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D&D 5.5e is, in general, an improvement on the original fifth edition. There's a reason I gave it a 9/10 review. Weak points have been addressed, play is more consistent, and the game is more approachable than ever before. The few issues I have with the edition upgrade are nitpicks - but one bothers me more than most. Read the full story on Wargamer: D&D 5.5e is excellent, but one lost 5e feature needs to make a comeback View the full article

Late on Thursday, two brand new Pokémon cards were revealed in Japan: a flashy new version of the living sushi Mega Tatsurgiri ex, and a new trainer card for Pokémon Z-A's Lida. The cards will first be available in promo packs for participants in Pokémon Card Gym battles in Japan, but will make their way to the Western world in a future set. Read the full story on Wargamer: Pokémon TCG reveals a deliciously weird new Mega Tatsugiri ex card, plus a powerful Lida trainer View the full article

The Communications Workers of America (CWA) union and their ********* offshoot CWA Canada have filed unfair labour practice complaints against Microsoft, accusing the company of having mishandled the recent mass layoffs at Xbox. Read more View the full article

Answering concerns that The Sims team may face pressure to reduce support for diversity following the Saudi Arabian-backed buyout of EA, senior character artist Jess Hyland says she's not "heard anything" about such a mandate and, if one were introduced, she "would fight it tooth and nail." Read more View the full article

