The modern Doom games have been a master class in reviving a beloved retro gaming series. Both 2016's Doom and 2020's Doom Eternal paid homage to both the look and feel of the original Doom titles without being slavishly devoted to older gameplay conventions that can feel dated decades later. Yet by the end of Doom Eternal, you could feel the modernized gameplay system threatening to burst at the seams a bit. Managing your limited ammo, health, and armor resources in Eternal meant expertly juggling a bewildering array of chainsaws, flamethrowers, grenades, and melee-based staggers into powerful, pre-animated "glory kills." That was all on top of the frequent weapon-switching needed to take advantage of the weaknesses of the varied enemies surrounding you and the double-jump-and-dash movement system that required expert use of all three dimensions. Something had to give. So for Doom: The Dark Ages, the team at id Software has committed to a more streamlined, back-to-basics system that limits complexity while maintaining the same overall difficulty level. That means a "fewer strings on the guitar" approach to controls that narrows almost every action down to just three context-sensitive buttons, as the developers discussed in a hands-off virtual preview session attended by Ars Technica. Read full article Comments View the full article
Ninja Gaiden 4 is official, having just been announced at the Xbox Developer Direct 2025. The next mainline installment in the iconic series is coming to a variety of platforms and has also been confirmed as a day-one Xbox Game Pass release. View the full article
We called Amplitude's fiendish and fanciful strategy game Endless Legend the best 4X of 2014, and its hexcellence hasn't dimmed with age. "The music, the amazing variety in terrain and units, the sheer quantity of words bringing to life every last quest, minor faction, creature, and environmental anomaly," breathed a reverential Ollie in 2023. "It's a simply splendid game." Like somebody commenting on the sturdiness of an original Picasso's frame, I will only add that it now runs pretty comfortably on the current least expensive Dell Thinkpad. Why in Meier's name would ***** choose to sell off the studio behind such a worldly wonder? The answer is lost in time (it's through that link, there), but fortunately, Amplitude endure as an independent - and they've just announced Endless Legend 2 with no less than Hooded Horse as publisher. Here's the announcement trailer. Read more View the full article
Team Ninja and Koei Tecmo have surprise-released Ninja Gaiden 2: ******, an Unreal Engine 5 version of Xbox 360 hack-and-slasher Ninja Gaiden 2. It's out right now on Microsoft's Game Pass service. I'd say it has materialised from the darkness like a ninja, but there are a lot of ninjas in circulation right now and my analogy-jitsu gauge is running dry. So instead, I'm going to say that it has materialised from the darkness like a resurfacing duck, its beak stuffed with pond vegetation. The pond vegetation, here, stands for "tweaks to the weapons upgrade system". Here's a trailer. Read more View the full article
When discussing a potential Wolfenstein 3, Bethesda stablemates MachineGames once said that they’d yet to introduce mecha-Hitler, because once you do that, there’s nowhere to go. Doom: The Dark Ages feels like it’s hitting that ceiling, swapping the robo-fuhrer for a skyscraping mech and a “fire-breathing, gattling-gun-toting cybernetic dragon.” Id’s latest is a prequel to Doom 2016 and Doom Eternal, this time giving players the chance to go literally medieval on as many demons as they can. [Hidden Content] Read More... View the full article
Watching an artist complete a piece of work is a gratifying experience, and I had engrossed myself in watching the Slayer masterfully rip apart demons in my chance to preview DOOM: The Dark Ages. If DOOM 2016 was a high for fans, The Dark Ages is going to break that ceiling, inviting everyone along for the ride. Designers at id Software went out of their way to make The Dark Ages an experience everyone can enjoy, making players a deadly artist of destruction against the hell-ridden armies of the underworld. We didn’t get a full tour of The Dark Ages, but what we saw gave us hope and excitement about playing it sooner rather than later. View the full article
With the Xbox Developer Direct 2025 wrapped up, we’ve learned more details about the upcoming DOOM: The Dark Ages title from id Software. It’s removing several features from previous games in the franchise, and many are curious if there’s going to be a multiplayer cooperative addition to this entry. Traditionally, DOOM is a single-player game with a start and finish. DOOM Eternal, the entry that came out before The Dark Ages in March 2020, had a multiplayer feature where players could face off against each other in player-vs-player deathmatches, with players assuming the role of the Slayer and others as demons. It wasn’t a traditional multiplayer game mode, but some might be wondering if this game mode or others are on their way with the next entry. Can you expect to see multiplayer or cooperative gameplay in DOOM: The Dark Ages? View the full article
