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For decades, politically minded action movies often involve the President of the United States (fictional ones, usually). While most POTUSes need to be rescued from evil terrorists or rivals, there are times when the Big Cheese takes matters into their own hands. You don’t get to win the Electoral College without… Read more... View the full article

Daniel Vávra, co-founder of Warhorse Studios, has denied a recent rumor that Saudi Arabia had banned Kingdom Come Deliverance 2 over an unskippable gay cutscene. 2018’s Kingdom Come Deliverance is a story-driven action role-playing game set in the medieval Kingdom of Bohemia. It pitches itself as an historically accurate representation of the setting, but its lack of people of color became a talking point in the months following release. Kingdom Come Deliverance 2, due out February 4, 2025, once again leans on historical accuracy for its return to medieval Bohemia, but players can expect a slightly different experience. Warhorse has said that, because protagonist Henry is embarking on a journey from the countryside to a relatively cosmopolitan city that is besieged and occupied by an invading king, he will encounter a wide range of ethnicities and characters this time around. The claim that Kingdom Come Deliverance 2 was banned in Saudi Arabia reportedly emerged from a tweet by a Saudi Arabian news outlet, and was picked up by western media and spread across social media and forums. Now, Vávra has taken to social media to deny the claim and provide clarification on how Kingdom Come Deliverance 2 works. Vávra tweeted to say it does not have unskippable cutscenes and was not and is not banned in any country, “at least not that we know of.” Vávra then pointed to the fact that the first Kingdom Come Deliverance had gay characters, and said players are responsible for their in-game decisions. “If you want Henry to try a same-sex adventure, feel free,” Vávra insisted. “If you don’t want to, you don’t have to. All affairs are (and were in KCD1) purely optional. The characters are perfectly aware that it was a forbidden sin.” Following the Saudi Arabia ban rumor, Kingdom Come Deliverance 2 became the latest video game to be singled out for being “woke” or including “forced diversity” — a growing online trend that some developers and publishers have felt the need to counter in recent months. In September 2024, Ubisoft boss Yves Guillemot responded to a backlash against Assassin's Creed Shadows' ****** samurai protagonist to address "an important problem of perception that has been affecting the company's performance." "I want to reaffirm that we are an entertainment-first company, creating games for the broadest possible audience, and our goal is not to push any specific agenda,” Guillemot continued. “We remain committed to creating games for fans and players that everyone can enjoy." As part of his response to the online backlash against Kingdom Come Deliverance 2, Vávra made it clear that he doesn’t like "forced diversity,” insisting “nobody was forcing us to do anything, and we are not forcing anyone to do certain things.” He then reiterated comments Warhorse had already made about why the sequel is more diverse than its predecessor. “The game takes place in one of the richest cities in Europe which was besieged by a massive foreign army,” he said. “That´s the reason why the life in such a city is more diverse than the life in villages which were featured in the first game. “Musa came to Bohemia with an invading army as a member of the royal court of King Sigismund, whom he met thanks to his engagement at the court of Sultan Bayezid. He's an educated noble and renaissance man from the Kingdom of Mali. “At the same time, Musa is a very unusual figure for the local Bohemian folk, and many of the situations around him in the game stem from this. So his presence makes sense and creates lots of interesting situations in the game. The way he talks and behaves has a reason. “Everything displayed corresponds to the morals and social norms of 1403 Bohemia and is only there to make an interesting story, and not at all to appeal to a ‘modern audience.'” “Modern audience” is a now common phrase used online to deride games that are perceived to be appealing to a diverse audience. In the ongoing culture war, “modern audience” has become a meme, and is referenced in the downfall of everything from Suicide Squad: Kill the Justice League to Concord. Vávra concluded his response by hitting back at the anti-woke brigade whose fears he had worked to assuage. “Some of them sadly turned into exactly the same narrative they pretend to be fighting against,” he said. “The amount of hateful behavior is really sad and it will damage any cause associated with it.” When contacted by IGN, Warhorse and publisher Plaion pointed to Vávra X/Twitter thread. Wesley is the *** News Editor for IGN. Find him on Twitter at @wyp100. You can reach Wesley at [email protected] or confidentially at *****@*****.tld. View the full article