The shield saw, the star of last year's Doom: The Dark Ages, was my favorite weapon in Doom's entire bloody history. Not content with just sticking a parry in Doom and going for lunch early, id Software instead delivered the world's deadliest beyblade. A merciless disc of death you could frisbee into a screaming ******, or boomerang through entire hordes. The slowest, most lumbering entry of the new-Doom trilogy also starred a 'shield bash' that sent you rushing across the battlefield and slamming into Hell's finest. Slow? Please. Sonic wishes he could move like this. The shield saw should be patched into Dark Souls immediately. Every other shield in gaming should hang its non-head in shame. What I'm basically trying to get across here is that the shield saw rules. And within the opening hour of Doom: The Dark Ages – Revelations, the FPS' new DLC, id took my shield saw away and snapped it in half. (Image credit: Bethesda Softworks) It's a bold new step forward for the Doom Slayer, but rather than developers being able to celebrate, the studio is already losing half its staff as part of Xbox's ongoing large-scale layoffs. That includes reportedly putting the future of the id Tech engine itself in jeopardy, and leading developers to question the value of Microsoft's purchase of ZeniMax, which included id owner Bethesda, back in 2021 in the first place. That's all before we even had enough time to tell you this Doom: The Dark Ages expansion is actually super rad. Turns out, big business can be more devastating than any BFG – and that's heartbreaking. Sawly Missed (Image credit: Bethesda Softworks) Going dark (Image credit: Xbox/id Software) In our Doom: The Dark Ages review we said that "the joy of blasting cacodemons with a shotgun is never truly lost, and the over-the-top aesthetic will always elevate the experience". The Doom Slayer has been sent to Hell-prison, you see, presumably on about four billion ****** ******* charges. He thankfully gets to keep all the spectacular guns from last year's game, including the one that sprays bone fragments of ****** skulls, the shotgun that sounds like the Earth itself splitting in half when you fire it, and that wonderful chainshot that's essentially the grittiest reboot of ball-and-paddle ever. While it's great to be reunited with all these magnificent *******-toys, the shield saw being taken away truly hurts. Last year this studio trained us to approach Doom in a whole new defensive way, and now it's ripped and torn that option out entirely. Even FromSoftware let us enjoy an entire trilogy of Dark Souls games cowering behind a shield before snatching it away with Sekiro. id barely waited a year. (Image credit: Bethesda Softworks) So what replaces this divine disc of death? The new chain spear, which is so weedy in appearance compared to a shield/chainsaw hybrid that I thought the game was joking. It looks like the kind of thing the Doom Slayer would use as a toothpick. The spear actually shares a surprising amount of the shield's functionality. You can hookshot onto obstacles on enemies, like the shield dash. It can parry green attacks, and it stuns enemies you lob it into – though this effect only lasts until its hookshot has finished dragging you towards your victim. Which means you'll now be standing right next to a monster who's no longer stunned and is ready to get revenge. Gee, thanks. Ah, but I soon discover that where I land is actually in my control. This isn't your bog standard videogame hookshot, wherein you latch onto where you want to go and then simply watch yourself get yanked towards it. No, you're able to swing left, right, and above as you're hooked forward, opening up some sublime new strategies. The cacodemon, the floating megabrain that caused me so much misery in the main campaign, is now basically a hookshot launch pad for me to ascend myself to bullet heaven. I fling myself over it then unload super shotgun blasts into its grey-going-on-red matter the whole way down, landing in a fresh pile of its giblet-y remains. Bloody bliss. Revelations also restores the much-missed dash button from Doom Eternal. Not being able to block isn't so bad when you can hurl yourself around or keep flinging yourself into the sky. Better yet, Revelations starts rewarding daring dodges as much as it rewards parries. Death From Above (Image credit: Bethesda Softworks) Last-second dodges fill a meter you can spend on executing special moves. I initially opt for a ground slam that damages anything stupid enough to be near where I land. That dash works in the air, too, so I can hook myself up and get an impressive amount of kills in before my feet ever get reacquainted with the ground. Doom has rediscovered its love of sending you airborne and developed a newfound romance with keeping you up there. Properly engaging with the weapon wheel is friction I'd sorely missed. Ammo scarcity, something I all but forgot about in The Dark Ages proper, constantly catches me out this time. Probably because all my ammo upgrades from the main campaign are gone, and Revelations is about as difficult as that game's third act right from the starting shot. Not being able to just rely on a couple of guns to get through an encounter, but actually properly engaging with the weapon wheel is friction I'd sorely missed. Oh, I have a weapon called the impaler! Good to see you, old friend. Sorry for, er, completely forgetting you existed. Um… has the shield saw asked about me at all? Doom has also learnt how to keep a secret again. The Dark Ages' main campaign made the bizarre decision to put almost every collectable on the map screen. Then it had the audacity to cheer 'you found a secret area!' when you walked into the clearly signposted 'secret' area. Imagine if I showed you where my bathroom was and then bellowed "SECRET AREA FOUND" as soon as you entered it. You'd be baffled for a number of reasons. Revelations, somewhat ironically, knows to keep things under wraps so finding its secret areas and bonus pickups actually feel like achievements again. (Image credit: Bethesda Softworks) You'll want to seek them out, too, to afford the excellent Chain Spear upgrades. There's Deflection, which makes the spear reflect back automatic weapon fire whenever you dash, the slayer twirling it like a dance baton (where was this in Lollipop Chainsaw?). Tormentor will spin you around an enemy you've got the hook of the spear buried in, perfect for filling them with lead. Upgrade Tormentor again and enemies will also drop ammo and catch fire during that process. Cowards are definitely onto something – shooting someone in the back is immensely satisfying. …What? So, after a steep learning curve, the Chain Spear definitely won me over. But before it did, something odd happened. The saw shield came crawling back. A few hours in, Revelations returns the shield to you, and now you can switch it out with the spear whenever you want. I was really torn about this. Great as it was to have my favorite toy back, I respected the game a lot more when it locked me into a new playstyle. Offense is the Best Defence? (Image credit: Bethesda Softworks) The shield is essentially a safer, steadier bet. Whereas the spear, when used well, can end a brutal battle in seconds. The catch being it can also end the battle for you in seconds. Eventually, you learn when best to switch them out on the fly. Demons who fire automatic guns at me are no match for a spear which can deflect those bullets. Whereas near the end of a long, long onslaught of demons, I appreciate a quick breather behind the shield so I don't lose the last twenty minutes of progress. Once I truly got a handle on the spear, the shield was reduced to mere cameos, but I still think the game would have benefitted from at least another hour of it being my sole option before tempting me back into the more familiar pleasures of the shield saw. (Image credit: Bethesda Softworks) It's a minor pacing complaint with what's otherwise a terrific package, an inspired remix of Dark Ages and Eternal that's as exhilarating as Doom has ever been. It's beautiful, the story is… well, much less crap than the main campaign's, and the puzzles can actually be called puzzles this time without being laughed out of the room. Best of all, the core combat is about as good as FPS gunplay gets. Only Saros threatens this one's perch for single-player shooter of the year. I said single-player, Marathon stans. Put away your shield saws… Imagine owning a studio that can make games of this quality, that last year got three million players on board, and then gutting them more viciously than a ****** on the wrong end of a chain spear. Tragically, Xbox's cruel layoffs that are targeting 3,200 roles across several studios may have finally delivered the killing blow to the Doom Slayer. Let's hope Revelations isn't the swansong to a studio of such incredible talent. Check out our best FPS games ranking for more blasting! [/url]View the full article

