At first glance, you might mistake Atomfall for a Fallout-style game. Perhaps, even, an actual Fallout game set in a post-apocalyptic England rather than a post-apocalyptic America. Atomfall is first-person, it’s post-nuclear (it’s called Atomfall for a reason), and it has an alt-history design, as Fallout famously does.

Ryan Greene, art director at developer Rebellion, totally understands where the Fallout comparisons are coming from. Not only that, but the development team knew Atomfall would be compared to Fallout as soon as it was revealed.

“Once you play the game, you realize it's not Fallout, but yes, we knew,” Greene told IGN.

“And one of our owners, Jason Kingsley, he's a big Fallout fan, so inevitably there was going to be some parallels in that any kind of survival in the apocalypse, immediately Fallout's going to come up as a thing. And those guys are great at what they do. And that's cool.”

But Atomfall isn’t really like Fallout at all. This is something IGN pointed out August last year when we reported that Atomfall is something much more interesting than a British Fallout.

Indeed, Greene warned that the Fallout comparison is “misleading.”

“Once you play it for a bit, you're like, oh, this is its own thing for sure,” Greene said. And, Greene pointed out, Rebellion isn’t Microsoft-owned Bethesda. The independently owned British studio behind the Sniper Elite franchise has created an ambitious game, relative to its other games, but we’re not talking about an Elder Scrolls or Fallout-sized experience here.

“The reality is, here’s this very successful franchise and we're version 1.0,” Greene continued. “To be compared to those guys… thank you very much… Yes, we appreciate it because that’s a skillful team that's making that stuff.”

An average Atomfall playthrough, Greene said, is “probably 25-ish hours.” However, completionists can stretch that “a long way.”

To find out how the game plays, be sure to check out IGN’s most recent Atomfall hands-on preview, in which our Simon Cardy went off the deep end and killed everyone during his playthrough.

It turns out, you can go through the entire game killing everyone and it will cope with that. “You can kill anyone or everyone if you choose,” Greene confirmed. “That's fine. We have multiple finishes to the game, so some of those would shut down if you were supposed to work with them throughout, but you'll find multiple other routes to finish the game and achieve a result.”

Atomfall doesn’t have a main quest or a side quest in the traditional RPG sense. Rather, “it's a spider web of connected story,” Greene explained.

“So even if you sever one thread, you can usually find another thread that leads you back to the overall mystery.”

Conversely, you can play through Atomfall without killing anyone. At least, Greene is “fairly certain” you can. “I've made it about nine hours in, probably close to halfway running at a pretty fast dev play speed and killed no one,” he said. “I'm fairly certain you can do it and there's no gating of having to kill anyone ever.”

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.

The speedrunning community is trying to wrap its head around a technological phenomenon that is seemingly causing the SNES to run games faster as it ages.

Alarm bells rang in early February when Bluesky user Alan Cecil (@tas.bot) spread the word that the Nintendo's iconic console seemed to be running games slightly faster now than when it left production lines in the 1990s. It’s a theory that would mean the nearly 50 million SNES units sold may now feature improved performance with games like Super Mario World, Super Metroid, and Star Fox instead of wearing down as the years go on.

The idea of a video game console — or any kind of technology — working more efficiently simply thanks to the passage of time sounds ludicrous, but Cecil’s findings suggest a single component may be what’s setting the SNES apart from the rest.

The Fastest Thing Alive

As explained in an interview 404 Media conducted with Cecil, official Nintendo specs say the SNES’s audio processing unit (APU) SPC700 has a digital signal processing (DSP) rate of 32,000Hz dictated by a ceramic resonator that runs at 24.576MHz. Retro console fans have documented that these details aren’t quite accurate, with recordings from the last few decades showing slightly altered DSP rates depending on the physical conditions — such as temperature — the SNES is recorded in. It means the console is often processing audio and sending it to the CPU at a different rate than Nintendo has communicated, and as the DSP fluctuates, so too does the game’s speed even if it’s in small, unrecognizable ways.

Navigating the world of live TV alternatives can be a daunting task as there are so many options to choose from. One of the best options available today is Hulu + Live TV, which features everything Hulu has to offer plus a robust library of channels that includes popular live sporting events and entertainment. Even better, Hulu + Live TV also bundles in Disney+ and ESPN+ at no additional cost, giving you access to even more streaming options that include the very best of Marvel, Star Wars, Pixar, and more!

If you're interested in checking out Hulu + Live TV, you're in luck. Scroll down for information on the current free trial offer, as well as details about what's included in the service, pricing, and where it's available to stream.

Does Hulu + Live TV Have a Free Trial?

Yes, Hulu + Live TV offers a three-day free trial that allows you to take the live TV streaming service for a spin. You'll gain access to more than 95 live TV channels that include sporting events and the most popular entertainment channels. Hulu + Live TV also includes the Disney Bundle, which means you'll also be able to enjoy the entire Disney+, Hulu, and ESPN+ catalogs at no additional cost. It's the only streaming free trial offering a total of four services at once.

When you're ready to sign up, click the link below to sign up for the free trial. After your trial period ends, you'll be automatically charged for your subscription if it's not canceled.

Thank your own personal deity—possibly Kratos—it’s Friday! Even though it’s Autumn for Aussies, it’s time to spring into ludicrous Spring Sale savings on Steam. If the picks of that litter don’t interest you, I’ve sniffed out console-based bargains on grand adventures, pulse-pounding action, or quirky indie gems; there’s a little something for everyone.

This Day in Gaming 🎂

In retro news, I'm (somehow) celebrating the 23rd birthday of the OG Xbox, a console that blew my mind at launch (even though I was happily married to a PS2). This was the chunky vehicle that brought Microsoft into the console gaming world. And while it didn't have the prettiest design or the greatest library of games, it gave us two important contributions to gaming: Halo and Xbox Live.

While some N64 enthusiasts may argue that GoldenEye paved the way for quality console first-person shooters, it was Halo that revolutionised the genre. Almost every FPS that came after Halo utilised its control scheme and a modified version of its health system. But where Halo truly succeeded was in providing console gamers with the first-of-its-kind 16-player LAN battles. This was the first shooter that made my PC gaming mates jealous, and I still own and adore my Limited Edition Crystal Xbox. Even though ants once tried to take it over and turn it into a very expensive vivarium.

Earlier this month Roblox announced that its The Hunt: Mega Edition Event would come with a $1 million grand prize for one super skilled gamer, and today the event officially started, revealing the 25 different Roblox experiences players will need to compete in to walk away a millionaire.

Roblox's last event, The Hunt: First Edition, attracted 34 million users without promising enough money to buy 1,428 PlayStation 5 Pros and still have money left over for a decent library of games, so expect The Hunt: Mega Edition to be the focus of the Roblox community until the event hits its live-streamed final in April. For that final the top ten The Hunt: Mega Edition competitors will be invited to Roblox HQ for their shot at the jackpot.

The full list of 25 different Roblox experiences that make up The Hunt: Mega Edition Event are:

• A Dusty Trip
• Arsenal
• Basketball Legends
• Bayside High School
• Blade League
• Clip It
• Car Crushers 2
• Chained [2 Player Obby]
• Drive World
• Eat the World
• Fisch
• Hell's Kitchen
• Infection Gunfight
• It Girl
• Metro Life
• Natural Disaster Survival
• Pet Simulator 99
• PRESSURE
• Regretevator
• RIVALS
• SpongeBob Tower Defense
• Tower Defense Simulator
• Untitled Boxing Game
• Untitled Tag Game
• World Zero

That's quite the variety, meaning to get to the big prize players will need to show their skills in games like life sim Bayside High School, cook up a storm as Gordon Ramsay's next executive chef in Hell's Kitchen and survive zombie FPS Infection Gunfight.

The only catch is to win the money you need to be 13 years-old or over, but even if you out of the running for the cash there are still special ultra-rare digital items created exclusively for The Hunt: Mega Edition to win. For all the terms and conditions head on over to the official The Hunt: Mega Edition site.

Rachel Weber is IGN's Managing Editor.

If you're in the process of building out a new gaming PC and you're looking for the best gaming processor, this is it. Right now, the recently released AMD Ryzen 7 9800X3D AM5 desktop processor is back in stock on Amazon and Best Buy at its retail price of $479 shipped. This is the official launch price with zero markup, and it's not bundled with anything you don't want or need. The AMD Ryzen 7 9800X3D is the best gaming processor currently on the market (across both AMD and Intel) and a better choice for gamers than the more expensive Intel Core Ultra 9 285K.

Back in Stock: AMD Ryzen 7 9800X3D Desktop Processor

AMD's X3D series processors are optimized for gaming. In that respect, they bench better than even the most expensive of AMD's standard lineup of CPUs thanks to AMD's 3D V-Cache technology. Although perfectly capable of handling multitasking, rendering, and creation, the limited number of cores means they aren't the ideal processors for those tasks. At its retail price of $479, the 9800X3D is $110 cheaper than the Intel Core Ultra 9 285K ($589) and $170 cheaper than the AMD Ryzen 9 9950X, even though it outperforms both of them in gaming. Unless you're a staunch Intel fan, or you're still on AM4 and don't want to upgrade all of your components, the 9800X3D is the obvious choice for your next gaming rig.

Not everyone is the DIY type. If you're in the market for a prebuilt gaming PC, Dell is one of the best brands we'd recommend. Alienware desktops and laptops feature solid build quality, top-of-the-line gaming performance, excellent cooling (further improved on the newer models), aggressive styling, and pricing that is very competitive with other pre-built options. Best of all, there are plenty of sales that happen throughout the year, so it's not difficult to grab one of these computers at considerably less than their retail price. This page includes all of the best deals that are currently available.

Dell and Alienware Coupons

Dell and Alienware Gaming PC Deals

Dell and Alienware Gaming Laptop Deals

Dell and Alienware Monitor Deals

You can quickly browse through all of the listed products on sale above. See below for our favorite picks.

Alienware Aurora R16 RTX 5080 Gaming PC

Alienware Aurora R16 RTX 4090 Gaming PC

Dell Tower Plus RTX 4090 Gaming PC

Alienware Area-51 RTX 5080 Up for Preorder

New Price Drop

Alienware m16 Gaming Laptops

Alienware x16 R2 Gaming Laptops

Alienware m18 R2 RTX 4080 Gaming Laptop

Dell G-Series Gaming Laptops

Few sports feel more primed for the whole “being a video game” thing than professional wrestling, but it’s also kind of a weird pairing when you stop to think about it: While undoubtedly a feat of athleticism, the WWE is more akin to an elaborately choreographed fight sequence in a movie than it is an actual competition, whereas the goal of the games based on it is to fight to win. But inherent contradictions aside, I can confidently say — thanks to its much-improved Showcase and MyRise modes, several smart additions like intergender matches, “they’re always good” modes like WWE Universe and MyGM, and generally great game feel — that WWE 2K25 is pretty grand. There is a new guy on the undercard called The Island, and he sucks, which kinda drags the whole thing down a little — but not enough to get me to stop watching.

Even though I’ve been playing wrestling games since the N64 days, my first stop in an annualized series like this is usually the tutorial because, unless things have gone very wrong, something is always a little different (this year, for instance, sees the long-requested return of Chain Wrestling). WWE games have had a good introduction for a while now, especially compared to other sports game franchises. (Hi, Madden! Your skills trainer is great, but it needs to be about three times its current size!). WWE 2K25 has an incredibly detailed tutorial that will walk you through everything you need to be a champ in the ring, with in-depth explanations of what moves do and how to execute them. The Performance Center is a great teaching tool whether you need a quick refresher or you’re learning to do an Irish Whip for the first time. This may seem like an odd thing to spill ink over, but every version of a game is someone’s first – or maybe their first in a while – and I’m glad developer Visual Concepts seems to remember those people.

Once I’d refreshed my memory, I spent a while just looking around. WWE 2K25’s got an absolutely stacked roster, whether you’re here for classics like Bret “Hit Man” Hart, wrestlers-turned-movie-stars like Dave Bautista and Dwayne “The Rock” Johnson, megastars like “Stone Cold” Steve Austin, or weirdos like Doink the Clown. I also appreciate that there are several versions of the same dudes from across their history in the WWE. Why yes, WWE 2K25, I do need a handful of Triple Hs, each with their own different stats, thank you! Did you know that, compared to the modern version of The Rock, the 1997 version is kind of a bum? Me neither, but that’s what the stats say! Remember what Rhea Ripley’s visual style was in 2020? Or 2017? When was the last time you thought about “Ravishing” Rick Rude? This granularity is great, and what’s better is you can edit just about every aspect of these wrestlers, from how the crowd reacts to them to tweaking individual stats and changing out moves if you don’t like Visual Concepts’ take on them. The ability to tweak individual wrestlers is not new, but as this roster gets bigger, it’s good to be reminded of how impressive all of it is.

That goes for the in-ring action, too. WWE 2K25 doesn’t deviate much from WWE 2K24, which is one of those “if it ain’t broke, don’t fix it” deals, but it does include the welcome return of Chain Wrestling. This is a minigame that mostly takes place early in the match, where you advance through (or fight to get out of) a series of increasingly impressive holds and maneuvers before landing a signature move or finisher to wrap things up. The system can be confusing initially as you have to move the analog stick around a circle to find a sweet spot before your opponent does, but once you learn it, it’s a neat addition that replicates some very cool, complex moments in pro wrestling. If anything, the only bummer here is that it’s generally relegated to the beginning of a match and extremely situational at any other time.

I’ve also really enjoyed the new match types. Intergender matches aren’t functionally different than any other kind of match beyond “you may have a dude and a lady in the ring at the same time,” but it’s cool that you can do that now – and I, for one, enjoyed having Rhea Ripley fight Kevin Nash. I can say similar things for the Underground matches, which are more like a traditional fighting game (there are no ropes on the ring, and you win by either KOing someone or depleting all their health), and the more chaotic Bloodline Rules bouts. These additions are fun in and of themselves, and match/mode variety can make or break a game like this, so more is good.

Speaking of good, let’s talk about this year’s Showcase mode, which follows the Bloodline and the Anoa’i, Fatu, and Maivia families. Paul “The Wiseman” Heyman hosts the thing this year, and he’s clearly having a very good time chewing the scenery and providing the backstory that explains who the players are and why these matches are significant. There’s a lot of archival footage here, as in years past, though the problem of awkwardly blurring out some folks’ faces (maybe due to rights issues?) persists.

Regardless, Showcase feels better than last year’s version, partially because we’ve got full ring entrances and the mid-match commentary is really excellent for every fight. A fun twist this time around is that you’re sometimes asked to change the outcomes of matches that members of these families lost in the real WWE storyline or create new “what if?” matches entirely. There are also no longer any cuts to match footage that interrupt your gameplay – big moments are instead recreated in-game, which means they play out more organically, even if you’re not following the checklist (though there’s something to be said for showing what happened through archival footage). That said, it’s a net positive overall, and I had a blast doing things like beating the ever-loving snot out of Hulk Hogan with Yokozuna or pitting “High Chief” Peter Maivia against George “The Animal” Steele in a steel cage match.

The optional in-match objectives, especially timed ones, can be irritating. Yeah, I get that in the real match, X wrestler might’ve done Y thing so many times in Z seconds, but recreating that in-game means hoping that the computer doesn’t pull a reversal or we don’t get caught in the “you hit me and then I hit you and then you hit me until one of us screws up” mini-game. At that point, you’re better off restarting the match. It’s still worth doing these optional objectives because of the rewards like new wrestlers and arenas, but man, some matches are easier than others in ways you’ll feel.

The other problem with this year’s Showcase is how much of it boils down to “the Bloodline is great because they win all the time, but if they didn’t win, we have to correct that injustice because of how great they are.” That’s fine, but it’s thematically inconsistent in a weird way. Great wrestlers lose all the time and that doesn’t make them less great. I don’t know what the answer to this is since nobody likes playing a game where you’re forced to lose, but I think I would have rather had more real matches with real outcomes.

The other standout mode is MyRise, where your customized character (WWE 2K25 still has one of the best character creators in the world) battles an infiltration by NXT Superstars who are trying to take over the WWE and be the last brand standing. In my run, my “bold and brash” technical wrestler teamed up with his “comedic and fun” ex-girlfriend to fight back against the invasion. The voice acting is… questionable in MyRise, but the scenarios are goofy fun that alternate between “this is a business that combines soap operas and combat sports and we’re going to approach it like that” and “this is serious business” with alarming frequency. But it’s fun to make decisions that change the flow of what happens and it’s cool that you can re-import your characters to start again fresh and make different choices.

The MyGM and Universe modes also return, and they’re largely unchanged from last year, but there’s a couple of nice additions: MyGM is online now, which is great for those who wanna compete against their friends to book the best shows, and Universe finally gets the long-awaited return of promos. I prefer to run with a single wrestler (I have already made Randy Orton the WWE Undisputed Champion, because RKOing people even more fun when you have a big belt that says “look at me, I’m great”), so Universe is more my bag, but if you’re looking to book matches across the WWE, you can’t really go wrong with either option.

MyFaction is also back, and… look, man, it’s a card game, okay? You’ve seen this a million times before. You collect wrestlers and do challenges or take your faction online and compete against other players so you can get new cards and watch the shiny pack-opening animations designed to make your brain produce dopamine and…. Jesus Christ, I’m tired just describing it, please end my misery. It’s Ultimate Team but wrestling, and it’s designed to separate you from your hard-earned cash. The challenges can be fun, and I imagine if you’re really into this kind of thing you’ll enjoy WWE 2K25’s version of it, but I’m not, and the more I play modes like these, the dirtier I feel.

But wait, it gets worse! When I say that MyFaction makes me feel sparkling clean compared to when I played The Island… yeah, that should tell you something. There’s a cool idea here somewhere — WWE God-King Roman Reigns invites you to come to an island and compete for a WWE contract by earning his favor, because apparently That’s a Thing That Happens — but the actual execution made me want to walk straight into the sea. This is really, really bad, folks. Like NBA 2K25’s The City, The Island is a big, open PvPvE space, but it’s mostly quiet, empty, and boring, filled with single-player challenges that are book-ended by static JPGs and text-boxes that get old fast. Meanwhile, the multiplayer in this mode exists to do one thing: Part people from their money, particularly whales who will spend inordinate amounts to make their customized wrestlers beasts off the bat. If you don’t do that, well… you’re gonna have a bad time. I didn’t want to spend long here, as it feels like it exists solely for 2K’s shareholders. It also makes me worry WWE 2K as a series might incorporate more of this in the future at the expense of everything else that makes these games great (hi, Ultimate Team!) as publishers continue to nakedly chase the almighty dollar.

But even The Island, as terrible and money-grubbing as it is, wasn't enough to ruin my fun with WWE 2K25 because everything else about it is great. Visual Concepts deserves their flowers for proving that an annual sports (sports entertainment?) game can feel excellent to play and look good year over year. The WWE series has always been a looker, but this iteration has managed to make things noticeably prettier than ever. Bruises, blood, and sweat are more realistic, and you can tell how long a match has been going, who is winning, and where the guys in the ring are taking the most punishment at a glance. It’s really impressive.

Konami's latest Silent Hill Transmission has arrived and it was focused completely on Silent Hill f, the upcoming entry in the beloved horror franchise that will take players to 1960s Japan.

Silent Hill f was was first announced in 2022 and was described as a game that looks to take place in a "beautiful, therefore terrifying” world. It was also confirmed Silent Hill f was being written by Ryukisshi07, the acclaimed Japanese visual novel writer behind the Higurashi and Umineko series.

After almost three years, we are finally learning a lot more about Silent Hill f, and you can read all about it below.

Silent Hill f Aims to 'Find the Beauty in Terror' and Present Players With a Beautiful Yet Terrifying Choice in 1960s Japan

Konami shared a brand-new trailer for Silent Hill f and a ton of new details, including that it will aim to "find the beauty in terror" and present players with a beautiful yet terrifying choice in 1960s Japan.

The team wasn't ready to spoil what the decision would be, but it did unveil a bit of the story, and we'll leave it to Konami to set the stage;

"Shimizu Hinkao was living her life as an ordinary teenager," the official description reads. "That is, until her town is suddenly shrouded in fog and begins to change in a horrific way. Now, she must explore a town she no longer recognizes while solving puzzles, fighting strange enemies, and doing everything she can to survive... in order to face the ultimate decision that she must make. This is a tale about a beautiful yet terrifying choice."

