Recently I covered that Kadokawa, the owner of ELDEN RING developer FromSoftware, were potentially being acquired by Sony and now Kadokawa have confirmed there's something going on. Read the full article here: [Hidden Content] View the full article
Kadokawa Corporation has confirmed it has received a buyout offer from Sony, but insists it has yet to make a decision on whether to sell up. Earlier this week, Reuters reported that Sony was in talks to buy Kadokawa, whose subsidiary FromSoftware is behind smash hit Elden Ring, the Dark Souls and Armored Core games, and PlayStation exclusive Bloodborne. Kadokawa has now confirmed the report, with a note from CEO Takeshi Natsuno issued after shares in the company skyrocketed on the news. “There are some articles on the acquisition of Kadokawa Corporation (hereinafter ‘the Company’) by Sony Group Inc,” Natsuno said. “However, this information is not announced by the Company. The Company has received an initial letter of intent to acquire the Company's shares, but no decision has been made at this time. If there are any facts that should be announced in the future, we will make an announcement in a timely and appropriate manner.” Sony has so far declined to comment. Kadokawa’s business extends into areas that fit into Sony’s broader entertainment offering, which includes anime, manga, TV, and film. Kadokawa is a prolific publisher of anime, and Sony already owns anime streamers Crunchyroll and Funimation. As well as FromSoftware, Kadokawa owns Danganronpa developer Spike Chunsoft, Octopath Traveler developer Acquire, and RPG Maker and Pixel Game Maker developer Gotcha Gotcha Games. Kadokawa is the majority owner of FromSoftware, with around 70% of the company. Sony already owns around 14% of the developer, with Tencent owning around 16%. Piers Harding-Rolls, Research Director at Ampere Analysis, told IGN that news of a potential deal isn’t that surprising. "Sony’s interest in Kadokawa’s games publisher FromSoftware was made more concrete in 2022 when it acquired a roughly 14% share of the company following up on its long-time collaboration with the company," Harding-Rolls said. "At the time, Sony mentioned a broader interest in cross-media development of anime and games IP to support its other media businesses. So, in that sense any deal for the parent company Kadokawa, which also operates extensively in manga and anime, is a natural extension of this earlier deal. These other areas align nicely with Sony’s anime businesses. "The market conditions for acquisitions have changed dramatically over the last two years but Sony will always be looking for opportunities that can fuel its growth and that bolster its IP portfolio, and that represent value. There may also be a defensive element to this move. FromSoftware is an important partner for Sony’s games business, and it will not want a competitor taking control of Kadokawa and potentially disrupting that relationship. It helps that Kadokawa is also active in areas which are a strong fit with Sony’s wider business." For Sony, its gaming business has already suffered significant layoffs this year and the closure of multiple studios, including Concord developer Firewalk. In February, it announced a round of layoffs affecting 900 staff, or about 8% of its global PlayStation workforce. The layoffs impacted a number of PlayStation studios, including Insomniac, Naughty Dog, Guerrilla, and Firesprite, but PlayStation's London studio was hit hardest with a notice of closure. Since then, Sony-owned Bungie has also suffered devastating cuts as Destiny 2 struggles to find commercial success. 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
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Apart from the Tomb of Elders activity and new loot, Act Two of Revenant in Destiny 2 continues the story of you chasing down Fikrul across the system. The story is short and ends with the Captive Memories mission, which features a small puzzle and an old ******. Here’s a complete walkthrough of the Captive Memories mission in Destiny 2. View the full article
The Magic: The Gathering card Screaming Nemesis has seen a slow but significant price rise over the past few weeks. This red spirit card cost $9.50 a month ago, but since then it's gone up 200%, to a far more impressive $28.60. Read the rest of the story... RELATED LINKS: MTG teases its strangest Commander deck yet The best MTG planeswalker cards Best card games 2024 View the full article
Baldur's Gate 3, pound for pound, has had more daily users in 2024 than in 2023, which feels a little bit like setting a coin spinning, going on holiday for a week, and then coming back only to find it still whirring away on your table... Read more.View the full article
Good news, Final Fantasy 14 is coming to mobile, meaning you'll be able to play the big RPG/MMO thing on the loo without having to haul your bulky setup in there, or do some trickery with keeping doors open so you can still see the screen. Read more View the full article
