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Raising your Sims’ skills is essential to ensuring their success in The Sims 4. There are many different ways you can work on progressing them, but one of the most efficient and often overlooked is after-school activities. There are quite a few different after-school activities to choose from which means you have plenty of ways to keep your Sims busy. If you’re interested in having your Sim join one, but you’re unsure which is the right fit for them, here are all of the best after-school activities in The Sims 4. View the full article

An early build version of Grand Theft Auto: Vice City has been uncovered, revealing a few interesting tidbits about the game's development and what the title could have looked like. First shared on social media, the pre-launch copy of Grand Theft Auto: Vice City includes several interesting differences when compared to the full game, some of which will surprise hardcore fans of Rockstar's catalog. View the full article

Missed out on an Nvidia GeForce RTX 5090 on launch day? You and me, both. Unfortunately, it's looking like the wait for new stock to find its way to retailers could be a long one, at least if one *** retailer's thoughts are anything to go by. With the RTX 5090 proving to be Nvidia's fastest gaming GPU yet and rightfully earning its place atop our best graphics card guide, demand for it has been huge. Not only that, but supply has been very slim, leading to the meager level of RTX 5090 stock initially available selling out in mere minutes. However, while an initial rush of enthusiasm and stock selling out might be expected, the potential future level of scarcity is looking like it could be unprecedented. Read the rest of the story... RELATED LINKS: Nvidia GeForce RTX 5080 a "monopolistic crime" says whistleblower Edward Snowden The Nvidia GeForce RTX 5060 is due in just a few weeks, according to this leak Where to buy 5070 - retailers to check for stock first View the full article

With their heavy reliance on AI frame generation to get their big frame rate boosts, Nvidia's latest RTX 5000 GPUs have proved divisive among commentators, and renowned tech privacy whistleblower Edward Snowden has waded into the discussion, describing the release of the new Nvidia GeForce RTX 5080 as a "monopolistic crime" on social media. While you do indeed need to enable Multi Frame Gen to get the most out of the new Nvidia GPU, as we found in our recent RTX 5080 review, we liked its $999 price tag (assuming you can find any RTX 5080 stock), especially after Nvidia priced the RTX 4080 at $1,199 when it first came out. The lack of competition is undoubtedly a factor here, though, with the AMD Radeon RX 9070 XT only expected to challenge the RTX 5070, rather than the 5080. Read the rest of the story... RELATED LINKS: You could be waiting 16 weeks to get an Nvidia GeForce RTX 5090, suggests store The Nvidia GeForce RTX 5060 is due in just a few weeks, according to this leak Where to buy 5070 - retailers to check for stock first View the full article

Can you romance companions in Avowed? A major pull for many to the whimsical worlds of fantasy RPGs is the opportunity to rizz up otherworldly hotties that you'd most likely fumble were they to exist in the real world. Additionally, there's something special about deepening your bond with your closest compatriots throughout a playthrough, which oftentimes leads to romance. While Pillars of Eternity 2 featured romance-able characters, there's never a guarantee developer Obsidian Entertainment will include the feature in its RPG games - Avowed included. Read on to discover if yo're able to romance your Avowed companions when the Avowed release date rolls around. Read the rest of the story... RELATED LINKS: Obsidian recruits Matthew Mercer to explain Avowed's extremely meaty lore Avowed release date, story, trailers, and latest news Avowed is more Fallout 3 than Baldur's Gate 3, but that's not a bad thing View the full article

AMD's new Ryzen 9000X3D gaming CPUs are reportedly due to arrive in just a few weeks, according to the latest leak. The new 16-core AMD Ryzen 9 9950X3D has already been officially announced, as has the 12-core 9900X3D, but AMD has so far only given the release date window as Q1 2025. That's exactly the same timeframe as the official Radeon RX 9070 release date window, leading to speculation that AMD plans to release the new CPUs and GPUs at the same time. According to AMD, the new Ryzen 9 9950X3D is, on average, 20% faster than the Intel Core Ultra 9 285K across a suite of 40 games the company has tested. Read the rest of the story... RELATED LINKS: Intel Core and AMD Ryzen gaming CPUs could be about to get loads more cores Grab an AMD Ryzen 5 9600X gaming CPU for its lowest ever price, if you're quick Best graphics card 2025 View the full article For verified travel tips and real support, visit: [Hidden Content]