This new game will be an original story that will be a great place for new players to jump in, but there will be certain Easter Eggs waiting for series veterans. Konami also discussed a few more details on the game, including that it will take place in the fictional Japanese town of Ebisugaoka - which is based on a real place called Kanayama, Gero, in the Gifu Prefecture.

Next, creature & character designer kera presented a message that should excite fans, as it teases what horrors await them in Silent Hill f.

"I love the Silent Hill series, and it's been a big influence on me," Kera said. "In particular, I am constantly remembering Silent Hill 2, and the messages on the walls, the music, and the monster designs. So, when it came to Silent Hill f, and bringing the setting to Japan, we had to come up with something that felt just a little different, and I had to really think about how to get that feeling.

"The monster designs were the hardest. I had to consider everything that's come in Silent Hill before, and figure out how to take this game in a different direction, but still be Silent Hill. It might not be the exact same blood-smeared, rusting scenery, but I sincerely hope you'll enjoy our vision and the world we've created."

Music will also be a very important part of Silent Hill f, and the team is bringing together long-time Silent Hill composer Akira Yamaoka and Kensuke Inage (Dynasty Warriors series and more) to create music for both the Fog World and Otherworld, respectively.

"I have composed music for an unsettling yet beautiful world that uses imagery from shrines, blending ancient Japanese court music with ambient echoes," Inage said. "I wove in various techniques that will connect the player to the protragonist's agony, internal conflict, fear, and other emotions."

While we didn't get a release date, it was confirmed that Silent Hill f will be released on PS5, Xbox Series X/S, and PC.

Have a tip for us? Want to discuss a possible story? Please send an email to newstips@ign.com.

Adam Bankhurst is a writer for IGN. You can follow him on X/Twitter @AdamBankhurst and on TikTok.

I don't post very many deals on LG's Gallery Series OLED TVs because they're usually obnoxiously expensive. Today's deal isn't exactly "cheap", but it's one of the best deals I've seen for one of the nicest TVs you can get. For a very limited time, Walmart and Amazon are offering the 83" LG Evo G3 Gallery Series 4K OLED Smart TV for under $2,700 with free delivery. To emphasize just how good of a deal this is, the 2024 83" LG G4 TV currently sells for a whopping $5,300. The Gallery Series TVs are LG's highest end OLED TVs and perhaps the best OLED TVs, period.

83" LG G3 Gallery Series 4K OLED Smart TV for $2,634.21

The best portable chargers are an effective way to extend the battery of your smartphone or other devices. Unfortunately, many of these bricks can get a bit clunky. A battery case provides a sleeker solution tailored to your phone, and you’ll get to skip the cable management that often comes with traditional power banks.

TL;DR – The Best Smartphone Battery Cases:

Battery cases must be able to add extra juice to your phone and provide damage protection. You’ll also want something that doesn’t interfere with your phone's features, like NFC or ports, nor add too much bulk. Wireless charging and quick charging make battery cases even more convenient. However, there are some duds out there that either make your phone a little too chunky or fail to deliver a reliable charge. To help you in this search, we've rounded up five battery cases for the top phones on the market.

1. Mophie Juice Pack Battery Case

Best iPhone 16 Pro Battery Case

2. ZeroLemon Battery Case

Best iPhone 16 Pro Max Battery Case

3. Mophie Juice Pack Wireless

Best iPhone SE Battery Case

4. Newdery Battery Case

Best Samsung Galaxy S25 Case

5. Mophie Juice Pack Connect

Best Battery Case for Any Phone

How to Choose the Best Battery Case

You might think picking the right battery case for your phone is just a matter of finding an option with the biggest capacity. That's a surefire way of buying something too big to fit in your pocket. Choosing an ideal charging case comes down to hitting the right balance between battery capacity, size, and price.

If you're looking for a battery case to just throw in your bag when you need it, you might as well grab a portable charger. There's no point in buying something molded to fit your phone if you're never going to use it with the charging case, which leaves space that otherwise could have been used for more energy cells. With that in mind, you need to find a battery case that'll actually fit into your pocket or bag without adding too much weight or bulk while adding protection to your phone.

Another problem with choosing the highest capacity battery is that it's often its only feature. Most of the highest capacity battery cases we've seen sacrifice quick charging and Qi charging capabilities for storing more energy. That latter feature is important if you like to keep the charging chase on your phone at all times. It’s also especially handy for wirelessly charging your phone and battery case simultaneously.

Battery Case FAQ

Are battery cases safe for your phone?

Yes, a battery case shouldn’t damage your phone’s battery, as long as it’s used properly. Your phone takes power directly from the battery case, and after the case is drained, it’ll start using the phone’s battery. Smartphones also come with the ability to monitor your battery as it charges, preventing overloading. The only major issue you could run into is overheating if the case doesn’t offer proper ventilation.

Should you drain your battery case before charging?

No, it isn’t necessary to drain the lithium-based batteries found in battery cases. If you let your battery fully drain completely, it may even damage it, reducing the capacity over time.

Mark Knapp is a contributing freelancer for IGN covering everything electronics and gaming hardware. He has over 10 years of experience in the tech industry with bylines at PCMag, Reviewed, CNET, and more. Find Mark on Twitter @Techn0Mark or BlueSky at @Techn0Mark.

Danielle is a Tech freelance writer based in Los Angeles who spends her free time creating videos and geeking out over music history.

Jeff Strain, co-founder of ArenaNet and co-creator of State of Decay, along with his wife Annie Strain, are suing Marvel Rivals creator NetEase for $900 million, alleging that NetEase caused the devaluing and ultimate closure of their studio by spreading rumors among investors that the Strains had committed fraud with their most recent venture, Prytania Media Group.

In a case filed in January in the civil district court for the parish of Orleans in Louisiana and since moved to federal court, the amended complaint seen by IGN opens with a hefty accusation: "This case is about the destruction of the careers of two gaming industry veterans and their company by a Chinese entity seeking to avoid compliance with United States law."

The story told by the Strains in the complaint is a complex one that does not fully fill in the many questions left last year when Prytania Media's subsidiaries unexpectedly shut down, one by one. Per their account, NetEase invested early in one of Prytania's subsidiaries, Crop Circle Games, taking a 25% share and seating Han Chenglin on the company board, with Jeff and Annie Strain taking the other two positions.

At first, they say, the relationship was a positive one. However over time, they say that NetEase leaders and representatives began to express concern about compliance with U.S. laws regarding foreign investment, including in at least one email asking the Strains to keep their investment "low profile" so as to avoid having to comply with rules laid out by The Committee on Foreign Investment in the United States (CFIUS). The complaint says they were asked to open branches in Canada or Ireland in order to make it easier for NetEase to invest.

A significant portion of the complaint endeavors to outline NetEase's alleged ties to the Chinese Community Party, suggesting NetEase wanted to keep those connections confidential from the United States government, and citing both Tencent's declaration as a "Chinese military company" by the U.S. government earlier this year, and reports that NetEase CEO Ding Lei allegedly used the threat of CCP retaliation against Activision Blizzard back in 2023 in its dealings with the company over licensing.

The pair also claim they were told that Lei was in the process of immigrating to the United States into a $29 million Bel-Air mansion sold to him by Elon Musk in 2020. They say that Lei expressed concern that his immigration would be threatened if NetEase's investments were publicized.

The Strains say that they continued to ask questions and push the company about regulatory compliance, and over time their relationship with NetEase began to break down. It also seems that the company began to have money troubles at some point during this period, because in early February of 2024, Crop Circle Games laid off some of its staff and furloughed others, and IGN understood at the time from sources close to the studio that internally there was significant confusion, fear, and later anger internally at how the situation was handled.

In the Strains' complaint, they say that on February 22, Jeff Strain received a text from a managing director of one of the venture firms that invested in Prytania saying that Crop Circle Games was being accused of fraud and misuse of funds. The Strains claim they traced the rumors back to its source, saying that the director claimed he had heard this from NetEase. In a board meeting in March, Han Chenglin admitted that he told his coworkers "I'm really surprised that the company is running out of runway so quickly," and suggested this was where the rumor had come from.

The Strains allege that following this incident, other investors began to pull funding from Prytania, and the company could not find any new investors to work with. According to the complaint, in the ensuing weeks and months Prytania Media and all its subsidiaries came to be "worth nearly nothing," having once been estimated to be worth $344 million. Prytania shuttered Crop Circle Games entirely at the end of March last year.

Then, in April, Annie Strain published a lengthy letter on the company website in which she blamed the recent industry economic downturn and inability to find funding for the company's struggles. She also repeatedly mentioned an alleged article being written by Kotaku reporter Ethan Gach that she claimed would have outed her own personal health struggles without consulting her. The letter was taken down not long after, and Kotaku never published the article in question. However, Prytania subsidiary Possibility Space shuttered a week later, with Jeff Strain blaming employees leaking information to the press for the closure. Neither NetEase, nor allegations of fraud were mentioned at this time.

Jeff Strain, Annie Strain, and Prytania Media are suing NetEase for defamation, unfair trade practices, tortious interference with business relations, and negligence. They are seeking damages in excess of $900 million, triple their company's prior valuation.

NetEase shared the following statement with Polygon in response to the suit:

The allegations by Prytania Media and its founders Annie and Jeff Strain are wholly without merit, and we emphatically deny and will vigorously defend ourselves against them. Our record as a global gaming company speaks for itself, and we remain committed to conducting business with integrity. We are confident that the legal process will vindicate our position and shed light on the real reasons behind the demise of the Strains’ studios.

Rebekah Valentine is a senior reporter for IGN. You can find her posting on BlueSky @duckvalentine.bsky.social. Got a story tip? Send it to rvalentine@ign.com.

This review contains spoilers for season 3, episode 8 of Invincible, “I Thought You’d Never Shut Up.”

After “What Have I Done” ended on a high – promising action hand-in-hand with vital advancement for the characters – the season 3 finale “I Thought You’d Never Shut Up” drops the ball. Narratively scattered and thematically incoherent, it’s the first bad episode Invincible has ever had, one that draws on familiar sights and stories from the show and other superhero media, but presents them with little to nothing beneath the surface.

The arrival of the elderly, one-armed Viltrumite warrior Conquest, at a time when Mark is caught once again between killing or not, sets the stage for a moral dilemma that never arrives, but whose conclusion is presented as though it were agonized over for 40 minutes. Instead, we’re treated to a finale centered entirely around Conquest, who’s better suited to playing a transitional bad guy, rather than the final boss of such an emotionally loaded season. Not only have we never seen Conquest prior to last week’s closing moments, he’s also devoid of any real ideology. Claiming to love only death and destruction makes him a useful foil to Mark, but as an exclamation point on season 3, he’s a giant shoulder shrug with little connection to anything meaningful within Invincible.

Conquest’s antics force Mark to put civilians in danger once again, a development our hero doesn’t even acknowledge, despite it being such a potent part of his recent arc. “I Thought You’d Never Shut Up” ignores any left over angst from the Powerplex saga despite reenacting the supervillain’s origin story: A Viltrumite big bad using Mark as a battering ram to slaughter innocent bystanders. But Conquest ending season 3 the way Nolan ended season 1 lacks weight. Rather than Mark feeling each death, the people are merely collateral damage, and the guy forcing Mark to kill them isn’t someone he knows. It’s Invincible doing an encore of one of its greatest hits, but in completely uninteresting fashion, making it damn near impossible to invest in the climax of this uneven season.

Oliver veers in and out of the final battle, and Eve arrives as well the moment she wakes up from her coma. That they’re both at risk of being killed at least lends some stakes to the fight, but when Eve is gravely injured (she has her jaw broken and her insides strewn about), it’s hard to get on board with the idea that she might actually die – the GDA possesses near-magical technology capable of healing any injury, after all. But even before we’re faced with this reality, the air is let out of “I Thought You’d Never Shut Up” when Eve heals herself thanks to a power-up rooted in actual magic, pretty much out of the blue.

Mark wailing away on Conquest is, therefore, a purely physical act with no emotion behind it. The Viltrumite is a complete stranger, and giving him lengthy monologues this late into the season (and so soon after his arrival) feels entirely pointless, as though Invincible were straining to grant him some semblance of heft or relevance. The results are dull, and they ensure that the edges of the episode’s violence are all sanded down. While the question of Sinclair’s work for the GDA (which now extends to Invincible cyborgs) looms, it exists only as a hint for later seasons, rather than something that matters in the moment.

Similarly, when the finale wraps up, it points towards vague, oncoming developments for numerous side characters like Battlebeast and the demon detective Damien Darkblood, though there’s still no sign of the all-important, absent-for-several-weeks Nolan. When “I Thought You’d Never Shut Up” is near its end, we finally learn that Rex actually did, in fact, die – it’s hard to tell who’s dead for real, given the sudden resurrections of late. But before anyone (let alone his girlfriend, Rae) really has time to grieve, the focus shifts back to Mark and Eve’s relationship. Mark claims to have been deeply affected when he believed Eve was dead, but since this lasted for only a handful of minutes, and because this is the last we’ll see of Invincible until season 4, we’re left to wonder what impact it’ll actually have on him, and on their dynamic. Things wrap up neatly for Debbie, who’s happy to have her kids back, and the finale features a few ominous hints of how far Cecil is willing to go. But for the most part, “I Thought You’d Never Shut Up” leaves Invincible in stasis, with little resolution, and only nominal, minor developments toward what comes next.

One of the earliest appealing factors of streaming services when they first became popular was convenience. You could binge all of your favorite shows all at once and not get interrupted by commercial breaks like you would watching linear TV. But as more and more companies have moved over to a streaming model, ads have made their way into streaming. If you want an ad-free experience now, you need to pay for the "premium" service.

Obviously it isn't ideal to have to pay more just to keep the streamlined experience you had before. But where do you draw the line? Are you willing to pay more for the ad-free experience of your go-to streaming service, or do you just ignore and mute the commercial breaks to keep your streaming bill down?

I've always been willing to pay more for the ad-free experience, but the first time I broke from that was when Amazon Prime started to include ads. My Amazon Prime subscription is something I mostly use for shopping and Prime Video always felt like a bonus add-on. So when the option came to pay more to avoid ads, I chose to just ignore the ads. For a streaming service like Hulu or Netflix where I am specifically paying to be able to watch things, I will most likely cancel before I ever downgrade to the ad-filled experience – especially when there are so many free streaming sites that don't cost me anything.

What Do You Think?

Where do you stand on ads in streaming? With prices constantly going up across services, are you willing to stomach some commercials to continue your subscription? There is currently a Disney+ promotion going on right now that bundles a subscription with Hulu for $2.99 a month for the first four months, but is that a low enough price to even consider dealing with ads? Let us know what you think in the comments below!

When you’re setting out to build or upgrade your gaming PC, the best graphics cards are often the first thing that comes to mind. There’s a simple reason for that: When it comes to PC games, GPUs are the most impactful component in determining your rig's raw frame rates. Quite simply, most of the time, a better graphics card directly results in better performance – at least up to a point. With Nvidia's RTX 5090 and RTX 5080 cards out now (though it's nearly impossible to actually get one), here are the best graphics cards on the market.

TL;DR: These Are the Best Graphics Cards:

These days, GPUs have legitimately become a luxury good. With graphics cards like the Nvidia GeForce RTX 5090 costing upwards of $1,999, you can expect to pay top dollar for top performance. Prices are still way higher than they were when the GTX 970 blew my mind in 2014 – even when adjusted for inflation. However, if you temper your expectations, you can still get a solid gaming experience for a fraction of that price, especially if you're okay with gaming at 1440p or 1080p.

I’ve been reviewing graphics cards for the last four generations, and I’ve personally benchmarked, built with, and played games using every GPU on this list. However, if none of these strike your fancy, feel free to comment below what kind of gaming experience you’re looking for, and I’d be happy to help you find the perfect card for your build.

What to Look for in a Graphics Card

While it would be easy to just tell you to get the most powerful graphics card on the market for the best gaming experience, the truth is that picking a GPU is something you need to put a bit more thought into. not all graphics cards are created equal, you see, and everyone is going to need something a little different out of their PCI-E brick.

The resolution you play games at is going to be the first thing you want to figure out. Whether you already have a gaming monitor you love or you're looking to build up an entire gaming battlestation, decide on your resolution first. This is because a graphics card that's great at 4K isn't exactly going to translate to an amazing 1080p graphics card. Just take a look at the Nvidia RTX 5090. While the new flagship flies at 4K, it can actually be slower than much cheaper graphics cards at 1080p, due to CPU bottlenecking. Instead, if you're playing at 1080p, something like the Intel Arc B580 is going to be a much better fit. You're still going to get solid gaming performance, but at a much lower price, which you can use to, well, buy more games. Likewise, 1440p gamers are probably best off buying something like the AMD Radeon RX 7700 XT or the Nvidia GeForce RTX 4070 Super.

Budget is also a huge concern, and graphics cards are only getting more expensive these days. It would be awesome if everyone could afford an Nvidia GeForce RTX 5090, but that's just not the world we live in. These days, the floor sits around $200-$250. For that price you can get a solid 1080p graphics card, without having to go back to a previous generation. If you have a bit more cash, something like the Nvidia RTX 4060 will unlock all of Nvidia's exclusive bells and whistles – though they're much less important on a lower-end GPU.

If you really want to go all-out, you can get an amazing graphics card for around $1,000. Both the AMD Radeon RX 7900 XTX and Nvidia GeForce RTX 5080 will provide an awesome 4K gaming experience, and the one you choose should ultimately depend on how much you care about ray tracing. For most people that just want raw gaming performance, the Radeon RX 9070 XT is probably going to be a better option, but you're going to want to wait a minute for AMD's next-generation offering. I don't know how well the Radeon RX 9070 XT is going to perform until I benchmark it, but it should prove to be great for 4K gaming, especially with the upcoming FSR 4.

Luckily, it looks like this generation of graphics cards is going to make 4K gaming much more accessible. When I reviewed the Nvidia RTX 5070 Ti, I found that it had no problem breaking 60 fps in even demanding games like Black Myth Wukong. However, more expensive and powerful cards like the RTX 5080 and 5090 are going to give you more breathing room for future PC games.

With more expensive graphics cards, however, power is going to be a big concern. You're going to want to make sure you check which power supply you have, and check it against the power requirements for the graphics card you're looking at. Something like the Intel Arc B580 can get away with a 450W PSU, but you're going to want to make sure you have something much more powerful for the Radeon RX 7800 XT, for instance. You don't need to go overboard and fork over the cash for a power supply that offers twice the recommended power, just make sure you have enough juice to keep your GPU going.

1. AMD Radeon RX 9070 XT

The Best Graphics Card for Most People

2. Nvidia GeForce RTX 5070 Ti

The Best Mainstream Graphics Card If You Want to Spend a Bit More

3. Nvidia GeForce RTX 5090

The Best Nvidia Graphics Card

4. AMD Radeon RX 9070

The Best AMD Graphics Card

5. Nvidia GeForce RTX 4060

The Best GPU for 1080p

Upcoming GPUs

The new generation of graphics cards has almost completely landed. With the most recent launches, the entire market is covered from the high-end with the RTX 5090 to the budget market with the Intel Arc B580. While there are some new cards that will trickle out over the coming months – looking at you RTX 5060, wherever you are – we probably won't see the market shake up again until at least 2027.

Still, now might not be the best time to jump in and buy a graphics card, especially if you already have a passable gaming PC. Most of the best graphics cards are sold out right now, and demand is making the ones that remain much more expensive than they should be. My advice is to wait until you can find one of these graphics cards reasonably close to their launch price, even if it means waiting a couple of months. It'll be worth it.

Best Graphics Cards FAQ

AMD or Nvidia? Or Intel?

When it comes to which brand of graphics card you should get, it ultimately comes down to your personal preference – even if each brand has its own unique advantages. Intel graphics cards are the most affordable option on the market right now, but its graphics cards aren’t exactly the fastest in the land. On the other hand, Nvidia makes the most powerful GPUs around, but you’re going to have to pay out the nose for that performance.

AMD graphics cards strike a pretty good balance between the two, but while the company loves to use open-source graphics APIs, it means you don’t get access to some of the exclusive features that Nvidia owners enjoy – features like DLSS (and the new DLSS 4). AMD has alternatives for literally every Nvidia software feature, but some of them simply aren’t as good. See our guide to AMD vs. Nvidia GPUs for more info.

What power supply should I get?

Graphics cards, especially high-end ones, are sucking up more electricity with every passing year. If you’re looking to build a new gaming PC, or even upgrade from an older graphics card, you should really consider upgrading to one of the best power supplies.

