Will Smith, whose career has deep ties to The Matrix, teased something involving the sci-fi franchise earlier this month, but it turns out it's just a song from him and rapper Big Sean.

The actor posted on Instagram to announce a song called Beautiful Scars from "Mr Anderson and Mr Smith," which releases January 30. The image for the song features both artists in The Matrix attire and their names in the classic computer font.

Smith appears to be portraying Neo, which is perhaps a reference to his turning down of the role in the 1990s before it was picked up by Keanu Reeves. Big Sean, meanwhile, is wearing the suit, jacket, and iconic glasses of Morpheus.

A tease from Smith on January 7 recreated the iconic scene from the film, showing a black screen with the words "Wake up, Will..." typed up. Fans therefore theorised his connection to The Matrix was about to come full circle with his starring in The Matrix 5, but Hollywood Reporter said this wasn't the case.

The Matrix 5 is still shrouded in mystery, however. It was announced in April 2024 from Warner Bros. with The Martian and The Cabin in the Woods' Drew Goddard set to write and direct. It will be the first film not to have either of The Wachowskis, Lana or Lilly, at the helm, though the former will executive produce.

While the original The Matrix is among the most beloved films of all time, its sequels were less well received and even reboot film The Matrix Resurrections was widely panned upon its release in 2021. "The Matrix Resurrections is a bunch of really good ideas stacked together to make a bad — and sometimes ugly — film," IGN said in our 4/10 review.

Photo by DANIEL RAMALHO/AFP via Getty Images.

Ryan Dinsdale is an IGN freelance reporter. He'll talk about The Witcher all day.

Xbox's family of transparent controllers is getting a new addition. The company has revealed a brand new Pulse Cipher Special Edition controller that has the same transparent design as its predecessors but in a vibrant red color instead.

It's now available to preorder at Amazon, Best Buy, and on the Microsoft Store for $74.99. You won't have to wait too long to get your hands on it, either, as it's set to release on February 4 this year. Head to the links below to get your preorders in today.

Preorder Xbox Pulse Cipher Special Edition Wireless Controller – Out February 4

Pokémon TCG: Scarlet and Violet - Prismatic Evolutions represents the culmination of the slow build-up to Pokémania 2025. The wild popularity of the set sold preorders out fast, with stock only now starting to return to shelves and online retailers. But, despite these difficulties, it's quickly become the ultimate crown jewel of the Scarlet and Violet era, delivering fan-favorite Eevee and its evolutions in jaw-dropping Special Illustration Rares and ultra-rare Master Ball foils.

Packed with over 200 cards, including powerhouse Pokémon like Roaring Moon ex and Pikachu ex, this set blends stunning artwork with competitive playability, making it a must-have for trainers and collectors alike. Improved pull rates for Special Illustration Rares sweeten the deal, giving fans a better shot at pulling their dream cards, even as demand hits an all-time high.

Dragon Age: The Veilguard developer BioWare has released a new patch for the game and in the same breath suggested it’s basically done with it less than three months after launch.

As spotted by Eurogamer, Patch 5 includes just one quality-of-life improvement and a number of bug fixes, but it’s the wording from BioWare that suggests this is the final major patch Dragon Age: The Veilguard will get.

“Thank you all for playing Dragon Age: The Veilguard; we were so happy with the game’s stability at launch and hope you have enjoyed our Quality of Life patches since then,” BioWare said. “With the game being in a stable place, we are moving to monitor for any game-breaking bugs should those occur. Dareth shiral!”

Moving to monitor game-breaking bugs sounds like players shouldn’t expect any new content. And as Eurogamer points out, "dareth shiral" means "farewell" in Dragon Age's Elvish language.

Dragon Age: The Veilguard was the first new game in the fantasy RPG series in 10 years, but it came and went not with a bang but a whimper. Amid the launch BioWare confirmed Dragon Age: The Veilguard wouldn’t get any post-launch DLC, shocking fans who had hoped for expansions as previous Dragon Age games had received.

This week, publisher and owner EA admitted Dragon Age: The Veilguard had failed to meet sales expectations by a whopping 50%; it had expected three million players, but the game managed only 1.5 million.