Despite having 15 years between them, Call of Duty: ****** Ops' PS4 and PS5 port is seemingly suffering from the same exploits that its PS3 version has also been a victim of. Activision released both Call of Duty: ****** Ops and ****** Ops 2 for the PS4 and PS5 last week in the form of straightforward ports, not remasters – both games are also on Xbox Series X|S via backward compatibility. While making two fan-favorite games available to more people should've been a slam dunk win for Activision, XP exploits quickly made multiplayer lobbies nearly unplayable for large waves of ****** Ops 1's online population. As spotted by IGN, YouTuber Tdawgsmitty recently chatted with a modder who explained that the problem might actually be a leftover exploit from the original game's PS3 and Xbox 360 days. Right now, there aren't any aimbots and such flooding the game, but people are modding save files to farm more XP than is usually possible by spamming themselves with grenades, say, which is ruining competitive games for regular players. "Essentially, what you're doing is that it's like PS3 where you copy [a save file] to your USB, and there's a website that lets you unencrypt it," the modder says. "The site lets you use a jailbroken PS4/PS5, and it will decrypt it for you. The save data is the exact same as PS3. What sucks about this port is that Iron Galaxy [and] Activision didn't bother changing the encryption on the files, which is the whole reason why this is available right now. That's the only reason why." Activision disabled "select playlists" a few days ago while it investigates reported issues. It then updated some playlists with "a server-wide fix," though the modder suggests other game modes are still exploitable. For now, reminisce with the best Call of Duty games of all time. [/url]View the full article

A brand-new 8-player co-op survival game, where players try to survive a convergence of tornadoes, has hit Steam and received some strong reviews at launch. For anyone who enjoys co-op games on Steam, especially those that lean more toward friendslop, it's a game worth watching. View the full article

After almost three weeks of community outcry, Blizzard is modifying the drop rates for Mythics in Diablo 4 Season 14. Players had been finding it tough to get Unique Mythics, to the point where many couldn't find any despite farming specifically for them, and now hotfixes are being rolled out to take the edge off. "We've heard your feedback on Season of Death Awakening, including Mythic unique drop rates, equip limits, and more," Dan Tanguay, the design director of live service for Diablo 4, says on the official Blizzard forums, as relayed by Marcus 'Marcoose' Kretz, senior community manager for the Diablo series. "In a patch releasing today, we're increasing the drop rate for Mythics from the Corrupted Reaper boss fight and removing equip limits for Mythic Uniques," he writes. "Additionally, in a patch coming next week, we're adding Superior Lair Keys to the Glints of Hope repeatable cache and increasing the Mythic Tribute drop rates in the Undercity." [Hidden Content] How much the drop rate for the Corrupted Reaper battle increases will need to be tested, but seeing as numerous players have gotten exactly zero uniques from that encounter, things can really only go up. Letting people equip more than one is helpful as well – you can only have one crafted Mythic at a time currently, significantly reducing the options for any given build. His post was made on July 16, yesterday at time of writing, meaning it should be live and available to you whenever you boot up Diablo 4 next. A fan on Reddit amusingly told others they can now "re-install Diablo 4," since a few had commented they were ostensibly avoiding this season due to what was happening with Mythics. The second patch Tanguay mentioned should massage out further problems, too. "Seasons are where we experiment with new ideas and push Diablo 4 in new directions," he finishes. "Not every idea lands exactly as intended, but we’ll continue listening to your feedback, addressing what’s not working, and applying those lessons to future seasonal updates." Diablo 4's Overwatch crossover skins have been revealed and they are completely cursed: "Mercy looks like a 90-year-old grandma." [/url]View the full article