Now that official Baldur's Gate 3 mod support has arrived, I'm excited to download all of the custom campaigns. The scope for fully realized, expansive, and detailed player creations is endless, and these original narratives give us entirely new worlds and characters to play with. One of my most anticipated mods is finally here, and it blends BG3 with the best starting zone in all of World of Warcraft. Read the rest of the story... RELATED LINKS: Baldur's Gate 3 Patch 8 accidentally rolls out, but not for everyone The 32 best Baldur's Gate 3 mods Upcoming Baldur's Gate 3 mod adds entire campaign inspired by World of Warcraft View the full article

How do you sign up for Battlefield Labs? The Battlefield team is hard at work on the iconic series' next installment. While it's still in the very early stages of development, the devs at the newly formed Battlefield Studios are now turning to the community to "test specific focus areas" and help them fine-tune the experience with a new initiative, Battlefield Labs. Providing a test bed where you'll be able to try out "combat mechanics, modes, and more," Battlefield Labs is similar to what the team has done with previous games, though on a much larger scale. As many (ourselves included) feel the FPS series' most recent blockbuster attempt, Battlefield 2042, wildly missed the mark, gleaning player sentiment from even the earliest playable builds of the upcoming game will hopefully help produce the best Battlefield yet. To find out how to get involved, read on. Read the rest of the story... RELATED LINKS: EA prepares community tests for new Battlefield game as it follows Skate's lead Battlefield 2042 attempts to lure in players with an unprecedented bonus Battlefield 2042's high-stakes hardcore mode is here, and it's going dirt cheap View the full article

IGN Fan Fest is back and ******* than ever with an expanded lineup of games, movies, series, comics, collectibles, and more. Tune in February 24 - 28, 2025 for a live showcase every day highlighting huge reveals, tons of trailers, gameplay, never-before-seen clips, and exclusive conversations with your favorite movie and TV stars. For IGN Fan Fest’s epic 5th anniversary, the fun kicks off with a brand-new ID@Xbox showcase on Monday February 24 and continues throughout the week with special streams dedicated to games, anime, horror, superheroes and more! Don’t miss exciting reveals from huge games including Monster Hunter Wilds, WWE 2K25, and Alien: Rogue Incursion just to name a few. Plus catch new looks at TV and streaming series like Daredevil: Born Again, Mythic Quest, its new spinoff Side Quest, Survivor, ****** May Cry, The Walking Dead: Dead City, and Anne Rice's Mayfair Witches. Novocaine, The Monkey, The Surfer, and Fear Street: Prom Queen, are just a few of the hotly-anticipated movies coming to IGN Fan Fest. And don’t miss a ton of new content from your favorite anime including I Parry Everything, The Apothecary Diaries Season 2, Fire Force Season 3, and The Beginning After The End. We'll also be revealing new details from popular comics series including Godzilla, Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles, Sonic the Hedgehog, Blade Runner: Tokyo Nexus, and Doctor Who: The Fifteenth Doctor. Rounding out the event will be exciting previews of cool products and collectibles from Stern Pinball, McFarlane Toys, and more. Last year’s IGN Fan Fest featured conversations with the casts of Dune: Part 2, Fallout, and The Walking Dead: The Ones Who Live, reveals from games like Powerwash Simulator, Kingmakers, and Dave the Diver, plus exclusive looks at series like Invincible, Abbott Elementary, and Avatar: The Last Airbender. IGN Fan Fest 2025 is just a few weeks away so stay tuned throughout February for the full schedule, more announcements, surprises, and inside looks at what promises to be the biggest Fan Fest yet. View the full article

With World of Warcraft Classic in its Cataclysm era, players get to relive the MMORPG’s third expansion in all its glory—with a few twists, like the season system. And part of that glory is, of course, playing the PvP Arena seasons in order. Classic Season 10 began in October 2024 and is a revival of the original season that took place in 2011, with Ruthless Gladiator as the main reward. But the end of the current season is coming soon, the devs have said. View the full article

Sure, the first teaser trailer for The Fantastic Four: First Steps doesn't really show you anything at all, but at least there's a promise of a proper trailer coming tomorrow. Read more View the full article

The large-scale warfare of Battlefield is returning to PC and console soon with a new entry in the series, but not before the game’s developers get some help from you, the player. Battlefield Labs is a new feature starting off today where players can sign up to help test out the new game and shape its development, sort of like an early access title that you may find on Steam or Xbox Series X|S. View the full article

At the 67th Grammy Awards, Winifred Phillips took home the Best Score Soundtrack for Video Games and Other Interactive Media award for her work on Wizardry: Proving Grounds of the Mad Overlord. The game itself is a faithful 3D remake of the original Wizardry from 1981, a medieval fantasy RPG considered a pioneer in party-based video game RPGs. Its influence can be seen in Final Fantasy, Dragon Quest, and many other beloved franchises. The remake stays true to its roots, even allowing players to view the original Apple 2 interface while playing. View the full article