There's been some smoke around Dragon Age: The Veilguard's struggles, such as it receiving a significant discount just a month after launch for Cyber Monday, and the departure of its director, Corinne Busche, from BioWare just last week. We've chronicled some of the game's development challenges already, including layoffs and the departure of several project leads at different stages.

Mass Effect 5 now appears to be BioWare’s focus, although it seems far, far away still. And what next for Dragon Age? Given how Dragon Age: The Veilguard went for EA, it seems the publisher will take some convincing to greenlight yet another sequel any time soon.

Wesley is the UK News Editor for IGN. Find him on Twitter at @wyp100. You can reach Wesley at wesley_yinpoole@ign.com or confidentially at wyp100@proton.me.

Dishonored 2 cost more to make than legendary role-playing game and fellow Bethesda title The Elder Scrolls 5: Skyrim and struggled for sales, but it still saved developer Arkane according to a former employee.

Julien Eveillé, who worked in quality assurance on Dishonored 2 and as a designer on sequel Dishonored: Death of the Outsider, told PC Gamer that the game underperformed financially but saved Arkane by providing a "seal of quality" that "would maybe be considered the most refined games of the whole Bethesda catalogue."

Bethesda questioned the series' viability in the wake of disappointing sales of Dishonored 2 and Death of the Outsider, Eveillé said.

"It was a bit strange and weird. I think when Bethesda was looking at the numbers, they thought, 'Okay, Skyrim sold so much. And it cost less than Dishonored 2 to make.' So they were asking questions," he said.

"From an executive spend standpoint, it makes sense to ask those questions of, 'Why should we keep going with you?' But we knew that we had a kind of seal of quality protection, making what would maybe be considered the most refined games of the whole Bethesda catalogue."

This "kind of saved the studio," Eveillé added, noting that focusing on this kind of game instead of chasing trends like live service games was critical to the "future success of the studio." This pedigree continued on to Deathloop, deemed a masterpiece by IGN, and fans will surely hope the incoming Marvel's Blade will have that quality too.

This is a tale of two Arkanes, however, as Arkane Austin infamously went down that path of chasing trends when it developed Redfall as a live service title, though this was reportedly at the request of upper management and not the actual developers creating it.

Redfall launched without that Arkane "seal of quality" but instead with "bland missions, boneheaded enemies, and repeated technical problems," according to IGN's 4/10 review. Bethesda owner Microsoft later shut down the studio in a devastating round of lay offs.

Ryan Dinsdale is an IGN freelance reporter. He'll talk about The Witcher all day.

In early 2025, a Final Fantasy 14 mod sparked "stalking" fears amid reports it was able to scrape hidden player data, including details like character information, retainer information, any alternate characters linked to a Square Enix account, and much more.

The mod, named “Playerscope,” allows users to track specific player data of anyone in the vicinity of the person using it. This information is then sent to a centralized database managed by the mod author (no matter if you are looking at a specific player, or just happen to be around other players), and tracks information that players would usually not be permitted to see via in-game tools.

Specifically, the mod offers information on “Content ID” and “Account ID,” which can be used to track players across characters. This was done by manipulating the Content ID system introduced in the Dawntrail expansion, which in turn let players blacklist others across their service account and multiple characters.

The only way to prevent your account data being scraped by the tool is to join the private Discord channel for Playerscope and opt out. Theoretically, every single Final Fantasy 14 player who is not in the Discord channel is having their data scraped. Obviously this is a significant privacy risk, and the community has been vocal in its response: “the purpose is obvious, to stalk people” one commenter noted on Reddit.

Several weeks ago the mod author posted on Discord that the plugin was found on Github, which led to an explosion in popularity. Due to terms of service violations, Playerscope has now been removed from Github, but it was allegedly mirrored on similar websites Gittea and Gitflic. IGN has verified that a Playerscope repository no longer exists on either alternative platform. Theoretically, the mod could also still be circulating in private communities.

Star Trek has been around for so long now that, for the purposes of a listicle like this, it seems only fair to group the franchise’s output by era. You’ve got The Original Series period of the late ’60s, then there’s the movies featuring those old scientists, which then gave way to the Rick Berman era which started with Next Generation and ended with Enterprise, and then of course there’s the modern era of Parmount+ shows which began with Discovery in 2017.