Some of the graphics cards out there right now can take upwards of 450W of power by themselves, so you may want to consider a 1,000W power supply – especially if you’re going for the Nvidia GeForce RTX 4090.

GTX vs. RTX

Nvidia has both an RTX, or Ray Tracing Texel eXtreme, and GTX, Giga Texel Shader eXtreme graphics cards series, with the RTX offerings being newer, more powerful, and more expensive.

That boosted performance is thanks to the architecture of RTX cards, which offer both Tensor and RT cores alongside CUDA cores for better graphics and rendering. Tensor cores enable AI and high-performance computing tasks bringing support for DLSS tech to help with upscaling and sharpening. RT cores are dedicated to ray tracing, allowing for more realistic lighting and shadows in scenes. Nvidia’s GTX graphics cards have a much simpler architecture and don’t offer Tensor or RT cores. Though they still work for budget builds, GTX cards will soon be obsolete.

Where to Get the Best Graphics Cards in the UK

There aren't too many differences when it comes to the graphics cards you can pick up in the UK, but the main takeaway is where you can purchase them. All of the following links have been updated with UK vendors, saving you some time and money if you're interested in picking up any of the graphics cards we've mentioned.

Jacqueline Thomas is the Hardware and Buying Guides Editor at IGN. When she's not helping her friends and family buy computers, you can usually find her tinkering with her own PC.

One of the original dungeon-crawling board games that sought to recreate the excitement and danger of tabletop RPGs like Dungeons & Dragons, HeroQuest was first released more than 30 years ago. Putting players into roles like the mighty Barbarian and spell-slinging Elf, HeroQuest let a group of friends play out their heroic fantasies right at the kitchen table in a matter of only a couple hours compared to the afternoon-long sessions a traditional TTRPG may take. With its massive amounts of plastic miniatures that came packed in its iconic box and multi-quest long story, HeroQuest established a passionate fan base that would continue to sing its praises decades later and rally behind it when Hasbro asked if folks wanted it to return through its HasLab crowdfunding platform.

And here we sit, several years after the campaign, and new and old fans alike have plenty of HeroQuest to enjoy in the form of the new release and all of its expansions! To help folks who may be interested in working together to slay the evil Zargon and stop his machinations in their tracks, this buyer's guide will help you plan adventures!

HeroQuest Game System

HeroQuest First Light

Kellar’s Keep

MSRP: $33.99 USD

• 1-5 players (solo play requires the free HeroQuest companion app)
• Ages 14+

Contents

• Quest book w/ 10 new quests
• 19 miniatures (8 orcs, 6 goblins, 3 abominations, 2 doors)
• Sheet of cardboard tiles
• 14 cards

As the first of the expansions for HeroQuest, Kellar’s Keep is one of the lighter offerings among the options available today and its a faithful rerelease of the Kellar’s Keep expansion for the original HeroQuest from the 90s. Kellar’s Keep feels very much like a continuation and extension of the base HeroQuest, thanks in part to a lot of similar monster minis being included. It’s still a fun time and an easy way to understand how expansions work. Kellar’s Keep is the perfect offering for anyone who isn’t necessarily looking for a spike in difficulty but just more HeroQuest.

Return of the Witch Lord

MSRP: $33.99 USD

• 1-5 players (solo play requires the free HeroQuest companion app)
• Ages 14+

Contents

• Quest book w/ 10 new quests
• 18 miniatures (8 skeletons, 4 mummies, 4 zombies, 2 doors)
• Sheet of cardboard tiles
• 14 cards

That dastardly Witch Lord you dealt with in the base Game System is back with his armies of the undead! Return of the Witch Lord is very similar to the Kellar’s Keep expansion, giving players more miniatures from found in the base game, but this pack also includes some pretty cool looking new tiles that are used in over the course of its 10 quests - including the menacing skull on the ground! Return of the Witch Lord is a classic quest that longtime players of the game will recognize and brings about a nice feeling of conclusion carried over from the Game System an Kellar’s Keep storylines. The three together really feel like the beginning trilogy of the HeroQuest series.

Prophecy of Telor

MSRP: $33.99 USD

• 1-5 players (solo play requires the free HeroQuest companion app)
• Ages 14+

Contents

• Quest book w/ 13 new quests
• New Warlock class
• 15 miniatures (13 translucent orange enemy minis, 2 warlock character minis)
• Set of 6 translucent orange D6 Dice
• 14 cards

Previously one of the two expansions exclusive to the Mythic tier during its crowdfunding phase on Haslab, Prophecy of Telor is now available to everyone in this new premium release. With a menacing set of translucent orange monsters, dice and a brand new character class in the Warlock to play as, the Prophecy of Telor expansion give all players a chance to experience this story. The new Warlock class is particularly fun, being able to change into a demonic form to do battle, making for some wonderful new party composition options for all of your HeroQuest adventures.

Spirit Queen’s Torment

MSRP: $33.99 USD

• 1-5 players (solo play requires the free HeroQuest companion app)
• Ages 14+

Contents

• Quest book w/ 14 new quests
• New Bard class
• 15 miniatures (14 translucent teal enemy minis, 1 bard character mini)
• Set of 6 translucent teal D6 Dice
• 15 cards

Spirit Queen’s torment is very much similar to the Prophecy of Telor - both being premium mass market releases of previously mythic tier exclusives, awesome translucent monsters and die (this time in an icy teal), and a brand new character class with the Bard. You will deal with dark magics and explore mysterious locations like the Wyvern Keep over the course of the 15 adventures included. And now, at long last, you can play out all your greatest bard fantasies in HeroQuest, singing your magical tunes that will put your enemies to sleep, heal your friends, and grant bonus attack dice to your friends. You will need to homebrew rules to try and seduce monsters though, so be sure to work with your Zargon for all your flirty needs.

Against the Ogre Horde

MSRP: $44.99 USD

• 1-5 players (solo play requires the free HeroQuest companion app)
• Ages 14+

Contents

• Quest book w/ 10 new quests
• New Druids class
• 28 miniatures
• 2 sheets of cardboard tiles
• 29 cards

For the group that likes to fight and kill a lot of enemies, Against the Ogre Horde will be right up your alley. This latest expansion to release is also a remaster of one the classic modules released for the original HeroQuest back in the day. For fans of the original, much of it will feel incredibly familiar, but there have been slight tweaks and adjustments to account for modern tastes. The miniatures included are some of my favorite offerings so far, with the giant Ogres and massive throne that are included. The new enemies help make this a fun box to snag if you enjoy creating homebrew quests to send your friends on too.

The Mage in the Mirror

MSRP: $44.99 USD

• 1-5 players (solo play requires the free HeroQuest companion app)
• Ages 14+

Contents

• Quest book w/ 10 new quests
• 33 miniatures
• Sheet of cardboard tiles
• 35 cards

With the Realm of Reflection to explore, the Mage in the Mirror expansions tasks your heroic group of heroes with saving a princess, finding a legendary sword, and contending with an evil archmage - basically some good ol’ classic high fantasy goodness. Mage in the Mirror includes a new body type and set of cards for the Elf class that comes with the base Game System in addition to a number of highly detailed environment objects, new tiles, and monster minis. This expansion tells the first part of a story that concludes in the Rise of the Dread Moon set, so it may be worthwhile to get both at once.

Rise of the Dread Moon

MSRP: $44.99 USD

• 1-5 players (solo play requires the free HeroQuest companion app)
• Ages 14+

Contents

• Quest book w/ 10 new quests
• New Knight class
• 29 miniatures
• Sheet of cardboard tiles
• 58 cards

Picking up where The Mage in the Mirror questline left off, Rise of the Dread Moon brings with it a number of brand new mechanics like the Elven mercenaries but also a new character class as well with the sword-and-board wielding Knight. With a bunch of cool new tiles, objects and monster minis, Rise of the Dread Moon is great for fans that like to make their own quests too. However, if you plan to play through the story and not just utilize the pieces the come in the box, be sure to get and playthrough the Mage in the Mirror expansion first to get the best experience!

The Frozen Horror

MSRP: $44.99 USD

• 1-5 players (solo play requires the free HeroQuest companion app)
• Ages 14+

Contents

• Quest book w/ 10 new quests
• 23 miniatures
• Sheet of cardboard tiles
• 35 cards
• 6 combat dice
• 2 movement dice
• 1 pad of character sheets

Bundle up heroes as the Frozen Horror will send you into the Frozen Wastelands. For Barbarian fans, this expansion will be for you, being a very focused experience tailored to the class - even including a new barbarian miniature with a new body type. There are a bunch of really neat monster sculpts present too with icy blue war bears, and the incredibly imposing title monster, the Frozen Horror, along with a host of mercenaries too. One particularly interesting aspect to the Frozen Horror expansion is that the adventure starts with a series of solo character quests before the group quests resume. If smacking things really hard is your style (and you want a cool new set of blue dice to play with) then The Frozen Horror expansion may be for you.

Jungles of Delthrak

Character Packs

Hero Collection: Rogue Heir of Elethorn

MSRP: $14.99 USD

Contents

• New Rogue class
• 2 miniatures (2 different body sculpts for the Rogue)
• 13 cards (12 game cards, 1 story card)

Every good adventuring party needs the sneaky stabbing rouge character, and with the Rouge Heir of Elethorn character pack, that’s exactly what you get. This box comes complete with models and cards featuring two different body types and has skills that utilize throwing daggers, attacking multiple times, and dealing more damage when a foe is already engaged with a teammate. The only downside is the lack of any real story or quests that explore more of the character.

Hero Collection: Path of the Wandering Monk

MSRP: $14.99 USD

Contents

• New Monk class
• 2 miniatures (2 different body sculpts for the Monk)
• 8 game cards
• 1 scroll prop

One with the elements and with fists as deadly as any blade, the Monk is one of the more unique classes you can pick from in HeroQuest. By utilizing the elements of wind, water, earth and fire – each with two special effects associated with each element - the monk has a lot of utility that can prove helpful in a pitch. From sailing over traps with the power of the wind to blasting an energy blast from their hands with the power of fire which can hit a large number of enemies at once, the Monk could fill that spot as a last-ditch trump card. In order to use those powerful Fire attacks though, will have required you to have the other three elements expended first. As a master of unarmed combat, the monk doesn’t come with starting armor or a weapon, but with three defend dice and getting two attack dice when attacking unarmed, doesn’t mean they are a pushover. Much like the the Rogue Heir, the main downside to this small character pack is that it doesn’t come with a quest or two that dives into their story.

The End

Hasbro and Avalon Hill show no signs of slowing down their support for the heroes and their questing anytime soon. A whole new generation of players are getting to dungeon dive and learn from the wise Mentor, creating memories they will cherish for the rest of their lives. While HeroQuest may be a bit light on mechanics for an older and more experienced crowd trying out this legacy for the first time, the community has created a wealth of custom rules and unique quests that may help with that.

HeroQuest remains a classic in the board gaming hobby, and its future looks bright.

For more, check out our picks for the best escape room board games, as well as the best board games for teens. And if you have a sizable group for game night, also see the best board games for 6 players.

Scott White is a freelance contributor to IGN, assisting with tabletop games and guide coverage. Follow him on X/Twitter or Bluesky.

When I was in high school, I would stay up ‘til all kinds of ungodly hours of the night playing PC games. I even stayed up five days straight once, just to get to the end of Baldur’s Gate II ‘Throne of Bhaal,’ but what fascinated me about PC games most was how inventive they could be.

One that struck my imagination powerfully was Red Faction, which caught my eye because it had some of the hallmarks of DOOM (a high-tech, first-person shooter set on Mars, you say?) yet it added an essential wrinkle; terrain deformation. Red Faction is set in the mines of Mars, and I could fire explosive weapons at walls, creating holes or destroying them, and even tunneling through rock to circumvent checkpoints. It was all about charting your own course and finding your own path to accomplish your goals. It was incredible.

Unfortunately, not a lot has been done with that idea in the intervening years, but when Rainbow Six Siege came out, the ability to freely climb and rappel up and down buildings, and shoot through or destroy walls and ceilings sent a delightful little tickle through my Red Faction-loving brain.

While Siege began as a far more focused (and less exploratory) affair than the old Volition shooter, that (and quite a bit more) is about to change with the arrival of the upcoming Siege X update. Apart from gameplay, graphical, auditory, and UI enhancements, it introduces what is shaping up to be a fantastic new permanent multiplayer mode: Dual Front.

In Dual Front, a predetermined seasonal Operator pool will dictate who you can play, and team sizes are bumped up to six per side. Instead of spawning directly inside (or outside) one target area, there are three large areas to choose from, each with its own objective, so your team of six will need to split up to focus on both defending and attacking different locations simultaneously.

While the scope has expanded, much of the great core gameplay remains the same. When a match starts, each team will spawn in their squad HQ and one of two locations in your team’s sector will start a countdown to a Defend mission. The is true for your opponents, so each team will need to defend one spot while attacking another. How you handle that, and where you decide to go, is up to you.

What’s more, there is a neutral zone in between the mirrored zones held by each team, and extra objectives will appear there. Completing those objectives, such as rescuing a hostage and getting them to an extraction point, will give your team a big boost in the back-and-forth struggle for supremacy, so even if you fail to defend your first location or attack the enemy base, victory is still possible.

Since Dual Front expands the contested space so significantly, I was moving between attacking and defending to suit the team's needs, creating a more free flowing experience with way more variation between matches than your standard Siege match. What results is a fluid, chaotic mess I had a blast with.

The seasonal Operator pools will be updated every month, and because your squad will need to do a little bit of everything, you’ll have access to both Attacker and Defender Operators on the character select screen. When you die during a match, you’ll quickly respawn and re-select your Operator, so changing strategies on the fly to counter your enemies is a central (and delightfully fun) part of the game now.

Several times during my preview, it looked like my current (attacking) team was in a great spot, so I would rush across the map to help my other beleaguered comrades who were fighting for their lives to defend our own base objective. Sometimes, everything was as it seemed: I arrived in time, and our team brought home a victory. Other times, I got separated from my team only for them to be ambushed by reinforcements. Each match was tense, because in maps as large as Dual Front’s, it’s difficult to know where the enemy is until they become a capital “p” Problem.

Speaking of navigating larger areas, I should mention some of the new gameplay additions. You can now rappel around corners of buildings and even sprint while rappelling, so it’s easier to poke around and find ways to get inside structures. New fire extinguishers create concussive blasts and visual obfuscation when destroyed, gas pipes can be shot or damaged to create jets of fire before exploding and scattering fire around on the ground, and metal detectors can be disabled temporarily or permanently. Overall, it’s more fun to play in the space, and there is a lot more space to play in on Dual Front’s mirrored map.

Siege X also marks a shift in monetization. After the update, Siege will adopt a free-to-play model, and for casual versus competitive stuff, here’s the skinny: casual and onboarding playlists, unranked quickplay, and Dual Front are all free, and will grant access to up to 26 Operators and skins. Siege Cup and Ranked modes will be pay-to-unlock, and grant access to all 50 Operators. So if you are jumping in as a casual player, there are no barriers to entry, but new players who want to get more serious on the competitive side will need to fork over some cash. If you already have Siege, don’t worry; you will keep everything you have, and retain access to all modes (and as an added bonus, Siege players will get a badge showing off the year they started and a little bonus for each year of Siege they played).

Some other updates in the Siege X package include five modernized maps (Clubhouse, Chalet, Bank, Kafe, and Border), enhanced visuals, audio, first-person shadows, new menus, better player onboarding, the ability to inspect weapons, and a lot more. The dev team has also committed to introduce a new Operator (or remastering an existing one) each season, and a bunch more.

But all those enhancements pale in comparison to Dual Front, which is on track to become my favorite mode for Siege, and once Siege X launches, it’s likely to be the only mode I’ll play as Siege marks its upcoming tenth birthday in an incredibly fun way.

The Arkham Horror universe has a whole lot of games in its catalogue. In fact, there are so many to choose from that we’ve had to separate them into two guides. In this buying guide, we will go through the several families of board games. If you’re seeking information about the many deck-building card games also under the umbrella, you can click on over to our Arkham Horror: The Card Game Buying Guide.

Arkham Horror is an long-running franchise of horror board games. You and your fellow players embark on missions that involve a lot of communication to win. The games each have several pathways that can be taken depending on which roles, expansions, and campaigns you employ. These also make terrific solo board games for when you don't have a group on hand to spend an hour-plus playing a board game.

Featured in this article

Want to skip the blurbs and go straight to the various games and expansions? Scroll through the catalog above. If you're interested in the nitty gritty of how all the items relate to one another and to the broad Arkham Horror universe in general, read on below.

Arkham Horror: The Board Game

Arkham Horror: Under the Dark Waves Expansion

Arkham Horror: Secrets of the Order Expansion

Arkham Horror: The Dead of Night Expansion

Elder Sign

Elder Sign Expansions

Elder Sign has six expansions: Unseen Forces, Gates of Arkham, Omens of Ice, Grave Consequences, Omens of the Deep, and Omens of the Pharaoh. Grave Consequences is a standalone deck and can be played with or without the core game. The last expansion was released in 2018. It is currently unknown if there will be any more.

Mansions of Madness (2nd Edition)

Mansions of Madness Expansions

There are two expansions for Mansions of Madness. Both of them are cooperative games that are guided by the app.

Mansions of Madness: Path of The Serpent Expansion

Unfathomable

Unfathomable: From the Abyss Expansion

Eldritch Horror

Eldritch Horor Expansions

There are eight expansions possible to play in Eldrich Horror. Those expansions are Forsaken Lore, Mountains of Madness, Strange Remnants, Under the Pyramids, Signs of Carcosa, The Dreamlands, Cities in Ruin, and Masks of Nyarlathotep.

Other Ways to Play

There are a couple of other ways you can play in the Arkham universe outside of these standard board games. You can play a couple of the board games online. You can also try the franchise's first foray into the world of tabletop roleplaying games.

The Arkham Horror: The Roleplaying Game

Arkham Horror released its first TTRPG late last year, with a starter set followed by a rulebook. I recommend trying the starter set first. Once you’ve gotten a feel for the rules and the game, you can choose to grab the rulebook to start your own journey.

Arkham Horror: The Roleplaying Game - Hungering Abyss Starter Set

Arkham Horror: The Roleplaying - Game Core Rulebook

Video Game Versions

A digital version called Arkham Horror: Mother’s Embrace was released on Steam in 2021. It’s a single-player game that some might find similar to the Mansions of Madness board game expansion. Unfortunately, it only plays as a solo game. If you're open to solo treks into this universe, you can get this digital adventure on Steam or on Switch for an MSRP of $19.99.

Solo or not, the digital version has gotten mixed reviews. IGN's Arkham Horror: Mother's Embrace review scored it a 5 due to lacking story execution. It fumbles with some heavy topics, which may deter some players from enjoying the Lovecraftian mythos.

There is also a digital version of Elder Sign available on Steam and mobile platforms. Elder Sign: Omens was released in 2011, but has received mostly positive reviews on Steam. It's quite affordable at only $5.99.

The Bottom Line

If you are a fan of Lovecraft mythos-themed games, as I am, Arkham Horror is absolutely worth exploring. One awesome thing is that you can play several of these games solo as well as with friends. They are each different and offer a unique presentation of the Lovecraftian worlds.

That said, these games are on the more difficult side. They have quite a bit of chance, which can drastically increase replayability as well as frustration. Setup and learning time can also take some time. You’ll find that the card games are easier to set up than the board games, even without expansions.

Jennifer Stavros is a contributing freelancer for IGN, covering everything from comics, games, technology, and nerd culture. She has over 15 years of experience in the gaming industry, including testing and writing for Wired, Inverse, and more. Follow her on Twitter or watch her on Twitch under the handle @scandalous.

Hazelight Games says its latest co-op adventure game Split Fiction is continuing its roaring start after selling 2 million copies in just one week.

The dual-protagonist story dropped March 6 for PC, PlayStation 5, and Xbox Series X and S and quickly managed to secure itself as yet another success story for the studio. Hazelight took to social media to celebrate the strong launch, saying that it’s “blown away” by the support from fans both new and old.

The team’s previous update on Split Fiction sales numbers revealed that a whopping 1 million players picked up Mio and Zoe’s sci-fi story only 48 hours after its initial launch. That means another million have each picked up a copy in the five days since.