The recent manga series Monochrome Days has been rescued thanks to the enthusiasm of fans in both Japan and the English-speaking world. The series is the latest project from Matsumoto Yousuke, whose past work includes the short-running series Sono Shukujo wa Guuzou to Naru, and a well-received entry into a Blue Archive anthology series. Monochrome Days follows Fudo […] Source View the full article

Iron Man is one of the strongest Duelists in Marvel Rivals if used properly. The Avengers’ leader can fly and burst down enemies, but he lacks one basic feature. Iron Man, aka Tony Stark, is a Duelist in Marvel Rivals, which is all but surprising. In the end, a flying, armed man capable of taking down Thanos couldn’t have been a Vanguard or Strategist. But while Iron Man is terrific in the game, players have realized he cannot do one basic thing—walk. Tony’s lack of walking shoes was pointed out by a player on Reddit on Feb. 2. They asked if anyone ever wondered why the character is unable to walk in the game, while most other heroes can. He can fly, and has a skill that allows him to accelerate if needed, making him truly powerful on maps with an open sky. However, you can’t technically walk on the ground while playing him, which is at least odd. View the full article

Regarding video game villains, Yorinobu Arasaka in Cyberpunk 2077 is a bit of an odd case. He's initially important, the target of the player's first big heist, and sets up the major conflict of the game by murdering his father at the end of Act One. But beyond that, he's hardly present at all, only ever seen on TV screens and heard in recordings. Yorinobu's presence is felt, but he takes the backstage in a major way, only appearing in person again during a certain ending. View the full article

With the release of the Darkest Dungeon 2 Inhuman ******** DLC comes the arrival of an exciting character known as the Abomination. Fans of the first game will recognize him from that, especially as he shares a lot in common with his previous incarnation. A man who transforms into a beast at will, Abomination is both powerful and versatile. View the full article

Marvel's Spider-Man 2 has received its second hotfix following its shaky launch on PC, fixing several major bugs and addressing optimization issues. Developed by Insomniac Games and ported to PC by Nixxes Software, Spider-Man 2 was released for PC on January 30, 2025, amid much anticipation. View the full article

Once upon a time, Alice B (RPS in peace) was frustrated that the villagers in Early Access medieval townbuilder Foundation would not eat their bread and were furiously starving. Then it turned out Alice was the one starving them. Hoho! Pure japes. Five years later, Foundation has just hit 1.0. Read more View the full article

The world could always use more heroes, and Overwatch 2 could always use more updates. As a live-service title, OW2 is constantly being updated with new events, skins, gameplay changes, and more. But for the big additions like heroes, maps, and wholesale tweaks to shake up the game and meta, that’s what Overwatch 2 Spotlight has been created for. View the full article

Final Fantasy 7 Rebirth just received its first PC update patch, which addresses some of the recent port’s stability issues. Final Fantasy 7 Rebirthwas released on Steam and the Epic Games Store on January 23, nearly a full year after it launched to ample praise on the PS5. While this PC port doesn’t include any extra content, it does feature enhanced graphics and boosted frame rates on systems that can support them, allowing gamers who missed out on the adventure the first time around to experience the sights of Final Fantasy 7 Rebirth’s world like never before. View the full article

Electronic Arts has shared the first pre-alpha gameplay footage of the next Battlefield game. About 10 seconds of footage is included at the end of a new video introducing the studios working on the game and a new Battlefield community testing program. It’s viewable above. Confirming a recent leak, the new closed testing environment for the series is called Battlefield Labs. Read More... View the full article

The first Kingdom Come: Deliverance sold itself as a historically grounded medieval RPG and earned praise and criticism for its obtuse, sim-like mechanics and methodical pacing. It was a scuffed gem many skipped over, especially given its poor technical state at launch. However, its renown has only grown over time thanks to its wonderful cast of characters, their camaraderie, and the often ridiculous scenarios they find themselves in, from bar brawls to psychedelic trips with wannabe witches, that juxtapose a bleak but well-told tale of war and revenge. Read the rest of the story... RELATED LINKS: Kingdom Come Deliverance 2 has three expansions coming in 2025 alone Kingdom Come Deliverance 2 dev slams "grifters" amid 'anti-woke' backlash Kingdom Come Deliverance 2 dev may ban people from forum for discussing politics View the full article

