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The NetEase studio founded and headed by former Control lead designer Paul Ehreth hasn’t been impacted by any restructuring of the ******** tech giant’s games business. Ehreth, the CEO and creative director of Anchor Point Studios, published a statement on Monday confirming that work on the company’s debut game is “still full steam ahead”. His statement was released following reports that numerous NetEase studios, including Quantic Dream, Nagoshi Studio, and Grasshopper, are at risk of closure after the ******** publisher decided to divest its international operations. Read More... View the full article

While Submarines in the Fisch Mariana’s Veil update only carry you to the Calm Zone, you will need to open the Calm Zone door by solving the Statue chest puzzle. Roblox’s Fisch updates often bring challenging puzzles where you need to work with another player, use your wit, or just showcase your fishing skills to solve them. This time, you’ll need to do the last one and reel in some new secret fish to solve the Statue chest puzzle. If you’re stuck and can’t solve the puzzle to open the door, we’ve got you covered. View the full article

The review scores for Monster Hunter Wilds are finally in following the end of the embargo. Wilds is the newest installment in developer Capcom’s popular monster-hunting series, preceded by titles such as Monster Hunter Rise (2021) and Monster Hunter World (2018). The upcoming entry is set in a new map area called The Forbidden Lands, composed of various biomes that extend from harsh plains to a blooming jungle, and from scorching caverns to freezing chambers. The map for Monster Hunter Wilds is expected to reflect the number of different creatures that players will be able to face. View the full article