Pokémon Winds and Waves is making a real splash right now with several exciting new leaks surfacing for the upcoming release. Though the game's launch is still a ways off, Winds and Waves is already shaping up to be one of the franchise's biggest generational leaps yet. The 10th-generation adventure transports players to a sprawling tropical archipelago inspired by Southeast Asia, featuring lush jungles, volcanic islands, bustling coastal cities, and expansive underwater environments to explore. View the full article

New Slay the Spire 2 patch notes have just hit the roguelike deckbuilder's beta branch, with key Ancient relics and class cards nerfed. Read the full story on PCGamesN: Slay the Spire 2 makes painful but necessary nerfs, and some scary buffs, in a big new balance overhaul View the full article

Bohemia Interactive say DayZ Badlands is the largest expansion so far for the popular open-world zombie survival game. Read the full article here: [Hidden Content] View the full article

As Assassin's Creed ****** Flag Resynced players beg Edward to put his pipe away, Ubisoft has confirmed it's looking into it. The remake of the title many people consider the best Assassin's Creed game is unsurprisingly pretty well liked, with it being the fourth-highest-rated game in the series – it even saw the biggest Steam launch in the series' history. But the biggest complaint with the game itself – well, aside from the gross $80 DLC and it being briefly unplayable over the first weekend on PC, but those aren't as funny – has been Edward's pipe. For whatever reason, the blowpipe weapon in Assassin's Creed ****** Flag has been moved for its Resynced return. As far back as months before the game launched, fans picked up on the weird positioning of the weapon, and players have been asking for a toggle to make the blowpipe invisible until you need to use it. Speaking with YouTuber JorRaptor, Richard Knight – game director on Assassin's Creed ****** Flag Resynced – acknowledges the complaints about the weapon. When JorRaptor mentions that players are looking for a way to hide it, Knight explains, "I'm not sure this is official yet," but "one of our most senior programmers is working on it right now." He adds, "The feeling is mutual. I have a feeling it's coming soon." [Hidden Content] As for why it wasn't there from the get go, Knight says: "I wish it was just a magical feature that just was there the moment it started, but it's just because of the way characters are set up." He explains, "Somebody has to do setup to make this specific part of the character just disappear only when this specific setting is enabled, which you know we need to do." So while nothing is "official" yet, you can rest easy knowing you'll be able to have Edward sans blowpipe soon. If you're yet to set sail in Ubisoft's new remake, be sure to check out our Assassin's Creed ****** Flag Resynced review. [/url]View the full article