Some days I’ve moped about how I'll never get back the feeling I had the first time I played Skyrim. And then Kingdom Come: Deliverance 2 arrived on a mighty steed to sweep me off my feet at full gallop. Armed with excellent, skill-focused melee combat and a rousing, action-packed medieval saga fit for a Hollywood blockbuster, it's one part sequel and one part coronation, bringing a lot of the original's ideas to fruition in the same way The Witcher 3 did for CD Projekt Red or Greedfall did for Spiders. No game of this scope and scale is without some technical scuff, of course, and its competing design goals are occasionally at war with themselves just as much as our hero Henry is internally. But even still, its majesty is hard to deny. This tragic tale picks up almost immediately where Kingdom Come: Deliverance left off back in 2018, though I don't necessarily think you need to have played the first one to get up to speed thanks to the main plot being relatively easy to follow and most of the callbacks being well explained as they happen. Henry, a blacksmith's son turned unlikely warrior, is thrown into the middle of dynastic politicking and bloodshed played out by a diverse and complex cast, including your boisterous failson of a liege lord and some truly memorable entrances from real historical figures I don't want to spoil. What we said about Kingdom Come: Deliverance There’s a shining suit of mail underneath Kingdom Come: Deliverance’s authentically medieval grime. Strong characters and storytelling, one of my favorite first-person melee combat systems ever, and special attention given to building moment-to-moment immersion come together as a mighty alloy that ranks among the most unique, memorable RPGs I’ve played in years. While a lack of technical polish occasionally caused me a good deal of frustration having to replay areas due to a bug or poorly-communicated quest objective, it’s the kind of adventure I didn’t hate replaying. - Leana Hafer, February 16, 2018. Score: 8 Read the full Kingdom Come: Deliverance review. [/url] The star that shines brightest across this expanse of countryside, though, is the city of Kuttenberg. I can't speak about this place in any terms less flattering than to say it might be one of the wonders of the modern RPG world. I don't think I've ever walked the streets of a virtual medieval city that feels this huge, detailed, and most importantly, alive. The layout is based largely on the actual town that still stands today, with parts of it following the modern street grid almost exactly. It's a wonderful place to simply wander around and discover all kinds of urban adventures – from resolving a dispute between two rival sword schools to hunting down a grisly serial killer. Yes, some of the NPCs obviously share the same voice actor and others share the same face – even important side characters, which can be particularly jarring. But it’s hard to get too hung up on that in a place like this. When I first arrived here I was already more than 40 hours into my 120-hour journey, and I spent multiple in-game days gleefully shopping for the sickest duds and best armor I could afford. And that's what arriving in a huge regional capital should make me want to do! There are around 100 quests, and practically every one was memorable. The quest variety is what impressed me most of all, and that extends beyond just Kuttenburg. Very rarely are you simply sent to kill some bandits or carry a package to the next town – at least without some kind of interesting twist, moment of emotional turmoil, or decision built in. There are around 100 quests in total and, having done nearly all of them, practically every single one was memorable enough that it would stand out as a highlight in a lesser RPG. Admittedly, some were slightly better in concept than execution. There was one I stumbled onto completely by accident that took me deep underground and turned my sword-swinging adventure into a horror movie, but ended up being far too short for the dread to really set in. All the same, I never felt like doing side quests ever became a chore, because I knew each one would be its own little complete episode of The Adventures of Henry, stuffed with quality writing and unique objectives. It's a testament to how consistently strong they were that 120 hours did not feel way too long to me. Along the way are expansive, breathtakingly beautiful landscapes spread over two open-world maps, both of which are chock full of meticulously researched details of late medieval Bohemian life. There isn't a ton of variety in terms of geography – it's all wooded hills and meadows, for the most part. But that’s what the region looks like in real life. It's big enough to get lost in, and the contrast between villages and open wilderness varies things up nicely enough. I did find it odd that you can't go into most of the churches, though, since those would be near the top of my list if I were planning a tourist trip through 1400s Europe. If the side quests are like episodes of a TV show, the main quest is a big-screen war movie that pulls out all the stops in its ambition, dialogue, and emotional range. Parts of it made me cheer. Parts of it actually brought me to tears. And Henry's ultimate nemesis got under my skin in a way video game bad guys rarely do, making me rethink everything I’d done up to that point in what might be one of the most memorable final encounters I've ever played through. It's mature without being edgy, it drips with historical authenticity, and it has interesting questions to ask you about what it means to be a hero or a villain. The main quest is like a big-screen war movie that pulls out all the stops. It's somewhat unfortunate, then, that Kingdom Come: Deliverance 2 is both a mostly linear medieval action-drama and an open-world sandbox, and those two concepts don't always play well together. I'm going to skirt around spoilers the best I can, but I need to give a specific example of the worst experience I had. I need to tell you about the Hungarian Camp. In one of the