Please excuse the eyeball jelly. I've just got done tearing my face away from the screen it was attached to by the glitter and amphetamine-infused superglue secreted by Mindwave's minigame barrage. The current Steam demo is a generous slice of a wonderful thing its developers describe as a "cerebral microgame frenzy". It's the sort of thing you play for five minutes before realising, not unpleasantly, that you are most definitely inside of it now. It has wrapped you all up, and it's going to be quite difficult to escape. Trailer below: Read more View the full article

The Magic: The Gathering card Grinding Station has risen in price slowly but steadily over the past month. Priced at $11.40 on December 20, 2024, it has since climbed to $30, and shows no signs of stopping. That's a pretty significant increase of 163%, and a nice bit of value added to the card. Read the rest of the story... RELATED LINKS: Pokémon Pocket makes me wish MTG Arena was more generous MTG found the perfect way to make fans pay $40 for ten basic lands The best MTG planeswalker cards View the full article

Choosing between Arlecchino and Clorinde in Genshin Impact 5.3’s rerun banners may be a difficult choice, not only because both of them are superb DPS units but also because of the limitations involved in obtaining F2P (free-to-play) Primogems. Arlecchino, the Fourth of the Fatui Harbingers, was introduced as a playable character in Version 4.6. The 5-star character excels at consistently dealing Elemental DMG by applying Bond of Life to herself and, in turn, imbuing her Normal, Charged, and Plunging Attacks with Pyro. Arlecchino’s best build in Genshin Impact can easily transform her into one of the strongest Pyro DPS units. View the full article

The Magic: The Gathering card Grinding Station has risen in price slowly but steadily over the past month. Priced at $11.40 on December 20, 2024, it has since climbed to $30, and shows no signs of stopping. That's a pretty significant increase of 163%, and a nice bit of value added to the card. Read the rest of the story... RELATED LINKS: Pokémon Pocket makes me wish MTG Arena was more generous MTG found the perfect way to make fans pay $40 for ten basic lands The best MTG planeswalker cards View the full article

Elon Musk has made headlines again, but this time, it’s not for launching rockets or naming his next child after a cryptic formula. Instead, he’s admitted to something many gamers suspected all along—he’s been relying on account sharing and real money trading (RMT) to climb the ranks in Path of Exile 2 and Diablo 4. The confession came after a series of odd moments during a livestream where Musk showcased his so-called gaming prowess. YouTuber Quin69TV broke down the fiasco, highlighting some head-scratching moments. At one point, Musk struggled with the Endgame map—a feature any seasoned player would be familiar with—and made the baffling comment, “My staff is only level 62,” when, in reality, it was one of the best in the game. Spoiler alert: it’s not the staff that’s low-level here. View the full article

Isn't Straftat a pleasing word to say? Straftat. It almost demands an angry bark, an accusatory finger. Straftat! The bite-sized two-player shooter was one of our favourite games of last year, summoning the fast-paced killthrills of ancient Quake servers as much as the quickfire 1v1 scraps of the gulag in Call of Duty: Warzone. And now it has a bunch of new maps. Not content with making the powerful pew-pew 'em up completely free (WHAT), the developers have added new weapons, features and a further 30 bullet-pocked arenas. And look, an icy and divisive fan-made map of ye olde Counter-Strike appears among them. Read more View the full article

An unlockable Gallery Card in Marvel Rivals may have shown off unreleased skins for ****** Panther, Winter Soldier, and Psylocke. Marvel Rivals is currently in the beginning of its first full-length season, which will add every member of The Fantastic Four over the span of three months. The developers recently stated that fans can expect to see new characters added to the game every six weeks for the foreseeable future. View the full article

