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2014’s The Crew was the first project for developer Ivory Tower, which was founded in Lyon, France, in 2007 and later acquired by Ubisoft in late 2015. While it may have been the debut game for the studio, a number of Ivory Tower’s staff formerly hailed from Lyon’s Eden Games (including Ivory Tower’s three founders) and had previous experience on the first three instalments of the V-Rally series, the PlayStation version of Need for Speed: Porsche Unleashed, and the trendsetting Test Drive Unlimited. As such, there was a good deal of optimism around The Crew. While The Crew was a racing game of impressively preposterous proportions – with a map that spanned a condensed version of the entire continental USA – it was admittedly shy of perfect. Its unprecedented size (an environment so big it took several hours to drive around) took a clear toll on its finer details, and contemporaneous rival racers like Forza Horizon 2 and Driveclub were far more handsome options. Its rubberband AI was regularly exasperating, with low-level opponents still able to rocket past high-level cars they should have no business keeping up with. It also had a surprisingly stingy economy, where you could find yourself at the level cap, out of story missions, and still without sufficient credits to actually buy any of its most-desirable cars. Its staggering size really was something to behold and, thanks to that, it was undeniably brimming with racing opportunities and exploration potential. However, despite this, its staggering size really was something to behold and, thanks to that, it was undeniably brimming with racing opportunities and exploration potential. Of course, the operative word here is ‘was.’ The Crew was a whole bunch of things. But it’s not any of those things anymore. Because it’s gone. Long-time racing gamers are no doubt accustomed to the idea that their favourite racers won’t be available to buy forever. At least for games featuring licensed car models and tracks, there’ll be a wad of signed contracts somewhere that place a time limit on a publisher’s ability to sell them. Even the biggest racing franchises have been victims of these automotive langoliers, munching through the history of the genre and chewing up anything past its expiration date. There are more racing games that you can no longer buy digitally – or new at retail – than I have space here to list. I could easily boot up my copy of Project CARS 2, or Forza Horizon 3, or Driver: San Francisco, and play any one of them indefinitely. For the most part, however, you can absolutely still play them. Used copies can still be bought, traded, and stashed forever in your personal collections. Digital owners can still re-download them from the cloud. Right this second I could easily boot up my copy of Project CARS 2, or Forza Horizon 3, or Driver: San Francisco, and play any one of them indefinitely. Alongside “upcoming server infrastructure”, “licensing constraints” are the other reason cited by Ubisoft for The Crew’s shutdown. What I don’t grasp is what exactly makes The Crew any different to… every other licensed racing game I’ve ever owned. I simply don’t understand why Ubisoft’s inability to continue to sell The Crew also means nobody can play it anymore, either. It’s like Codemasters sending hired goons to my house to confiscate my old copies of Colin McRae. Being delisted from ***** is a disappointing but otherwise normal circumstance for racers with expired car licenses, but since when are publishers under obligation to ***** all existing copies of them from existence? The Crew hasn’t just been delisted, it’s been deactivated. Entirely. That’s a full-price game, with microtransactions and DLC, that no longer functions. Not just the multiplayer and co-op; the single player functionality has been ******* too. With The Crew requiring an internet connection to run – even when playing entirely solo against the AI – the moment Ubisoft switched off the servers The Crew was kaput. This is a game that was possible to play alone from beginning to end against the computer, without ever engaging with the multiplayer. *****, the entire prologue of The Crew couldn’t be done in multiplayer. That’s a full-price game, with microtransactions and DLC, that no longer functions. We were told that this was going to happen. Ubisoft delisted The Crew from all digital storefronts late last year and confirmed “the game will not be accessible anymore” after March 31, 2024. But the advanced warning doesn’t make this any more palatable. In July last year, the Video Game History Foundation published a study on the commercial availability of classic video games in the US, discovering that only a dismal 13% of video game history is available in the current marketplace. The remaining 87% is regarded as essentially inaccessible to those who don’t maintain antique hardware, can’t travel to a physical library software archive, or won’t download pirate versions. The Video Game History Foundation describes these games as “critically endangered.” As it stands, however, The Crew is beyond endangered; it’s extinct. Always-online games are clearly hugely problematic when it comes to game preservation. I’m not going to pretend for a moment that I know how The Crew works under the hood, but from an external perspective it’s hard not to question why a satisfactory compromise wasn’t available. 