You can grab ******** Squad ***** The Justice League for just $5 on PC right now. Rocksteady's canonical follow-up to the Batman Arkham series hasn't won over many players since it launched at the start of this year, but if you've been on the fence about trying the live service co-op shooter, this new ***** is the perfect chance to give it a shot. Read the rest of the story... RELATED LINKS: ******** Squad Season 2 saw just 600 players show up to the party ******** Squad is about to be given away for free on Prime Gaming ******** Squad's 10x player count jump can't save Season 1 View the full article
Dooley has been rampant in The Bazaar over the last week, pumping out win after win. The cheeky little ****** harnesses the power of his trusty Core to beat up his poor, unsuspecting opponents. But the dreaded Harmadillo is the real star of the show. In a bid to save the meta, developer Tempo has temporarily removed the overpowered item. In a hotfix patch on Nov. 19, Tempo disabled Harmadillo, Yo-yo, Crook, and a few other items and skills ahead of a “larger patch” coming soon. If you’ve played The Bazaar over the last week, you should be familiar with Harmadillo by now. The armored ****** ramps up quickly, stacking up Armor and dishing out tons of Damage. View the full article
When is the Marvel Rivals Season 1 release date? We're already thinking ahead to the 2025 roadmap for the multiplayer shooter, and if it's anything like its competitors, Overwatch and Valorant, then we can surely expect plenty of additional content and seasonal updates to keep things fresh. The Marvel Rivals release date is not far off, and the multiplayer game starts with Season 0 which will last one month, taking you through December and into the beginning of January. It features half the amount of content we can expect from full season launches and battle pass, but is priced to reflect this. Though details are pretty thin, we do have an idea on what's coming to Season 0 and when to expect Marvel Rivals Season 1. Read the rest of the story... RELATED LINKS: Marvel Rivals release date, gameplay, and latest news All Marvel Rivals characters, tier list, leaks, and full roster Marvel Rivals events - all current and upcoming events View the full article
Leveling up your Pokémon in Pokémon Go is essential if you want to tackle top-tier foes and stay ahead of the curve in PvP. However, Go‘s leveling system is strikingly different to other games in the franchise, so finding out a critter’s level while you train it can be tricky. While there is no exact method of determining a Pokémon’s level in this game, there are several visual cues which can serve as a strong indicator. Here, we’ll ***** into two routes for finding a Pokémon’s level in Pokémon Go, looking at the Pokédex screen method and the Candy method. View the full article
Is Atomfall coming to Game Pass? Rebellion's survival RPG arrives next year, so if you're wondering whether you can play the game on Microsoft's subscription service in 2025, here's everything we know. The Atomfall release date is fast approaching, and Rebellion has finally revealed whether Atomfall is set to be released on Game Pass. In addition to this, we've also received confirmation about the survival game's exact release date and launch platforms. Alongside the announcement, the RPG game is now available to pre-order, and includes a basic supply bundle DLC of an exclusive melee *******, loot caches, and an item recipe, sure to help you with fighting cults and discovering the secrets of the British village. Read the rest of the story... RELATED LINKS: Atomfall release date, gameplay, trailers, and more Atomfall launch window confirmed, as Fallout rival gets closer Fallout London has a rival in new British apocalypse survival RPG View the full article
If you've been waiting for the right moment to buy a new gaming laptop, then you'll want to take a look at this latest offer on the Alienware M16 R2. You can currently save $400 on the price of our favorite gaming laptop, which has an amazing spec, including an Nvidia GeForce RTX 4070, a superb 240Hz screen, and 32GB of RAM. Thanks to this Best Buy gaming laptop deal, you can now pick up this machine for $1,699.99, rather than the usual $2,099.99 asking price. You can read all about why we love this machine in our Alienware M16 R2 review, where we praised this laptop's gaming performance, its great cooling system, and its crisp 240Hz screen. The $1,999 spec we reviewed has the same GPU and RAM as the version on offer, but a lesser CPU in the form of the Core Ultra 7 155H, but the Alienware machine on offer here has the faster, top-end Intel Core Ultra 9 185H in its innards, making it an even better buy for the money. Read the rest of the story... RELATED LINKS: Alienware Pro Wireless review - a surprise package in the best way New Alienware Pro gaming headset looks great, but it's not cheap Dell's Alienware gaming chair just got an awesome price cut View the full article
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Bethesda just released a new patch for Starfield, which fixes many lingering issues and adds a slick new ride. While the developer's post-launch support for the sprawling RPG may have been a bit slow out of the gate it's managed to pick up the pace in 2024 by releasing several updates that have tweaked some frustrating settings and included great quality-of-life improvements. The latest update is no exception but Bethesda has gone one step further by giving everyone access to a couple of exciting free Creations. View the full article