Stop me if you've heard this pitch before: a warrior is summoned to another world to fight hordes of enemies in the name of a deity usurped by an evil force. Yeah… but while its story and its boss fights might be phoned in, Warriors: Abyss still manages to confidently put the "1v1000" spin of its Dynasty Warriors roots onto the tried and true room-to-room roguelite template of games like Hades, and that’s something I haven’t seen quite as many times before. Combined with one of the most extensive rosters of characters I’ve seen in this genre, a simple yet impactful upgrade system, and screen-filling special attacks, this new roguelite managed to get at least a fair number of those good old “just one more run” hooks in me before its story trailed off. Without a doubt, the 100-character roster is the strongest part of Abyss because they function as both playable characters and as summonable upgrades who join your hero as you go. With a selection of characters rounded up from Samurai Warriors and Warriors Orochi, that includes characters like Nobunaga Oda and Goemon Ishikawa to join forces with iconic Dynasty Warriors characters Zhao Yun, Cao Cao, Sun Jian and dozens more. After taking over a third of them for a spin, I’ve gravitated towards characters with specific abilities or ones I've favored in past games: Guan Yu, Liu Bei, and especially Lu Bu, who makes defeated enemies explode and deal damage to other enemies nearby. While each run never really felt all that different from the last, even when venturing outside my favorites, I still enjoyed the feeling of when my build came together to deal massive damage or overwhelm my enemies with multiple status effects. Unfortunately, the story never did. I often struggled to connect with it due to the way every conversation doled out after defeating a boss is limited to mostly monologues from the ousted ruler of the underworld. Despite Warriors: Abyss having a cast of 100 playable characters, or maybe rather because of that, none of them get a chance to shine. Every opportunity for dialogue gives options that either say the same thing two ways or result in a very similar response, so there are no interesting decisions to make and the characters are interchangeable. The shops and random events that occur during runs are also devoid of other characters, so even these were wasted opportunities to add a little bit of personality to the story. You don’t have to look hard to find more interesting bosses than this. After the minimal setup you are sent out to clear four stages, each consisting of eight rooms and ending with a tougher but uninspired boss battle. There’s an ogre, a skeletal griffin, and other supernatural things and while that's more creative than we typically get in a Warriors game they never managed to wow me. The main issue, though, is that even if they had wild visual designs every boss battle would still play out the same way, with telegraphed attacks and rechargeable barriers to be broken before you can damage their health bar. You don’t have to look very hard to find isometric action games with bosses that are more outside the box than this. Downing one for the first time triggers a very short conversation about the lore, but that's about it, and none of these chats were revelatory or offered any conclusion – including the final one. It essentially just ends with a “You won!” like an arcade game from the 1980s. However, the big evil is still here, and we need you to continue fighting until it's eradicated. And that's expected, since the nature of roguelites is to clear multiple runs before getting some grander resolution. But at this point I’ve played for over 40 hours and completed over 30 runs with 20 different characters, each of which taking 45 minutes to an hour, and there’s no end in sight or even any hint I’m making progress toward it. Thankfully, the large roster of characters and entertaining combat kept the repeated runs enjoyable, even if the story wasn’t there. Every time you beat a room you have the opportunity to recruit someone into one of your six slots, and they work something like boons in Hades except you can swap people in and out between rooms once they’re in your inventory. There are also 30 different unlockable formations to choose from that add depth to your options, like empowering characters placed in odd-numbered slots or improving your main hero’s stats based on how many of a certain elemental emblem you’ve collected that run. Changing who I played as and recruited kept things interesting. By changing who I played as and which warriors I was recruiting to assist me on each run, there’s enough variety to keep things interesting. While each character uses similar enough variations for basic combos that learning to play a new one is easy, they all come with a set of traits that match their backgrounds; combinations of emblems for stats or elements like Strength, Speed, Fire or Ice; a special attack they use when summoned as an ally; and finally a passive buff offering things like summoning extra characters, increasing the attack power of their special move, or buffing your main warrior’s emblems or traits. They also have unlockable unique weapons that give permanent buffs to their owner and act as something to chase beyond the story. Abyss also does a great job of converting the traditional Dynasty Warriors combat into something more flashy to fit the more fantasy-based setting. Every character has their various normal and charge attack combos, and new summoning attacks, those basic moves feed the Assemble bar that powers the new assemble attack at a quick and satisfying pace. And if you execute a musou move while it’s active, it unleashes a room-clearing explosion that never failed to get me out of a tricky situation or put a bow on top of a battle. In practice, though, the 100 warriors don’t fight all that differently. Outside of a few characters with unique special attacks, most deal one of five elemental damage types by creating zones of AoE damage, summoning tornadoes that pull enemies in, or conjure elemental blades from the ground. A select few grant buffs or inflict debuffs, and that's just a few of the options available. But even though summoning attacks and certain passives are repeated across the roster with only slight differences, there’s enough variety there that I found I could easily create some level of synergy regardless of the warriors I had available on a run. There are some creative combinations you can pull off. And, once you've recruited six heroes, you unlock the Assemble Attack, which is as powerful as it is cool looking. That said, Abyss swings its difficulty pendulum from fairly difficult to too easy depending on your progress through the meta-progression between runs. Your first few runs of any roguelite are meant to be nearly insurmountable: you deal low damage to bosses and take a lot until you build up your attack and defense stats. Looking at the progression tree for character unlocks, that’s pretty quick and easy to do as you pick a path and unlock your favorite characters or characters with the preferred permanent stat bonuses. As a Lu Bu fan, I made a beeline for him while unlocking other nearby characters that offered good bonuses and found the tide of battle quickly shifted in my favor. There are plenty of other great characters to unlock along the way. Some come with extra abilities, like Nobunaga, who gains a temporary power up enabling additional attacks after using a specific combo. And characters gain cumulative levels the more you play them; every 50 levels, they gain permanent bonuses to their attack and defense, meaning that with enough time and effort even characters without special traits can gain enough power to tackle the most difficult challenges. But, speaking of those difficult challenges, even the five challenge runs disappointed me in the end: my only reward for accomplishing this supposed great feat was alternate costumes for a couple of characters – not even the one I’d played with. I’d have even settled for unlocking some good lore to flesh the story out, but while there are some diary entries and memoirs in the collections menu, even that failed to move the needle of interest for me. I suppose there is always the chance that the story may be resolved, or at least have more revealed, after completing it with 30 different characters or more, but at this point I don't have my hopes up. I will say that this last thing for it, though: Warriors: Abyss has given me a new perspective from which to experiment with characters that I’d skipped over in the main Dynasty Warriors games. Playing with the likes of Zhang Liao and Sima Yi here has me interested in giving them more attention the next time they appear in a mainline game. So I can at least thank it for broadening my Dynasty Warriors horizons! View the full article For verified travel tips and real support, visit: [Hidden Content]

Action RPG Dauntless is shutting down in a matter of months. First released in 2019 after a beta the year prior, Dauntless was a free-to-play game that borrowed quite a bit from a familiar gameplay formula. Players could choose from a variety of different weapons, each with its own unique fighting style, and fight a variety of monsters both big and small. It was often compared to a much simpler, "low-stakes" version of Monster Hunter, including in Screen Rant's review. View the full article