Meanwhile, Split Fiction’s status as a co-op game means the actual number of players engaging with the experience is surely much higher than the number of copies sold. Bolstering its impact with gaming fans is its Friend’s Pass feature, which allows one player to purchase the game while granting a friend access at no additional cost. As Hazelight’s adventure continues to make waves on social media, that 2 million sold number will surely only increase.

Hazelight’s previous title, 2021 Game of the Year winner It Takes Two, saw similar success after selling around 1 million copies a few weeks after its launch in March 2021. That number ballooned to 10 million copies by February 2023 and 20 million by October 2024.

In IGN's Split Fiction review, we called it “an expertly crafted co-op adventure that pinballs from one genre extreme to another.”

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

Here are the best deals for Thursday, March 13. Highlights include newly released PlayStation 5 Slim console bundles featuring Astro Bot, PlayStation Portal and PS5 DualSense controllers, a super popular Bose soundbar, an Apple Watch stainless steel model, the 83" LG Gallery Series OLED TV, and more.

Playstation 5 Slim Astro Bot Console Bundles Available Today

The Justice League has crossed paths with everyone from Godzilla and King Kong to He-Man and the Masters of the Universe in recent years, but when heroes gotta go fast, there's only one ally that fits the bill. Now DC and IDW Publishing have joined forces to release DC x Sonic the Hedgehog.

Check out the slideshow gallery below to see cover art and interiors from DC x Sonic the Hedgehog #1:

DC x Sonic the Hedgehog is helmed by two Sonic the Hedgehog mainstays, writer Ian Flynn and artist Adam Bryce Thomas. The first issue features cover art by Pablo M. Collar and Ethan Young.

This crossover opens as Darkseid makes the jump from the DCU to the Sonic universe, sensing a great power for the taking. The Justice League and Team Sonic will have to band together if they have a hope of stopping the ultimate evil from conquering a new dimension.

DC x Sonic the Hedgehog is part of a larger collaboration between Warner Bros. and Sega. The companies are teaming for a series of toys and collectibles sold exclusively at Target, starting off with a line of T-shirts and hoodies featuring Shadow the Hedgehog dressed as Batman.

DC x Sonic the Hedgehog Chaos Controller Shadow X Batman Youth Crew Neck Short Sleeve T-Shirt

Dungeons & Dragons show Critical Role is on the verge of releasing its first big video game, and CEO Travis Willingham says it could be announced “any day.”

The group spoke about its big plans for the future during an interview with Business Insider. There’s no word on what the video game will be called or how exactly it will tie into the Critical Role universe quite yet, but Willingham said the team behind it remains “hard at work.”

"They'll actually be getting their hand on the stick and controlling the outcome of the story, changing what might be possible from not just some of their favorite characters, but new offerings in the world of Exandria," he said when describing the video game spinoff.

This article contains spoilers for the Invincible Season 3 finale.

After eight episodes featuring huge character deaths, multiple Invincibles (Steven Yeun), and so, so much blood and guts, Invincible Season 3 is in the books. Unlike Season 2, which ended with a relatively quieter tag for the finale, Season 3 not only teed up a ton of storylines for the already-in-production Season 4… It also included a mid-credits scene that sets up a storyline Invincible co-creator Robert Kirkman never got to do in the comic books.

Before we get to that closing montage – and mid-credits scene – a bit of explanation about the finale itself. It’s for the most part one, long fight scene as Invincible, Oliver (Christian Convery) and Atom Eve (Gillian Jacobs) take on the vicious Viltrumite warrior Conquest (Jeffrey Dean Morgan). Conquest is ostensibly on Earth to prepare the world for Viltrumite, er, conquest, but as he explains repeatedly to Invincible, he really loves destroying and torturing things.

Invincible Season 3 Ending Explained

After Conquest seemingly kills Eve, Invincible, who has had both hands broken, absolutely loses it and bashes Conquest to “death” with his own head. Some might say this is sweet, sweet vengeance for Negan (also Morgan) famously bashing Glenn Rhee’s (also Yeun) head in on The Walking Dead, but it comes straight from the Invincible comics, which came out in 2009. So incredibly satisfying to watch if you want #Justice4Glenn, but also mostly just a nice coincidence.

In any case, Eve is not dead and reveals – as fans who watched the Atom Eve Special learned – that when she’s put in moments of extreme stress, she’s able to get past the mental blocks that otherwise stop her from transmuting living matter, instead of just inert materials. However, eagle-eyed fans will also note that when she transmutes Invincible’s costume later in the scene when they’re about to have sex, it’s made of plants… So she may have broken through these blocks in a bigger way than she realizes.

The final conclusion of the episode, and the arc of the season, is that Invincible visits his half-brother Oliver in a hospital bed. And while Oliver thinks Invincible is going to tell him that killing is wrong… Invincible has decided that if anyone threatens his family again, just as Angstrom Levy (Sterling K. Brown) did in the previous episode, and Conquest this week, he won’t hesitate to kill them.

It’s a surprising move from the show, though again one pulled directly from the comic books, almost word for word. While the large majority of superhero media, from TV shows to movies, to the original comics wrestle with the “should heroes kill?” debate, Invincible has firmly fallen on the side of “yeah, when necessary.” Still, an ominous musical sting played under Invincible’s pro-death penalty statement points to more challenges coming the way of his realigned moral compass. So expect that this debate might not be as open and shut as the finale indicates.

Beyond that, the real eyebrow-raising moments are saved for that montage. So let’s break those Season 4 teases down, one by one.

Return of The Sequids

Last seen in Season 2, Episode 6 “It’s Not That Simple,” the Sequids are incredibly dangerous Martian brain slugs who almost beat the Guardians of the Globe in their last encounter, including Invincible and Atom Eve. They had taken over the brain of an astronaut named Rus Livingston (Ben Schwartz), who was finally freed and brought back to Earth after a horrifying, harrowing ordeal. Unfortunately for Rus, after he returned to his apartment, which had been trashed by Shapesmith (also Schwartz), he threw up a Sequid in the sink – which immediately took over his body, again.

That plotline has been on hold since the aforementioned episode, but looks like it’s coming back in a big way in Season 4. While everything else has been going on this season, the Sequids have been steadily building an army in the sewers, including what looks like hundreds of human workers and others. Given we were told that if the Sequids ever made it to Earth it was game over for humanity… Yeah, that’s bad! “Not long now,” says Russequid. Uh-oh!

Battle Beast Is Back

At the end of Season 3, Episode 4, “You Were My Hero,” the unstoppable Battle Beast was fighting a Viltrumite in the cold, dark reaches of space. We catch up to him here, as well as the scattered remains of the Viltrumite… BB is in suspended animation but is quickly picked up by an alien ship. And a few seconds after that, he wakes up, ready for battle. He wants “more!”

If things pan out on the TV show the same way they do in the comic, the ship was part of the Coalition of Planets, the group fighting back against the Viltrumites. Alongside Allen the Alien (Seth Rogen) and Nolan Grayson (J.K. Simmons), it looks like the Coalition finally has a fighting chance against the unstoppable aliens.

Greater Delights Await

In one of the best casting coups on the show, the creepy, Cenobite-esque Technicians who fixed up Angstrom Levy, as first seen in Season 3, Episode 7, are voiced by Doug Bradley. You might know him better as Pinhead from the Hellraiser series. And in this teaser of coming attractions, we get to hear Bradley say something extremely Pinhead.

After revealing that Angstrom has a new arm thanks to them (Invincible accidentally amputated it last episode), Angstrom asks what they want in return. “Angstrom Levy, you have witnessed what our ambitions have done to our world, and what we have had to do to ourselves to survive here,” a Technician explains.

Angstrom thinks they want a new home, but the Technicians have other ideas. “That is only the beginning of the delights we will achieve together,” the Technician says. Now, the classic Hellraiser line is “We have such sights to show you” while the 2022 remake employed “greater delights await.” But come on, if you weren’t Leo Dicaprio pointing at the screen meme at that line, what are we even doing here?

In any case, to explain what the Technicians are up to is to spoil one of the great plot twists of the Invincible comics. Suffice it to say that they will tie into the action, and we have not seen the last of either Angstrom or the not-Cenobites.

Conquest Of The Planet Of The Marks

Despite Invincible demanding Cecil Stedman (Walton Goggins) show him Conquest’s dead body, it turns out that the dead body was a fake. In fact, Cecil has Conquest locked in a massive, underground chamber as the Viltrumite’s body reconstitutes itself.

Donald (Chris Diamantopoulos), Cecil’s right-hand man, protests that this is a mistake. And if you’ve read the comics, you know that Donald is correct: you cannot hold a massively powered Viltrumite like Conquest with mere Earth materials, no matter how secure Cecil makes the facility. Unfortunately for Cecil, as well as the world, in this case, Invincible was correct: Conquest should have been killed.

Invincible Season 3 Post-Credits Scene Explained

That brings us to the mid-credits scene. While everything else we’ve explained above happens in the comic books by Kirkman, Ryan Ottley, and Cory Walker, this scene is completely new. And in fact, it’s something Kirkman always wanted to do in the comics, but never found room for. Oh, and there’s a fantastic, surprise voice actor involved.

Right after the end credits begin, we cut to Damien Darkblood (Clancy Brown), the demon detective we haven’t seen since Season 1, Episode 4, “Neil Armstrong, Eat Your Heart Out.” In case you forgot – it aired back in 2021, after all – Damien was investigating Omni-Man, then set up by Cecil and sent back to Hell. As he was sucked down to the inferno, he threatened vengeance on Cecil… And that’s (potentially) what we’re seeing here.

Now missing his trenchcoat, Damien creates a summoning circle, which calls a demon lord voiced by none other than Bruce Campbell. And Damien hails to the king, baby, by bringing “the great beast… welcome news.” Damien explains that he has the means to restore the demon to his former glory, and the “infernal throne.” The key? A “surface dweller of great power, likes of which this planet has not seen for eons.” And furthermore, Damien explains that “his blackened heart will be bound to your service.” And how will they do that? By conjuring “him” to Hell.

In the comics, Damien Darkblood was even more of a blink-and-you-miss-him character than he was on the TV show. But as Kirkman explained to the Cartoonist Kayfabe podcast in 2020, there was originally more planned.

“The thing that I really regret is I never had an adventure where the superheroes went into Hell,” Kirkman explained. “There’s been so many superhero comics where it’s like, they got to go fight Mephisto or something, and I was like, ah jeez, I never got around to that. And the Damien Darkblood character was there so I could eventually do a story like that, and I never got around to it.”

Part of the reason for this may be that the initial storyline and reveal of Omni-Man as a bad guy was supposed to go nearly double the length that it did in the comic. It ultimately came to a head in issues 12 and 13, versus the planned 25. That meant there just wasn’t as much room for Darkblood to be investigating Omni-Man, because… Well, there was nothing left to investigate. So credit to Kirkman and company for letting that planned story play out on the TV show in a way we never saw in the books.

The big question here is: who is Damien Darkblood referring to? Is it Invincible? Omni-Man? Cecil? We’ll know more when Season 4 of Invincible premieres on Prime Video.

Warhammer 40,000: Space Marine 3 is officially in development.

Publisher Focus Entertainment and developer Saber Interactive have joined forces once again following the huge success of last year's Space Marine 2, which has sold 5 million copies.

"We’re pleased to announce that the development for Warhammer 40,000: Space Marine 3 has officially begun at Focus Entertainment, Saber Interactive and Games Workshop," reads a statement. "We’ll share updates on this new title when the time is right. For now, our focus remains on delivering the best possible experience for Space Marine 2 players."

There's no real detail on what to expect from Space Marine 3, but Focus did release the below image that confirms the return of Titus, not that there was any doubt about that. Games Workshop said Space Marine 3 "will boast an all-new immersive campaign and multiplayer modes," but again, there was no doubt about that either.

If you bought a brand new TV over the holidays and you're looking for a good audio solution at an excellent price, then one of the best Black Friday deals is back. Walmart is currently offering the Bose Smart Soundbar 550 for just $199 with free shipping after a massive $300 off instant discount. At this price, it's certainly one of the best soundbars you can get, especially if you're looking for an affordable soundbar that supports Dolby Atmos.

60% Off Bose Smart Soundbar 550

No video games for you! Superbad co-writer Seth Rogen has revealed that Sony found Jonah Hill's character so "reprehensible" that reps insisted he stay away from a PlayStation during a video game scene in the now-beloved comedy.

“On Superbad, we were told that Jonah Hill’s character, Seth, was so reprehensible to the studio that they were like, there’s a scene where they’re playing video games and [Sony] was like, ‘Jonah can’t touch a PlayStation,’ ” Rogen told Rotten Tomatoes in a South By Southwest 2025 red carpet video.

“They were like, ‘We can’t have him interact with our products, because it’s too vile a character.’ And I was like, ‘It’s based on me, that’s very insulting.’ But we accommodated them, ultimately.”

@rottentomatoes "Jonah can't touch a Playstation. We can't have him interact with our products." #TheStudio's Seth Rogen shares his favorite note from working with Sony on #Superbad. #SXSW #sethrogen #playstation #comedy #movie #movietok #filmtok #redcarpet #interview ♬ original sound - Rotten Tomatoes

Sony Pictures co-financed the film, so they had a lot of leverage over a few top-notch comics trying to make a generational comedy. Ultimately, instead of Hill’s Seth keysmashing his controller and yelling at the TV screen when he died in-game, Michael Cera’s character Evan can be seen playing The Getaway: Black Monday on PS2 in that scene. But fun fact: there’s actually a bit of a gag with one of Cera’s lines here. He mentions using an M16 assault rifle in the game — but The Getaway: Black Monday, a British cop game, doesn’t even include them in the weapons arsenal. Go figure.

Kingdom Come: Deliverance 2 is getting a big update today. Patch 1.2 is out now, and alongside fixes and improvements, there's both a barber shop and Steam Workshop modding support added to the massive RPG.

The barber shop is the first of "several" planned free DLCs, per a press release from Warhorse, and will let protagonist Henry visit the barber to change up his hairstyle. There's also an option for either a clean-shaven or rugged appearance, as well as facial hair ranging from stubble to beard. A new haircut will, just like in real life, give Henry a temporary boost to charisma.

Patch 1.2 (massive patch notes below!) addresses over 1,000 fixes and improvements, including equipment and NPC behavior, as well as gameplay balance. Specifically, developer Warhorse Studios tackled country-specific localization as well. The new patch for Kingdom Come: Deliverance 2 refines the Chinese translations, both Traditional and Simplified, improves the Korean font for clarity, and has a newly recorded French voiceover.

As for modding, dedicated Steam modding support has arrived alongside the barber DLC and Patch 1.2. The toolkit allows players to tinker with over 300 elements in Kingdom Come: Deliverance 2, ranging from user interface and combat mechanics to AI behavior. "Whether making subtle tweaks or complete overhauls, the possibilites for customization are vast," Warhorse said. The studio plans on discussing these updates further during a developer stream, set for March 20, 2025.

Additional content is expected to roll out for the historical RPG throughout the year, with its first paid content drop "Brushes with Death" set for this summer. The Legacy of the Forge expansion is expected in autumn, and then this winter, Warhorse aims to release Mysteria Ecclesia, which involves a covert mission in the Sedlec Monastery.

The latest from Warhorse Studios doesn't show any sign of slowing down in sales, either. The sequel sold 2 million copies in less than two weeks, and Embracer has hailed the game as a success. In our own review of Kingdom Come: Deliverance 2 at IGN, the RPG got high marks for its melee combat, story, and a "truly dynamic" open-world sandbox.

Getting started in Kingdom Come Deliverance 2? Check out our advice on Things to Do First and How to Make Money Fast Early to get you started, or head to our Walkthrough hub for a step-by-step guide to the main quest. We’ve also got guides for the myriad Activities and Tasks, Side Quests, and even Cheat Codes and Console Commands.

Kingdom Come: Deliverance 2 update 1.2 patch notes:

New

Barber

- Introduced the barber feature. Check it out in Zhelejov and Kuttenberg!

Features

Achievements

- Adjusted the difficulty of certain skill checks so that the player can unlock the Close One achievement more reliably.

- Fixed the issue where the achievement The Lord Taketh Away would sometimes unlock without meeting its conditions.

Alchemy

- Improved lighting effects.

- Improved resolution of the fire texture.

- Fixed pouring animation causing a flash.

- Fixed an incorrectly localised label in the list of alchemy recipes.

Animals

- Improved dying animations and ragdoll for cows and bulls.

- Fixed some animal spawners not working correctly.

- Fixed reactions of hares to Mutt.

- Fixed random movement of animals and reduced the frequency of their turns.

Archery range

- Arrows are now re-equipped automatically after archery contest.

- Fixed the issue with the competitor NPCs sometimes ceasing to shoot.

Balancing

- Rebalanced how quickly food goes bad over time.

- Rebalanced armour durability values; the durability spread is now wider, so smaller distinctions between armours are now more readable.

- Rebalanced the formula for triggering a black-out from being drunk.

- Rebalanced stealth items.

- Rebalanced the price of meat and other items lootable from animals.

- Rebalanced the difficulty of pickpocketing NPCs.

- Rebalanced the amount of damage each armour layer receives.

- Rebalanced the influence of an item's quality on its price.

- Rebalanced the prices of horse equipment.

- Rebalanced the prices and stats of jewellery.

- Rebalanced item weights.

- Rebalanced comfort for studying books in inns.

- Changed ranged weapons distribution within shops and other places.

- Changed stats of the Gallant Huntsman's Kit.

- Slightly improved loot from chests in some bandit camps.

- Lowered skill-teacher prices.

- Lowered the overall value of caravan chest contents.

- Made polearms stronger.

- Made shields cheaper.

- Increased the price for which player can sell herbs.

- Recalculated items' conspicuousness based on their appearance.

- Fixed the incorrect display of item's maximum charisma when the item is dirty.

- Made several locks in the Trosky region easier to allow for a smoother levelling curve.

- Made locks on chests containing mostly food easier to lockpick.

- Adjusted lockpicking difficulty for some horse traders' chests.

- Fixed exploit with a restocking chest containing a Balanced Die.

- Fixed incorrect arrow damage values.

Blacksmithing

- Generally rebalanced the blacksmithing minigame.

- Improved visual indication of workpiece cooling.

- Added horseshoe recipes to various merchants and locations.

- Removed bezoar from alchemy and added it to blacksmithing.

- Fixed the alignment of semi-finished products at the forge and anvil.

- Fixed the Knight's sword recipe.

- Fixed issue with not being able to interact with blacksmiths who are idling while player is using their smithery for the minigame.

Carts

- Increased the distance at which the interactor for getting on carts is available.

- Fixed player sometimes spawning right inside a cart when interacting with events close to the Vidlak Pond.

- Fixed the issue with carts sometimes leaving behind their invisible collision even after despawning.

- Fixed cartwheels not aligning with ground properly.

- Fixed players sometimes randomly dying after dismounting a cart.

Combat

- Increased damage from hits from the multi-hit combos.

- Added proper facial animations for Henry during the mercy kill execution.

- Adjusted the animation of drawing a bow while moving.

- Being hit will no longer interrupt the player drawing a weapon.

- Adjusted the free attack animation used when holding a torch.

- Adjusted the animation of a dog attacking a target that is holding a ranged weapon.

- Improved animation for transitioning into aiming with the crossbow.

- Introduced a short delay between melee attacking an opponent while not locked on to reduce the effectiveness of attack spamming.

- Adjusted the animation of the player being pulled down from a horse in combat.

- Adjustments for few sound effects such as hits to the shield or firing of the crossbow.

- The player is no longer able to easily back away from attacking enemies, thanks to the slowdown effect during hit reaction.

- Improved the animation of NPCs shooting from a crossbow.

- Properly adjusted damage type for master strikes when deciding between usage of slash or stab damage value.

- Adjusted damage of the upper master strike with shortsword and shield.

- Adjusted limits of the freelook feature in combat.

- Fixed various freezes following from causing massive mayhem in Kuttenberg.

- Fixed the issue with missing audio responses for attacks and hits.

- Fixed issues with disarming NPCs or player when they were supposed to die from a clinch attack.

- Fixed an occasional infinite fader after being knocked to the ground with low health in a fist fight.

- Fixed an issue with player holding ranged weapon getting knocked back long distances by unarmed enemies.

- Fixed the NPC logic of when to use a torch in unarmed combat.

- Fixed animation alignment while player is backing up while blocking with shield.

- Fixed the issue with NPC's additive animation for torch while fighting with a dog or a wolf.

- Fixed sometimes missing the chat option to surrender.

- Fixed camera issues in unarmed fight with dogs/wolves.

