, Miyamoto revealed he had now entrusted most of the work on new Mario games to others, though said he still played through the first half hour of new projects himself to ensure it felt "like Mario" to him.
Speaking in celebration of Super Mario Bros' 40th anniverary, the veteran designer, now 72, also said he hoped "to stay healthy until Mario's 50th anniversary" in a decade's time.
"Nowadays, I have teammates who help maintain the world of Mario, so I entrust much of it to them," Miyamoto told Japanese magazine Casa Brutus (thanks, VGC). "Even so, I always personally play through about the first 30 minutes of the game and check the interface thoroughly — to make sure it really feels like Mario."
Recent years have seen other Nintendo faces appear more prominently during Nintendo Direct broadcasts, with Miyamoto often only appearing to introduce new Nintendo concepts such as the company's expansion into theme parks and movies.
"With the help of many passionate people outside our company, Mario has expanded into theme parks and movies, and I'm really looking forward to how things will develop from here," Miyamoto continued, discussing his current work.
"Up through Super Mario Odyssey, I feel we've done just about everything we could on the Switch. In the past, whenever a new console came out, we always released a new Mario game, so I do wonder how the current team will take on that challenge," he teased. "But maybe I'll say, 'I won't look anymore!," he laughed. "I just hope to stay healthy until Mario’s 50th anniversary!"
"The setting for the next movie is, just as the title says, the galaxy — that's all I can really say," Miyamoto concluded when asked about the film. "We're in the final stages of production now, but I think it's going to be fun. I usually just say, 'I'll keep working on it until it becomes fun,' so that alone should tell you how confident I am (laughs)."
Image credit: Kayla Oaddams/WireImage.
Tom Phillips is IGN's News Editor. You can reach Tom at tom_phillips@ign.com or find him on Bluesky @tomphillipseg.bsky.social
Kadokawa, the parent company of Elden Ring: Nightreign developer FromSoftware, has confirmed we'll get new DLC for the multiplayer game by the end of March 2026, as unhappy players leave negative reviews on Steam.
"We are aiming for further sales growth for Elden Ring Nightreign, original Elden Ring, and its DLC," the company said in its recent financial report to investors (thanks, GamesRadar+). "We have multiple game titles in the development pipeline. FromSoftware is currently developing Elden Ring Nightreign DLC (planned for release in FY2025) Elden Ring Tarnished Edition (planned for release in 2026 for Nintendo Switch 2), and The Duskbloods (planned for release in 2026)."
FY2025 in this instance means by the end of Kadokawa's current financial year, so by March 31, 2026. But while the financial report revealed that Nightreign had "performed well beyond initial expectations" and confirmed the DLC — described on the Steam storefront as being available "by Q4 2025" — is still on the way, recent user reviews for the Deluxe Upgrade Pack have dropped to a 'Mostly Negative' rating as players express their frustration at the lack of tangible news.
"We're mid-Q4 2025. No news, no teasers, total silence," wrote one negative reviewer on November 1. "If you're thinking about buying Deluxe Upgrade, wait until we get actual news about the content. I can't recommend you a promise." Another said: "It's been half a year now, still no dlc or any new characters in sight even though they got leaked a bit ago. Right now this is a complete scam, as even the soundtrack isnt even full."
Someone else said they would change their negative review to positive "once FromSoft announces something."
Nightreign's ultra-hard difficulty mode, Deep of Night, released back in September, having been discovered by dataminers back in August. Beyond that, though, there's been very little firm news on what additional content could be on the way. It's worth noting that even though the Kadokawa financial report guarantees the release of the Nightreign DLC by the end of March 2026, that doesn't necessarily mean it won't release before the end of calendar year 2025.
"When Elden Ring Nightreign is played exactly as it was designed to be played, it’s one of the finest examples of a three-player co-op game around," we wrote in IGN's 7/10 Elden Ring: Nightreign review. "But a lack of crossplay, duo matchmaking, and built-in communication tools makes it hard to create the conditions needed to have this kind of experience unless you’re bringing two real-life friends on every run."
