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The upcoming adventure game Split Fiction was just one of many exciting new titles that were revealed during the 2024 Game Awards. This latest game from Hazelight Studios is another co-op multiplayer title that takes players through the fictional worlds created by aspiring authors Mio and Zoe. Although only a limited amount of information was shown to audiences in the reveal trailer, it is enough to make one incredibly excited about what it has in store for players in the future. View the full article

According to Xbox insider Jez Corden, Bethesda may be gearing up to reveal a remake or remaster of the 2006 RPG The Elder Scrolls 4: Oblivion in January 2025. This corroborates a leak first seen earlier in December, prompting fans of The Elder Scrolls 4: Oblivion to begin their celebrations a tad early. View the full article

A Fortnite news creator has shared that the co-founder of Riot Games has no plans for the Arcane skins to return to Fortnite. This wouldn't be the first time that skins in Fortnite have been limited to players, as the Travis Scott skin also made a one-time appearance throughout the duration of his in-game event. Other popular battle pass skins have also obviously never returned, encouraging players to purchase quickly when they see something they love. View the full article

Fans of point-and-click adventure games have a limited time to get a free download of The Dark Eye: Chains of Satinav on GOG, available now until December 30. Originally released in June 2012, this Daedalic Entertainment title takes players into the role-playing world of The Dark Eye with a new mysterious plot to be unraveled. View the full article

A new Honkai: Star Rail leak has revealed that the popular 4-star Light Cone "Dance! Dance! Dance!" will get a rerun in Version 3.0. The Light Cone is quite versatile and works well with most Harmony characters in Honkai: Star Rail. View the full article

Developer Grumpyface Studios recently voiced how heartbreaking it was to see the games published under the Cartoon Network Games label be delisted across all platforms. Grumpyface Studios is best known for its collaboration with Adult Swim Games and Cartoon Network Games, releasing a variety of mobile titles based on shows that were aired on the network. Some of the shows that Grumpyface Studios worked with include Adventure Time and Regular Show, along with the Steven Universe: The Light Trilogy titles that were released on major consoles and PC. View the full article

Hot Wheels Unleashed is the perfect antidote to all those boring racers where the game grumbles if you so much as try and ram someone off the track. And now, thanks to the Epic Game Store's daily holiday giveaway, you can get it absolutely free. You'll have to hurry, though! Read the rest of the story... View the full article

The information comes from tipster Zhangzhonghao, who claimed on ******** hardware forum Chiphell (via @9550pro) that the reference version of the 9070 XT will have a TBP of around 260W, with custom models possibly rated up to 330W. The leaker added that the card's base clock will be 2.8 GHz,... Read Entire Article View the full article

Most gamers would be happy with a dual-channel setup. However, this gaming laptop offers a staggering four DDR5 memory slots supporting up to a ludicrous 192GB of DDR5-5600 RAM. Read Entire Article View the full article

Steam’s numbers from 2024 are in, and the players have spoken. Of all the games on the Valve storefront, a handful made the biggest impact among PC users, as shown by new player data released yesterday. Valve shared its “Best of 2024” data on Dec. 26, highlighting games that performed the best by a variety of metrics. The data is split into various categories, such as best-selling games, most played, and favorites among Steam Deck, VR, and controller users. View the full article

The Epic Games Store has revealed Hot Wheels Unleashed as the 10th free Mystery Game available in December 2024. With a focus on collecting different Hot Wheels cars and building spectacular tracks, Hot Wheels Unleashed is an excellent pick for Epic Games Store users who love the popular franchise. View the full article

A helpful Marvel Rivals fan took to social media to share that players can break Mantis' infamous stun ability, Spore Slumber, by attacking the ghost that appears on the target's back. Marvel Rivals recently launched its first major event, Winter Celebration, which has introduced a new game mode and several fresh cosmetic bundles for players to enjoy. As gamers continue to explore the hero shooter's various modes, fans are constantly gaining a deeper understanding of the game's many mechanics. View the full article

Hot Wheels Unleashed is the perfect antidote to all those boring racers where the game grumbles if you so much as try and ram someone off the track. And now, thanks to the Epic Game Store's daily holiday giveaway, you can get it absolutely free. You'll have to hurry, though! Read the rest of the story... View the full article

As part of the ongoing Winterfest 2024 event in Fortnite, players can now grab the Yulejacket skin for free at the Winterfest Cabin in-game. Yulejacket is the second skin to be given away during Fortnite's hugely popular winter event and can be obtained by opening all of the presents on the left-hand side of the Cabin, but players need to act fast as the skin will only be available until January 7. View the full article