- Fixed the issue with NPCs not dying properly when running away from player and getting hit by the tackling attack.

- Fixed the issue with player striking the air in a sequence of attacks during clinch if the enemy gets killed by the first strike.

- Fixed some battle cries not being played properly during battles.

- Fixed NPCs being indecisive about bandaging themselves, fighting, or running away in combat.

- Fixed dying enemies still looking at their opponent.

- Fixed the issue with NPCs unreasonably pulling out ranged weapons in melee combat.

- Fixed the player being able to interrupt weapon drawing animation of NPCs indefinitely through their attacks.

- Fixed audio for combat clinches.

- Fixed missing sound while parrying an attack from clinch.

- Fixed wolves and dogs not transitioning into ragdoll properly under certain circumstances.

- Fixed the issue with the player being able to turn the camera 360° vertically while using free look and holding block in combat.

Crime

- Made NPCs less precise in where they're going to look when investigating a sound heard from far away.

- Torch visibility buff now applies even if the torch is not visible while equipped.

- Improved reaction for guards when player steals a corpse that's currently being guarded.

- Items in player's stash now keep their stolen item marker.

- Improved the mechanism determining whether an NPC should interrupt player who is currently skipping time in trespass.

- Boosted hearing for NPCs reacting to a violent or criminal situation.

- Adjusted NPC behaviour when feeling threatened by the player.

- Revised reactions to sleeping in beds owned by NPCs.

- NPCs watching a violent situation will now flee if the source of the violence moves too close to them.

- Made enemy corpses now persist in the game longer before despawning.

- Improved an animation of a surrendering NPC.

- Improved reaction for when the player is seen lockpicking a door and opens lockpicked doors in front of the arresting guard.

- Added a tutorial for displaying the list of crimes when in the crime confrontation dialogue for the first time.

- Added more overlay tutorials for the rabbit icons.

- Adjusted cooldowns for various reactions of bandits.

- Changed how civilians react to the player's dog in stealth areas.

- Fixed a violent assault crime sometimes not being elevated to a murder after the NPC dies.

- Fixed the resisting-arrest crime sometimes incorrectly persisting through an NPC's unconsciousness.

- Fixed authorities sometimes confronting player in their underwear when raised from their bed at night.

- Fixed NPCs sometimes still looking for the player even though they are fighting right in front of them.

- Fixed NPCs sometimes seeing the player's actions through obstacles.

- Fixed NPCs sometimes being able to see behind themselves.

- Fixed and rebalanced calculating the angriness of a location triggered by player's thefts and violence.

- Fixed prolonged loading times caused by stuck NPCs.

- Fixed dialogues about resolving crimes not making sense in the context of Sigismund's camp.

- Fixed the crime icon stuttering while inside a bush.

- Fixed no fine being calculated for stealing certain horses.

- Fixed issues related to resolving crimes with victims who had been unstreamed in the meantime.

- Fixed NPCs sometimes confronting player about a drawn weapon or other minor issues after being released from the surrender dialog.

- Fixed the recognition rabbit icon sometimes getting stuck.

- Fixed NPCs incorrectly using combat barks meant for group skirmishes when in skirmish with only one person and an animal.

- Fixed player being able to walk through an NPC who is currently arresting them through triggering the ghosting mechanism.

- Fixed the arrest dialogue with guards being broken under rare conditions.

- Fixed being able to start a friendly chat with a NPC in a brief moment after pickpocketing them.

- Fixed the NPC reaction to shooting during a combat encounter.

- Fixed the NPC reaction to arrows/bolts flying by while reporting crime.

- Fixed the NPC reaction to the player lockpicking when the lockpicking should be legal.

- Fixed the NPC reaction to being attacked, but missed, while they're surrendering to the player.

- Fixed locks not getting locked after player is arrested for lockpicking.

- Fixed the issue where a civilian would not stop banishing the player's horse.

- Fixed animation issues with a poisoned NPC attempting to run.

- Fixed NPC pathfinding when looking for an active shooter.

Cutscenes

- Made equipped arrows and bolts show on player even within cutscenes.

- Fixed several reasons for video sometimes stuttering during cutscenes.

- Fixed issues with player's helmet visors in cutscenes.

- Fixed consistency issues across cutscenes.

- Fixed green frames sometimes briefly appearing at the beginning of cutscenes.

- Fixed general synchronization issues.

Daily life

- Generally improved NPC daily schedules across both maps.

- Improved the animation of NPCs sweeping.

- Revised the logic of locking shop doors.

- Improved animation transitions when leaving the leaning stance, now considering the movement direction.

- Improved female beggar pose and animations.

- Improved female sitting pose and idle animations.

- Adjusted trespass at the saddler's tent by the horse market in Kuttenberg.

- Food items on shelves at the bakery in Tarmark in Kuttenberg are no longer free.

- Adjusted trespass in some of the backrooms in the city bathhouse in Kuttenberg.

- Added an animal companion restriction for tents inside the Sigismund's camp.

- Adjusted the placement of smoke particles by multiple windows in Kuttenberg.

- Added water particles for NPCs when they wash themselves / drink from troughs.

- The baker in Tarmark now locks his door when he finishes his shift.

- Added a time period before the next bandit starts patrolling the route after the previous bandit was eliminated.

- Door to the player's room at the Devil's Den now remains open.

- Fixed day cycles of people at the northern gate of Kuttenberg.

- Fixed day cycles for villagers in Suchdol at night.

- Fixed some food items being free at the Kuttenberg vegetable market.

- Fixed the tailor's store being left unguarded and unlocked in the evening in Kuttenberg.

- Fixed innkeepers getting stuck by the barrel in the Hole in the Wall tavern.

- Fixed various house doors in Kuttenberg being left unlocked at night.

- Fixed the issue with Cuman soldiers not talking with each other in Sigismund's camp.

- Fixed constantly active trespass in the smithy in Hoprink in Kuttenberg.

- Fixed a trespass behind the counter of the baker in the Czech quarter in Kuttenberg.

- Fixed the possibility of Mutt easily falling into the mine shafts west of Kuttenberg.

- Fixed issues with some items not having a proper owner in Kuttenberg.

- Fixed NPCs in Miskowitz sometimes falling under terrain while feeding chickens.

- Fixed various places in Kuttenberg where player started reading a book on a bookstand through an NPC reading the same book.

- Fixed conflicts of NPCs wanting to use an item for their behaviour and having to hide it while using a ledge or a ladder.

- Fixed the issue with one of the Kuttenberg fortification towers having a blue trespass instead of the correct red one.

- Fixed the issue with one of the Kuttenberg fortification towers not being marked as trespass consistently across all of its area.

- Fixed the issue with some guards in Kuttenberg not preferring sleep to heal when they are hurt as they should.

- Fixed the baker in the Czech Quarter in Kuttenberg not selling anything.

- Fixed issues related to NPCs using torches wanting to climb a ladder or lie in bed.

- Food items are no longer free at the baker's stand in Jewish quarter.

- Fixed a certain part of the Kuttenberg underground allowing companions to appear.

- Fixed robbing dead smugglers in the Kuttenberg underground being considered stealing.

- Fixed an NPC stacking wood inside a wall in Kuttenberg.

- Fixed locking of doors leading to the Kuttenberg underground.

- Fixed an issue where NPC would pick up a filled bowl when picking up an empty one.

- Fixed Adder not having a daily routine active after spying in Maleshov.

Dice

- Added more money to some dice players.

- Fixed Agility XP gain when starting a dice game.

- Fixed dice sometimes clipping with the badge.

Environment

- Generally improved environment across both maps.

- Improved environment close to the level barrier so that it looks nicer even though it is not accessible.

- Improved the look of Trosky castle from far away.

- Adjusted interior visibility from afar in the Emperor Charles tavern.

- Reworked NPC navigation in Kuttenberg, allowing NPCs to take better advantage of wider streets.

- Removed out of place collisions on the river by Sedletz.

- Improved shadows on the St James Church model.

- Improved textures of certain houses in Suchdol.

- Placed better chairs in the Devil's Den.

- Improved lighting in Kuttenberg.

- Points-of-interests underground are now no longer discovered when walking over them on the surface.

- Improved textures on several houses in Kuttenberg.

- Removed a shadow artifact from the bathtub model.

- Improved normal maps of the shelf model.

- Fixed NPC navigation issues in several Kuttenberg houses.

- Fixed NPC navigation in several places around the Nebakov fortresss.

- Fixed multiple issues with inconsistent lights on Suchdol fortress.

- Fixed water being luminescent in the tunnels below Maleshov.

- Fixed reflections in the northern area of the Trosecko map.

- Fixed the lighting and smoke particles at cauldrons.

- Fixed Z-fighting of various rocks.

- Fixed Z-fighting in Kuttenberg battlements guard towers.

- Fixed Z-fighting on buildings in Kuttenberg.

- Fixed Z-fighting on Suchdol battlements.

- Improved several house visuals in Kuttenberg.

- Fixed stretched texture on a yellow house in Tarmark street.

- Fixed houses missing interior when viewed from a distance.

- Fixed a bad looking house corner in Kuttenberg.

- Fixed an issue where player could go underwater in certain parts of the river by Sedletz.

- Fixed the unclimbable stairs in the All Saints tavern.

- Fixed several issues in houses in the Suchdol village.

- Fixed the missing shrine outside of the village on the Maleshov map.

- Fixed many trees being placed slightly above the terrain.

- Fixed raining inside of a barn in Zhelejov.

- Fixed the player's head clipping through a wall in a Vrchlitz cellar.

- Fixed inaccessible tailor's shop in Kuttenberg.

- Fixed issues which could cause the player to get stuck in various places.

Fast/travel

- Added a fast-travel point to Bozhena's hut.

- Made dialogue prompts triggering fast-travel more consistent across different quests.

- Fixed missing dots during fast-travel.

Horse riding

- Improved the automatic follow feature while on a horse whose stamina is depleted.

- Improved road magnetism.

- Fixed conflict between road magnetism and the automatic follow feature.

- Fixed horse speed restriction in Miskowitz.

Horse trading

- Reworked the transaction in Semine resulting in getting Pebbles as a companion.

- Fixed automatic horse gear equipping after buying a new horse.

Characters

- Improved the visual asset for von tBergow's face.

- Reduced details of physical simulation of clothes on distant NPCs to improve performance.

- Turned on local lights influence on hair even with the low graphical preset.

- Improved Rosa's hair.

- Improved textures of women's bodies.

- Improved textures and overall quality of many character outfits.

- Improved the clothes of several unique characters with added details and polish.

- Fixed physical simulation of clothes not running in inventory.

- Fixed the model of the Crested cuman helmet

Maintenance

- Added the option to repair bows and crossbows to more NPCs, most notably huntsmen.

- Reworked how blood and dirt work on shields and how it is cleaned when the player washes themselves.

- Improved visual effects when damaged firearms explode.

- Fixed non-repairable items sometimes activating the damaged-armour debuff.

- Fixed wielder not getting damaged when a damaged firearm explodes in their hands.

- Fixed broken water trough in Bylany.

- Fixed Bascinets not getting cleaned when using washing spots near rivers.

- Fixed an issue where baths would temporarily disable by constantly entering and leaving dialogue with the bathhouse owner.

- Fixed broken haggle in bathhouses.

Music

- Added more music for villages in the Trosky region.

- Changed mood music for Opatowitz village.

- Added more music into the credits sequence.

Mutt

- Added a marker for Mutt on the map and compass when the player sends Mutt to Zhelejov/Devil's Den.

- Made it harder for the player to feed Mutt during combat. Work first, treats later!

- Mutt can no longer enter the fighting arena in the Jewish quarter.

- Fixed Mutt sometimes being unable to return to the mill during the night.

- Fixed an issue with Henry not saying anything when Mutt finds an interesting place or object while searching.

- Fixed some of Mutt's internal timers not resetting correctly through save/load.

Performance

- Generally improved performance and stability.

- Optimized Kuttenberg marketplaces for better performance.

- Improved frame rate stability in battle parts of quests.

- Optimized streaming of NPC visuals, especially in Kuttenberg.

- Improved level switch duration by over 15 seconds on average.

- Limited the number of torches drawn by NPCs in large skirmishes to improve performance.

- Fixed late game stutter in Kuttenberg due to various reputation problems.

Photo mode

- Changed controls for opening Photo Mode on controllers.

- Fixed controller vibrations persisting when opening Photo Mode while using the grindstone.

Platform-specific fixes

- PC/PS5 – Fixed adaptive triggers on the DualSense controller sometimes not working properly.

- PS5 – Fixed audio stuttering when playing with headphones connected to a controller.

- PS5: The Media button no longer pauses the game.

- PS5 – Fixed visual artifacts in the sky when objects were close to the camera.

- Steam Deck – Fixed incorrect button prompts.

- Windows – Added enabling/disabling Audio enhancements directly from main menu.

- Windows – Fixed the keyboard input sometimes getting stuck after system locale change.

- Xbox – Fixed controller sometimes disconnecting before initialization.

- Xbox – Fixed sometimes incorrectly unlocking preorder rewards or season-pass rewards.

- Xbox – Fixed inventory icons sometimes being blurry on Xbox Series S.

PROS

- Fixed placeholder text and icons for PROS appearing in the main menu.

- Fixed a rare case in which PROS would fail to connect.

Random events

- Fixed missing random events after starting a new playthrough.

- Added more goods for several event merchants.

- Removed the chance of a bandit camp spawning right by the Semine fort.

- Fixed logic within the random event with a villager celebrating his newborn.

- Fixed cooldowns of random event variants.

- Fixed carts rarely being moved outside of the playable area when loading a save.

- Fixed random events spawning so their state is consistent during save and load.

- Repositioned few of events so that they are not right next to fast-travel exit points.

- Fixed bandits sometimes never ceasing to loot victims' corpses.

- Fixed the issue of not being able to loot unconscious event NPCs after loading the game.

Reputation

- Fixed several logical issues within the world's reputation/faction tree.

- Fixed issues in Tachov and Nebakov location description.

Shop

- Removed asking the player if they want to haggle after already confirming selling their items for all of the NPC's current wealth.

- Improved the logic for rounding amounts in shop.

- Improved shop haggle logic.

- Shops no longer sell cobwebs.

- Fixed an issue where items would remain in the shop basket from a previous encounter if the user loaded a savegame during price negotiation.

Skills & perks

- Rebalanced XP gain for Vitality, Agility, Thievery, Stealth, Marksmanship, Houndmaster, Horseriding, and melee weapon skills. Specifically training Marksmanship should be noticeably easier now and training melee weapon skills should be slightly slower.

- Prevented exploiting the Next to Godliness perk for indefinite healing.

- Reimplemented the Warmonger perk so that it increases player's chance to land a hit on enemy in addition to its previous benefits.

- The Against All Odds perk now has a visible buff icon next to the health bar while it's active.

- The Opening Strike perk now functions on every hit, even if the player does not damage the health of the target.

- Fixed the issue with the bonus from the Gladiator perk not showing up as a buff in the Swords skill.

- Fixed the issue with activating Surprise Attack / Ambusher perks' effects when shooting dead bodies.

- Fixed the issue with the Train Hard, Fight Easy! perk applying only to melee weapons.

- Fixed the missing color indication for buffed values in inventory screen while the River perk is active.

- Rebalanced values for the Tendon Slicer perk.

- Fixed the time period during which the Fundamentals of Theology perk is active.

- Fixed the Escape Artist II perk being available to pick even without its Escape Artist I prerequisite.

- Fixed the issue with the Dark Arts Apprentice perk giving an unlimited sprinting stamina between 0:00 and 4:30.

- Fixed stuttering caused by the Local Hero perk.

Stealth

- Created new clothing and equipment specifically supporting stealth gameplay and rebalanced stealth stats for all clothing.

- Fixed material transparency in Trosky castle which allowed NPCs to see through some obstacles.

- Fixed NPC reactions to pebbles being thrown from a different floor.

Takedowns

- Added screaming of NPCs when being stealth killed.

- Improved takedown and stealth kill animations for lying NPCs in complicated areas.

- Removed animation glitch at the end of the slaughter animation.

- Improved stealth kill animations.

- Polished animations of stealth killing female NPCs.

- Improved light of falling torch after stealth killing or knocking out an NPC.

- Stealth kills are now more likely to fail.

- Fixed positioning player's hands on takedown victim's face.

Tutorials

- Disabled tutorial about not having to hold W while riding a horse repeating.

- Added new tutorials providing hints about fighting multiple opponents.

- Fixed damaged hand cannon tutorial appearing inappropriately.

UI

- Main Menu: Fixed invalid result when pressing PROS and Credits at the same time.

- Made POI icons on the map smaller.

- Removed rain from the inventory UI.

- Adjusted the colour indication in the inventory when player is overloaded.

- Removed false notification about discovering Suchdol when game loaded into the Kuttenberg level after startup.

- Removed map marker for items in player's horse inventory.

- Added horse stat icons to the Horse/Sidekicks tab.

- Improved lighting and shadows in the inventory.

- Fixed incorrect UI message being displayed after loading a save that was created while getting out of a bed.

- Fixed consistency of skill teacher icons so they are not visible when the skill teacher is not active.

- Fixed inconsistencies between the combat rabbit indicator and the actual combat state.

- Fixed issue with clouds appearing incorrectly over the map after loading the game.

- Fixed controls getting stuck in dialogue when pressing Talk and opening Inventory at the same time.

- Fixed incorrect weapons shown in inventory preview when using drag & drop.

- Fixed notifications about losing quest items sometimes appearing even though player didn't lose them.

- Fixed the stolen in label and other elements sometimes overlapping with the item's properties.

- Fixed the values of horse armour not being reflected properly in the inventory UI in the companion section.

- Fixed the issue with a few microquests sometimes claiming a tracking slot even after being completed.

- Fixed the dirtiness of items sometimes displaying incorrectly within the washing UI.

- Improved accuracy of the load progress indicator.

- Added an icon for the blacksmith by the Horse market in Kuttenberg.

Visuals

- Added option to enable NVidia DLSS 4 Super Resolution.

- Improved SVOTI recalculation at camera dialogue switches.

- Removed lightning underground and indoors during a storm.

- Fixed glitches when player or NPC changes clothes.

- Fixed motion blur being disabled in dialogues.

- Fixed screen flicker during certain situations.

- Fixed various visual pop-in after game is restarted or loaded.

- Fixed issues related to rare shader combinations.

- Fixed objects sometimes not casting the correct shadow.

- Fixed flickering of objects when switching their LoD.

- Fixed character and vegetation detail sometimes being inconsistent when changing advanced graphical settings.

- Fixed the issue with the screen space reflection ceasing to update upon activation of Resolution scaling.

- Fixed flickering artifacts on distant objects showing against a sky.

- Fixed broken vegetation and rain animations for long playthroughs.

- Fixed flickering of horse and dog when player gets closer.

Miscellaneous

- Added numpad keybinds for control of QAM.

- Allowed sprinting while drunk.

- Player no longer gets a head injury caused by hangover.

- Skill teachers' icons now better represent the availability of their lessons through color.

- Corrected voiceover for innkeeper in Troskowitz.

- Polished physics for all the bridles and chanfrons.

- Improved lipsync across the game.

- Improved descriptions of various items.

- Improved physics of the parsnip.

- Improved physics simulation quality of scabbards.

- Prevented the player from being able to access their inventory while praying at a shrine.

- Changed link for the Plaion web page for help.

- Removed the point of interest tipster icon from some NPCs that had nothing left to tell the player about.

- Fixed controls getting locked after interacting with a kettle after loading the game saved while eating from the same kettle.

- Fixed calculating the Civilians killed statistic.

- Fixed animation of picking up items while holding a bow.

- Fixed guards losing their armour after they kicked player out of the Sigismund's camp.

- Fixed some facial animations not working in dialogues when the speaker is lying on the ground wounded.

- Fixed looped drinking sound after being killed when drinking.

- Fixed the lockpicking minigame not being cancelled if the cart with the chest moved away from the player.

- Fixed dead NPCs sometimes T-posing after loading.

- Fixed issues in the mash-eating NPC behavior related to save/load.

- Fixed the issue with some water troughs offering to clean the player even though they are clean already.

Quests

A Good Scrub

- Adjusted the slogan yelling, so that the town crier doesn't yell over Henry.

- Added an adequate hangover buff after the bathhouse party.

- Removed a T-posing NPC in the background of the cutscene.

- Adjusted trespass appearing after the quest in the private rooms of the Kingfisher bathhouse.