Vikki Blake is a reporter for IGN, as well as a critic, columnist, and consultant with 15+ years experience working with some of the world's biggest gaming sites and publications. She's also a Guardian, Spartan, Silent Hillian, Legend, and perpetually High Chaos. Find her at BlueSky.
Marvel actor Jeremy Renner has denied allegations of harassment made by filmmaker Yi Zhou, after the pair worked together on a Disney documentary project.
In a Daily Mail interview published last week, Zhou claimed Renner became "violent" during a meeting at Renner's house in August where it's alleged the actor drank a bottle of wine. Zhou said she then locked herself in a room overnight for her safety. In a later text conversation, in which Zhou accused Renner of being a "pig" and sending her explicit photos, the Chinese director claimed Renner replied to her: "immigration will be notified of your..." — though the rest of the message is cut off.
"The allegations being made are totally inaccurate and untrue," a spokesperson for Renner stated to Variety.
Renner has subsequently filed a cease and desist letter, obtained by TMZ, in which the actor claims the pair previously had a "brief consensual encounter" prior to the meeting at his house. The Hawkeye star says Zhou had sent him "hundreds" of explicit messages, but told Zhou he was not interested in a relationship when they met again in August, when he confirmed Zhou slept in a guest room that night.
TMZ reports that Zhou has filed her own cease and desist letters over the past month, accusing Renner of sending "sexual or suggestive" messages that have caused "discomfort and distress."
Reports dicussing the pair's relationship have swirled for some time, with Zhou previously posting numerous photos of herself with Renner, and more recently criticising him for not publicly promoting their projects together, including a documentary about Disney staff. In October, Zhou said she and the actor had been "dating", prior to their August meeting.
"This experience really shows the dark side of Hollywood and the smear campaign to deter women and Asian female filmmakers and women in general," Zhou wrote in an Instagram post last week. "I'm appalled but happy to read also many support from friends and media that will continue to uncover domestic abuse, abuse of women and the unwanted unsolicited porn attack against innocent young women."
Renner recently returned to screens in the latest Knives Out movie, Wake Up Dead Man, after a period of recovery following his 2023 snowplough accident. The actor has also recently discussed his hopes of returning to his Marvel character for a second season of Disney+ series Hawkeye. Renner was not among the names listed in Marvel's Avengers: Doomsday casting announcement.
Image credit: Noam Galai/Getty Images.
Tom Phillips is IGN's News Editor. You can reach Tom at tom_phillips@ign.com or find him on Bluesky @tomphillipseg.bsky.social
Arc Raiders has had another bumper weekend, once again breaking its own concurrent record on Steam.
Within a day of its release, Embark Studio's new extraction shooter hit a Steam concurrent peak player count of 264,673, making it one of the biggest extraction shooters ever on Valve's platform. And now it's topped even that record over the weekend, hitting a concurrent peak of 462,488 players according to Valve's official figures.
Yesterday, November 9, Arc Raiders had a higher concurrent peak than Battlefield 6 (441,035), and placed behind only the eternally popular Counter-Strike 2, Dota 2, and PUBG. Of course, Arc Raiders' true concurrent player peak will be higher, given the game is also available on PlayStation 5 and Xbox Series X and S, but neither Sony nor Microsoft make their player numbers public.
As Arc Raiders tears up Steam's most-played games list, streamer Shroud has continued to call on his fans to vote for it as Game of the Year 2025 over Clair Obscur: Expedition 33, calling multiplayer gamers "the minority" (even though research shows that it's mostly multiplayer games that retain high player counts).
"I thought I was only going to play five or six hours of Arc Raiders on launch day before sitting down to write this initial review in progress, but after just a handful of matches, I suddenly couldn’t pull myself away – and before I realized it, I’d been playing for 10 hours," we wrote in IGN's Arc Raiders review-in-progress.
"This is without question the most hooked I’ve found myself on an extraction shooter (and I’ve played a lot of them), with clean and tense gunplay, a progression system that’s been incredibly satisfying so far, and a loot game that has me sweating over what to put in my backpack and what to leave behind."