We’ve had the chance to learn more details about DOOM: The Dark Ages following the Xbox Developer Direct 2025. With those details comes the confirmation for the official launch date of the game, and when we can expect to get our hands on it. The launch trailer for the latest installment of DOOM broke down what we can expect from this highly anticipated game. Not only is it a science-fiction, medieval setting, but the id Software team has gone out of its way to make it a much more fast-paced system. Here’s when you can expect to get your hands on DOOM: The Dark Ages when it launches in 2025, and how you can get the chance to play it. View the full article
Xbox Game Pass subscribers should definitely circle May 15 on their calendars, as that's the day Doom: The Dark Ages is releasing for the service as a day one release. When Microsoft acquired Doom owner ZeniMax Media, one of the reasons it did so was to bolster the lineup of games it had in store for Xbox Game Pass. View the full article
The cat is out of the bag. Doom: The Dark Ages will launch on May 15, 2025, and it’ll be the third ‘nu-Doom’ game from esteemed developer id Software. But this game, which is confusingly a prequel to the instant classic Doom (2016), will eschew a trend established both by the first game in the rebooted series, and 2020’s Doom Eternal: it won’t have multiplayer. Read more View the full article
Team Ninja and Koei Tecmo have announced Ninja Gaiden 4, the first new numbered entry in the bloodthirsty third-person action series since 2012. Trailered at this evening's Xbox Developer Direct, it releases for PC in fall 2025, and they're working on it in collaboration with Bayonetta and Nier: Automata devs Platinum Games. All of which very much tickles my dismemberable gizzards. Here's the reveal video. Read more View the full article
Clair Obscur: Expedition 33 has just rocked up at today's Xbox Developer Direct, offering us another look at its very Final Fantasy vibes-filled adventure about stopping an artist in Belle Époque France from doing some painting. It's also now locked in a concrete release date of April 24, 2025. Read more View the full article
Microsoft has announced the release date for South of Midnight. Compulsion Games’ action adventure game will be released on April 8 on Xbox Series X/S, PC and Game Pass. More gameplay from the game was shown during the latest Xbox Developer Direct. Read More... View the full article
As well as announcing Ninja Gaiden 4, Koei Tecmo has announced a remake of 2008 action game Ninja Gaiden 2 — and it’s out now. Announced during Microsoft’s Xbox Developer Directo 2025, Ninja Gaiden 2 ****** shadow-dropped across console, PC, and Xbox Game Pass today, January 23. Developing… 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
During today's Xbox Developer Director, we saw a new trailer for South of Midnight complete with a release date of April 8, 2025. In the trailer, we saw a good look at Hazel's powers, which blend the traditional craft of weaving with magic to allow her to fight, conjure things, and overcome environmental obstacles. As she fights, Hazel "unravels" enemies to destroy them in action combat, and has some elements of customization in her fighting style that can help her counter different types of enemies. Hazel will visit different different regions ruled by magical creatures, each one with a different Southern Gothic history that she'll need to heal by collecting their fragmented memories. In the trailer, we got a look at several of these creatures, including a real big bird and a massive crocodile covered in spikes with giant trees going out of its back. South of Midnight was first announced at the Xbox Showcase in 2023 as a new game from We Happy Few developer Compulsion Games. Set in a magical realist American South, it follows a young woman named Hazel who seems to be searching for her mother in the wake of a massive hurricane, using newfound magical powers called Weaving and encountering all sorts of strange creatures along the way. It reappeared at the Xbox Showcase last year, and we got a hands-off look at it back in November. You can catch up on everything shown in today's Xbox Developer Direct right here. Developing... View the full article
The final boss of the Trial of the Sekhemas in Path of Exile 2 is Zarokh, the Temporal, a being that manipulates time itself to prevent any timeline where you beat them. This entity is an endgame opponent for only those with the strongest character builds crafted for a playthrough. Those who can endure against this boss can earn great rewards and reach the pinnacle of strength for their character. View the full article
Microsoft promised to bring us a deeper look at South of Midnight during its January 2025 Xbox Developer Direct, and the publisher has delivered. The stylish action game’s segment was a highlight, and it even came with a release date on PC and Xbox. Read more View the full article
This is not a drill. ANinja Gaiden 2 remake has just been announced at the Xbox 2025 direct, and it's available to play on PC and Xbox consoles right now! Read more View the full article
Ninja Gaiden 4 is in development, Xbox has confirmed. The game is a collaboration between Team Ninja and PlatinumGames and will be published by Xbox Game Studios Publishing, with a release planned for Fall 2025 on Xbox Series X/S, PS5, and PC. The game will also be available on Xbox Game Pass on day one. [Hidden Content] Read More... View the full article
The latest Game Developers Conference (GDC) survey has been released, and it gives a rather glowing overview of how great things are for PC gamers with lots of developers working on games. Read the full article here: [Hidden Content] View the full article