- Fixed an issue where the bathmaids started mounting the wagon together, clipping into each other.

- Fixed an issue where during the wagon ride, horses would start jumping halfway.

A Moment of Fame

- Fixed the issue with quest tipster marker staying active on the compass even if the player kills the questgiver.

- Fixed the quest fight arena to solve the problem of player getting stuck in the environment.

Ars Dimicatoria

- Adjusted how the quest reacts when starting the tourney while being wanted for crime in Kuttenberg.

- Adjusted who is the victim for crimes comitted in the fencing hall during certain quest fail scenarios.

- Talking to Menhart to enter the tourney won't force the player straight into the tourney, but gives the option to still back out of the dialogue.

- The fencing hall crier will now correctly announce which master is teaching in the hall, depending on the quest outcome.

- Improved gestures for the crier at the fencing hall.

- Improved NPC daycycles in the fencing hall.

- Fixed possible stuck fader when talking to Menhard to start the tourney.

- Fixed defeating Menhard sometimes being considered a crime.

- Fixed Menhard being illogically drunk in certain dialogues.

- Fixed Arne not having the same training sword as the player during their fight.

- Fixed an issue where NPCs would get stuck standing around when talking with Menhard in the inn.

- Fixed skill teaching not being activated on certain quest related skill teaching NPCs.

- Fixed the issue where a fight would start before NPCs entered the arena during the tourney.

- Fixed 'New quest' marker activating on dead Nicolas of Prague.

- Fixed the objective to get healed by the bathwench getting stuck if the player healed themselves instead.

- Fixed NPCs sometimes not acknowledging the crime of stealing the guild sword, even when catching the player in the act.

- Fixed the fencers sometimes not entering the tourney arena if being called upon when drinking from the barrel.

- Fixed the wenches not healing the player in the second half of the tourney.

- Fixed a broken animation for stealing the guild sword when started from a certain angle.

- Fixed the issue where Menhard and Arne won't accept a duel while wearing a coif, mistaking it for an armour piece.

- Fixed the issue where fencers could get stuck in a table at the tourney.

Attila

- Improved the environment in the spot where the bandit is buried.

Back in the Saddle

- Fixed the race failing automatically if too many races were started and completed in short succession.

Bad Blood

- Pavlena will now die at the proper spot if the player decides to leave the Trosky region and come back.

- Pavlena won't react to the player taking Otta's sword anymore.

- Prasta won't go straight to the inn after the player finds Roman anymore.

- Prevented Dusko from having a crime reaction to the player lockpicking Roman's door.

- Fixed broken dialogue with Jakesh in some rare combinations of previous quest decisions.

- Fixed certain music tracks failing to end properly during the quest.

- Fixed Pavlena not being dealt with by the law after certain quest outcomes.

- Fixed some dialogue options still being available with bailiff Thrush after the player already concluded the investigation.

- Fixed an issue with the contents of Pavlena's chest changing during the quest.

- Fixed the bed assignment for Bozhena and Pavlena.

Bellatores

- Fixed Posy and Tugbone sometimes going to sleep on a bed with dead Cumans after finishing the quest.

- Fixed the Cuman pillagers sometimes attacking Jan of Zimburg unexpectedly while he's talking to Henry.

- Fixed a debug string being present when talking to Jan of Zimburg.

Besieged

- Rebalanced the battle.

Brunswick

- Improved Henry's reactions to collecting the last items.

Civic Duty

- Objectives no longer randomly update when player has no news.

- Fixed the issue where player can infinitely interact with bailiff after killing Chenyek or Knuckles.

Civitas Pragensis

- Adjusted difficulty for the fight with Erik.

- Improved dialogue cameras when talking with Hans and Kubyenka.

- Improved consistency of NPCs clothes.

- Removed a redundant NPC in the camp.

Combat Training

- Added check for weapon and armour if starting it right after the first combat tutorial.

- Fixed the issue where the player could not continue Combat Training II because of a drunken blackout.

- Fixed the issue where the quest wouldn't continue after yielding.

- Fixed the issue where the player would get stuck in the arena if they challenged Tomcat to a duel after 19:20.

- Fixed broken start of the For Victory! quest if only a polearm was used since the second combat tutorial with Tomcat.

- Fixed attacking in Dry Devil's combat tutorial.

Damsel in Distress

- Improved timings for notifications of various skillcheck resolutions.

- Fixed trespasses being globally turned off when quest can be started.

Dancing with the Devil

- Improved NPCs shooting from the battlements.

- Improved particles at Maleshov.

- Improved transition of the player's allies' hiding animation.

- Improved enemies behavior.

- Improved loot.

- Fixed the issue of characters sometimes appearing later than they should in cutscenes.

- Fixed von Bergow being undressed when loading the game from saves from an older version of the game.

- Fixed the quest getting softlocked if the player stayed at edge of quest area when Hans was placing a ladder.

Demons of Trosky

- Fixed a blocked off room at Trosky if the quest is still active after starting For Victory.

- Fixed Osina's voicelines when player gives up during the fight.

Divine Messenger

- Prevented player from being able to leave the closed area in several places.

- Prevented Godwin from starting the blacksmithing minigame or the alchemy minigame.

- Removed butterflies from the meadow to improve its bleak atmosphere.

- Removed additional NPCs that would sometimes wander into the meadow.

- Improved atmosphere.

- Improved the tour to the fortress with Erik.

- Improved dialogues.

Dragon's Lair

- Increased the time Gerhart will wait for the player's response after offering them a deal.

- Added some tasty loot to the Alchemist's inventory.

- Fixed bodyguards' behaviour if player beat them using the Ringenmeister perk.

- Fixed Gerhart's behaviour at the inn.

- Fixed bodyguards reporting a crime after being knocked out with the Ringenmeister perk.

- Fixed the possibility of bodyguards' AI breaking at the bone site.

- Fixed dead soldiers appearing in a cutscene at the bonesite.

- Fixed disappearing dragon bones after loading a save where the player split with other parties and stole them back.

Easy Riders

- Player can no longer stealth knockout the bandits in the forest.

- Fixed a ledge that allowed player to return to the camp through a boundary.

- Adjusted an objective trigger in the rock maze.

- Increased vision and hearing of the bandits in the forest.

- Added an automatic trigger for a dialogue with Hans if they reach the maze at the same time.

- Improved how the girl reacts to the thrown pebble.

- Improved alignment of Henry and Hans at the log where Hans slides down.

- Adjusted the path of a bandit in the rock maze.

- Improved Hans' running up the hill in the forest.

- Fixed a repeating dialogue by one of the bandits in the forest.

- Fixed bandits in the forest sometimes getting stuck if distracted by a thrown pebble.

- Fixed Hans running through the bushes at the end of the maze.

- Fixed Hans occasionally stopping for a moment and running again in the forest.

- Fixed a line of Hans' dialogue in the massacre cutscene.

- Fixed riposte icon showing during the perfect block tutorial.

- Fixed some vegetation in the massacre cutscene.

- Fixed the ability to push an opponent out of a fighting pen using clinch.

Exodus

- Improved NPC movement in the underground.

- Adjusted the distance from which the burning synagogue switches to just being burned down.

- Removed a possible drunk effect for Samuel's mother.

- Fixed an issue where the player could get stuck if he and Lichtenstein opened the door to the inn at the same time.

- Fixed the player being able to kill certain horses at the end of the quest.

- Fixed an incorrect Game over in the underground section if the player stays near Lichtenstein.

- Fixed the player's unconscious effect in the backyard that should show the Game over screen.

- Fixed weird behaviour of Samuel in the backyard if the player fought unarmed.

- Fixed player barks if he goes the wrong way in the underground section.

- Fixed an issue where Samuel would skip part of his movement and dialogue on the way to his mother.

- Fixed Lichtenstein sometimes missing at the start of the quest.

For Victory!

- Replaced the potentially dead character with another one.

- Removed broken skill XP reward when winning at dice during the feast.

- Fixed sounds missing in cutscenes.

- Fixed broken text in the dialogue with Johanka of Zhernov.

- Fixed continuity regarding a dead NPC from previous quests appearing in a cutscene.

For Whom the Bell Tolls

- Added more groschen around Trosky so that the player can play dice with Nicodemus.

- Fanka won't be angry that there is no ginger in the chest when there is.

- Repositioned the guards at Trosky to make stealth easier.

- Fixed objective marker on Nicodemus.

- Fixed guards' reaction to pebbles thrown from a different floor.

Forbidden Fruit

- Fixed the issue where player couldn't get off the cart after killing the gravedigger.

- Fixed the sliding during the animation of the NPC boarding the cart.

Fortuna

- Prevented non-quest NPCs from walking inside the quest area.

- Prevented quest NPCs from calling guards on the player.

- Improved Bozhena's behaviour while the ambushers are present.

- Fixed the crime reactions of Bozhena, who will no longer run away from the player.

- Fixed an issue where players couldn't bandage themselves in Bozhena's hut after loading.

- Fixed fireplace extinguishing.

- Removed the possibility to leave the quest without a weapon.

- Improved chat with NPCs.

Hammer and Tongs

- Fixed forging the sword in the Trosky region not progressing the quest.

High Toll

- Fixed soldiers or the whole camp disappearing while the quest is active.

Hunger and Despair

- Fixed the tower archers shooting at the player after loading an autosave.

- Fixed the camera issue with Godwin in the polylogue.

- Fixed weather continuity.

- Fixed an issue with the combat lock getting stuck on fallen enemies when player tries to fight unarmed in big battles.

- Fixed the issue with Mutt being respawned if he was eaten.

- Fixed the clothing issues in the preaching cutscene.

- Fixed the issue with the Katherine romance continuing even though the player refused.

- Revised dialogue prompts triggering some of the romance options to make it clearer what their result will be.

- Closed a gap that allowed players to get out of Suchdol castle.

- The battle now ends only when there is no enemy on the walls anymore and ladders are down.

Ill Repute

- Improved snapping NPC movement in the duel area upon calming down from crime reactions.

- Fixed objectives reacting incorrectly if the player kills certain bathwenches.

- Fixed wrongly displayed area markers for certain sabotages.

- Fixed a possible stuck objective if player had the quest related perfume confiscated during certain playthroughs.

In Vino Veritas

- Added ownership of player's bed in the vineyard.

- Some journal entries rewritten.

- Improved dialogue conditions in cases when the player steals sulphur first.

- Rebalanced alcohol consumption values.

- Fixed dialogue conditions before the dialogue with Havel.

- Fixed NPC's immortality conditions.

- Fixed an active objective after completing the quest.

- Fixed a dialogue condition with Adleta.

- Fixed the trespass area on the vineyard.

- Fixed conditions for recruiter on vineyard.

- Fixed the locks on the doors between Havel's room and the player's rented room.

Into the Underworld

- Prevented the player from leaving the closed area.

- Fixed NPC quest behaviour.

- Fixed missing voiceovers in cutscenes.

- Fixed Chenyek sometimes being obviously seen teleporting.

- Fixed crime reactions after the fistfight in the Hole.

Invaders

- Added autosaves at the beginning and end of the quest.

- Improved time skips while drinking with the Cumans by replacing them with text-based cutscenes.

- Fixed start dialogue having two valid sequences.

- Fixed time sometimes stopping if the player had booze in their inventory and later had it confiscated.

- Fixed Jasak not walking normally after the player draws a weapon when going for more alcohol.

- Fixed Vuytek leaving after being knocked out right before the quest starts.

- Fixed the unconsciousness animation if the player hits a Cuman right before losing consciousness.

- Fixed the cutscene trigger area for Mutt being too close to the booze stash.

- Fixed the tip dialogue about the quest ending abruptly with Kreyzl.

- Fixed after the player gaining a drunkenness buff insteaf of a hangover buff after drinking with Cumans.

- Fixed the quest starting when Cumans are not present in the inn.

- Fixed Nomad missing from the dialogue after flirting with Jasak's love interest.

Johnny the Gob

- Fixed an issue with the quest sometimes completing prematurely.

Judgment Day

- Rebalanced quest rewards.

- Fixed horse behaviour after the battle.

Justice

- Fixed a situation where player could hand in the quest while being reported for murder at the same time.

Kuttenberg Tournament

- Improved the disqualification process during the tourney.

- Improved timeskipping at the tourney. Fixed tourney getting stuck during timeskips.

- Shortened the time between one discipline end and the start of another.

- Added proper gestures for Kumel while announcing.

- Correct journal entry will now appear if player doesn't collect their rewards at the tourney.

- Adjusted how long is player banned from further tournaments if he caused a crime during one.

- Kumel shouldn't arrive drunk to the repeated tourney activity.

- Trying to attack the opponent too early will trigger the fight early instead of a crime.

- Adjusted how the different fighters swap for different tournaments.

- Prevented the attending skill teachers from teaching during the tourney.

- Fans won't be teleported inside the arena if the player leaves and comes back.

- Fixed an issue where an opponent would surrender and run away from the area.

- Fixed the tourney getting stuck if player left the tourney and returned later.

- Fans standing by the arena won't stand inside each other anymore.

- Fixed the player sometimes getting stuck in the fighting arena if they got disqualified while inside it.

- Fixed the player committing a crime at the tourney for unsheathing their weapon.

- Fixed objective to 'Equip tournament gear' reactivating upon successfully returning the gear.

- Fixed several issues related to saving/loading in unexpected moments.

- Fixed an issue where fighters wouldn't change their gear for other disciplines.

Lackey

- Fixed Vostatek not talking about other quests after finishing this one.

- Fixed an issue where huntsman Vostatek might have managed to survive being eaten by wolves under certain conditions.

- Fixed terrain issue allowing the player to move into a position unreachable by NPCs.

Last Rites

- Fixed the game sometimes freezing after knocking down a ladder.

- Fixed disappearing edges around the wall hole from trebuchet on lower graphics settings.

- Fixed the Suchdol chimney appearing later than the fortress itself.

Last Will

- Fixed an issue where a player could receive a reward twice if they ordered Mutt to attack Gerda during the duel.

Like Old Times

- Adjusted the position of a chest in the soldiers' camp to fix a broken animation during lockpicking.

- Adjusted the body of the killed huntsman to not clip into the tree.

- Fixed the issue with dead soldiers' bodies staying in the camp upon travelling back to Devil's Den.

- Fixed a possible chat prompt without text during the horse ride with Capon.

Lost Honour

- Fixed incorrect heraldry on one of Garbow's pavises in his camp.

Master Schindel's Toys

- Player can no longer lose an important quest item.

- Fixed journal logs after failing the quest.

Materia Prima

- Fixed dialogue cameras.

Miri Fajta

- Improved animation of NPCs sitting on the ground.

- Polished the music during a dialogue.

- Improved deterred NPC's behavior.

- Removed items in Tibor's inventory when being held captive.

- Fixed skill reward in dialogue.

- Fixed the animation when picking up the dead body.

- Fixed woodcutters' reaction while player trespassing.

- Fixed trespass area in the barn.

Mutt

- Removed mentioning Vostatek if player already knows about him.

- Improved Mutt's animations in the first dialogue with him.

- Increased damage for parry attacks against wolves.

- Changed loot in Mutt's wolf den.

- Added note in the descriptions of the items indicating that they are sniffable by Mutt. 

- Fixed the behaviour of the first pack of wolves.

Necessary Evil

- Removed marker from von Bergow while he's sleeping after the raid on Semine.

- Added waiting behaviour for von Bergow after player reports the results of the torture.

- Added the cleaning activity for Capon after the return from Semine.

- Increased visibility of the gate from Semine fortress on low settings.

- Fixed horse alignment during the raid on Semine.

- Fixed dying animation if player kills the NPC during torture.

- Fixed teleportation of the player during final polylogue with von Bergow.

Opus Magnum

- Fixed the condition of the objective of bringing the book to the miller.

- Fixed the issue with a guard guarding the book owner indefinitely.

Oratores

- Improved the final horse race.

- Removed the prompt mistakenly offering to play dice with Samuel, Capon, or Brabant while in Ruthard Manor.

- Fixed reaction of vagabonds to a thrown pebble in Ruthard Manor.

- Forbid sending Mutt home from the closed Suchdol castle.

Popinjay Shoot

- Fixed player being unable to shoot after quick sword draw in the Popinjay Shoot quest.

Post Scriptum

- Improved miners' reaction to crime after the fight.

- Guards are now always present behind the entrance door, so they can let the player see Markolt.

- Fixed the letter staying in inventory after giving it to the bailiff.

Ransom

- Fixed Henry being sunken into the ground in the dialogue with Jan of Suchotlesky if the player woke him up from unconsciousness.

- Fixed a possibility of Jan going back to the ambush site while he's trying to investigate crime.

- Fixed the burnt down house breaking combat during the handover.

- Fixed objectives not disappearing after talking to the prisoner in Sigismund's camp.

- Fixed injured Jan standing up in dialogue during some facial animations.

- Fixed Kubyenka and Adder not being recruitable for reinforcements.

Reckoning

- Rebalanced stats of the Prague soldiers to make stealth slightly more challenging.

- Fixed sleeping soldiers not waking up when alarm is triggered.

- Fixed soldiers not reacting to their food being poisoned.

- Fixed some alignment with wine in a cutscene.

- Fixed animation of picking up a sword in the yard.

- Fixed some places where the player could get stuck.

So It Begins…

- Improved food confiscation during siege quests.

- Improved performance after the night attack.

Speak of the Devil

- Added collisions to carts to prevent climbing on top of them.

- Lowered the armour quality of the guards escorting the Dry Devil.

- Fixed Zizka's men accusing the player of murder when revisiting the ambush place.

- Fixed music getting stuck on the same track during the search for weapons.

- Fixed an issue where killing the sleeping guard would lead to a stuck objective during the quest So it Begins.

Spoils of War

- Fixed the villagers not always counting the valuables taken from their hidden stashes towards the stolen-value counter.

- Fixed missing text when handing in more valuables than required.

Striped Tonies

- Fixed journal not mentioning why the player failed the quest.

- Fixed the standard moving unnaturally when walking on the stairs.

- Fixed saves created within the Striped Tonies quest having incorrect names.

- Fixed the behaviour of Miner Anton Kaspar, so that he does not leave the spot at the Church of St. Jacob.

Taking French Leave

- Improved soldiers' animations.

- Improved environment.

- Improved Maleshov tower entrance.

- Improved horses' behaviour at Maleshov castle.

- Added weapons to Maleshov castle.

- Improved cutscene lighting.

- Improved the quest log.

- Fixed saving/loading issue if the text cutscene is played right after loading game.

- Fixed the alarm sounding during the cutscene in Maleshov.

- Fixed Capon waking up from unconsciousness after saving/loading.

- Fixed the Nighthawk potion blinding player after escaping from Maleshov.

- Fixed bark if Hashtal is dead.

- Fixed NPC falling from the stool after knockout.

Teeth in a Bag

- Fixed a rare issue with player is unable to repeat the fight with Zavish and Damian.

- Fixed the invalid dialogue prompt if player refuses to pay the bet in the double fight with Zavish and Damian.

The Best for Last

- Fixed the issue making dialogue with Barnaby inaccessible due to the world time.

- Fixed the issue where you couldn't start a fight with Herbalist Barnaby after refusing him once.

- Fixed issue caused by Ringenmeister perk while trying to end the fight with a choke.

The Blacksmith's Son

- Fixed improper objective when taking the materials from the chest.

The Devil's Pack

- Added the option to bury Ranyek.

- Added missing voiceover with the innkeeper when asking about Ranyek.

- Fixed the objective marker to carry Ranyek to not flash in the navigation panel.

- Fixed the objective to bury Ranyek not activating.

- Fixed the quest not being able to progress after a failed skill check with the dice players.

- Fixed the player losing more groschen than they haggled in the dialogue with the bailiff.

The Feast

- Fixed Godwin not being able to succeed in the skillcheck with Servant Dasha.

- Fixed NPCs jumping to position during treating wounded animation at the end of The Feast.

The Fifth Commandment

- Added a missing journal entry for when player kills someone in the house of Grolle.

- Removing the dialogue loop of giving thanks from Stanya.

- Removed frequent praying from Lipold's daycycle.

- Changed dialogue for Strnad if beating him until he is unconsious.

- Started to automatically pull the weapon out before the fight with Thaddeus.

- Rewritten journal entries.

- Changed the heads of William and Barton.

- Adjusted position of dead Mandelina during polylogue after trap.

- Changed the prompt for the focus camera for the crime scene.

- Added Marigold decoction to the option to cure Lipold's hangover.