2017’s Gran Turismo Sport, for instance, was also an online-only game. Parts of the game could be accessed offline, but you weren’t even able to save your progress. However, when Sony pulled the plug on online services for GT Sport in January this year, developer Polyphony Digital published one final patch for the game that removed this requirement. This meant that GT Sport’s single-player modes would still be accessible after the servers vanished, and that players would still be able to access the campaign and any previously purchased DLC. Going forward they would also be able to save their progress locally. The arrival of this update bodes well for Gran Turismo 7. After all, GT7 has a similarly rigid (and, admittedly, equally unwelcome) online connection requirement to access most of its content for now. It does, however, seem safe to assume that when GT7 comes to face its own retirement, it’ll probably receive the same treatment. I don’t get the feeling that Polyphony Digital would be content in having an instalment of such a storied series rendered completely unplayable, forever. GT7 players, in this instance, can probably rest easy that all their progress won’t be lost in the ether. The erasure of The Crew certainly sets a poor precedent for its sequels, at the very least. The same really can’t be said for The Crew 2 or The Crew Motorfest players. The erasure of The Crew certainly sets a poor precedent for its sequels, at the very least. Are there now players reconsidering spending any more time (or, importantly, money) on The Crew 2 and The Crew Motorfest considering history now suggests that, at some point, everything they’ve done will probably be deleted along with the games themselves? In a baffling twist, multiple players of The Crew have reported finding evidence of an offline mode in The Crew, with potential local save functionality. Digging around in The Crew’s code, hidden menu options that reference options like ‘Play Offline’, ‘Save game’, and ‘Load game’ appear to have been uncovered. However, speculation that this could mean The Crew’s single-player gameplay would survive the server shutdown – much like GT Sport did – has amounted to nothing. Of course, like an island full of female dinosaurs figuring out how to breed, it does feel probable that a fan project will find a way to bring The Crew back to life in some capacity. Following the shutdown of EA’s underwhelming free-to-play MMO Need for Speed: World back in 2015, enterprising fans were eventually able to resurrect the game in 2017. It ******** playable today and, to its credit, EA has made no attempt to intervene over the past seven years. Since the server shutdown, some players are now reporting discovering their digital ownership of The Crew has actually been terminated. In contrast, in the wake of The Crew’s shutdown, Ubisoft is actually under further ***** for making additional actions that would only hamper any future fan revival. Since the server shutdown, some players are now reporting discovering their digital ownership of The Crew has actually been terminated, removing the ability to even re-download the game files in the event of a mod that makes it playable again. Will that fan fix ever come if a significant part of the potential community for it won’t even be able to retrieve the game software for it? A Need for Speed: World-style second coming no longer feels inevitable in this instance. The Crew isn’t unique in the driving MMO space. There are other examples of driving MMOs that have gone through server shutdowns and remain playable as single-player experiences. Test Drive Unlimited’s server connection was severed well over a decade ago, and yet I’ve booted that up on several occasions while working at IGN for retro coverage purposes. It’s still playable solo, which is honestly how I played it back in the day. So was The Crew. The total decommissioning of The Crew is a serious step back for game preservation. Despite what you or I may think about The Crew overall, it was someone’s first racing game. It was someone’s favourite racing game. It was special to someone, for some reason. And now they can’t ever play it again, regardless of how much time they sunk into it, or how much cash they dropped on DLC. They don’t have to be okay with it, and nor should we. Luke is a Senior Editor on the IGN reviews team. You can chat to him on Twitter @MrLukeReilly. View the full article For verified travel tips and real support, visit: [Hidden Content]