late-game areas, there is a military camp set up by King Sigismund, the evil conquering bastard you've been opposing since the first hour of the first game. I, of course, tried to assault it by myself the second I got there, and was immediately put down like a dog. Fair enough. But for the next 40 hours of adventuring, I was plotting my revenge. A fire was lit in me – motivation to become as much of a badass as possible. I studied with all of the best blademasters. I learned the way of the bow. I saved up for the best armor. I forged, by hand, the very best sword in Bohemia. Next time I showed up at that camp, things were going to be different. So, near the end, I went back to the Hungarian Camp Rambo-style and I killed everyone there. Okay, not the cook or the tailor. And not Musa – Musa's cool. But probably somewhere in the neighborhood of 30 to 40 armed men. This was an empowering and gleeful rush, with difficult combat that tested all of my skills like never before. A real highlight of the entire journey. And these are enemy soldiers, let me remind you! I don't feel like this was an unpredictable or degenerate thing to do. So it was a downer when, shortly after, I was asked to infiltrate this same camp as a spy, and Henry didn't even so much as mention that he had completely desolated the place and had a bounty on his head so large that the authorities would skip fines and prison and straight-up execute you if you're caught. This is a required story quest with no alternate path, so the ridiculous, frustrating solution was to sneak up on the unkillable quest NPCs several times to talk to them and start the next cutscene before that same NPC spotted me and went running to call the guards. It also ruined my near-perfect reputation because I guess killing invading enemy soldiers was a crime the peasants Sigismund is actively oppressing couldn't forgive, and everyone in every town ended up hating me. But this was a major outlier in what was otherwise a hugely engrossing, marathon-length playthrough. Other than that one total debacle though, I truly adored almost every minute I spent with Henry and company. The tactical, skill-based sword combat is a sharp refinement of the already great system from the first game, though I felt like at higher levels, the balance of pure stats to player skill skewed too much in favor of the former. You could probably reach the credits without actually getting particularly good at the swordplay, which was certainly not the case in the first one. But it is cleaner, more varied, and smoother to play. Archery, in particular, has improved a lot. There's a blacksmithing minigame now, which I found a little bit clunky and unsatisfying, but it's still great to be able to use a sword I made myself in combat. And alchemy has been made way more intuitive. I also really like the new perk system, where every level up feels like it gives you multiple choices between meaningful bonuses. In the first one, a lot of perks honestly felt more like side-grades than upgrades. There was a perk that made it so sleeping outside was more restful, but sleeping in a bed, less so. The sequel’s version only has the upside, and not the drawback, which is important if I'm going to spend my hard-earned skill points on something rather than picking it as a character background at the beginning. And while there wasn't a single quest as interesting or different as the monk arc from the original, getting to level up my scholarship and unlock new quest resolutions by destroying my enemies with facts and logic was also great. Did I mention that it runs really well on my 4070 Ti, even at 4K and very high settings? I still can't even run the first Kingdom Come: Deliverance at max settings on this same machine, and that game is seven years old at this point. So the optimization work that was done here deserves a shout. There are also plenty of bugs, but most of them are of the silly sort you screenshot to show your friends that you'd expect in an RPG with this much ambition. Only rarely did something actually disrupt my gameplay. 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EA has confirmed the end of support for Need for Speed Unbound just over two years after the game came out as its developer goes all in on the next Battlefield. *** studio Criterion Games, best-known for the much-loved Burnout series, developed Need for Speed Unbound for launch in December 2022 and recently rounded out its second year of updates. IGN has confirmed with EA that this marks the end of new content for Need for Speed Unbound, and the Need for Speed team within Criterion is now, alongside the rest of the studio, working on Battlefield. The game will remain on-***** so players can continue to play the base game and all nine content drops. “The Need for Speed team at Criterion are joining their colleagues working on Battlefield,” a statement from Vince Zampella, Head of Respawn & Group GM for EA Studios Organization, sent to IGN reads. “As a company, it was important to us to take the last year to listen to our Need for Speed community and use their feedback to create content for Unbound. With an increased understanding of what our players want in a Need for Speed experience, we plan to bring the franchise back in new and interesting ways.” That’s a rather vague hint that Need for Speed will return at some point, but it’s unclear when and in what form. It’s a different situation for Dead Space remake and Star Wars: Squadrons developer Motive, which EA told IGN is still working on both the future of Battlefield as well as an Iron Man game. DICE and Ripple Effect, the other two studios that form part of what EA calls Battlefield Studios, are only working on Battlefield. The Need for Speed news comes as EA starts to reveal more about the new Battlefield, including a first official look at pre-alpha gameplay and the establishment of Battlefield Labs, where players can test the game ahead of launch. There’s no word yet on when the game will be released. 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