Rockstar Games' open worlds are humungous affairs full of things to buy, shoot, collect, rob, and do. Although with games as lush and extravagant as Red Dead Redemption and GTA 5, it might surprise you to learn that Rockstar Games is actually quite restrained, and the developer cuts a lot of content before passing the finish line. That's according to former GTA 5 producer John Ricchio, who recently told Kiwi Talkz about how the Grand Theft Auto developer trims the **** on its mammoth games. "There was so much stuff in GTA, particularly GTA 5 – oh my god, there was so much stuff that was like done," he says in the interview. "Like, minigames that were completely done and ready to go, except for like animation, right?" [Hidden Content] Minigames were allegedly binned because "the animation team were getting destroyed," and there was "so much animation work to do to bring everything to the same level" in a game as large as GTA 5 "that we had to cut stuff that was otherwise completely done." There simply wasn't enough time on the calendar to have everything meet the same level of quality. Ricchio was often told by fellow developers that sweeping cuts are just "'a thing that happens, you know, because the game is so big – GTAs are always gigantic.'" Rockstar leaders wouldn't hesitate to bin larger parts of the game, either: "They'll throw out entire levels and they'll throw out entire things because they don't have enough resources to get everything to the same level." Major cuts were sometimes "hard to deal with" for the dedicated developers who had been working on features or levels or minigames for a "really long time," especially when everyone on the team was happy with the cut work. "It wasn't like they went into DLC or anything… They just disappeared," Ricchio adds. But he also acknowledges that such cuts are part of working under a "large production" like Rockstar Games, and it's sometimes for the best. "Every decision can't be made by everyone," he says, and when a developer's headcount stretches as wide as Rockstar's, there'll inevitably be decisions that not everyone will agree on. According to another ex-developer, an entire single-player Agent Trevor DLC was abruptly scrapped after the dizzying success of GTA Online. Rockstar Universe also lists all of the games' supposed cut content, mostly based on glimpses of features from old trailers that never made it into the finished product. GTA 5 is still selling millions a year, letting Rockstar do whatever it wants with GTA 6: analyst estimates 1.8 million just on PS5 in 2026. [/url]View the full article

Bandwagon is a bullet heaven survivors-lite (that's a new one?) that takes the genre in a fun new direction with music and you restoring joy to the world. Read the full article here: [Hidden Content] View the full article

Clockwork Revolution isn't going to feature an overly annoying companion, thankfully, with inXile Entertainment founder and Fallout veteran Brian Fargo confirming as much. We've all played games with less-than-ideal companions. From too much hand-holding to generally pesky personalities, there's no shortage of qualities that can make gameplay a bit of a slog to get through. The Legend of Zelda immediately springs to mind for me, with the ever-loathed (and beloved) Navi, and Metroid Prime 4: Beyond's Myles Mackenzie, the notoriously annoying sidekick of protagonist Samus. Much to the gaming community's delight, however, Clockwork Revolution won't feature a companion that makes you want to connect your head with the desk – Fargo, studio head and game producer, reassures us of this in a new online post. "Been getting questions about the companion in Clockwork Revolution. Rest assured: I LOATHE companions that point out the obvious because they think players are dumb," he writes. "Ours only speaks when it knows something you couldn't or has something genuinely funny to say. Kept rare on purpose. Hoping by the end you say, 'I wish she talked more, not less.'" That'd certainly be the day, eh? Been getting questions about the companion in Clockwork Revolution. Rest assured: I LOATHE companions that point out the obvious because they think players are dumb. Ours only speaks when it knows something you couldn't or has something genuinely funny to say. Kept rare on…July 16, 2026 As for why Fargo and fellow developers at inXile chose to make their companion (presumably Prentice, the flying, foul-mouthed automaton described by publisher Xbox Game Studios last month) that way, basically, it has to do with retro games and how Fargo feels they treated their players. "My philosophy goes all the way back to the '80s," as he explains in response to a fan agreeing that they're "so tired" of spoiler-laden companions. "Even when the audience was truly younger than today, we always treated them with intelligence, and we never regretted doing so." That makes a lot of sense – and explains why older games feel more "difficult" in contrast. I'm personally thrilled to learn Prentice won't be as hand-holdy, but I suppose we'll have to wait and see just how far that goes when Clockwork Revolution releases in 2027. Time-bending RPG from Fallout veteran has choices that "take a long time to catch up with you." [/url]View the full article

DIEATHLON is a retro-styled shooter that's not just another boomer shooter, as you're racing down a mountain on skis as you attempt to survive. Read the full article here: [Hidden Content] View the full article