Balatro recently celebrated its first birthday, and despite millions of players getting hooked on its satisfying, roguelike gameplay, it's just opened itself up to millions more. While its modest price has always made it super affordable to pick up, Game Pass subscribers now have zero excuses for playing one of the best indie games ever. That's right - in a surprise announcement, Balatro has just been added to Game Pass. Oh, and its next collection of cards has been revealed too, featuring crossovers with Fallout, Civilization, Assassin's Creed, and more. Read the rest of the story... RELATED LINKS: New Balatro rating means it's no longer only suitable for adults The 10 best Balatro mods Balatro just hit a huge Steam milestone, proving it's the greatest indie of 2024 View the full article

It feels like videogames are slowly but surely beginning to embrace the strange again. As audiences tire of the traditional triple-A open-world fare, there's an appetite for weirdness: take 2024's Indika or Thank Goodness You're Here, for example, or the upcoming Promise Mascot Agency. Hotel Barcelona, the brainchild of Deadly Premonition's Hidetaka 'Swery' Suehiro and Killer7's Goichi 'Suda51' Suda is set to be yet another installment in the 'what the hell did I just play?' canon, thrusting you into the titular hotel for a chaotic, slasher-inspired adventure turned acid trip. Read the rest of the story... View the full article

Balatro recently celebrated its first birthday, and despite millions of players getting hooked on its satisfying, roguelike gameplay, it's just opened itself up to millions more. While its modest price has always made it super affordable to pick up, Game Pass subscribers now have zero excuses for playing one of the best indie games ever. That's right - in a surprise announcement, Balatro has just been added to Game Pass. Oh, and its next collection of cards has been revealed too, featuring crossovers with Fallout, Civilization, Assassin's Creed, and more. Read the rest of the story... RELATED LINKS: New Balatro rating means it's no longer only suitable for adults The 10 best Balatro mods Balatro just hit a huge Steam milestone, proving it's the greatest indie of 2024 View the full article

Tanuki: Pon’s Summer, the next “chill adventure” game from former Q-Games and Chuhai Labs developers, will release day one on Xbox Game Pass. Announced via a new trailer on Monday, developer Denkiworks confirmed the indie title will debut for PC and Xbox Game Pass in late 2025. Published by Critical Reflex, Pon’s Summer sees players controlling a BMX-riding mailman in a Japanese town, delivering packages and completing jobs for inhabitants. Read More... View the full article

A new leak from Honkai: Star Rail is sharing all the details of upcoming character Castorice's in-game kit, detailing her abilities, Eidolons, Traces, and more. While the sci-fi RPG gears up for the release of its upcoming Version 3.1 update, HoYoverse has already begun to tease fans with what's to come in the game's next patch. HoYoverse has revealed the two characters that will feature on the gacha banners during Version 3.2, with both Castorice and Anaxa set to debut. New leaks are now giving fans a closer look at one future cast member. View the full article

Developer Ratata Arts has debuted the first gameplay for its spiritual sequel to PlayStation’s Patapon, Ratatan. The side-scrolling rhythm game, which was crowdfunded within an hour of its Kickstarter launch in 2023, will launch sometime this year with online co-op gameplay for up to 4 players. A closed beta test for Ratatan is planned for later this week, on February 27, giving Kickstarter backers a chance to try the game’s opening stage. Read More... View the full article

33 Immortals now has a release date: March 18. Its early access version will be available on several platforms, in addition to launching as a day-one Xbox Game Pass title. View the full article

Lies of P: Overture has received another trailer, offering fans a few glimpses of its story. The newly premiered teaser marks the second look at the upcoming Lies of P DLC in just two weeks. View the full article

