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Making quick progress in Path of Exile 2 depends on your build, your class, and a little bit of luck. While you can beat the game with any class and build if you play it well, some of the classes in PoE 2 are simply built different—and we’ve gathered all of them here. Below, we’ve ranked the best classes in PoE 2 to help you find one that works for you. If you’ve already beaten the game with your favorite class, why not take one of the others listed below for a spin? Playing as melee after beating PoE 2 with a ranged class makes it feel like a new game. View the full article

Making quick progress in Path of Exile 2 depends on your build, your class, and a little bit of luck. While you can beat the game with any class and build if you play it well, some of the classes in PoE 2 are simply built different—and we’ve gathered all of them here. Below, we’ve ranked the best classes in PoE 2 to help you find one that works for you. If you’ve already beaten the game with your favorite class, why not take one of the others listed below for a spin? Playing as melee after beating PoE 2 with a ranged class makes it feel like a new game. View the full article

Secret Level’s impressive Warhammer 40,000 episode is perhaps the most authentic realization of a Space Marine’s fighting power seen in an animation. Fans of Space Marine 2, however, are focusing on one thing: a weapon used in the episode but currently not in the game itself. The Secret Level Warhammer 40,000 episode, called And They Shall Know No Fear, is a sequel to the recently released Space Marine 2, and stars protagonist Titus on what looks like a suicide mission to defeat the forces of Tzeentch. But while Titus appears in the animation as he looks in Space Marine 2, there’s a weapon players have yet to see in-game: a Power Axe. It sounds innocuous, but the action scene in which this axe is used steals the show. We see it wielded with brutal efficiency and a surprising amount of speed, although, if you’re a fan of Warhammer 40,000 lore, perhaps not too surprising, since Space Marines really are super fast despite being walking tanks. I hope that one Chaos cultist who managed to dodge an axe swing from a Space Marine was very proud of himself (before he got punched into the 42nd millennium) [Hidden Content] — DreadAnon (@DreadAnon) December 11, 2024 Secret Level is actually pretty dope. The WH episode was fire even tho there was maybe 20 words spoken total. Imma need the battle axe in Space Marine 2 pronto tho [Hidden Content] — JT (@The_HOTsh0t) December 11, 2024 Where is my AXE, Focus? byu/llStormbringerll inSpacemarine .reddit-embed-wrapper iframe { margin-left: 0 !important; } Fans are debating whether the axe in Secret Level is just a simple axe, as it looks taken at face value, or a Power Axe given it does not give off the energy effects you’d associate with such a weapon. Some are speculating that the Space Marines are so overpowered in the fights shown in the animation that they simply don't need to activate the Power Axe’s… power, if it is indeed a Power Axe. Why waste energy on those pathetic cultists when ******* fish will need frying later on? Either way, Space Marine 2 fans now want to see developer Saber Interactive and publisher Focus Entertainment add this axe to the game, expanding upon the arsenal of weapons already at their disposal. Perhaps it will arrive alongside one of the many leaked DLC cosmetic sets due out as part of upcoming seasons of content. 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