TOHO has announced a new live-action film based on indie developer KOTAKE CREATE’s surprise hit thriller game The Exit 8. While details on the new live-action film for The Exit 8 are scant, it will premiere sometime next year – in 2025. Here’s a comment from the game’s creator, plus a teaser trailer: Exit 8 will be […] Source View the full article

Silvegis is a difficult creature to fight in Palworld Feybreak. It is a mini-boss known for its striking appearance and powerful abilities. Its unique and almost magical presence is due to its combination of beauty and strength. Its design suggests it was inspired by myths, blending mechanical and natural features into a memorable form. With its Dragon element, Silvegis is highly effective in battles, making it a valuable team member. View the full article

Publisher Infold Games and developer Papergames detailed the first big update for Infinity Nikki, not long after its big global. The first big update for the game, dubbed “Shooting Star Season,” is launching on December 30th and will run through January 23rd. Players can expect the update to add new adventures, events, dazzling outfits, and more. […] Source View the full article

Nightreign sounds like the sort of thing an Elden Ring player might want to play after coming home from a night out. That might sound like an insult, but we reckon it’s a pretty convincing sales pitch for FromSoftware, a studio that usually specializes in vast, epic adventures where quick one-and-done sessions are about as far from the intended experience as possible. [Hidden Content] Read More... View the full article

If Moore's Law predicts that the number of transistors on an integrated circuit will double every two years then we should go ahead and coin Barone's law saying that the number of games like Stardew Valley launching doubles every year. As the farm sim contender count continues to rise, it gets harder and harder for me to separate wheat from chaff but each year there's always one really standout farmlife sim and in 2024 it was the early access for Fields of Mistria.&nbsp.. Read more.View the full article

No seriously, why is Jon Heder - the screen actor best known for taking the leading role in 90s indie hit Napoleon Dynamite - starring in a documentary about Warhammer 40,000, grimdark media, and art legend John Blanche? The creative team at Trademark Films tells all, revealing the rhyme and reason behind the upcoming documentary 'The Grim and The Dark'. Read the rest of the story... RELATED LINKS: The six biggest Warhammer 40k releases to expect in 2025 What is Warhammer 40k's version of Christmas? Warhammer 40k's best reveal of 2024 is its last: an array of awesome dead bits View the full article

The Honkai: Star Rail 3.0 livestream is set to occur soon as the turn-based RPG’s Version 2.7 moves into its latter half and starts gearing up for the release of Amphoreus and all of its related contents, including new characters, main story quests, and activities. Version 3.0 is the next big patch for HoYoverse’s title and it should kick off its third year of content by taking the Astral Express crew to the mysterious new destination called Amphoreus. So far, HoYoverse has shown some teasers for Amphoreus in Honkai: Star Rail 3.0, such as a video highlighting some locations. View the full article

If you’ve played Apex Legends, you know there’s only two big rules to this game: Don’t follow your Octane teammate jump-padding into a fight with four other teams already there, and cool skins are everything. And 2024 had some great skins. From the thematic to the stylish to the downright bizarre, a skin you like is one way of leaving your signature on a kill for all others to see, whether on the battlefield itself or on your player banner. Here are the best skins in Apex from 2024. View the full article

Publisher Nordcurrent Labs and developer River End Games shared a new gameplay trailer for Eriksholm: The Stolen Dream, their new isometric narrative stealth game. Here’s a rundown on the game, plus a new trailer: Experience an isometric, narrative-driven stealth game set in the stunning city of Eriksholm. When Hanna’s brother, Herman, disappears and the police begin […] Source View the full article

Platform games can be some of the first that many players experience, with classics from Super Mario and many Metroidvania titles being incredibly popular. They often have fairly straightforward gameplay mechanics of running, jumping, and climbing, with different levels to jump between on the screen. Though this sounds fairly basic, the complexity that developers can create within this genre can vary greatly and include some challenging puzzles for players to overcome. View the full article