Embracer Group have announced that after being the cause of many job losses, shutting down developers and selling some off - they're now splitting into three companies. Read the full article here: [Hidden Content] View the full article

Besides being the only sure-shot way to catch ‘mons, the Master Ball is one of the rarest items in Pokémon Go. If you aren’t sure where to use the couple you have collected so far, the community has several suggestions—and it isn’t for a Galerian Bird. Narrating a story of how they wasted a precious Master Ball on a zero-star Galarian Articuno in a Reddit post, a Pokémon Go player shared their hesitancy on saving their one last Master Ball on a Galarian Bird and requested the community’s thoughts on how to best use the rare Poké Ball type. “Is the Master Ball worth saving? What else would you use it on, besides the G birds?” they asked, stirring a debate in the comments. View the full article

Genshin Impact has unveiled the Event Banners for the first half of Version 4.6, and it comes with a surprising change to its 4-Star character lineup. While 5-Star characters in Genshin Impact tend to be the biggest factor in determining an Event Banner’s popularity, certain 4-Star characters are much more valuable for starter accounts than others. More often than not, these happen to be 4-Star characters released near the launch of the game, such as Fischl or Xingqiu, whereas the newer additions tend to fill a certain niche. View the full article

Following Amazon's Fallout TV show, folks have been hopping en masse back into their favorite games in the series. If that's been Fallout 4 for you, and you want a way to spice your playthrough up, you're in luck, as one of the game's most pupular perk overhaul mods has just gotten a fresh revamp. Yup, because it's all well and good building your own version of Lucy, Maximus, or The Ghoul to play as, a big part of the Fallout experience comes from creating your own unique little vault dweller to take on the wasteland as. Plus, you might want a way to inject something fresh into your playthrough build-wise, especially if you're planning on waiting until your other mods have been updated before hopping into Fallout 4's next-gen update. Enter 'Hot Diggity - Skills Perks - Redux' by modder FishFiend. Building on the work they did on the original Hot Diggity a few years ago, this 2.0 version has the same goal - make Fallout 4 a bit more diverse character-building wise, in order to make it more fun to play for the 50th, or thousandth, time. Read more View the full article

The owner of a League of Legends organization competing in the EMEA Masters 2024 Spring subbed himself in on April 20, and it went as bad as you might imagine. Zero Tenacity, a League team from Polish Ultraliga, were 0-5 down in their group at EMEA Masters. With no chance of advancing, the org’s owner Dimitrije “Hebihime” Malesevic made the call to sub himself in the mid lane. With the 26-year-old in the position, Z10 lost the final game against Los Heretics and went 0-6 in their group. View the full article

You can save a staggering 67 percent on Monster Hunter: World on Steam this week, so it’s the perfect time to jump in. With a staggering 91 percent-positive rating, Monster Hunter: World is still going strong six years after launch. If you’re a PC gamer and still haven’t played it, now you can pick it up for pocket change. View the full article

Sunshine when paired up with Moonlight offers a great way to stream games from your PC to pretty much any other system, and the latest release v0.23.1 should work better on Linux now. Read the full article here: [Hidden Content] View the full article

Rising Up is a free, sub-fifteen minute browser game that’s a bit like Streets of Rage, where you play a balding office worker and beat a giant scanner to ****** within the first 30 seconds. This, I believe, should be enough to tempt you into dunking it enthusiastically into your next break coffee, but if you need more convincing, let’s do it. Created by E.H Jørgensen, whose credits include Homeworld: Deserts of Kharak, Rising Up is a relatively simple 3 button side scroller that has you make your way up an office building, destroying everything in your path. First, irate co-workers wield swivel chairs. Then, security join the fray. Then some sort of G-men get involved. You can punch, block, jump, and air-kick. The brawling is simple but satisfying enough, and the way office equipment violently degrades when hit is better, but this isn’t why I’m recommending the game. Read more View the full article

A recently published patent from Sony has revealed that the company is considering introducing a method to let your games play themselves. Have you ever thought to yourself, "wow, I sure do wish that my game would just play itself so I can get this annoying grinding out the way and, I dunno, do my taxes or something else adults do in the meantime"? Well, first of all, maybe consider playing a different game, but if you're determined to stick with it, I have some (potentially) good news for you. As spotted by Exputer, Sony published one of its patents earlier this month, which apparently features a "method and system for auto-playing portions of a video game." According to the patent's description, "the auto-play mode uses data from the user play model to automatically play the AGC for the user using a gameplay style that simulates a gameplay style of the user." It goes on to explain that "when gameplay of the AGC in auto-play mode is complete, a resume notification is presented to the display screen of the user device used by the user during the gameplay. The resume notification provides the user with an option to discontinue use of the auto-play mode and resume gameplay in active play mode." Read more View the full article