And that’s what we’re discussing today, as the service formerly known as CBS All Access (remember that?) launches the first straight-to-streaming TV movie, Star Trek: Section 31 (which actually originated as a series). In less than eight years, the modern Trek brain trust has also created five new shows, two of which are animated, as well as a series of shorts known as, of course, Short Treks.

With the variety of approaches that these different projects have taken on – from straight sci-fi drama to comedy, animation, shorts, feature-length, and more – comparing them to one another is a bit tricky. There’s also the fact that a show can have good and bad seasons, so keep that in mind when looking at our rankings as we’ve taken a series’ entire run into account rather than just focused on a favorite run of episodes.

So with all that said, let’s make it so, engage, fly, blast off, punch it, or whatever else is your favorite thing to say while cosplaying as a Starfleet captain!

7. Star Trek: Section 31

Long in development as a series featuring (one of) Michelle Yeoh’s Star Trek: Discovery character(s), Section 31 eventually morphed into the first Star Trek TV movie after the pandemic disrupted the production schedule and Yeoh won an Oscar for Everything Everywhere All at Once. Starring Yeoh as former Emperor Philippa Georgiou, refugee from the dark Mirror Universe, the finished film seems to have lost its way during that long gestation period. There’s very little Star Trek to be found here; just look at the in-name-only Section 31 of it all, or the lack of any of the overarching themes that makes Gene Roddenberry’s franchise what it is. At the same time, what we do get often feels like an undercooked, 11-years-too-late riff on Guardians of the Galaxy’s freewheelin’ approach to outer space adventure. It’s a shame, because Yeoh deserves better, and direct-to-streaming Star Trek movies should be something that becomes a regular occurrence. After this debacle, that seems less likely, alas.

6. Star Trek: Short Treks

As with the concept of doing feature-length movies for the small screen, going in the other direction and producing a series of Star Trek shorts – Short Treks, as they were called – was another interesting approach to telling new stories in this universe. There were two seasons and a total of 10 shorts released between 2018 and 2020, and a couple of them are terrific. The standout is "Calypso," written by Pultizer-winning author Michael Chabon and, yes, based in part on the Calypso myth from The Odyssey. The short utilizes the Star Trek: Discovery sets to tell the story of Aldis Hodge’s lost seaman (OK, spaceman) who falls under the spell of a beautiful… computer. But often the shorts were hamstrung by their very nature – they were typically conceived to be cost-effective and utilize existing sets and costumes, and sometimes the stories didn’t quite prove to be worth telling. Still, it was a new and interesting format for Trek and certainly merits more installments if the Trek military-industrial complex is willing.

5. Star Trek: Picard

OK, Star Trek: Picard is one of those cases I mentioned earlier where the quality between seasons varies significantly. Looking at the overall three-season return of the almighty Jean-Luc Picard, it’s a fairly mixed affair. Season 1, with its no uniforms/no Starfleet for Picard mandate from Patrick Stewart, wasn’t awful but didn’t really land in any meaningful way. (It did turn our beloved admiral into an android, though!) Season 2 was awful, with a seemingly exhausted Stewart sleepwalking through much of the story in what appeared to be a budget-saving move to 2024 Los Angeles. And then Season 3 was a nostalgic delight, bringing back most of the original Next Generation crew for one (more) final adventure, and porting them into a modern TV landscape along the way with a more mature approach to their (and their next generation’s) ongoing stories. Of course, even the return of Riker, Crusher, et al. ran counter to the show’s initial mission statement, a sort of admission that what was there wasn’t working before the old crew came in to help save the day.

4. Star Trek: Discovery

The modern era started back in 2017 when we were introduced to Sonequa Martin-Green’s mutinous Starfleet officer Michael Burnham, along with the off-kilter crew of the USS Discovery. Star Trek: Discovery, like Picard, suffers from an uneven track record, but its first two seasons were pretty great, despite the creative upheaval that was happening behind the scenes with multiple showrunner changes. Setting Disco in the years immediately prior to The Original Series was a choice to be sure, as its 21st century depiction of future tech (among other things) seemed to break continuity with what we know of that time period. But ultimately none of that mattered. Season 1 felt new and exciting in multiple ways, from its unique depiction of the Klingons as truly alien, to the jump technology that powered the ship, to the core concept of centering the show on a character who was not in command. Indeed, Martin-Green was always the heart of Discovery, and while Season 2 continued to excel (it introduced us to Anson Mount’s version of Captain Pike, which of course eventually led to us getting the awesome Strange New Worlds as a spinoff), the show seemed to increasingly lose its way once the crew were sent to the far-off future at the start of Season 3. An over-reliance on mystery box story arcs and the loss of the angsty edge of the first couple of seasons eventually made Star Trek: Discovery too milquetoast for its own good.