- Removed trespass from Lipold's house during the quest.

- Added crime suppression during the trap.

- Edited stash of a chest in the morgue where lies dead Alenka.

- Fixed Lipold's behavior at the end of quest, so he will leave the room.

- Fixed the quest sometimes getting stuck after accusing Prokop of the murder.

- Fixed dialogue conditions with Prokop.

- Fixed issue in the Fifth Commandment where Strnad would not talk to plazer to finish the objective for thief Zdena.

- Fixed issue of locked doors during the trap in the Fifth Commandment quest.

- Fixed the journal entry for choosing William as a murderer.

The Finger of God

- Improved Bull's weapon preset before the battle.

- Improved Godwin's behavior by the graves.

- Improved crime interactions between the player and allies.

- Improved the interactions between the player and other defenders.

- Improved placement of targets for the gun tutorial.

- Fixed broken dialogue option after handing in a horseshoe.

- Fixed stats of weapons for repair.

- Fixed the NPC's clothing during the dialogue with Klara.

The Heirloom

- Improved reactions of Vendula and Svatava upon being hit.

- Prevented gossip dialogues during hostage situation.

- Fixed Mikush not becoming a skill teacher in some endings.

- Fixed Mikush not accepting his hat in some endings.

- Fixed the hostage situation getting broken by Mutt.

The Jaunt

- Ventza won't be in the camp when you're supposed to find him in the rocks

- The Jaunt can now be finished after failing the objective to follow lord Semin and Gnarly.

- Improved the tied-up animation for Gules and Ventza.

- Knocking Ventza out and bringing him to Lord Semine is now a valid option.

- Fixed the issue where Captain Gnarly and Lord Semine were not in Semine after the player completed the quest without them.

The King's Gambit

- Entering the assembly now properly keeps the player incognito.

- Player can no longer read a book while carrying a pitcher of wine.

- Rebalanced the duel with Christopher.

- Made Vavak easier to get a hold of.

- Added a wine serving tutorial overlay at the start of the assembly.

- Fixed a missing objective marker on Anna of Waldstein.

- Fixed Franta picking up the waiter's clothes at the tailor repeatedly.

- Fixed disappearing objects at the end of the toast with the king.

- Fixed mismatching character positions after the intro cutscene.

- Fixed Godwin's horse leaving during the intro polylogue.

- Fixed the Raborsch stablemaster bribery option not having an effect.

- Fixed the head butler asking about Franta multiple times.

The Lion's Den

- Revised music playing during the quest.

- Fixed the correct reaction when leaving Sedletz after Stephen Crow is dead.

- Fixed the correct reaction when committing a crime after a trial.

- Fixed the correct reaction when attacking Commander Katz.

- Fixed the player not being able to knock out the guard guarding Musa in the Lion's Den quest.

- Fixed redudant objective to talk to Ditrich Katz after the trial.

The Magic Arrow

- Pasha's crossbow is now more powerful.

- Removed inappropriate crime reactions at the end of the arrow ceremony.

- Improved a journal entry.

- Fixed gravedigger Lenek's surrender.

The Mouth of Hell

- Changed the position of a sword in the mine.

- Moved the dialogue camera during the initial scene of massacre in Old Kutna.

- Fixed the issue where the screen would go black after fast travelling through Old Kutna.

- Fixed issue of missing dead cows in Old Kutna.

- Fixed an issue where Marian and Vladimir might show up to confront Taras naked at night.

- Fixed collisions in the mine.

- Fixed the behavior of Taras so that he will not flee if escalating a fight after showing him the contract.

- Fixed behaviour of Taras if he falls down while chasing player.

The Peasant Revolt

- Prevented the shootable stashes from getting restocked.

- Fixed an issue where Vlasta was not willing to speak to the player after finishing the quest.

The Reliquary

- Removed camp trespass when returning the finished sword.

- Fixed duplication of quest reward if it's stolen before finishing the quest.

The Spark

- Eldris' chest is not impossible to lockpick now.

- Improved guards' routine after fight.

- Fixed Knuckles staying in front of the inn when he's supposed to be banished.

- Fixed the ropes of hanged The Guild members.

- Fixed Whisker's reaction to player lockpicking the chest in front of him.

- Fixed visual bug of the burnt dugout.

The Storm

- Revised the debuff received from the torturing.

- Removed Mika's openworld dialogue from the Storm quest.

- Added healing items to stashes at Trosky after the duel with Istvan.

- Improved dialogue lighting.

- Removed Zizka's mace during the torture scene.

The Sword and the Quill

- The active outfit is no longer partly unequipped upon being woken up by Zuzana.

- Disabled toggling on-road follow while following the wagon.

- Removed the option to ask Katherine about Nebakov when it's no longer relevant.

- Improved the cutscene.

- Improved Suchdol foot traffic slightly.

- Fixed player's horse periodically stopping while following the wagon.

- Fixed Suchdol light sources not emitting light.

- Fixed the trialogue with Katherine and captain Frenzl not triggering from a specific direction.

- Fixed a visual issue with Zizka's eating animation.

- Fixed player's horse's tack changing in the final cutscene.

The Voivode's Curse

- Rebalanced the blacksmithing recipe to require ingredients appropriate for the Trosky region.

- Prevented asking Aranka for more work if the quest is already started.

- Fixed quest log not reflecting some quest decisions properly.

The White Roebuck

- Fixed players being able to easily make money by killing poachers repeatedly.

- Fixed a certain animal not appearing after the game was saved and loaded after finding the hide.

Thou Art But Dust…

- Improved collision of the trapdoor.

- Fixed players not being able complete the pyramid of skulls and continue the quest.

Tragedy in Danemark

- Fixed the issue with the reaction of miller's family to the player's elimination of the bandits.

Troubadours

- Fixed Michael and George sometimes standing free after loading a save next to the pillory.

- Fixed daily schedule for Michael and George.

Via Argentum

- Improved trespass zones inside of the secret mint.

- Added alternative dialogue for speaking with Volkmar outside of his court

- Improved dialogue cameras for initial dialogue with Volkmar.

- Fixed the issue sometimes making Buresh immortal.

- Fixed the issue where Buresh could react to the player's strikes and potentially flee.

- Fixed the issue where Buresh could teleport out of the secret mint during the timeskip.

- Fixed issue where some characters could be stripped during the opening cutscene.

- Fixed the condition in the final dialogue with Christian of Pisek to match the events in the secret mint.

- Fixed the issue where Volkmar teleported a short distance away and did not react to the player if the player chose to kill him.

Victimised

- Improved timings for notifications of certain skillcheck resolutions.

- Adjusted the Wait for Margaret interactor to be easier to find.

- Fixed possible crime reactions later in the quest, if player knocked out Lacek in the inn.

Warding Off Evil

- Improved lighting in the inn basement.

- Improved the Parler chamber, specifically the window surroundings for a graceful knockout.

- Fixed an issue where the Protective Axe disappeared from the inventory after giving Johann another axe.

Wedding Crashers

- Improved dialogue cameras.

- Improved Hanush's position in the dialogue.

- Removed the option to attack NPCs at the wedding.

- Removed blood on NPCs before wedding ceremony.

- Improved movement of the cook while trying to lure her away from the kitchen.

- Rebalanced the training sword's damage.

- Michael and George can attend the wedding now.

- Fixed GPU performance issues during the wedding cutscene.

- Fixed some optional objectives and behavior.

- Fixed condition in dialogue between Svatya and Vuytek.

- Fixed optional dialogue condition with the guard by the cellar.

- Fixed optional dialogue conditions with Jurko.

- Fixed optional dialogue conditions with the Chamberlain.

- Fixed going unconscious again right after getting up during event brawl.

- Fixed an issue where Strong broth was not working as an anti-alcohol food.

- Fixed dialogue condition before going to the wedding.

Yackers'n'Fash

- Added Innkeeper Helga Schelm as a tipster for the Yackers 'N' Fash quest.

- Fixed the issue with foreman Vlach not telling player to meet later in the evening.

--

(Plus hundreds of other fixes and improvements not mentioned in detail)

Eric is a freelance writer for IGN.

One of the biggest reasons for why we remember the Tony Hawk's Pro Skater games so fondly is because of the licensed soundtrack. From punk rock to hip-hop, and a new wave of hardcore with the remasters, the series forged our music tastes, and it will continue to do so with Tony Hawk's Pro Skater 3 + 4 Remastered coming July 11 this year. In the lead up to its release, Activision is putting together the official THPS 3 + 4 playlist on Spotify and continually updating it as it reveals more and more of the song list.

The first wave of tracks have just been revealed, and here are the songs we currently know of for the THPS 3 + 4 Remastered soundtrack:

• "Ace of Spades" by Motörhead
• "Them Bones" by Alice in Chains
• "Ultimate" by Denzel Curry
• "Damaged Goods" by Gang of Four
• "96 Quite Bitter Beings" by CKY
• "Yankee and the Brave (Ep. 4)" by Run the Jewels
• "King of the Beach" by Wavves
• "Real Thing" by Turnstile
• "Not the Same" by Bodyjar
• "New Wage Slavery" by End It
• "Head" by Jeff Rosenstock
• "Collard Greens" by Schoolboy Q and Kendrick Lamar
• "Outta Here" by KRS-One
• "Result" by TCMF
• "Dog Years" by Urethane
• "Charlotte" by Kittie
• "Mass Appeal" by Gang Starr
• "Faster than the World" by H20
• "Roadkill" by Starcrawler
• "Amoeba" by Adolescents

Additionally, those who get the deluxe edition of the game, or access it through Xbox Game Pass, will also get a full band version of the Doom E1M1 theme song "At Doom's Gate" as a playable track (along with the Doom Slayer and Revenant skater skins).

Personally, I'd love to hear Guttermouth's "I'm Destroying the World" and AFI's "The Boy Who Destroyed the World" from THPS 3 make comebacks, as well as Bad Religion's "Big Bang" and Flogging Molly's "Drunken Lullabies" from THPS 4. That's mostly because I'm a washed up old punk kid. However, it's an opportunity to discover new music and celebrate the scene as it is today, bridging the gap between the new and old as was the case with THPS 1 + 2 Remastered from 2021.

Those who preorder THPS 3 + 4 Remastered's deluxe or collector's edition can access the playable demo sometime in June which will include two parks, two skaters, and a limited soundtrack. An exclusive physical Birdhouse skate deck also comes with the collector's edition. You'll also be able to access the full game early on July 8, three days ahead of its official release date.

If you've been wondering what Batman writer Chip Zdarsky is up to now that he's ended his run on that series, wonder no more. IGN can exclusively reveal White House Robot Romance, a kooky new series from DSTLRY that explores an imporbable romance set against the backdrop of a brewing war between the US and Canada. Well, at least the robot part is still science fiction...

Check out the slideshow gallery below for an exclusive look at cover art and interior pages from White House Robot Romance #1:

White House Robot Romance pairs Zdarsky with artist Rachael Stott (Star Trek, Doctor Who), with colors by Tamra Bonvillain and letters by Ariana Maher. The first issue also features covers by Jill Thompson, Elsa Charretier, and Bengal.

Here's DSTLRY's official summary of this politically timely new series:

When Chef-9 learns that Service-1 is scheduled for immediate decommissioning, he makes an unprecedented choice: abandon his station, break protocol, and flee with Service-1 into the streets of Washington, D.C. But what starts as a desperate act of defiance quickly spirals into an international crisis. Service-1’s memory banks hold highly classified state secrets—ones that could tilt the balance of power between America and Canada. As paranoia mounts and the military mobilizes, the runaway robots find themselves hunted by government agents and targeted by corporate spies.

“Yes, there’s science fiction and political intrigue here, but the heart is an old-fashioned romance,” said Zdarsky in a statement. “Getting to write the love story between Service-1 and Chef-9 and see their love come to life thanks to Rachael and Tamra has been an absolute delight. I hope everyone falls for these two the way I have!”

“Drawing White House Robot Romance has been an incredible challenge in the best way possible,” adds Rachael Stott, co-creator and artist. “I’m channeling my love of classic sci-fi, espionage thrillers, and of course, star-crossed romance. Bringing these characters to life and making them feel human has been an exciting experience.”

White House Robot Romance #1 will be released in Summer 2025.

For more exclusive comic book previews, check out a look at the final issue of TMNT: The Last Ronin II and The Dark Knight Returns-inspired Daredevil: Cold Day in Hell.

Jesse is a mild-mannered staff writer for IGN. Allow him to lend a machete to your intellectual thicket by following @jschedeen on BlueSky.

Hot on the heels of its announcement of new game Project C4, ZA/UM has announced an official mobile version of Disco Elysium.

ZA/UM said its goal for the mobile version, exclusive to Android devices, is to bring Disco Elysium to new players “and hopefully serve existing Disco Elysium players with a fun, on-the-go alternative.” To this end, it will release the first two chapters of Disco Elysium for mobile free of charge. You can then pay once to unlock the full game, ad-free.

“We want players to make an informed decision about their potential purchase,” ZA/UM said. “Today’s ZA/UM studio is comprised of both creators and custodians of the Disco Elysium IP. We take both of those roles very seriously and we believe that is evident in the Disco Elysium mobile experience we are creating.”

Studio head Denis Havel went one step further and said Disco Elysium on mobile is about attracting the TikTok audience.

“We intend to captivate the TikTok user with quick hits of compelling story, art, and audio, ultimately creating an all new, deeply engaging form of entertainment,” Havel said.

ZA/UM’s announcement came alongside a debut trailer for Disco Elysium on mobile, as well as screenshots. The game has new, 360-degree scenes built “exclusively to place the mobile user right in the middle of Revachol.” There’s brand new audio featuring full voiceover that “serves to deliver a more immersive, even more character-rich experience.”

Here’s the official blurb:

This is a total re-imagination of the award-winning, gripping psychological RPG Disco Elysium and designed to completely cater to the habits of today’s mobile users. This story-rich adventure has been optimized for short play sessions, allowing players to dive in anytime, anyplace on their mobile devices.

Narrative Lead Chris Priestman said Disco Elysium’s mobile version is “what audiobooks wish they were,” and is designed to be played in short bursts.

Disco Elysium released on mobile via Google Android summer 2025.

It is of course worth noting that while the studio name is the same, many of the key people who worked on Disco Elysium are not at ZA/UM. Numerous former ZA/UM members have left the studio since Disco Elysium's release, and some of those are working on spiritual successors.

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.

I’m not gonna lie: this one stings. Star Wars prequels producer Rick McCallum recently revealed that the legendary cancelled series Star Wars: Underworld would’ve cost a whopping $40 million per episode to make — effectively dooming it to be axed for budget reasons.

“The problem was that each episode was bigger than the films,” McCallum explained in an interview on the Young Indy Chronicles podcast. “So the lowest I could get it down to with the tech that existed then was $40 million an episode.” McCallum added that the inability to successfully realize the project over the years continues to be “one of the great disappointments of our lives.”

With 60 “third draft” scripts written that showcased the Star Wars universe in “sexy, violent, dark, challenging, complicated, and wonderful” ways from “the most wonderful writers in the world,” it seems as though the budget was the true killer in the crib for this project. 60 scripts times $40 million an episode is already well into the $1 billion mark — and it seems as though even George Lucas himself couldn’t scrounge up that kind of cash back in the early 2000s.

“[It] would’ve blown up the whole Star Wars universe and Disney would’ve definitely never offered George to buy the franchise,” McCallum added. The series was truly axed once Disney took control of Lucasfilm and Lucas stepped aside.

Though McCallum did not confirm any plot details during this interview, fans have long believed that the series would cover the events between Revenge of the Sith and A New Hope. The producer previously revealed that the series would feature a whole new cast of characters, would’ve greatly expanded the Star Wars universe, and was targeting an adult — rather than teen and child — audience.

Star Wars: Underworld was first revealed at Star Wars Celebration back in 2005 and test footage from the series was leaked in 2020, but since then, that’s all she wrote. Sadly, it looks as though it may just stay that way.

Lex Briscuso is a film and television critic and a freelance entertainment writer for IGN. You can follow her on Twitter at @nikonamerica.

The world of Monster Hunter Wilds is big, and also pretty connected. One player set out to show just that, with a long journey from a starting zone to the peaks of its later areas.

Over on the Monster Hunter subreddit, user -BrotherPig- posted a video, below, chronicling their journey across the zones of Monster Hunter Wilds. They start out in the Windward Plains, running across the sand and dunes, all the way to the later game zones and, eventually, some of the last game areas and locales. Spoilers await, if you haven't rolled credits on the campaign just yet.

It's an impressively long trip, and emphasizes just how linked all the zones are. There's only one loading screen that happens, around halfway into the trip, as the traveler heads from the Oilwell Basin into the Iceshard Cliffs. Otherwise, it's one big run for this presumably exhausted Seikret.

Monster Hunter Wilds isn't entirely without loading screens, of course. Aside from the one we see in the trip above, there's also the loading screen to enter the training grounds, and those you would get from fast traveling or departing for a friend's quest. But the connectivity is certainly fascinating to see in action, and gave me a new appreciation for all the little corridors and passages that connect the Forbidden Lands.

The secret sauce for Monster Hunter Wilds though, according to a series producer, is apparently in its story, immersion, and cross-play. I've personally just enjoyed seeing all the discoveries players are making with how Wilds handles the series' systems in the open world. No matter why you're playing, it seems like there's still stuff to keep players occupied between now and the first Title Update in April.

To help get your Monster Hunter Wilds adventure started, take a look at what Monster Hunter Wilds doesn’t tell you, and a guide to all 14 weapon types in the game. We’ve also got a detailed Monster Hunter Wilds walkthrough in progress, a Monster Hunter Wilds multiplayer guide to explain how to play with friends, and if you’ve played one of the open betas, here’s how to transfer your Monster Hunter Wilds Beta character over.

IGN’s Monster Hunter Wilds review returned an 8/10. We said: “Monster Hunter Wilds continues to smooth off the rougher corners of the series in smart ways, making for some extremely fun fights but also lacking any real challenge.”

Eric is a freelance writer for IGN.

The Netflix miniseries Adolescence is probably best classified as a drama, with some of the mystery and suspense elements of a police procedural. No one would file it under “horror.” Except that… maybe they should?

If nothing else, it begins with a moment straight out of a nightmare. A half-dozen armed, armored British police officers barge into a nice suburban home and start barking orders. They drag a 13-year-old named Jamie Miller (Owen Cooper) out of his bed, leaving the parents, Eddie (Stephen Graham) and Mandy (Christine Tremarco), confused and panicked. It seems that Jamie, a sweet-looking youngster, has been accused of murdering a classmate named Katie. Later, at the police station, Eddie – named as his son’s legally appointed “appropriate adult” – watches as the mortified teen gets strip-searched and then interrogated. Thanks to the novel presentation devised by co-writers Graham and Jack Thorne and director Philip Barantini, we watch it all play out in real time, in one continuous shot that steeps us in the dread and confusion of the Millers’ harrowing new reality.

Because by the end of the first episode, a new nightmare swamps the old one. What if Jamie is guilty? What if Eddie raised a child capable of stabbing a teenage girl seven times? Adolescence is less concerned with who killed Katie than it is with examining – with more sorrow than scorn – the sick souls of today’s youth. Each of its four episodes is incredibly intense, pushing us to question any assumptions we have about the crime and who’s responsible. Graham and Thorne sketch out a vision of a world where adults barely register in the lives of young people, who instead scrutinize and bully each other incessantly, online and in person. This miniseries is, quite frequently, terrifying.

It also has one heck of a gimmick. Each episode covers roughly one hour in the lives of the people involved with the case. Episode one deals with the arrest and the initial interrogation. Episode two takes place two days later, as two detectives, Luke Bascombe (Ashley Walters) and Misha Frank (Faye Marsay) question Jamie’s classmates. In the third episode, set seven months later, Jamie is at a juvenile detention center, having a tense conversation with a social worker, Briony Ariston (Erin Doherty), about how his attitudes toward women have been shaped by misogynistic online influencers. And in the fourth and final episode, set on Eddie’s 50th birthday, the parents try to have a nice, normal morning, but keep getting gutting reminders of what their child is capable of.