After 12 months of big hitters such as Helldivers 2, Elden Ring: Shadow of the Erdtree, Dune: Part 2 and Shogun, it’s not unreasonable to consider 2024 a good year for pop culture. But the smooth always comes with the rough, and the past year really has been a rocky one for the things we love and the people who make them. From layoffs and studio closures to costly consoles, underwhelming adaptations and struggling sequels, these are the biggest disappointments in 2024. Gaming Industry Layoffs and Closures The games industry found itself facing a crisis in 2023 as many publishers and studios, both large and small, made scores of staff redundant in an effort to cut costs. But the pains of that year would be repeated in 2024, which has seen an estimated 14,600 job losses - a 39% increase year-on-year. The cuts have seen thousands of talented studio staff thrown into the most difficult job market the games industry has ever seen, with developers attempting to find new roles in a landscape where companies are slimming down. Among the major companies cutting staff loose have been Riot, Microsoft, Bungie, Unity, TakeTwo Interactive, EA, and PlayStation. Such businesses have reduced their staff numbers for a variety of reasons and factors, be that rising development costs, shifting player habits in the years following the COVID-19 pandemic, and the global impact of the Russian invasion of Ukraine. Whatever the reasons, remaining staff at these publishers and studios must continue to work in uncertain times without the aid of their former colleagues. That is if their studio still exists. Adding to the dismal picture are several studio closures. Perhaps the most prominent among them is Arkane Austin, Bethesda’s immersive sim specialist responsible for the acclaimed Prey. Sadly its most recent release, Redfall, was a critical and commercial bomb – a situation that seemingly sealed its fate. Arkane Austin was shuttered by parent company Microsoft, along with Alpha Dog Games, Roundhouse Games, and Hi-Fi Rush developer Tango Gameworks. Somewhat miraculously, Tango was rescued by Krafton in a last-minute turn of fate, but such good news is rare. Also suffering closure this year was PlayStation’s London Studio, Galvanic Games, Avalanche Studio Group’s New York and Montreal studios, as well as others. To say it's been a tough year is an understatement. Trend-chasing Failures Another developer closed for good is Firewalk Studios, the team behind what is certainly PlayStation’s biggest disaster of the generation: Concord. A PvP hero shooter, its long and costly development meant it arrived long after the genre had peaked in popularity. But, despite being developed by many FPS veterans hailing from the likes of Bungie and Activision, what could have been PlayStation’s next big multiplayer phenomenon struggled to stand out from the likes of Overwatch and Apex Legends thanks to its lacklustre character kits and standard fare objective design. From the outside Concord simply looked like another typical hero shooter, which meant few wanted to see what was going on inside. It’s not an exaggeration to say that almost no one turned up for its August release – it achieved a high of just 697 concurrent players on Steam during its first week. Less than two weeks later, Sony pulled Concord from *****, refunded players, and shut the game down. By the end of October, Firewalk Studios was closed for business. It all sadly means Concord is gone without a trace. Well, almost – an episode of Amazon’s Secret Level animated series serves as a prequel to the ongoing Concord in-game story that never happened. A similar, thankfully less tragic story also happened earlier this year with Rocksteady’s Suicide Squad: Kill The Justice League. After months of poorly-received marketing, Sucide Squad launched as a critical and commercial bomb. As with Concord, much of Kill The Justice League’s failings were due to chasing trends that players have long since largely tired of – in this case, the Destiny-style live-service shooter grind. It didn’t help that Suicide Squad resembled Crystal Dynamics’ ill-fated Avengers game from a few years back, which similarly annoyed players for being a repetitive multiplayer PvE game. In Suicide Squad’s case, it was a shattering fall from grace for a studio that previously made beloved single-player Batman games. Many of us just wanted more of that best-in-class superhero action with a villainous twist, but sadly Warner Bros’ chase of live-service revenue seemingly got in the way. Not that it paid off - an initial lack of sales and dwindling players has contributed to a significant revenue decline for the company. Hardware Hiccups The time-compressing effect of the pandemic years has disguised the fact that, yes, we’re already at the midpoint of the current console generation. Right on cue, Sony delivered its mid-cycle refresh PlayStation 5 Pro, and it’s safe to say that practically no one was pleased by its $700 price tag. That’s not just down to the cost of living squeezing everyone’s wallets – Mark Cerny’s presentation that apparently showcased the console’s ability to render The Last of Us Part 2 Remastered so much better than the base console was basically the “They’re the same picture” meme from The Office in action. While there’s definitely time for the PS5 Pro to prove why it costs $200 more than the regular PS5, the initial results have been pretty disappointing. Rather than eliminate the need to decide between quality and performance modes, developers have added even more options to Pro-patched games, with confusing names such as ‘Fidelity Pro’ and ‘Versatility’. Remember when you just plugged in a console and it worked? Halcyon days. Plus, all the Pro’s extra power can’t even make Bloodborne look any better. At least Sony fans got a console, though. After months of