Palworld released in Early Access one year ago today and, to celebrate, developer Pocketpair has revealed its 2025 roadmap includes crossplay, a final boss, and more. An X/Twitter post revealed the "future roadmap" and then asked fans to continue supporting Palworld in its second year, suggesting all of this will arrive in 2025 (and perhaps the first three weeks of 2026). "We've been updating the game since the start of Early Access, and we'll continue to update Palworld as we prepare for the official release," Pocketpair said. Alongside cooperative crossplay and a final boss and "ending scenario," Pocketpair revealed "world transfers for Pals," further ways to strengthen and improve Pals, "various new content such as new Pals and technologies," and game collaborations such as the one with Terraria. Also coming are improvements to world object placements, improvements to base Pals, improvements to optimization, and improvements to the user experience. Pocketpair obviously didn't mention what could be its biggest event of 2025 — the conclusion of its legal battle with The Pokémon Company and Nintendo. Palworld, an open-world, multiplayer survival game dubbed "Pokémon with guns" by some, gained a staggering 25 million players in one month when it launched last year. Many drew further comparisons between it and Pokémon upon release, claiming various Pal designs were practically direct copies of official pocket monsters. The Pokémon Company said in January 2024 that it intended "to investigate and take appropriate measures to address any acts that infringe on intellectual property rights" but went quiet for months after. Finally, however, in September 2024, Nintendo and The Pokémon Company announced it had launched a patent lawsuit against Pocketpair. The developer didn't appear particularly deterred by the lawsuit, initially saying "we are unaware of the specific patents we are accused of infringing upon" before going on to release Palworld on different platforms afterwords, and even release one of its older games on Nintendo Switch. It later revealed the lawsuit was directed at patents that involve a catching mechanic: Pokémon are famously captured with Pokéballs, and Palworld are caught with a spherical object called a Pal Sphere. Ryan Dinsdale is an IGN freelance reporter. He'll talk about The Witcher all day. View the full article

Desperate to play Resident Evil 6 on modern consoles? No? Well, a new rating suggests you might be able to anyway. Read more View the full article

Marvel Rivals Showdown Twitch Rivals was one of the first tournaments for the game. If you missed the action, here’s everything you need to know to catch up. The event gathered a few of the most renowned streamers from North America and put them against each other in an exciting format. Besides earning the glory of winning the prestigious Marvel Rivals tournament, there was also an impressive prize pool. View the full article

Reddit user OyeDiego claims to have spotted two MySims games on the EA app that have not been announced yet — Action Bundle and Beacon Bay. View the full article

Uh oh, Helldivers 2's latest Major Order is looking like it's gonna be a tough task to score a W in at this point, even though J.O.E.L's recently given the divers a helping hand by intervening with a friendly blizzard. Some of them aren't happy with it though, mainly because it's come about due to lots of players electing to go bug-diving rather than fight The Illuminate. Read more View the full article

As the digital world becomes more complicated, the lines between national security and cybersecurity are starting to fade. Recent cyber sanctions and intelligence moves show a reality where malware and fake news are used as tools in global politics. Every cyberattack now seems to have deeper political consequences. Governments are facing new, unpredictable threats that can't be fought withView the full article

Season Starfall added three new weapons to Delta Force, including the QJB201 light machine gun. Every weapon has its own unlock method, and getting QJB201 isn’t as obvious as you might expect since there’s no event or an Armory challenge. Here’s how you can get your hands on the QJB201 light machine gun in Delta Force. View the full article

Capcom just seemingly confirmed that a Monster Hunter Wilds PC benchmark tool is on the way, only to quickly rescind the statement and instead clarify that it's simply looking into the possibility of one. So if you've been hoping to test your rig's hardware against Wilds ahead of time, you're still going to have to hold out hope that Capcom releases the tool before launch. Read the rest of the story... RELATED LINKS: Monster Hunter Wilds Sword and Shield overview - moveset and how to use Monster Hunter Wilds Hammer overview - moveset and how to use Monster Hunter Wilds Hunting ***** overview - moveset and how to use View the full article

Heroes of Hammerwatch 2 developer Crackshell has released a second patch for the roguelike action RPG just a few days after its first update since release. Heroes of Hammerwatch 2’s first patch deployed Build 115 on January 15, fixing a wide array of niche issues and supplying added features and adjustments based on player feedback. The team also highlighted they were working on fixing more serious bugs as soon as possible, but the first patch was designed to fix some of the simpler things first. View the full article

The Secret Banana in Fisch is a rare fish that can be obtained randomly by fishing. However, the chances of stumbling upon this elusive fish are somewhat tricky. Roblox’s Fisch has multiple fish you can catch, but the developer has now added three Secret Fish that are hard to find in the wild. While some Secret Fish have a set place where they spawn, others can spawn anywhere in the ocean, making adding it to your inventory extremely difficult. But if you’re looking for the Secret Banana, we’ve got you covered. View the full article

A lucky Pokémon collector was surprised when a booster pack they opened contained cards from a set that is still two months from releasing—providing hits they could never have dreamed of. The Pokémon TCG has recently seen a surge in popularity, with Prismatic Evolutions selling like hotcakes and Costco stores in the United States turning into a Royal Rumble as people scramble for the 151 Blooming Waters Collection Box. View the full article