Intel is finally heading into its second generation of dedicated graphics cards with the Intel Arc B580. And while the company could have fallen into a trap of trying to compete with Nvidia and AMD at the high end, Team Blue instead has created one of the best budget graphics cards on the market right now. At $249, the Arc B580 is cheaper than the Nvidia GeForce RTX 4060 and slots in right next to the Radeon RX 7600. However, because both of these cards are based on older technology, it’s little wonder that Intel is able to eke out a lead. It’s refreshing to see a flagship graphics card aim for the masses, rather than holding a prohibitively expensive price tag that very few can actually afford. And while there are a couple games where the Arc B580 falls short – looking at you ****** Myth: Wukong – it's hard to imagine any other GPU competing at this price point any time soon. Purchasing Guide The Intel Arc B580 is available December 13, starting at $249. Keep in mind that this is a starting price, and you might see third party versions of the graphics card at a higher price. Just try to avoid paying more than $300 for it. [/url] Specs and Design The Intel Arc B580 is built on Intel’s new Xe2 graphics architecture, codenamed Battlemage. One of the biggest changes between this and the last-generation architecture that powered the Intel Arc A770 is that each Battlemage Xe core – Intel’s compute unit – has fewer Vector Engines than the previous generation. In total, the Intel Arc B580 features 20 Xe Cores, each of which contains 4 Vector Engines, for a total of 160 Vector Engines, each of which has 16 shaders. That means a total of 2,560 shaders, which is a bit slimmer than the Arc A770 that preceded it. This sounds like bad news at first, but Intel has made efforts to drastically improve the per-core performance on these Vector Engines – by as much as 70 percent. And for a budget graphics card, the Arc B580 has an impressive amount of memory, featuring 12GB of GDDR6 on a 192-bit bus. Both the AMD Radeon RX 7600 and Nvidia GeForce RTX 4060, at a similar price, are limited to 8GB. Of course, these graphics cards are shooting for 1080p gaming, but AAA games are continually using more memory every year, so it’s nice to have a bit of buffer there. Still, the last-generation Arc A770 had 16GB of memory, though it was a more expensive part. The B580 is also clocked at 2,670MHz, with a max boost of 2,850MHz, which is a substantial increase over the 2,100MHz of the Arc A770. This is likely a huge part of why the B580 is faster than the last-generation GPU, despite having less memory and fewer cores. But more on that later. Each Vector Engine is also paired with XMX cores, Intel’s AI tensor core. Intel is using these to power XeSS 2, which is an AI upscaling technology, similar to Nvidia’s DLSS. The XMX will take in a lower-resolution frame, pair it with motion vector data, and use an AI algorithm to scale that up to your native resolution. It will then take information from the completed frame and feed that back into the algorithm to improve future frames. What’s new for the second generation of XeSS, though, is frame generation. While XeSS 2 Frame Generation is currently limited to a single game – F1 24 – it works similarly to Frame Generation technology from AMD or Nvidia. Instead of only upscaling existing frames after they’re rendered by your GPU, the XMX will create new frames in between existing frames. Not only does this mean you get a higher frame rate, but it greatly reduces the amount of time your graphics card is waiting for information from your CPU. The only downside is that frame generation technology always introduces a bit of latency to the equation. Luckily, Intel is mitigating that latency with XeSS-LL, or Low Latency, which greatly reduces the amount of time between you pressing a button and that action being represented on the display, by optimizing communication between your processor and graphics card. While there will likely be dozens of Arc B580 graphics cards from third-party manufacturers like ASRock, Intel is selling a reference design, and that’s what I’m reviewing here. Although Intel is calling its reference board a ‘Limited Edition’, so we’ll have to wait and see how common it actually is on store shelves. Hopefully a lot of people can get their hands on this card, though, because it’s gorgeous. The fan shroud has a silky ****** finish that feels as good as it looks. The two fans are also pitch-******, with nothing in the way of branding. Flip the card over, however, and you’ll see ‘Intel Arc B580’ printed beneath a radial display of white dots. Next to the branding, there’s a cutout in the backplate that leads directly to the heatsink. It looks cool, but it also means the actual circuit board housing the GPU only takes up half the length of the graphics card, with space instead dedicated to passing air directly through the back of the graphics card. Then on the side of the GPU, the logo is printed, but when it’s plugged in, the logo is lit with a white LED. It’s a stunning