rumours that Nintendo was due to announce its successor to the Switch, the company announced a brand new piece of hardware: an alarm clock. Yes, the Alarmo is a $100 clock with game-themed alarms and a motion sensor that can detect when you’ve got out of bed. It’s hardly the Switch 2 we were hoping for. And even when it comes to Nintendo’s history of weird hardware, Alarmo is far from the most interesting or bizarre. A true disappointment from the house of Mario. Unreliable Reliables Over in the realm of television, things have largely been bright thanks to the likes of Arcane, Shogun, and Fallout. But 2024 also saw some traditionally reliable shows struggle to maintain their quality. Season 3 of The Bear certainly wasn’t bad – it once again provided some solid character drama and beautifully-shot kitchen nightmares. But, compared to the incredible highs of the first two seasons, this third chapter fell significantly short. Its frustratingly slow pace clashed with the lightning speed of previous years, and the focus being almost entirely on Carmy’s inner crisis forced valuable characters like Sydney into the sidelines. Similarly, we saw this year’s Star Wars project struggle to hit the highs of The Mandalorian and Andor. The Acolyte was built on a fascinating premise that delved into the galaxy’s past, exploring the late High Republic era. It was packed with Jedi and featured one of the coolest lightsaber battles in the entire franchise, but even that couldn’t save the series from its sloppy and often infuriating storytelling. The Acolyte’s saving grace could have been Manny Jacinto’s Sith lord The Stranger, who sports one of the most menacing helmets in all of Star Wars. But while deeper exploration of his character could have resulted in a much-improved season two, we’ll never get to see that thanks to Disney axing the show entirely. This isn’t just a Disney problem – Netflix has also continued its habit of cancelling shows after barely giving them a chance to realise their full potential. 2024’s Netflix cull included Kaos and Dead Boy Detectives, which join last year’s Lockwood & Co in the “cancelled after a single season” club. Awful Adaptations This year’s Fallout was a stellar exercise of how to adapt a video game for television, with Amazon’s wasteland show being among our TV highlights of 2024. But it seems like Fallout’s success isn’t a guaranteed indicator that every Amazon video game show will be fantastic, as proven by the dreadful Like a Dragon: Yakuza show that landed on the service several months later. Featuring no karaoke, far too little Majima, and far too much melodrama, Like a Dragon totally failed to capture the stark contrast between serious and silly that the Yakuza games thrive on. It wasn’t just Japanese RPGs that were treated poorly for TV this year, though. Famed Japanese manga Uzumaki also received its long-awaited animated adaptation, and the results couldn’t have gone any worse. The four-part Adult Swim show turned Junji Ito’s monochrome horror into a rushed mess that sprinted to the finale, undermining plot points, character arcs, and scares on the way. The biggest disappointment, though, was the severe drop in animation quality following a visually rich episode one. Uzumaki transformed from beautifully chilling into a low-budget nightmare in the space of a week – it was a rug-pull scarier than anything Junji Ito could write. Box Office Bombs Unfortunately, terrible adaptations weren’t limited to the small screen. One of the biggest box office bombs of the year came in the form of Borderlands. Gearbox’s wacky looter shooter was transformed into a hideously miscast Guardians of the Galaxy rip-off for its live-action big screen adventure. Many of the games’ best-know qualities, such as its sweary sense of humour and love of turning humans into piles of goopy gore, were toned down to the point of vanishing completely. The result was bland, recycled MCU-ish ideas geared toward mass marketability. In short: a complete disaster. Unsurprisingly it died an unceremonious death when it launched in cinemas – with Lionsgate’s CEO saying “nearly everything that could go wrong did go wrong.” It’s arguable that an FPS like Borderlands was never going to survive the transition to cinema. A sequel to the most profitable comic book movie of all time and the first R-rated film to pass a billion-dollars at the box office, though? Surely a second Joker was going to be an easy win. Not so much. Joker: Folie à Deux turned out to be a miserably dull follow-up, with director Todd Phillips undoing almost all the good he established in the first film. When not even Lady Gaga can save your kinda-sorta musical from its snoozefest courtroom drama scenes, you know you’re in trouble. For the classic-mould movie buff, though, almost certainly the biggest disappointment of the year is Megalopolis. The years-in-the-making, self-financed magnum-opus from The Godfather director Francis Ford Coppola was (perhaps, if we’re honest, somewhat predictably) an indulgent catastrophe. Some people have seen method in the madness (including our own reviewer, who gave it a 9/10) but for many this opulent fable set in a futuristic, Rome-like New York City was a bloated, pretentious, dull mess. Quite how the creator of the quintessential ****** movie got here may prove to be one of the universe’s greatest mysteries. From studio closures to box office catastrophes, 2024 has had some real low points. It’s hard to find a silver lining in some of them, and we continue to hope that the industries that make our favourite things will turn a better corner in 2025. But in other instances it’s the downs that make the ups shine brightly – and you can find many of those bright stars in our roundup of the best reviewed games of 2025. Matt Purslow is IGN's Senior Features Editor. View the full article