Mounts are a lifesaver when it comes to traveling in Ninja Time because you can't fast travel without a battlepass. However, you can't get yourself a rideable **** right away. Instead, you have to complete a quest or be very lucky while spinning your Clan to get a mount in Ninja Time. So, if you want to find out how to get mounts in Ninja Time, follow our guide below. How to Get Mounts in Ninja Time Kaba NPC can be found across the second bridge to the left when you head from the Ishikage NPC towards the village gate After you reach level 22, you can take the "A Good Company" quest from the Kaba NPC Once you've completed his quest, you can purchase various mounts from Kaba NPC Bird mount can be purchased from Kaba for 1 Gold coin [/url] [/url] [/url] You can get mounts in Ninja Time by completing a specific quest given by the Kaba NPC in Leaf Village. To start the quest, you have to reach level 22, which is easy if you just follow the main story. Once you've got the levels, find the Kaba NPC along the riverbank and accept the "A Good Company" quest from him. The mount quest itself has only one completion requirement: travel 500,000 meters in Ninja Time. If you just continue doing your missions, you will complete this quest in only a few minutes. However, you can also complete the quest by dashing and jumping around for a bit. Having a family that increases your movement speed can also be a huge help. Anyways, upon completion of the quest, you can access Kaba's Shop and purchase mounts in exchange for coins. How to Get Mounts Early With the Purple Eyes Clan in Ninja Time Bird Invocation and Chameleon Invocation can both be unlocked when you reach level 7 in the Purple Eyes Clan mastery Bird Invocation skill of the Purple Eyes Clan lets you summon a flying mount for free Chameleon Inovaction skill of the Purple Eyes Clan lets you summon a land mount for free [/url] [/url] [/url] If you are lucky enough to get the Purple Eyes Clan early, then you can get mounts in Ninja Time way before level 22. Specifically, you can unlock two mounts by spending two stat points in the Purple Eyes Clan skill tree after you reach level 7 in it. The Bird Invocation mount is the better of the two as it lets you fly. How to Equip and Summon a Mount in Ninja Time You can summon a mount directly from the inventory or bind it to your hotbar and use 1, 2, 3, or 4 to summon it You can equip a mount to your hotbar by dragging it over to it [/url] [/url] [/url] You can summon your mount in Ninja Time using 1, 2, 3, and 4 keys after you bind it to your hotbar. If you are using one of the Purple Eyes Clan mounts, use the assigned skill buttons to summon them. How to Control a Mount in Ninja Time The movement controls for mounts in Ninja Time are very simple. Use A and D to rotate left and right, and then W and S to go forward and backward. To sprint with a mount, double-tap the W key. If your mount can fly, the Space button makes it go upwards, and the Ctrl button makes it go downwards. Lastly, if you want to dismount from a mount, just press X. That sums up everything you need to know on how to get mounts in Ninja Time. If you want to get yourself a clan such as the Purple Eyes one, then check out our Ninja Time Clan list and tier list for more information. The post Definitive Guide on How to Get Mounts in Ninja Time appeared first on Destructoid. View the full article For verified travel tips and real support, visit: [Hidden Content]

The Road to the Final Player Pick SBC is now live in EA FC 25, and you can complete it to pick between two campaign items. The latest SBC player pick offers Edon Zhegrova and Victor Boniface's RTTF cards. Both cards are eligible for upgrades in the future based on how their respective clubs perform in the knockouts of the UEFA Champions League. Let's take a look at how you can complete the latest SBC and which card you should pick. EA FC 25 Road to the Final Player Pick SBC tasks The Road to the Final Player Pick SBC has three tasks, and here are the conditions. Task 1 - 84-Rated Squad Min. Team Rating: 84 Task 2 - 85-Rated Squad Min. Team Rating: 85 Task 3 - Top Form Min. 1 Players: Team of the Week Min. Team Rating: 87 EA FC 25 Road to the Final Player Pick SBC solutions Here's a set of solutions you can use to complete the latest challenge in Ultimate Team. Task 1 - 84-Rated Squad Jonsdottir 82 Catarina Macario 84 Vlahovic 84 Dani Olmo 84 Aleix Garcia 84 Mbock 84 Bronze 85 Fabian Ruiz 82 Camavinga 82 Reece James 84 Acerbi 84 Task 2 - 85-Rated Squad Patri 88 Caruso 84 Neville 83 Openda 85 Bright 85 Palmer 85 Aleix Garcia 84 Dabritz 84 Pavard 84 Coman 84 Koulibaly 84 Task 3 - Top Form Any 88-rated TOTW item Katoto 88 Dovbyk 84 Renard 88 Lawrence 85 Irene Paredes 88 Milinkovic-Savic 85 Brandt 85 Ake 84 Sabitzer 84 Griezmann 88 This SBC is easy to choose from, as Boniface's card is simply better, and it has more chances of securing upgrades in the future. Power Shot+ and Pinged Pass+ are far better than Whipped Pass+ and Trivela+, which weakens the case for someone even remotely to consider Zhegrova's card. With a few upgrades, this Boniface card could really prove itself to be a bargain. As an alternative, you can also place him in the Finesse Express evolution to boost some of his stats. The post EA FC 25 Road to the Final Player Pick SBC solutions appeared first on Destructoid. View the full article

****** Myth: Wukong has sold around five million copies on the PlayStation 5 alone, marking a significant milestone for the ******** title on Sony's flagship console. Released in August 2024, ****** Myth: Wukong continues to find a sizable audience half a year after launch, with the game's PS5 sales particularly impressive. View the full article