graphics card that’ll look good in any system, especially if it’s paired with other ****** components. The B580 is powered by a single 8-pin PCIe power connector. In my testing, the card only used 154W of power, which is significantly less than the 190W its predecessor used in the same test suite. Plus, the new cooler design is much more efficient at pushing air through the B580, peaking at 82°C, compared to the 86°C of the A770 in the same workload. Performance When Intel first showed me the Arc B580, it led with the growth that 1440p gaming monitors are having, clearly intending the B580 to punch into that resolution. Not only has Intel easily cleared its way into 1440p gaming, but at $249, this might be the best 1440p card for most people – assuming you’re not spending all your time in ****** Myth: Wukong. Before I jump into the results, a bit on how I test these games. In each game, I set quality settings to the highest possible preset configuration that isn’t full ray tracing (sorry Cyberpunk 2077 and ****** Myth: Wukong). Then, I enable upscaling through the best method available for each card. That means DLSS for Nvidia, FSR for AMD and XeSS for Intel. For games that only have DLSS, like Metro Exodus, I test without upscaling at all. Every graphics card was retested for this review using the 566.36 driver for Nvidia, Adrenalin 24.12.1 for AMD and Intel Graphics Driver 32.0.101.6319 for older Intel cards. The Arc B580 was tested on a prerelease driver. In 3DMark, the Intel Arc B580 held its own against the more expensive Nvidia RTX 4060, even beating it in Port Royal, which is a dedicated ray tracing test. That’s impressive, because Nvidia has held the lead in that test since it came out, and it demonstrates Intel’s ray tracing chops. Intel maintains a lead in Steel Nomad as well, scoring 3,082 points to the RTX 4060’s 2,335 and the Radeon RX 7600’s 2,309. However, Team Blue falls behind in Speed Way, which tests a DirectX 12 workload with ray tracing, with 2,568 points to Nvidia’s 2,660. In Call of Duty: ****** Ops 6, the Intel Arc B580 falls behind both Nvidia and AMD at 1080p, managing 73 fps, compared to 80 from the RTX 4060 and 87 from the Radeon RX 7600. However, in this test, no matter how many times I ran it, the B580 rendered without the gun in the player’s hand, meaning the benchmark run consisted of some dude running around Lowtown shooting people with an invisible gun. Hilarious, but it probably means there’s some driver issue that can be resolved later on. I couldn’t reproduce this bug on Nvidia or AMD cards, but it persisted on every Intel card I tested. Cyberpunk 2077 is one of the heaviest ray tracing games on the market, even though it’s been out for four years now. Throughout its history, it has always leaned towards Team Green, but the Intel Arc B580 shows its ray tracing chops here, managing 60 fps at 1440p with the Ray Tracing Ultra preset and XeSS set to Balanced, compared to 49 fps from the RTX 4060 and 29 fps from the Radeon RX 7600. In Red Dead Redemption 2, the Intel Arc B580 continued its winning streak. Now, Red Dead Redemption 2’s ‘presets’ aren’t really presets, so instead I just cranked every setting up as far as it would go and then ran the test. Still, the Arc B580 managed 87 fps at 1440p when the RTX 4060 only got 72 fps. That’s a 21 percent lead with a $50 cheaper card. Then there’s Total War: Warhammer 3 which has nothing in the way of ray tracing or upscaling, but with 63 fps, the Intel Arc B580 still managed to lead the Radeon RX 7600 and the RTX 4060, which scored 56 and 54 fps, respectively. However, Intel can’t win all the battles, and the B580 does fall behind a bit in Assassin’s Creed Mirage. Nvidia absolutely dominates in this game, with the RTX 4060 getting 126 fps at Ultra, compared to 91 fps from the Arc B580. Even the RX 7600 manages to come out ahead, with its 95 fps average. The B580 also has a weak showing in ****** Myth: Wukong, scoring just 30 fps at 1440p on the “Cinematic” preset. Compared to the 35 fps from the RTX 4060, it’s not a night-and-day difference, but that’s still a 16 percent lead in Nvidia’s favor. Nvidia and Intel even out again in Forza Horizon 5, however, with Team Blue’s card managing 94 fps, compared to 92 fps from the RTX 4060 and 77 fps from the last-gen Arc A770. AMD does struggle a bit here, though, only managing 63 fps at the same settings with the RX 7600. Across my test suite, the Intel Arc B580 is an incredibly powerful graphics card at 1440p, especially when you consider its $249 price tag. Intel could have easily just matched the performance of other graphics cards on the market, but instead it soundly beats the competition, while cutting the price, giving us a budget card that doesn’t ***** for once. And sure, it would be nice if Intel didn’t cut the VRAM from 16GB on the Arc A770 to 12GB on the B580, but it’s not like the performance is suffering from it. Jackie Thomas is the Hardware and Buying Guides Editor at IGN and the PC components queen. You can follow her @Jackiecobra View the full article