Though neither the material nor the technique are new ground for Adolescence’s creative team – Graham has spent most of his formidable career playing tightly wound, angry men, in projects like the Thorne-written youth-culture chronicle This Is England and Barantini’s previous real-time/one-shot experiment, Boiling Point – there are downsides to telling a story this way. Because each of these four episodes only documents a sliver of the characters’ lives, a good chunk of the dialogue is spent on info-dumping, making sure we know who everybody is and are up to speed on everything that happened off-screen. There’s a bluntness to the way people talk in Adolescence. Graham and Thorne have some big themes they want to explore, about how navigating childhood today is both trickier and more dangerous than it was 30 or 40 years before the internet age. And given how tightly constructed each episode is, the characters often just say outright what’s on their mind, so they can get the point across before the credits roll.

The upside to staging everything in one continuous shot? Each episode is absolutely riveting, and is graced with performances that have time to develop and shift right in front of our eyes – like a piece of live theater. Cooper in particular is a real casting coup. As Jamie, he holds his own in scenes with powerhouse actors like Graham and Doherty, shifting unnervingly easily between looking like a scared little boy and swaggering like a fledgling “manosphere”-pilled bro.

More than anything though, what makes the “you are there” approach work so well in Adolescence is that it gets us to experience a shocking tragedy through the eyes of each of the main characters, often as they themselves are processing it. We’re with Jamie as he navigates the grim realities of the police station. We’re with the detectives Bascombe and Frank as they become depressed and discouraged by the gray lifelessness of Jamie and Katie’s school. We’re with Briony as she tries to coax Jamie into describing what a 13-year-old understands about sexuality and gender roles. And we’re with Eddie, as he wrestles with whether or not he’s been a good father.

Graham, Thorne and Barantini play a lot with subjectivity throughout this series, by muting the dialogue at times – to reflect how the characters have become too overwhelmed by what’s happening to process it – or by having people describe in precise terms what they’re sensing and feeling. (DS Frank sums up the institutional hell of Jamie’s school by telling DI Bascombe it smells like “vomit, cabbage, and masturbation.”) Primarily, what they’re doing is taking a huge social crisis and breaking it down to small, comprehensible moments, lived through by sympathetic individuals. They’re doing what Eddie’s therapist encourages him to do whenever the pain of Jamie’s alleged crime cuts him too deep: He’s supposed to “solve the problem of today,” not to obsess over yesterday or worry about tomorrow. And yet the reality of what happened keeps creeping in, like a shadow. Like Adolescence itself, the darkness is chilling.

As a part of Microsoft's ongoing efforts to implement artificial intelligence into basically everything, the company is preparing to introduce its AI Copilot into your Xbox experience to give you gaming advice, help you remember where you left off last time you played, and perform other tasks.

Announced today, Copilot for gaming will be rolled out for Xbox Insiders through the Xbox mobile app sometime soon for testing. If you're not already aware, Copilot is Microsoft's existing AI chatbot (that replaced Cortana in 2023) that's already integrated into Windows. The gaming version will have a handful of features at launch. You can ask it to install games on your Xbox for you (a process you can already do now just by pushing a single button on the app), and you can also ask it about your play history (in case you forgot what you were doing last time you played), achievements, library, or for a recommendation of what to play next. You'll also be able to speak to Copilot for Gaming directly on the Xbox app while you're playing, and it will serve you answers in the same way Copilot currently does when asked questions via Windows.

FuturLab has announced PowerWash Simulator 2, the sequel to the hugely popular cleaning game.

The Brighton, UK-based studio said it’s self-publishing PowerWash Simulator 2 after Final Fantasy maker Square Enix published the smash hit first game since 2022. It’s due out late 2025 on PlayStation 5, Xbox Series X and S, and PC.

PowerWash Simulator does exactly what it says on the tin: players clean grubby environments with a powerwash. It’s a smash hit, with over 17 million players enjoying the satisfying ping whenever a dirty section of the environment is cleared of dirt. PowerWash Simulator did so well that it ended up attracting big-time licensed DLC, including Warhammer 40,000, Shrek, and SpongeBob SquarePants.

It’s the commercial success of PowerWash Simulator that put FuturLab in a position to self-publish the sequel.

“PowerWash Simulator 2 feels like a natural evolution from its predecessor,” said Dan Chequer, Design Director at FuturLab.

“The original game’s design was all about eliminating anything that detracted from the pure satisfaction of taking something dirty and making it clean. PowerWash Simulator 2 is all about adding in even more avenues for players to achieve that same sense of satisfaction, with new tools, features and quality of life improvements.

“We're really excited to see players dust off their power washers and get stuck into this brand-new campaign, that brings you even more to clean, and even more ways to release the pressure.”

PowerWash Simulator 2 includes a new campaign uncovering more of Muckingham’s mysteries and brand-new grime-coated locations like Sponge Valley, Power Falls, and Lubri City. You even have a home base this time around, where you can “put down your roots and make the place yours by collecting furniture and trinkets to spruce it up along the way, then invite your power wash pals over to check out your pad.”

Also new is split-screen and the ability to share campaign progression online together for the first time.

Now here’s something interesting: FuturLab said it’s “excited” to share more information in April. Now, what’s happening in April? Only Nintendo’s Switch 2 Direct…

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.

Mac N Cheese, a studio composed of (among other folks) former art leads from Cyberpunk 2077, has announced Void Martyrs, a grimdark, top-down action game in which you are sent on a crusade to recover treasured relics at the edge of a blackhole, only to face off against those affected by a biomechanical plague. You play as a nun. Is that a video game first?

The developers describe Void Martyrs's gameplay loop as having "a unique Stigmata/Faith system where the divine choices you make impact your access to certain items and affect gameplay, especially how you survive against the invading evil. Players can take the easier route of slaughtering their way through the dark, but will face a tougher time escaping the unrelenting plague. Will you march blindly to your death, or defy the institution that cast you into the abyss?"

Survival and crafting mechanics come into play as you explore quarantined ships and space cathedrals. And as for how death is handled in Void Martyrs? "If you die," Mac N Cheese says, "Never fear, the Universal Church has thousands of novices and will simply send another to recover your holy remains and take up the cause."

Void Martyrs is in development for PC. Wishlist it on Steam if you're interested.

Ryan McCaffrey is IGN's executive editor of previews and host of both IGN's weekly Xbox show, Podcast Unlocked, as well as our monthly(-ish) interview show, IGN Unfiltered. He's a North Jersey guy, so it's "Taylor ham," not "pork roll." Debate it with him on Twitter at @DMC_Ryan.

The second season of The Last of Us hasn’t even arrived yet, but its looming presence is already making a splash.

The show’s most recent trailer for Season 2, which was released during a SXSW panel, has garnered over 158 million views across platforms in just three days, according to numbers provided by Warner Brothers Discovery. The streamer claimed this is a record for HBO and Max original programming, and that this trailer has outperformed previous promos for the show by “at least 160%”

You can’t stop this.#TheLastOfUs returns April 13 on Max. pic.twitter.com/DH8UzAugIV

— Max (@StreamOnMax) March 8, 2025

The show seems to only be growing in popularity as fans new and old alike wait patiently for Season 2’s arrival. The Season 1 episodes are averaging “around 32 million cross-platform viewers” domestically, which is a huge jump from the numbers of, say, Season 1’s finale. It racked up an impressive 8.2 million same-day viewers across platforms when it aired in March 2023, according to Deadline. Clearly, folks are excitedly getting ready for the next leg of the story with a little rewatch, but this huge jump in numbers says a lot about just how big this series actually is. It’s definitely one of the most successful for HBO in recent years, but the anticipation and love toward the show is undeniable with numbers like these.

The Last of Us will make a five-year time jump for Season 2, and follow Joel and Ellie as they are “drawn into conflict with each other and a world even more dangerous and unpredictable than the one they left behind.” Stars Pedro Pascal, Bella Ramsey, Gabriel Luna, and Rutina Wesley are set to return, with heavy hitters like Kaitlyn Dever, Isabella Merced, Catherine O’Hara, and Jeffrey Wright joining the cast alongside them this season.

At the SXSW panel, showrunners Neil Druckmann and Craig Mazin confirmed “spores are back” following their omission from Season 1. The trailer teased the introduction of spores after they were left out of Season 1; we see Ellie, played by Bella Ramsey, view an infected whose breath releases the spores.

Druckmann said there is "an escalation of numbers and types of infected, but also, as you see in the trailer, an escalation of the vector of how this thing spreads" in The Last of Us Season 2, adding: "Season 1, we had this new thing that wasn’t in the game of these tendrils that spread, and that was one form. And then one shot you see in this trailer, there are things in the air."

Mazin later confirmed "spores are back," before Druckmann added: "The reason [we’re doing it now], I mean, we really wanted to figure it out, and again, everything has to be drama. There had to be a dramatic reason of introducing it now. And there is."

Season 2 of The Last of Us premieres April 13, 2025 on HBO and HBO Max.

Lex Briscuso is a film and television critic and a freelance entertainment writer for IGN. You can follow her on Twitter at @nikonamerica.

Nintendo will open its San Francisco store on May 15, it has announced.

Nintendo San Francisco is the second official Nintendo store in the United States, and follows the hugely popular New York location, which was formerly known as the Nintendo World Store, but closed down for renovations and rebranding as Nintendo NY before reopening in 2016.

The San Francisco store is located in Union Square at 331 Powell Street. Here’s what Nintendo had to say:

In addition to game systems and games, Nintendo San Francisco will offer a unique shopping experience filled with Nintendo’s characters, worlds and exclusive products including accessories, apparel, home goods and souvenirs available only at this location.

Warhammer 40,000 real-time strategy series Dawn of War has been dormant ever since Relic Entertainment ended support for its failed 2017 effort, Dawn of War 3. Still, the first two games remain much-loved by fans, who have wondered ever since whether a Dawn of War 4 or maybe even remakes of either Dawn of War 1 or 2 might be in the works.

Now, after a single photo was published to LinkedIn, Dawn of War fans have hope that something new in the series is finally on the way.

Let’s start with Relic Entertainment itself, which recently gained independence from prior owner Sega via investment from Emona Capital. Emona managing partner Dominik Dolenec published a selfie to LinkedIn showing him standing outside Games Workshop’s Nottingham headquarters and the mecca that is Warhammer World. Yes, that’s a statue of a Space Marine in the background. It’s awesome.

The foreground is more interesting, however. Dolenec is wearing a Relic Entertainment T-shirt for his trip to Games Workshop, and so it can be reasonably assumed that he’s in town representing the developer.

“Great visit to Games Workshop PLC in Nottingham,” Dolenec said. “Many thanks to Owen Rees for sharing the Warhammer magic with us! Looking forward to deepening our partnership in years to come. 💪🎮”

Owen Rees is Group Head of Licensing at Games Workshop. He’s worked on a number of Warhammer video games, and leads the licensing of video games and consumer products for all Warhammer products. It’s also worth noting those emojis at the end of Dolenec’s comment. This very much reads like a video game business meeting.

You can imagine the speculation. Dawn of War 4 is top of the wishlist, it seems, but perhaps remakes of Dawn of War 1 and / or 2 are on the cards instead. Let’s be optimistic and suggest a brand new game and remakes are all in the works. Why not?

Here’s what we know: Games Workshop is on the hunt for the next big Warhammer video game hit after the hugely successful, 5 million-selling Space Marine 2 changed everything for developer Saber Interactive.

In January, reporting results for the first half of its financial year ending December 1, 2024, Games Workshop CEO Kevin Rountree hailed the success of Space Marine 2, which contributed significant royalty revenue to the business.

In fact, licensing revenue from royalty income increased in the period by a whopping £18 million (approx. $21.9 million) to £30.1 million (approx. $36.7 million). Earned income, which is the key figure here, was £26.1 million (approx. $31.8 million), up from £5.9 million (approx. $7.2 million), an increase Games Workshop said was mainly from Space Marine 2. 98% of Games Workshop’s total licensing revenue came from PC and console games (Space Marine 2 launched on PC, PlayStation 5, and Xbox Series X and S).

A win all round, then, but Rountree also expressed a degree of caution on potential future video game success, admitting hits like Space Marine 2 are few and far between.

Here’s the statement:

During the period, our licensing partners launched two new video games; Warhammer 40,000: Space Marine 2, a third person shooter for PC and console and Warhammer 40,000: Speed Freeks, a combat racing game. Established games continue to contribute, alongside royalty income earned following the success of Space Marine 2. We recognise that successes like these for Warhammer are not a given in the world of video games. Clearly we are looking for the next one. We remain cautious when forecasting royalty income.

So, where could this big Warhammer video game hit come from? It seems inevitable that Saber Interactive will get the chance to continue the Space Marine story with Space Marine 3, and indeed has said it has ideas for a third game.

Warhammer 40,000 has never been bigger. Amazon’s Space Marine 2 animation, released as part of the Secret Level anthology series, went down well with fans. And there’s huge excitement about the Henry Cavill-fronted Warhammer 40,000 projects in the works for Amazon, although they're years away. Creative Assembly is reportedly working on a Warhammer 40,000 Total War game (finally!), although it is apparently years away. Could a revival of Dawn of War scratch that strategy itch in the meantime?

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.

This review contains full spoilers for The Wheel of Time episodes 1-3.

The Wheel of Time turns, and a new season begins explosively with two excellent episodes showing what the series does best: creative magical battles, messy personal drama, and grappling with the world-shaking repercussions of the clashing agendas of powerful people. The episode that follows, however, is a bit of a let down by comparison, offering some good intrigue and emotional scenes but lacking focus because it has to weave together too many plots to set up what’s next.

Aes Sedai in the show wear the colors of their factions far more prominently than in the books, to make it easier for the audience to keep track of who’s who and on what their general deal is – and it’s hilarious that now that Liandrin (Kate Fleetwood) has been revealed to be secretly Black Ajah, she’s conveniently also splashing in some black along with her red apparel. Tensions are high in the White Tower: No one’s sure just how deep the contamination goes. Their concern is both warranted and misdirected, focused on the rest of the Red Ajah only to learn that the highest ranks of all of the groups have members who have devoted themselves to the Dark One. The contempt the Reds show for the Warders guarding the door when they try to join the fray is particularly funny because they’re actually in the right. It’s the Yellow and Green Ajah coming up behind them that are the real threat.

Aes Sedai dialogue is very cleverly written so that they twist words while always telling the truth. The Amyrlin Seat Siuan Sanche (Sophie Okonedo) acknowledges just how much trouble she’d be in if Liandrin’s allegations about her letting a male channeler go are true – which of course they are – before launching into her counteroffensive with Nynaeve al’Meara (Zoë Robins) as her key witness. Discovering Nynaeve has escaped the Seanchan to tell of her betrayal, Liandrin stops politicking and starts attacking.

All hell breaks loose in the White Tower, with the magical carnage quickly spilling out into the streets of Tar Valon. Lots of nameless Aes Sedai die in creative ways including balls of fire, magical evisceration, and being crushed by the ornate pillars of the White Tower itself. The use of shielding and healing makes for a particularly dynamic fight where combatants don’t necessarily stay down but death is still a real possibility.

That’s particularly true for a Warder, whose job is to protect their Aes Sedai at all costs. It’s beautiful that Maksim (Taylor Napier) and Ihvon (Anthony Kaye, replacing Emmanuel Imani) both dive to shield Alanna Mosvani (Priyanka Bose) from Liandin’s blade – it just happens to be Ihvon who takes the fatal blow. It’s a loss heavily foreshadowed by the throuple’s failed attempt to help the warder Stepin (Peter Franzén) deal with the death of his Aes Sedai in season 1.

The other strong emotional note of the fight is Moiraine Damodred (Rosamund Pike) saving Siuan despite being exiled by her former lover last season. The longing look the Amerlyn gives Moiraine before she disappears back in the city says so much about how even though their obligations may have drawn them apart, they would still do anything to help each other.

After the initial fireworks subside, The Wheel of Time provides something that’s been all too rare since the first episodes of the series: Moiraine and the five people she rescued from Emond’s Field all together, grappling with the weight of their destiny and the deep connections that bind them. The damage of Barney Harris’ departure in season 1 has now been largely undone and Dónal Finn has settled into the role of Mat Cauthon nicely, playing up his mischievous side while he pointedly ignores Moraine’s advice to lay low. He also shows deep vulnerability by turning to his former village wisdom Nynaeve for help dealing with the memories that have been tormenting him since he blew the Horn of Valere.

Season 1 and 2 largely corresponded to Robert Jordan’s first two Wheel of Time novels, and season 3 opens with a lot of talk about how Rand al’Thor (Josha Stradowski) should embrace his destiny as the Dragon Reborn and claim the sword Callandor in Tear – the plot of the series third book, The Dragon Reborn. But instead, the show skips that quest and moves to book 4, The Shadow Rising, by having Rand let his new Aiel bodyguards take him to the Aiel Waste to see if he is actually their prophesied leader.

After Rand used magic to tear apart a Seanchan who challenged him to a duel last season, I was worried that he’d entirely abandon the swordsmanship that’s so important to his character in the books. Luckily that’s not the case and Rand and Moiraine’s warder al'Lan Mandragoran (Daniel Henney) use physical training as an opportunity for some guy talk, giving Rand a break from the burdens of his immense magical power. The trust the men build provides a sharp contrast to Rand’s hostile relationship with Moiraine, who is so desperate to control him that she’ll cut deals with the phenomenally untrustworthy Forsaken Lanfear (Natasha O'Keeffe).

The Aiel warrior Aviendha (Ayoola Smart) gets the most new layers thanks to her sweet relationship with the princess and Aes Sedai in training Elayne Trakand (Ceara Coveney) and her general contempt for to idea of a “wetlander” being her people’s chosen one. (It’s an arc that’s very similar to Chani’s in Frank Herbert’s Dune, which Jordan said he was a fan of.) Aviendha’s fellow Maiden of the Spear Bain (Ragga Ragnars) and Chiad (Maja Simonsen) have strong moments of charm themselves in the form of the dangerous game of Maiden’s Kiss they play with Mat; hilariously, they also want to play it with the scholarly Ogier Loial (Hammed Animashaun). The numerous spear scratches on Mat’s neck provide a very funny testament to his courage and mediocre smooching skills.

Egwene al’Vere (Madeleine Madden) is having a tough time, haunted by nightmares of her torture by the Seanchan caused by Lanfear, who’s jealous of Rand’s childhood sweetheart. Madden beautifully conveys the character’s fierceness as she works to reclaim her own power by advancing rank in the Aes Sedai, even if it means confronting her fears that Rand will go mad with power. That scene’s impact is a bit diminished by how bad Stradowski looks in a wig that’s meant to give him the same wild look as the False Dragon Logain (Álvaro Morte). The Aes Sedai trials are such a good opportunity for character development that it’s a real shame Elayne’s isn’t shown, especially considering that she has a lot to fear based on the ruthlessness of her mother, Queen Morgase (Olivia Williams).

The show continues to be much bloodier and hornier than Jordan’s books. Elayne’s brothers attracting the attention of all the novices while sparring at the White Tower is straight out of The Great Hunt, but the loud sex they have after isn’t. Same for the extremely Game of Thrones-like palace scene where Morgasse ascends the throne with the help of her Aes Sedai advisor Elaida a'Roihan (Shohreh Aghdashloo) by having all her competitors murdered. It’s a bit over the top, but helps establish both Morgasse and Elaida as real threats to the Amryln’s authority, which is already fragile after the carnage Liandrin caused. Aghdashloo brings the same contemptuous dignity she demonstrated on The Expanse to her new role as she seeks to use the mistrust of the Red Ajah to her advantage.

Episode three is the weakest in this three-part premiere, pulled in too many directions as it sets up plots that will pay off in later episodes. Beyond Elaida’s machinations, the other strong arc is the emotional fallout over Ihvon’s loss, which provides some touching material on the complexity of shared grief. But everything else feels scattered. Mat shows off his new combat skills, Nynaeve and Elayne interrogate the Black Ajah to learn where Liandrin’s headed, Lan gets bugged about pursuing his own destiny, and Perrin Aybara (Marcus Rutherford) is denied a happy homecoming because the world’s falling apart and he killed a Whitecloak captain last season.

One of the episode’s biggest problems is how much time The Wheel of Time is devoting to its villains. It feels like the attempts to make Liandrin a sympathetic enemy have run their course. She might win a fight for the sisterhood by interrupting a child marriage, but she’s also killed many women or condemned them to fates worse than death. Lanfear is far more compelling in the conflicted nemesis role, but her fellow Forsaken assembling at the beginning of episode 3 don’t offer much menace themselves yet. The creepy Moghedien (Laia Costa) is clearly meant to be one of the season’s biggest enemies, but the fact that her assassins keep getting taken out relatively easily makes her an underwhelming threat.