Hollow Knight fans have been through the wringer recently, with cryptic X/Twitter activity from one developer sparking rampant speculation that the hotly anticipated follow-up Hollow Knight: Silksong will finally re-emerge at Nintendo’s Switch 2 Direct in April — and potentially even release on Nintendo’s next-gen console as a timed launch exclusive. It all started when supersleuths on the Hollow Knight subreddit noticed that on January 15, co-director of Team Cherry William Pellen had changed his Twitter/X profile picture to a picture of a chocolate cake. Alongside this, Pellen tweeted: “something big is coming. keep your eyes closed tomorrow.” At the time, Nintendo’s Switch 2 reveal was rumored for January 16, and so it proved — that was the day Nintendo finally announced the Switch 2. Had Pellen really asked followers to keep an eye out for the Switch 2 reveal? If so, why? Fans then reverse-searched the picture of the cake, leading them to a recipe for Brooklyn Blackout Cake on cooking website Bon Appétit. The date the recipe was published: April 2, 2024. The date of the Nintendo Switch 2 Direct is April 2, 2025. Fans also wondered what Pellen’s new X/Twitter handle, @everydruidwaswr, meant, if anything. Redditor Representative-True speculated that the “wr” in “everydruidwaswr” was the start of a word, perhaps “wrong,” or perhaps stands for “was wrong,” and pointed to the Druid of the Moss Temple Silksong NPC as evidence of… something. Pellen had a new X/Twitter name to go along with the new handle and profile picture: “little bomey.” Fans noticed Little Boomey is a wine from Southern Australia, where Team Cherry is based, but the spelling is different. The upshot of all this was that some fans thought Pellen had kicked off a Silksong alternate reality game (ARG), but over the weekend comments appeared to pour cold water on this theory. First, Hollow Knight YouTuber fireb0rn tweeted to say Team Cherry marketing and publishing chief Matthew 'Leth' Griffin had got in touch “to confirm there was no Silksong ARG and that the changes to William's account and the tweet were a nothingburger. Apologies to have misled everyone. The cake was a lie." And in a post on the Hollow Knight Discord, Griffin backed this up, saying: "It wasn’t [an ARG]. But it was still some impressive sleuthing skills by the fans... like ya’ll are WAY beyond those 2020 riddles now." Griffin himself followed up to respond to one fan who wondered if Team Cherry had given up on Hollow Knight: Silksong. “Yes the game is real, progressing and will release,” Griffin tweeted. This has done little to calm all the speculation, as you can perhaps imagine. And at the time of this article’s publication, Pellen’s tweet remains online. Pellen himself has yet to explain whatever his X/Twitter activity is all about, either. It’s worth remembering that when Hollow Knight: Silksong was announced, Team Cherry confirmed the launch platforms as Windows, Mac, Linux, and Nintendo Switch. But that was six years ago. We have a few months to find out what this all means, but in the meantime, check out everything announced at Nintendo's Switch 2 reveal. Wesley is the *** News Editor for IGN. Find him on Twitter at @wyp100. You can reach Wesley at [email protected] or confidentially at *****@*****.tld. View the full article

Shadow Pokémon have been a part of Pokémon Go for a while now, and with the introduction of Shadow Legendary Pokémon and the prospect of having a rare Shadow Shiny Pokémon, some trainers understandably want to trade to collect a full Shadow Pokédex in-game. However, when you go to trade with another trainer, no matter what your friendship rank is, you might find that Shadow Pokémon doesn’t show up as an option. So what gives? View the full article

Superhero card game Marvel Snap has been taken offline in the USA as part of the US government's ban-or-divest policy towards ByteDance, the ******** company best known for owning and operating shortform video-streaming service TikTok. Read more View the full article

Sonic the Hedgehog 3 has clearly proven itself a hit with fans, as it has overtaken the second film at the box office. Read more View the full article

Avowed is Microsoft’s first major release of 2025, and excitement is rising for the title from Obsidian Entertainment. If you can’t wait to dive into the adventure, we have all the details you need on exactly Avowed will become available. Set in the same universe as Pillars of Eternity in the world of Eora, Avowed is a first-person fantasy action RPG where the focus is investigating a mysterious plague rumored to be spreading throughout the Living Lands. View the full article