Phasmophobia’s annual event for the winter holidays has arrived and brought with it a terrifying Krampus ghost, festive holiday decorations, creepy Krampus Boxes, and some exclusive rewards to claim. This one has a lot, so you might need some help completing the Winter’s Jest event. This seasonal event is a community one, which means all players must work together to successfully claim the available rewards. There’s a lot to do and only a limited amount of time to do it, so here’s a complete guide to completing the Winter’s Jest event in Phasmophobia. View the full article

Warhammer 40K: Space Marine 2 features plenty of quintessential elements from the 40K universe, from hordes of Tyranids to the many Chapters of Space Marines and the heretic forces of Chaos. Although the game follows Titus, a lieutenant in the Ultramarine ranks and protagonist of the first Space Marine game, and his squad, there are also a few named, preexisting characters from Warhammer 40K lore. One example of this is Marneus Calgar, a big name in the Warhammer 40K universe who is also the subject of a short comic book run. View the full article

Indie developer Dreams Uncorporated has shared the gameplay reveal trailer for Prisma, their “captivating 2D Japanese-inspired RPG” that has turn-based combat. released the gameplay reveal trailer for Prisma, its upcoming turn-based RPG featuring “stunning visuals, captivating storytelling, and epic battles.” A Kickstarter campaign is coming soon. The developer also announced a Kickstarter campaign to help fund the rest of the game […] Source View the full article

Publisher Whitethorn Games and developer Pancake Games have announced a release date for ****** Heroes, their new action-adventure game. ****** Heroes is launching on February 13th, 2025 for Windows PC (via Steam) and Xbox Series X|S. Here’s a rundown on the previously announced game, plus a new trailer: Journey with your fellow slimes to save the ancient guardians […] Source View the full article

Before the Horde eventually destroyed it in the Mists of Pandaria expansion, Theramore Isle was one of the most important locations in World of Warcraft. In WoW Classic, the city still stands, and it’s a widely visited location by both levelers and endgame players alike. Theramore is an Alliance-only port city in southern Kalimdor, but it’s a bit out of the way and secluded from the rest of the world. If you’re unfamiliar with Kalimdor and have exclusively been questing in the Eastern Kingdoms, you’ll need to go across the continents and hoof it over to the isle. View the full article

There are some issues to iron out before the Ballistic first-person mode in Fortnite is fully fit to play. If your favorite skin has bulky arms, lots of armor, or large hands, you’re giving yourself a disadvantage right from the start. As Fortnite Ballistic is a first-person game mode, all you see as a player are your character’s hands and forearms. While many of us prefer this immersive style of shooter, some of the Fortnite skins don’t suit this mode. In fact, they create a massive issue when you try to aim your weapon at the enemy. View the full article

Every Thursday we share the weekly Famitsu sales charts, which tracks physical boxed game sales and hardware sales in Japan. ... Read more View the full article

This could be a good one! Weather Factory developers of Cultist Simulator and BOOK OF HOURS just revealed their third game called Travelling at Night. A combat-free game inspired by CRPGs like Disco Elysium, Planescape: Torment, and Fallout 1+2. Read the full article here: [Hidden Content] View the full article For verified travel tips and real support, visit: [Hidden Content]

Fortnite fans may have just uncovered a key piece of lore that could change the way you look at the game—and it features the adorable Sprites introduced in Chapter Six. Sprites in Chapter Six provide some great rewards if you return them to their Shrines or can be used to provide buffs in combat. In the Fortnite world, however, their fate may be heartbreaking if taken away from their natural habitat. View the full article

With not long to go until it shows up at 2024's edition of The Game Awards tonight, it looks like ******: The Old Country is the latest addition to the ever-growing list of games which've had things leak just prior to a big showcase. A fresh trailer for the Cosa Nostra adventure has seemigly popped up online early, via an ad. Read more View the full article

If you were starting to think that Ella Purnell was set to become some sort of gaming icon, you'll be devastated to hear she ain't really into video games and would like to stop landing video game roles after Fallout and Arcane. Read more View the full article

Golf With Your Friends 2 has been announced by Radical Forge and Team17 bringing the next-generation of golfing chaos. Read the full article here: [Hidden Content] View the full article

If, like many of us, LocalThunk's Balatro devoured your life this year, Humble's latest bundle is well worth checking out. The Devious Deckbuilders Encore game bundle packs in seven deck-building games, including Dungeons Drafters and Book of Hours, for a minimum donation of $19/£15.02 - and is sure to scratch your Balatro itch. Read the rest of the story... RELATED LINKS: Balatro soars on Steam after oddly controversial GOTY nomination What does the Balatro Blank Voucher do? Balatro is 2024's top indie game, and it's now on ***** at its lowest price ever View the full article