The Callisto Protocol has joined the growing list of games playable in 8K resolution on the PlayStation 5 Pro. Striking Distance Studios’ The Callisto Protocol launched in December 2022 as a triple-A ***** Space spiritual successor, but it met with mixed reviews, performance problems, reports of studio crunch, and issues with crediting staff who worked on the game. The Callisto Protocol initially ******* to meet parent company Krafton's sales expectations, with Glen Schofield, who co-created ***** Space and directed The Callisto Protocol, leaving Striking Distance Studios after significant layoffs. Now, The Callisto Protocol has received an update enabling 8K at 30 frames per second on Sony’s mid-gen console upgrade. Alternatively, you can play at 4K and 60fps. Remarkably, both graphics modes enable full ray tracing. Experience The Callisto Protocol like never before with the power of PlayStation 5 Pro. ****** out of ****** Iron Prison in breathtaking 8K at 30 FPS or 4K at 60 FPS, both with full ray tracing. Now available on PS5 Pro!#TheCallistoProtocol #PS5Pro [Hidden Content] — The Callisto Protocol (@CallistoTheGame) November 19, 2024 The Callisto Protocol joins Polyphony’s Gran Turismo 7, Hello Games’ No Man’s Sky and Codemasters’ F1 24 in supporting 8K output on PS5 Pro. PS5 Pro launched earlier this month priced $700, and offers resolution upscaling via AI-based PlayStation Spectral Super Resolution, or PSSR for short. However, some games appear to run worse on PS5 Pro than the base PS5, with players of Silent Hill 2, Call of Duty: ****** Ops 6, and Star Wars Jedi: Survivor reporting issues. IGN’s PS5 Pro review returned a 7/10. We said: “The PlayStation 5 Pro is an impressive console with noticeable boosts in performance and graphics for games that take advantage of its powerful hardware. But for $700, you’ll need to think twice about whether or not the upgrade is worth the price tag.” 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
It feels like almost ever since Disco Elysium arrived in our lives, it's been linked to behind-the-scenes messiness which, while it's taken various forms and involved different parties, usually follows some similar themes. It's generally quite complex - as they said/this other person said video game drama often is - sometimes litigious, and occasionally really weird, if still clearly worth taking seriously. Read more View the full article
The first trailer for the live action remake of How to Train Your Dragon just has me wondering why we keep bothering to do this. Read more View the full article
Who’s hungry? I’m starving. The League of Legends champion who says today’s LoLdle quote knows a thing or two about eating. Here’s the answer to the Nov. 20 quote. Who says “What is that taste?” in LoL? Starving. Screenshot by Dot Esports The LoLdle quote for Nov. 20 is “What is that taste?” The League champion who says this voice line is Tahm Kench. You know, that huge, hungry catfish guy. View the full article
An industry insider has shared promising news surrounding the next Battlefield game, claiming that publisher EA is holding some of the series' biggest playtests to date. According to the report, the upcoming installment in EA and DICE's popular Battlefield franchise is undergoing multiple playtests, which reportedly vary from smaller feedback sessions to large-scale player tests. View the full article
Ubisoft has released a new STALKER Apparel bundle for Tom Clancys The Division 2, just in time to celebrate the launch of GSC Game Worlds long-awaited shooter STALKER 2: Heart of Chornobyl. The collaboration was previously teased, but players can now get their hands on the cosmetics designed to bring the STALKER franchises post-apocalyptic aesthetic into The Division 2s fallout. View the full article
Every DnD dungeon master wants to immerse their players into the campaign, and audio has a huge role to play. Delving through dank dungeons, chains rattling and footsteps echoing; or amidst a violent battlefield, steel clashing with steel as thousands of voices shout in fury - it all adds to the sense that the players are really there. You can grab $570 (£451.38) worth of gorgeously crafted audio for only $25 (£19.28), thanks to the TTRPG Audio Compendium on Humble Bundle. Read the rest of the story... RELATED LINKS: All DnD languages explained DnD's Secret Level trailer goes full-on uncanny valley, Sonic movie style Kobold Press says sorry for dunking on DnD Dm's guide View the full article
SCS Software have announced that Euro Truck Simulator 2 - Greece is set for release on December 4th. Plus, they're continuing to update the visuals for both Euro Truck Simulator 2 and ********* Truck Simulator. Read the full article here: [Hidden Content] View the full article
****** Mesa finally finished development in 2020 after over a decade, but the community isn't done with the classic games just yet. Only yesterday, a small team of hobbyist developers announced an Opposing Force remake. View the full article
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Recently I covered that Kadokawa, the owner of ELDEN RING developer FromSoftware, were potentially being acquired by Sony and now Kadokawa have confirmed there's something going on. Read the full article here: [Hidden Content] View the full article