Vikki Blake is a reporter for IGN, as well as a critic, columnist, and consultant with 15+ years experience working with some of the world's biggest gaming sites and publications. She's also a Guardian, Spartan, Silent Hillian, Legend, and perpetually High Chaos. Find her at BlueSky.
A special box of Super Mario Galaxy Movie cookie dough has provided our best look yet at Mario's dinosaur steed Yoshi, and strongly hinted at two other fan-favorite characters expected to turn up in the sequel.
The latest leak, which comes from box artwork now visible via retailers online, features Yoshi prominently — as the cookie kit is designed to let you create Yoshi egg cookies. Yum! As fans will remember, the first Mario movie's post-credits scene teased Yoshi's egg starting to crack open — though we never saw the dinosaur fully hatch.
Other clues exist on the Pillsbury's cookie box which point to a couple of other Mario characters, meanwhile — both of which are also yet to make their big screen introduction.
The front and back of the cookie box feature the Comet Observatory, the central hub within the original Mario Galaxy game that's also where Rosalina lives. It's hard to imagine a Mario Galaxy movie without its all-important space princess, but this is our strongest confirmation yet that Nintendo will introduce the character on the big screen in the upcoming sequel.
Finally, the rear of the cookie box shows a star map that features graffiti of Bowser Jr., a key antagonist in various Mario games — including both Mario Galaxy 1 and 2. Nintendo's first Mario movie made no mention of Bowser's offspring, though that all looks set to change for its follow-up.
The leak follows an earlier spill of information from a similar promotional tie-in with Old Spice — which saw The Super Mario Galaxy Movie's name first revealed via promotional cans of deoderant. As if further confirmation was needed of that leak's legitimacy, the Yoshi artwork shown in better detail on the Pillsbury cookie box now matches up with the one seen in that leak exactly.
Fans have long been hoping for Nintendo to feature more of both Rosalina and Bowser Jr. — and in both cases, for more to be revealed about their origins. Indeed, after a notable tease in the first Mario movie, Nintendo looks set to reveal more about Rosalina's link with Peach following years of fan debate over how they might be related.
Bowser Jr., meanwhile, also has questions surrounding his parentage. First introduced in Super Mario Sunshine, the mischievous offspring is initially presented as the result of a union between Bowser and Peach, though this is later revealed as a joke. Exactly who Bowser Jr.'s mother is, though, has never been made clear. (Mario creator Shigeru Miyamoto once claimed in an interview he was the mother, though this was a joke too.)
The Super Mario Galaxy Movie is currently slated for release in theaters on April 3, 2026. Hopefully then, all will be revealed.
Tom Phillips is IGN's News Editor. You can reach Tom at tom_phillips@ign.com or find him on Bluesky @tomphillipseg.bsky.social
Sydney Sweeney’s new movie, Christy, has suffered a brutal opening round at the box office with just $1.3 million from North American theaters.
The biopic sees the Madame Web star assume the role of boxer Christy Martin in what many consider to be an Oscar-bait performance. But the critical reception is mixed, with IGN’s Christy review returning a 7/10. We said: “Sydney Sweeney blazes trails and pulls no punches in a choppy biopic that falters at the finish.”
The R-rated Christy, though, is on the ropes right out of the gate, with $1.305 million from 2,011 theaters domestically. That’s a per-theater average (PTA) of just $649, and is one of the worst openings ever for a film in over 2,000 theaters.
It’s an even worse domestic launch than Dwayne ‘The Rock’ Johnson’s biopic The Smashing Machine, which made $5.84 million from North American theaters during its opening weekend and was considered a disaster. The Smashing Machine ended up with a domestic box office total of just $11.38 million, which Christy looks set to struggle to match.
Last week, Sweeney broke her silence on the American Eagles jeans campaign kerfuffle from earlier this year, telling GQ that she refused to issue a statement in response because “I’ve always believed that I’m not here to tell people what to think.” The advert revolved around a pun on “great genes,” with the tagline: “Sydney Sweeney Has Great Jeans.”
Topping the domestic box office this weekend was Predator: Badlands. Sarah’s Oil starring Zachary Levi, Naya Desir-Johnson, and Sonequa Martin-Green grossed $4.459 million at the domestic box office this weekend. Nuremberg earned $4.1 million. Die My Love opened domestically to $2.8 million. Christy failed to crack the top 10.