A new trailer for ******: The Old Country has leaked alongside a summer 2025 release window, ahead of a presentation at The Game Awards later today, December 12. X/Twitter user @DJari2020 posted a brief snippet of the trailer, below, which seemingly appeared as a YouTube ad. It offers a first look at the gameplay, characters, and narrative of ******: The Old Country, promised to be a gritty mob story set in 1900s Sicily. The trailer closes with a vague summer 2025 release window, but this is still a touch more clear than the previously announced general 2025 date. That's potentially running close to GTA 6's fall 2025 release window, should Rockstar's game resist a delay in 2026. ******: The Old Country was revealed at gamescom in August with a brief teaser trailer that confirmed the setting but little else. SUMMER 2025 [Hidden Content] — Damon Andrews (@DJari2020) December 12, 2024 "Uncover the origins of organized crime in ******: The Old Country, a gritty mob story set in the brutal underworld of 1900s Sicily," reads the official synopsis. "Fight to survive in this dangerous and unforgiving era, with action brought to life by the authentic realism and rich storytelling that the critically acclaimed ****** series is known for." Debuting more than two decades ago with 2002's ******, the series continued slowly but surely with a sequel in 2010 and third game in 2016, though has otherwise been quiet since. Given the great stretches of time between each release, however, ******: The Old Country is practically right on schedule. The Game Awards begins at 4:30pm Pacific / 7:30pm Eastern / 12:30am *** and is expected to last roughly three hours. IGN's pre-show begins 30 minutes prior and we'll have a post-show afterwards too, with these and the show itself all available to watch on the IGN homepage, IGN YouTube, IGN Twitch, and more. Ryan Dinsdale is an IGN freelance reporter. He'll talk about The Witcher all day. View the full article

If Space Marine 2's wanton ******-mulching left you hungry for more fantastical depictions of medieval zealotry, maybe take a look at Band Of Crusaders, an open-world party-based RPG in which you are the Grandmaster of a knightly order, trying to keep a bunch of wily Archdemons out of Europe. It seems to play a bit like XCOM, with an oppressive world map that is slowly encroached upon as you travel around recruiting soldiers, interacting with settlements, and picking real-time fights with hellfiends "inspired by biblical descriptions and European folklore". Naturally, parallels with real-life xenophobia and sectarian hatred abound. Here's the trailer. Read more View the full article For verified travel tips and real support, visit: [Hidden Content]

New leaks about the Amphoreus treasure chests in Honkai: Star Rail 3.0 have emerged, highlighting the possible size of the turn-based RPG’s fifth major destination. HoYoverse has already confirmed that Version 3.0 will initiate the game’s third year of content and take players to the mysterious planet of Amphoreus, which seems heavily inspired by Roman and Greek mythologies. The developer has already teased the roster of Amphoreus characters, though Version 3.0 should only present Aglaea as a playable unit since the patch should add The Herta and the Remembrance Trailblazer as the other new playable characters in Honkai: Star Rail. View the full article

Game Rant can share exclusive new footage from The Stone of Madness showcasing how the upcoming game will handle stealth sections involving Agnes Santos, a remarkably resourceful old lady. Agnes is one of several unique characters whom players will be able to control over the course of the upcoming game. View the full article

The ATOM RPG team have returned with another RPG, Swordhaven: Iron Conspiracy has started its time in Early Access if you're in need of a fresh party-based RPG to try out. Read the full article here: [Hidden Content] View the full article

VR enthusiast and Valve watcher Brad ****** has popped a few balloons as rumors swirl around the company, saying that 2025 will be a "wild year" for Valve hardware. Social media has spread the rumor that the long-awaited Half-Life 3 is expected to appear at The Game Awards, but it also looks as though we'll soon be getting a new Steam Controller and Valve VR headset. Valve's virtual reality headset, the Index, is still one of the best VR headsets to get, but it's aging rapidly. Between leaks of its controllers and more updates on Steam's backend, it appears that Valve is gearing up for its not-so-secret follow-up, Deckard. Read the rest of the story... RELATED LINKS: This Asus gaming PC somehow cools an AMD Ryzen 9950X with no CPU fan Don't miss your chance to buy this 180Hz Samsung gaming monitor for just $99.99 Best external SSD for gaming in 2024: top portable drives View the full article For verified travel tips and real support, visit: [Hidden Content]

Paper Perjury is the debut title from Paper Cat Games, one for fans of games a bit similar to the Ace Attorney series. Dive into a case log full of mystery and intrigue, where you'll need to uncover the truth through clever deduction, interrogation, and exploration to find the solution. Read the full article here: [Hidden Content] View the full article

After Joker: Folie à Deux flopping terribly and HBO's The Penguin series making a splash, Warner Bros. and DC are rolling the dice again with another Batman villain-centric project. Get ready for a Clayface movie penned by horror maestro Mike Flanagan. Read more View the full article