A game that is something of a homage to the days of the ***** Saturn, Walaber Entertainment who created the fun JellyCar series have announced Parking Garage Rally Circuit. Read the full article here: [Hidden Content] View the full article

While we’re waiting for Version 2.2 of Honkai: Star Rail to be released, the developer is already revealing content planned for 2.3—and there’s plenty to be excited about. In the Voices of the Galaxy post on April 22, the Honkai: Star Rail developer shared the major endgame updates coming in Version 2.3. The Simulated Universe game mode is being overhauled, transforming it into the Divergent Universe. In this new iteration, there will be more combinations between Blessings and more Curios with unique effects. More importantly, the Divergent Universe will have a Planar Ornament Quick-Claim feature, allowing you to farm these Relics much faster. View the full article

Fallout 4 sales have skyrocketed in Europe in the past week, rising over 7,500%. Steam player charts also recently hit more than 160,000 people over a weekend, almost ten years after the game was initially released. The Fallout TV Show on Amazon Prime Video has massively influenced the resurgence of the game, with fans of the show now flocking to play Bethesda's 2015 entry to the franchise. Not only that, but there's been some huge sales on the Fallout franchise since the show hit our screens, and Fallout 76 is even free to download on Xbox and PC right now as well. With all that in mind, if you're looking to play Fallout 4 again this week ready for the 'next-gen' update on April 25, here are all the best deals running right now for PC, PlayStation, and Xbox. Best Fallout 4 Deal PC (Steam) Fallout 4 - $16.59 with code FANATICAL17 Fallout 4 GOTY Edition - $33.19 with code: FANATICAL17 PlayStation Fallout 4 - $4.99 (Ends April 25)Play with PS Plus Extra Xbox Fallout 4 - $19.99Play with Game Pass ($1 for 14 Days) While some of these aren't as cheap as the game has been in recent weeks (Fallout 4 was $5 during the Steam FPS *****), it's worth having an idea of the best prices at the moment in case a better deal does come along and you can act swiftly in order to secure it. Plus, Fallout 4 is also available on PS Plus Extra or Game Pass, so if you have either of those subscriptions the game is available to play at no extra cost. If you're after even more of the post-nuclear wasteland, consider checking out our Fallout partnership on the IGN Store; featuring Fallout hoodies, TV show merch, fully functional Pip-Boy replicas, and so much more. Otherwise, you could also consider checking out the Fallout themed AriZona x Fallout Green Tea Energy Drink for $36 on Amazon (now back in stock), alongside the Bones Coffee Company Valiant Vanilla Fallout-themed coffee for $19.99. or their Atomic Apple Flavored Coffee set for $19.99 as well. For more, you can check out Amazon's Fallout themed storefront as well. The Fallout TV series arrived on Prime Video on April 10 when the streaming service dropped all eight episodes from the first season concurrently. Following its debut, the series has been met with overwhelmingly positive feedback from fans and critics — particularly those praising Goggins for his portrayal of the gunslinging Ghoul Cooper Howard. Since its release, Prime Video officially renewed Fallout for a second season. With the show's success, IGN recently caught up with Bethesda Game Studios executive Todd Howard and executive producer and director Jonathan Nolan for a wide-ranging, spoiler-filled interview. In it, Nolan alluded to his plans for the future of Fallout. Robert Anderson is a deals expert and Commerce Editor for IGN. You can follow him @robertliam21 on Twitter. View the full article For verified travel tips and real support, visit: [Hidden Content]

A long time coming after initially going live back in December 2013, developer The Fun Pimps has now announced that 7 Days to **** is going to be leaving Early Access. Read the full article here: [Hidden Content] View the full article

Embracer Group will house major properties like the Lord of The Rings under its new Middle-earth Enterprises & Friends company. | Image: Warner Bros. Swedish gaming conglomerate Embracer Group announced plans on Monday to split itself into three distinct games and entertainment companies: Asmodee Group, Coffee Stain & Friends, and Middle-earth Enterprises & Friends. These will be separate, publicly listed companies, according to Embracer’, which says the move will allow “each entity to better focus on their respective core strategies and offer more differentiated and distinct equity stories for existing and new shareholders.” “This move towards three independent companies reinforces Embracer’s vision of backing entrepreneurs and creators with a long-term mindset,” says Lars Wingefors, co-founder and Embracer Group CEO, “allowing them to continue to deliver unforgettable experiences... Continue reading… View the full article