Image: Palworld Pocketpair is getting into the games publishing business. The company has announced that it’s taking the gobs of money it made after launching Palworld, the Steam-record busting, 15-million-copies-sold-in-its-first-month, monster-catching adventure game, to establish Pocketpair Publishing. “Pocketpair Publishing provides comprehensive support for game development through funding, development assistance, and publishing for indie game developers and small studios,” Pocketpair wrote in its press release. [/url] We don’t even have to wait long for the company’s first game. Pocketpair Publishing has teamed up with Tales of Kenzera: Zau developer Surgent Studios to produce its next title, a horror game slated for release later this year. Surgent Studios was founded by video game voice performer and on-screen actor Abubakar Salim. After launching Tales of Kenzera, an afro-futuristic metroidvania, the company was forced to furlough its games division due to lack of funding — a common occurrence that’s become endemic over the last two years. The indie game space has not been insulated from the effects of the layoff crisis that’s plagued the game industry. The big publishers, from which smaller indie outfits typically receive funding, are tightening their belts, choosing to either keep their cash or only dole it out to projects they believe are sure to make money. And even the publishers known for supporting quality indie games, like Annapurna Games, are having a hard time staying in operation. However, Pocketpair Publishing joins a group of new companies that have entered the indie games space via non-traditional means. In 2022, YouTube video game critic and content creator videogamedunkey, created his own publishing company Bigmode which published its first game, Animal Well, to critical acclaim last year. Also last year, Innersloth, developers of the wildly-popular ******* mystery multiplayer game Among Us, established Outersloth, which is an indie game fund rather than a traditional publisher. Like Outersloth and Bigmode, Pocketpair Publishing is seeking to parlay its commercial success into an avenue for more indie games like Palworld to get made. “Game development comes with many challenges,” said Pocketpair Publishing head John Buckley. “But we want to ease that process as much as possible and provide an environment where creators can pursue their dreams.” View the full article
Riot Games has unveiled several updates to the 2025 League of Legends EMEA Masters, including three new tournaments to align with the LEC’s three-split model. Key innovations like Fearless Draft and revamped formats promise an exciting year for new and veteran fans. The 2025 EMEA Masters marks a great shift from the previous two-split system in 2024 and will feature three tournaments—Winter, Spring, and Summer—much like the Tier One league. Similarly, each split grows in size and intensity, culminating in a grand finale in the summer. But that’s not all; Fearless Draft descends from the LEC onto the EMEA Masters during the winter, and new tournament formats expands team slots for spring and summer. View the full article
new announcement on The Witcher 3's Steam page made me think "oh that's nice" before my fingers suddenly started aching, the sky grew dark, and this wizened form crumbled into dust o'er the keyboard. As of May this year The Witcher 3: Wild Hunt, one of the finest PC action-RPGs there is, will be a decade old... Read more.View the full article
Assassin's Creed Shadows, like most games in its franchise, comes down to the details. Set in Japan's Sengoku *******, the upcoming title is taking the typical broad strokes of the Assassin's Creed franchise and layering on a generous dose of new systems. While some of its ideas are big — dual protagonists that lean heavily into different playstyles are an obvious selling point — others shake up the series in subtler ways. View the full article
Ever since the enormous success of Hogwarts Legacy in early 2023, there haven't been many other reasons to celebrate at Warner Bros. Games. While Mortal Kombat 1 has done alright and offers some gorgeous, gory fighting game action, the company has had to face the disappointing relaunch of Multiversus and, most notoriously, the complete flop that was Suicide Squad Kill The Justice League. Now, WB Games' top dog, president David Haddad, is on the way out. Read the rest of the story... RELATED LINKS: Suicide Squad Kill the Justice League confirms Season 4 will be its last Suicide Squad Kill The Justice League's $100 edition is $5, but be fast Suicide Squad Season 2 saw just 600 players show up to the party View the full article
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We called Amplitude's fiendish and fanciful strategy game Endless Legend the best 4X of 2014, and its hexcellence hasn't dimmed with age. "The music, the amazing variety in terrain and units, the sheer quantity of words bringing to life every last quest, minor faction, creature, and environmental anomaly," breathed a reverential Ollie in 2023. "It's a simply splendid game." Like somebody commenting on the sturdiness of an original Picasso's frame, I will only add that it now runs pretty comfortably on the current least expensive Dell Thinkpad. Why in Meier's name would ***** choose to sell off the studio behind such a worldly wonder? The answer is lost in time (it's through that link, there), but fortunately, Amplitude endure as an independent - and they've just announced Endless Legend 2 with no less than Hooded Horse as publisher. Here's the announcement trailer. Read more View the full article