Infinity Ward has hit back at claims the new Gunsmith for Call of Duty: Modern Warfare 4 features an AI chatbot. Modern Warfare 4's Gunsmith includes Gunny, a new feature designed to help players quickly create builds based on their playstyle and unlocked attachments. Infinity Ward has said it features weapon builds developed by the studio's Weapons Team, and can instantly configure close-, mid-, or long-range builds tailored to different approaches to combat. In a blog post, Activision said Gunny “brings a Gunnery Sergeant’s eye to weapon customization.” The new feature hit the headlines after a screenshot of Modern Warfare 4 showing the new Gunsmith user interface went viral on social media. In the image, we see Gunny "speak" to the player via text reminiscent of the kind of dialogue we’re now used to seeing from the likes of ChatGPT. “Hello, I can help you build a weapon when you have more attachments unlocked,” Gunny says. “Keep leveling your weapon.” You can press RT to access Gunny from Gunsmith. Fans picked up on this immediately and expressed concern, with some joking it that Gunny was Call of Duty’s take on Microsoft's animated paperclip assistant, Clippy. “Genuinely what’s one upside to having an AI help build your gun,” asked one fan. “Some responses were particularly aggressive. “If you’re allowed to chat with Gunny, I’m exclusively telling it to shoot itself in the face,” one person said. “You cannot go literally anywhere in the digital world without these ********* shoving this useless s**t down our throats.” Infinity Ward stepped in when former Call of Duty leaker TheGhostOfHope joined the complaints in a post on X / Twitter: “They got an AI chatbot in the game now to help mfs with their loadouts as if it’s not the same s**t used every year.” That, it seems, was enough to spark Infinity Ward into action. In a reply, the developer insisted Gunny offers developer-tuned setups for quick loadout swaps between matches. “Wrong (again.)” Infinity Ward said. “Gunny is hand crafted by our developers, not AI. It recommends builds based on the attachments you’ve unlocked for each weapon. It helps make quick loadout changes between matches. “Give it a shot in the Beta.” As you can probably gather by Infinity Ward’s “wrong (again),” response, there’s a bit of needle between Activision and TheGhostOfHope. TheGhostOfHope is well known in the Call of Duty community for leaks, some of which Activision has called out as wrong in the past. For example, in February, TheGhostOfHope claimed that “sources” had indicated that Activision planned to launch a standalone Zombies game. That claim prompted an official response from the Call of Duty account, which poured cold water on the “leak.” “The rumor factory working overtime. This ain’t it,” the account said. Then, in March, Activision demanded TheGhostOfHope stop releasing confidential information about the series, insisting that even when leaks are wrong they cause problems. TheGhostOfHope agreed, although has continued to comment on Call of Duty generally. While Gunny may not be an AI chatbot exactly, Activision has come under fire in the past for its use of AI in the Call of Duty series. The games company used generative AI to build in-game assets for both ****** Ops 6 and 7, and was called out by fans for ****** Ops 6’s infamous six-fingered zombie Santa. Call of Duty: Modern Warfare 4 launches across Xbox Series X and S, PlayStation 5 and PC via Battle.net, Xbox on PC, Steam, and Nintendo Switch 2 on Friday, October 23, 2026. Wesley is Director, News at IGN. Find him on Twitter at @wyp100. You can reach Wesley at [email protected] or confidentially at *****@*****.tld. View the full article

Making money in GTA Online has basically always been a game of whack-a-mole, with players finding the latest and greatest trick, and Rockstar promptly shutting the loophole down. With Grand Theft Auto 6 on the horizon, Rockstar has decided to nerf heists, which were one of the most popular ways to make a good buck in Los Santos... Read more.View the full article

Fortnite will soon be rolling out its plan to add AI-generated voices to its non-playable characters (NPCs). Epic Games has announced that it has now added “consistent voices and personas” to 36 existing Fortnite characters when they’re used as NPCs, and says more will come over time. This means if the characters are encountered in the game, they will now speak to the player in an AI-generated voice. Read More... View the full article