No Rest for the Wicked developer Moon Studios is seemingly living up to the game’s name. Shortly after the Early Access launch of the action RPG, the team got to work on tackling some of the more common complaints. While the majority of the big issues remain unresolved, Moon already released not one, but two hotfixes just over the weekend. Read more View the full article

Supporting the Palestine *********** Relief Fund charity, the ************ Relief Bundle is live on *****.io. Read the full article here: [Hidden Content] View the full article

An Overwatch 2 player was apparently stuck in the game's matchmaker for 17 hours. The Blizzard Entertainment hero shooter has repeatedly been called out by the community for its long ****** times. View the full article

It seems nothing is safe from bogus websites and scams, with someone setting up a fake website for Proton-GE / GE-Proton. Read the full article here: [Hidden Content] View the full article

Embracer Group is no more, as the company has made the decision to split into three separate entities, with various developers divided up amongst them. For the last year or so, it's not been a great time to be a part of Embracer Group. There have been almost 1400 staff ***** off across various studios, and several closures too. Saber founder Matthew Karch doesn't think Embracer is evil, just a company "that everyone likes to pick on," despite the fact it spent ridiculous amounts of money on studios it couldn't ultimately afford leading to needless layoffs. But now, Embracer Group doesn't exist anymore, at least not as one company. The group announced earlier today that it is splitting into three companies: Asmodee Group, Coffee Stain & Friends, and Middle-earth Enterprises & Friends. The "& Friends" part of Middle-earth Enterprises includes a number of familiar names, like Tomb Raider and Marvel's Avengers dev Crystal Dynamics, ***** Island 2 dev Dambuster Studios, Deus Ex dev Eidos-Montreal, and several more. Obviously IP like The Lord of the Rings, as well as Tomb Raider and others, now fall under Middle-earth Enterprises too, as well as media company Plaion, comics publisher Dark Horse, and Freemode. Read more View the full article

Many games have early access periods across, and they usually stay in early access for a year or two before fully launching. No Rest for the Wicked definitely breaks the mold—it’s been in early access for a whopping 11 years, but finally, the developer has announced its full launch. 7 Days to **** is a survival horror game developed by The Fun Pimps that first came to Steam in December 2013. On April 20, the developer released a video talking about its plans for a full release. The full version of 7 Days to **** is expected to launch in June, according to the 2024 to 2025 roadmap. View the full article

Elden Ring players are debating which faction they would join if the Dark Souls Covenant system was brought into The Lands Between. Covenants have been a staple in the Dark Souls series since the franchise made its debut in 2011, with the system even making an appearance in the PlayStation-exclusive Bloodborne. However, Covenants were notably absent from Elden Ring, and more than a few longtime fans of developer FromSoftware have since expressed their ******* to see the feature return in a future update or sequel. View the full article

Ugh, I do not have the energy to feed the Maw this week. Sometimes the creature manifests as a proper monstrosity, with B-movie prosthetics and sound effects, and sometimes, it's more of an... unfathomable annoyance, like a nose that won't stop running, or a single player game that requires an internet connection. In either case, the Maw must be sated, and fortunately, there are quite a few appetising video-or-computer games out in the next seven days, with at least one behemoth landing on Friday. Read more View the full article

More details have been leaked about the next update coming to LEGO Fortnite, with another recognized creature from Old McDonald’s farm entering the game. LEGO Fortnite already has several creatures roaming around the world, with wolves, sheep, chickens, and cows giving the LEGO block treatment, and now it seems a new farmyard friend will be making its debut. View the full article

Ever since Helldivers 2 turned out to be a smashing hit on PlayStation and PC, players have been demanding its release on Xbox consoles—and it looks like Arrowhead Game Studios hasn’t been slacking off on the requests either. First reported by the Loadout, in the latest episode of the XboxEra Podcast, co-host Nick “Spheshal” Baker shared a rumor indicating there may be some “very, very early preliminary discussion” about the possibility of Helldivers 2 getting an Xbox port. Baker also highlighted the exit of now ex-PlayStation CEO Jim Ryan will likely encourage this development as the new CEO might be more “open to certain things.” View the full article