3. Star Trek: Prodigy

The animated Star Trek: Prodigy is a kids show! So how could it be so high on this list? Well, it may be a kids show, but it’s also a really good Star Trek show. Designed to appeal to, obviously, the next generation of potential Trekkies, Prodigy is also a Star Trek: Voyager sequel. Not only does Kate Mulgrew return to the world of Starfleet as a holographic version of Captain Kathryn Janeway, but as the show progresses it becomes increasingly entwined in Voyager’s history. Along the way, some other Trek favorites of days past make appearances, but none of this ever distracts from Prodigy’s focus on its group of misfit kids who come from the far reaches of space, stumble upon an abandoned starship, and band together to… well, learn what it is to be a member of Starfleet. Which is to say, what it means to be a good person who does the right thing, even in times of extreme adversity. It’s about as Star Trek-ian a message as you can get, but the show is never heavy-handed about it. What a shame that this show only got two seasons, but it’s two seasons of often beautiful animation that are very rewatchable.

2. Star Trek: Lower Decks

More Star Trek animation at the top of this list! Unlike Prodigy, creator/showrunner Mike McMahan’s intensely nerdy Lower Decks isn’t a kids show, so to speak, but is very approachable for adults and younger viewers alike, not to mention for the Trek-curious. Told in a rapid-fire, I-need-to-rewind-this-and-put-on-the-subs style, the show depicts the exploits of Tawny Newsome’s Beckett Mariner and Jack Quaid’s Brad Boimler, a couple of ensigns aboard the USS Cerritos who get all of the grunt work and none of the glamour of the Picards and Janeways of the Starfleet world. The Lower Deckers and their friends also happen to be huge Star Trek geeks themselves, so the references that they let fly are frequently hilarious to fans, as well as Google-worthy. But the plots Mariner, Boimler and the rest find themselves in are usually true Trek stories of their own that just happen to be fun and funny. The show also hits a certain sweet spot for fans of ’90s-era Trek, as it’s set more or less in that same period. McMahan was smart enough to let his characters evolve and grow over the course of the show’s five-year run so that they didn’t feel stuck in the lower decks forever, unlike many of their (cough, Harry Kim, cough) predecessors. Lower Decks was a great instance of finding a new way to do Star Trek and do it well.

1. Star Trek: Strange New Worlds

I mean, Captain Pike’s hair alone gets him to the number one spot, right?

Strange New Worlds came about as a result of fans’ enthusiasm for Anson Mount’s Pike, Ethan Peck’s Spock, and Rebecca Romijn’s Number One after they appeared in Season 2 of Star Trek: Discovery. It was an interesting situation from the beginning, because the three actors were of course recreating characters who had appeared in the very first Star Trek story ever, the original pilot for The Original Series from before William Shatner was even hired. By the time Mount and the others got their own spinoff, something had clicked with this group, as well as the new characters introduced as series regulars. Strange New Worlds looked at what the other modern Trek shows were doing and said, ‘You know what? We're going back to the old school.’ And in so doing, it seemed to find the wonder and amazement that Discovery and Picard had too often skipped over. Make no mistake: Strange New Worlds is thoroughly modern in its approach, and it’s also unburdened by that dreaded concept known as canon in that it will never sacrifice a good character arc just because it conflicts with an episode from 55 years ago. (That kind of thing can always be hand-waved away easily enough anyway.) But through its great and likable cast, its intriguing stories, and its often kick-ass action and visuals, Strange New Worlds is currently the true final frontier of modern Trek.

But what do you think? What’s your favorite of the current era of Star Trek projects? Let’s discuss in the comments!