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.
Modder ‘cradilyex’ has released a brand new cool mod for Cyberpunk 2077. This mod aims to completely change how traffic works. To be more precise, the mod makes traffic more realistic and unique, depending on which district you’re in. It’s definitely a mod everyone should try out. Let’s take a closer look at it. Night … Continue reading New Cyberpunk 2077 Mod Aims To Overhaul Its Traffic→
Spoilers follow for IT: Welcome to Derry Episodes 1-3.
Well, it didn’t take long for IT: Welcome to Derry to hit what feels like its first filler episode. The first two installments of this IT prequel packed a lot of plot and characters into two hours, so there’s an air of inevitability to this week’s episode feeling like it has to grind the proceedings to a halt in order to sort it all out. Disappointingly though, Episode 3 (Now You See It) resets the status quo with elements that aren’t all that different from the status quo it already had, leaving Welcome to Derry feeling like its spinning its wheels a little earlier into its run than anyone would want to see.
This episode feels like the first real stumble for the kids’ side of the story, which was undoubtedly the stronger element of the first two installments, immediately doubling back on one of last week’s more disturbing developments: Lilly (Clara Stack) being reinstitutionalized at Juniper Hill after her grocery store encounter with Pennywise. For as much time as that episode spends reinforcing how terrified she is of getting sent back to that place, Episode 3 starts with her being discharged, and from there there’s almost no time spent on exploring what effect going back had on her.
...it starts to feel like déjà vu all over again, and three episodes in, that’s not a promising sign.
Lilly’s so far the most well-drawn of the young characters, so it was really disappointing to see a big development like that have to take a back seat to the plot, which has Lilly, Ronnie, Will, and Rich coming together to clear Hank Grogan’s name for the killings that ended the premiere. Since that brutal rug-pull took three Losers’ Club stand-ins off the board, Welcome to Derry has been working towards reassembling a gang of brave kids to fight Pennywise. But by the time Lilly’s bringing this new gang up to the hideout atop the Derry stand to discuss the source of their torment, it starts to feel like déjà vu all over again, and three episodes in, that’s not a promising sign.
Over on the air base, we’re getting some more context for James Remar’s General Shaw, and why he in particular is leading the charge to learn more about Pennywise. Shaw takes more of the spotlight this week, navigating the delicate politics with the local Indigenous population of digging around sacred burial sites looking for Pennywise “beacons.” With the Cuban Missile Crisis looming, Shaw’s interest in this mission has seemed entirely focused on national security up to this point, so the reveal that Shaw’s got a lot more of a personal connection to Derry than we first realized is a welcome one. Remar plays Shaw with more softness than you may expect of a Kingian military man (say, The Major from The Long Walk), which makes his more aggressive moves like ordering the attack on Leroy to prove his mettle or continuing the dig despite the protests of his old friend Rose (Kimberly Guerrero) all the more intriguing… almost as intriguing as naming a character “Rose” in a Stephen King story.
As manager of Derry’s Secondhand Rose pawn shop, Rose has been on the periphery of the action up to this point, but it’s clear from her role here as a confidant to both her community and to Shaw that she’s a force for good. The 1907 flashback set in Shaw and Rose’s childhoods that opens the episode reinforces an idea that Welcome to Derry’s been implicitly driving towards: that Pennywise’s cycles of terror are routinely opposed by a group of brave Derry children. Welcome to Derry has been at its most thematically interesting so far while interrogating the generational differences of how kids and adults have dealt with Pennywise/evil over the years, and if nothing else, at least Episode 3 leaves Shaw and Rose as deeper characters than when we met them.