Longstanding RTS series Warhammer 40,000: Dawn of War has been around for over twenty years now, and with the next edition, Dawn of War IV, coming soon we’re really excited to see how it keeps evolving and moving forward. It’s a series known for featuring much loved and battle hardened characters from the various factions […]View the full article

When Konami revealed back in February that it's finally making a new Castlevania, the teaser trailer's art and color palette was so reminiscent of the Netflix anime series that it seemed possible the game was actually using the show's designs, or at least had gotten a little love from the folks at Powerhouse Animation. In a recent interview with PC Gamer, Konami confirmed there's no explicit continuity between the show and the new game, but the similarity was certainly intentional... Read more.View the full article

After the usual silence we've come to expect from Valve on everything, they gave a short blog post on the upcoming MvM update for Team Fortress 2. Read the full article here: [Hidden Content] View the full article

Being a teenager with a Game Boy Advance and a Nintendo DS in the early 2000s was a wonderful time, because almost every year, there was a new Castlevania game to sink my fangs into. But after Order of Ecclesia in 2008, that never-ending stream of some of the best 2D platforming and exploration in gaming history dried up, and we’ve now somehow gone 18 years without a proper 2D Castlevania. Yes, 2D Castlevania’s Absence is old enough to vote now. But if there’s one thing I’ve learned from the many Castlevanias I’ve played, it’s that Dracula’s resurrection is inevitable, eventually. Enter Castlevania: Belmont’s Curse, a much-welcome brand-new entry in the storied series. And in even better news, it’s developed by the team behind Dead Cells. I got to play through the first three-ish hours at a recent preview event, and based on my early impressions, it's shaping up to be a return worth waiting for. To set the stage, Belmont’s Curse takes place 23 years after the events of Castlevania 3: Dracula’s Curse, and serves as a direct follow-up to that story – which is also what the fantastic Netflix Castlevania anime is largely based on. The game begins with a summons for Trevor Belmont to head to Paris, which has been ravaged by an unknown force that has flooded the streets with monsters, turned the moon blood red, and left the city in utter chaos. Despite sensing the likely trap, Trevor makes his way to the City of Light, but not alone. He’s joined by his daughter, Rose, who is eager to continue the family legacy of hunting monsters and vampires. My first thought as soon as I picked up the controller was "Yep, this definitely feels like Castlevania by way of Dead Cells." My first thought as soon as I picked up the controller was, “Yep, this definitely feels like Castlevania by way of Dead Cells.” That’s not a bad thing. In fact, it’s quite good. There’s a certain fluidity to Rose’s movement and animation that immediately felt reminiscent of controlling The Beheaded from Dead Cells, minus the ability to quickly shoot to the ground by holding down and pressing jump while in the air. Rose can swing her weapon in front, above, and below her, much like in Dead Cells, while also having access to a quick forward dash to dodge under projectiles or reposition herself behind an enemy, along with a backdash to quickly move out of the way of incoming attacks. Cool Whip Of course, the whip has always been the defining weapon of the Belmont clan, and it is a core element of Rose’s kit as well, though surprisingly, not as a direct combat tool. Instead, the whip can be used to swing from grapple points to reach new heights, and to pull yourself towards enemies and quickly close the distance. My favorite aspect of the whip, though, is that if you press the attack button while you’re pulling yourself towards an enemy, you’ll execute a grapple attack, which varies greatly depending on which of the seven types of weapons you’re wielding. The starting longsword’s grapple attack allows you to slash through enemies, dealing good damage and keeping your forward momentum, allowing you to chain multiple grapples and cross lengthy gaps. Doing a grapple attack with the Cestus equipped, meanwhile, will execute a shoryuken-like uppercut that will launch enemies up into the air for air combos. Then you have the greatsword, which performs a hugely damaging AOE-focused spinning attack. I love the fact that every single weapon has a unique charged attack, grapple attack, and basic moveset, giving you plenty of incentive to experiment with