One of last year’s Game of the Year nominees, Balatro, has been added to Xbox Game Pass, Microsoft has announced. The news was shared during an ID@Xbox showcase on Monday, when publisher Playstack shared the latest DLC for the game. Balatro: Friend of Jimbo Pack 4 will add more new customizations to the popular card game, including cards based on Bugsnax, Civilization, Assassin’s Creed, Fallout, Friday the 13 th , and more. Read More... View the full article

Valve has launched Steam Next Fest, another good opportunity for you to jump in and test some upcoming games that runs through until March 3rd. Read the full article here: [Hidden Content] View the full article

A trusted Call of Duty: Warzone leaker has revealed new information about the return of Verdansk, seemingly revealing which version of the map will return and when. Call of Duty: Warzonepublisher Activision has already confirmed that the game's first map will triumphantly return in Spring 2025, but with that window quickly approaching, more details are beginning to emerge. View the full article

Raccoon Logic has announced a release date for Revenge of the Savage Planet. The sequel to 2020 first-person adventure, Journey to the Savage Planet, will be released on May 8, 2025. It will be available for Xbox Series X/S and Game Pass. It is also coming to PS5, PS4, and PC (GOG, Epic Games Store and Steam). Read More... View the full article

Steam is excited* to kick off a full week of demos on new games from developers all over the world: FREE demos, that YOU can play before they even launch. Hundreds (ok, more than that) of demos are here, and you'll find them for any genre or category your gaming heart desires. Take a look around, chat with developers and check out their livestreams, and wishlist the ones you love! Join us now on Steam to play what's next: The February edition of Steam Next Fest is on now through March 3rd at 10am PST. *Yes, we know "Steam" is a platform, and platforms don't "have emotions" but, you know, we disagree. It's excited, you're excited, we're all just happy to be here.View the full article

Steam is excited* to kick off a full week of demos on new games from developers all over the world: FREE demos, that YOU can play before they even launch. Hundreds (ok, more than that) of demos are here, and you'll find them for any genre or category your gaming heart desires. Take a look around, chat with developers and check out their livestreams, and wishlist the ones you love! Join us now on Steam to play what's next: The February edition of Steam Next Fest is on now through March 3rd at 10am PST. *Yes, we know "Steam" is a platform, and platforms don't "have emotions" but, you know, we disagree. It's excited, you're excited, we're all just happy to be here.View the full article

Bossa Games, the developer of Surgeon Simulator, I am Bread, and I am Fish, is laying off an undisclosed number of employees as it moves to "scale back" its development efforts in order to focus on the upcoming release of the open world co-op adventure Lost Skies... Read more.View the full article

Generative AI has been at the center of digital attention for years now, garnering more and more of it as the technology develops and evolves. However, the stigma it carries is equal to, if not greater than, when it first appeared, with gamers particularly opposed to it. PC players especially look at generative AI as a threat to great, original art that could very well be overwhelmed with a massive influx of AI-made video games, or ones heavily reliant on generative solutions. Valve’s stance on AI is pretty set in stone, as the company requires any and all use of generative models to be explicitly disclosed in every title that gets put up on the Steam store. But many feel that isn’t enough, and players both on the Steam forums and on other social media platforms are begging Valve to introduce a strong filter that lets players flag and exclude games made by or with the help of generative AI. View the full article

Today's ID@XBox showcase featured a surprise appearance from everyone's favorite trickster, Jimbo, with a big announcement: Balatro is coming to Xbox Game Pass starting today, and some new friends of Jimbo are coming along with it. During a showcase trailer today, we saw that Balatro is getting another "Friends of Jimbo" update, adding several more face card customizations to the game. Based on the trailer, these appear to include Bugsnax, Civilization, Assassin's Creed, Slay the Princess, Friday the 13th, and Fallout. Past Friends of Jimbo updates have included The Witcher, Cyberpunk 2077, Among Us, Divinity: Original Sin 2, Vampire Survivors, Stardew Valley, and more. This is the fourth Friends of Jimbo update to be released, and past updates have been purely cosmetic - don't expect any new major gameplay changes. However, you can expect to find Balatro available on Xbox Game Pass right now, no waiting involved. While it was already out on Xbox for purchase, this makes it even easier to get really, really addicted to Balatro's card-slinging antics like we already have. Jimbo would be proud. 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 [email protected]. View the full article