Chris Chalk turns in another great performance as Dick Hallorann, and through him we’re treated to one of Episode 3’s few bright spots: a Shining-enabled psychic peek into the cistern under Derry that Pennywise calls home. Chalk’s really impressing with his performance, skillfully deploying recognizable tics and murmurs of Scatman Crothers’ to great effect here as his psychic visions lead him down terrifying paths. We have a pretty good understanding of the rules of how Pennywise operates on our physical plane of existence, but because we’re visiting the cistern through a psychic vision, Dick’s encounter with Pennywise feels way more dangerous. That’s underlined by Chalk after Dick’s vision concludes, as his telling Leroy Hanlon “it wasn’t supposed to see us” lands with the gravity that it should.
That said, the Hanlons get stuck without much to do this week. We learn a little more about Charlotte’s desire to be more involved with civil rights activism, and Leroy’s reservations about that, and Will forges closer bonds with Rich, Lilly, and Ronnie. But Episode 3’s focus is much more on building up the mystery of Pennywise’s presence in Derry over time, so the Hanlons’ place in that tapestry gets shelved for now.
The scares this week are sorely lacking, and seem to suggest that the visual effects animating them are going to be an episode-by-episode grab bag. Baby monster from the premiere? No thanks! Lilly’s dead pickle dad from last week? Shiny, briny, beautiful… but the skeleton man skittering around the forest in broad daylight this week? That wasn’t it, Welcome to Derry. There is some good dread generated as young Shaw nervously walks through a carnival haunted house, and in the aforementioned Dick Hallorann/Pennywise meeting, but payoffs here in Episode 3 largely miss the mark.
Episode 3 falls apart during its cemetery-set finale, as the kids attempt to conjure Pennywise to photograph him in the hopes of absolving Hank. But rather than drawing out the tension and really building up to a moment, all hell breaks loose shortly after the kids begin the rite and the hodgepodge of funhouse surprises that follow take all of the air out of the spooky setting. Here the episode’s visual effects are at their worst, as the kids ride through the infinitely dolly-zooming cemetery and the ground opens up beneath them. Whether it’s the uninspired designs of their ghostly dead friends or the obviously composited shots of the kids riding full speed on their bikes, nothing about this sequence works and, for all its chaos and scale, it’s a total letdown of an ending. The plan does seem to have worked though, and the kids get a handful of photos of their supernatural assailants which I’m sure the adults in Derry will believe are real.
Speaking of which, the 1907 prologue that opens the episode concludes on a pointed shot of a female clown with Pennywise-esque makeup. I wonder if the “Young Periwinkle” character in the episode’s credits knows anything about that… And who in the good gosh is Periwinkle, anyway!?
Predator: Badlands looks like a hit after it secured the biggest global opening ever for a Predator movie — including the Alien vs. Predator films — at the box office.
Dan Trachtenberg, who revitalized Predator with 2022’s back to basics Prey and this year’s animated anthology Killer of Killer, has continued his hot streak with the PG-13 Predator: Badlands, which has enjoyed strong reviews from critics. (IGN’s Predator: Badlands review returned an 8/10.)
Disney said Predator: Badlands opened to $40 million domestically and $40 million internationally for a global opening weekend total of $80 million. That’s the biggest debut for a Predator movie ever at current rates. For context, 2018’s The Predator opened to $73.5 million.
Predator began with 1987’s much-loved Predator, starring Arnold Schwarzenegger. Predator: Badlands is a very different film; less sci-fi horror, more mainstream sci-fi action. For the first time ever the Predator is the protagonist, with a Yautja called Dek (Dimitrius Schuster-Koloamatangi) out to prove himself to his father by killing a monster on a death planet. Along the way, he meets a Weyland-Yutani synth called Thia, played by Elle Fanning, in an Alien / Predator crossover.
It's a big swing for Predator and for Dan Trachtenberg, but he was uninterested in essentially remaking prior Predator movies for this new sequel. In a recent interview with IGN, Trachtenberg said he was inspired by Terminator 2 when it came to making Badlands. "Terminator 2: Judgment Day was like a movie my mom could watch," he said. "So that was a part of it for me, like how to make something that was bold and visceral but also emotional."
It’s a strong start, then, and hopefully a sign that Trachtenberg will be able to continue making more Predator movies, fleshing out his fledgling Predator cinematic universe and perhaps making good on that Dutch tease at the end of Killer of Killers. Could we perhaps see an all-star team up at some point?
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.
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