your arsenal and find the right tool for the job. Tools of the Trade Weapons aren’t the only thing you’ll be able to experiment with, either. Like in Hollow Knight, Prince of Persia: The Lost Crown, and other modern Metroidvanias, you can also find and equip up to three relics, which provide powerful passive bonuses. These are usually reserved as rewards for completing difficult optional challenges, like a tricky platforming section or a lengthy combat encounter, and even in my brief hands-on time so far, they have proven to be well worth the trouble of seeking them out. Finally, since Rose is the daughter of both Trevor Belmont and Sypha Belnades, she’s equally skilled in both weaponry and magic (that is how genetics works, right?). As such, she can also find and equip a variety of spells, known as Arcana. In my demo, these spells were always rewards for defeating a major boss, with me gaining one of the boss’s core abilities. Defeating The Fallen rewarded me with the Holy Cross boomerang, besting Joan of Arc gave me her ground explosion attack, and taking down Medusa granted me her petrification beam. Each of these Arcana could be improved by completing various Achievement-like challenges called “Works of Mercy.” For the Holy Cross, for example, I had to find three different whip-type weapons, kill five enemies with one Holy Cross throw, or kill 10 enemies with a whip attack. Completing a Work of Mercy rewards you with a point that you can spend on a variety of upgrades for that specific Arcana. Again using the Holy Cross as an example, I could upgrade it so that I could throw two crosses out a time, make the cross deal more damage the farther away from me it got, or refund 10% of the mana cost for every enemy it hit, up to 60%, if I caught the cross on the way back. What’s great is that these upgrades were actually interesting and affected the way I used the Arcana, rather than just being simply higher damage numbers, a straight up lower mana cost, or quicker rate of use. Skeleton Crew The rogue’s gallery of enemies will no doubt be familiar to any long time Castlevania fan. I went up against zombies that rose up from the ground, the classic medusa heads that like to fly in from the side of the screen and move in a predictable wavy pattern, red skeletons that would eventually revive after being killed, and plenty of gargoyles. Castlevania games have typically varied substantially in terms of their difficulty, and thus far, Belmont’s curse has fallen somewhere in the middle of the pack. These first few hours certainly were no cakewalk, and I definitely had my fair share of deaths against some of the tankier and harder hitting enemies, but checkpoints are generously spaced, you now have three health-restoring flasks that get refilled when you pass said generously spaced checkpoints, and unlike most modern Metroidvanias/soulslikes, there’s no real penalty upon death outside of enemies respawning and you getting placed back at the nearest checkpoint. The bosses were no pushovers either. My favorite of the bunch was Medusa, which had me swinging between two sides of the boss arena to avoid her flailing tail and arms, and then quickly ducking down behind a rock when she used her screen-covering petrifying gaze. Opportunities to deal damage were brief and I had to make sure I made the most of every chance I got. It was a fun fight that made good use of Rose’s mobility options, rewarded pattern recognition, and required quick reflexes without being too demanding, especially for an early boss. Overall, I had an absolute blast with Castlevania: Belmont’s Curse. The art and animation are absolutely gorgeous; combat is fun and dynamic with plenty of room to carve out your own personal playstyle thanks to the variety of weapons, Arcana, and relics; exploration was appropriately rewarding and there were plenty of secrets hidden within the cracked walls of the Parisian streets; and the bosses provided a nice challenge without ever feeling too overwhelming for how early I was in the game. The real star of the show though, is the whip, which enabled a very unique style of acrobatic combat that gives Belmont’s Curse its own unique feel and identity in the increasingly crowded Metroidvania genre. If the Dead Cells veterans at Evil Empire can build upon what’s already here and keep up this same quality of level, enemy, and boss design throughout the entire campaign, we could have a return to Castlevania that’s more than worthy of standing next to the all-time greats of the series. Mitchell Saltzman is an editorial producer at IGN. 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