If you bought a Nintendo Switch 2 in June, the odds are good you also bought Mario Kart World. In fact, according to Circana, 82% of Nintendo Switch 2 purchasers also picked up Mario Kart World.
That comes from Circana's June report, which shared that the Nintendo Switch 2 is officially the fastest-selling video game console in the U.S. In total, the Nintendo Switch sold 1.6 million units in the U.S. in June, beating out the PlayStation 4's previous record of 1.1 million units in November of 2012.
Of those 1.6 million unit sales, 82% either purchased the Nintendo Switch 2 + Mario Kart World bundle, or bought the game standalone. This helped propel Mario Kart World to become the third best-selling game of the month in Circana's rankings, though it's possible it could have ranked even higher due to the exclusion of Nintendo's digital data from the sales charts.
As a comparison point, when the Nintendo Switch 1 launched, over 100% of new console owners that month also purchased its launch game, The Legend of Zelda: Breath of the Wild, worldwide. Yes, the game sold more copies on Switch than Nintendo did Switch systems. "This may be attributed to people who purchased both a limited edition of the game to collect and a second version to play," Nintendo suggested at the time. So Mario Kart World isn't quite beating those numbers.
But it may also be doing even better in other countries. According to a report from Wccftech, attach rate for the game to system in France was over 95%.
Additionally, we learned from Circana this morning that 32% of Nintendo Switch 2 purchasers in June also bought a Nintendo Switch 2 Pro Controller, helping make it the best-selling accessory of the month in the U.S. by dollar sales.
Unshockingly, one of the reasons people are buying Mario Kart World is because it's pretty dang good. We gave the game an 8/10, saying that it "may not make the most convincing case that going open-world was the boost the series needed, but excellent multiplayer racing, incredible polish, and the thrilling new Knockout Tour mode still more than live up to its legacy."
Rebekah Valentine is a senior reporter for IGN. You can find her posting on BlueSky @duckvalentine.bsky.social. Got a story tip? Send it to rvalentine@ign.com.
The Nintendo Switch 2 debuted in June to become the fastest-selling hardware ever in the U.S., shooting spending on games to new monthly records, according to the monthly report from Circana.
Spending on hardware was up a whopping 249% year-over-year thanks to the console's debut, reaching $978 million and greatly surpassing the previous monthly record from June 2008 of $608 million. In total, the Switch 2 sold 1.6 million units in the U.S. during its launch month, beating the PlayStation 4's previous sales record of 1.1 million units in November of 2013. Unshockingly, it was the best-selling console of the month both in terms of units and dollar sales.
Across both Nintendo Switch platforms, Switch 2-exclusive Mario Kart World was unshockingly the best-selling game of the month, followed by Cyberpunk 2077 and Rune Factory: Guardians of Azuma, both of which launched alongside the new console. In fourth and fifth place respectively were Tears of the Kingdom and Breath of the Wild, followed by Street Fighter 6, Mario Kart 8, Hogwarts Legacy, Bravely Default's remaster, and Minecraft. Because Nintendo doesn't share digital sales numbers with Circana, this chart may be missing some big sellers. For instance, we learned today that Deltarune topped Switch 2 charts in digital sales in June, but with no physical edition and the game only costing $25, it's missing from the dollar sales ranking entirely.
So does all this Nintendo Switch 2 success mean it's on track to outsell the Nintendo Switch 1? I asked Circana analyst Mat Piscatella, and this is what he told me:
What the launch sales of Switch 2 primarily tell us is that they made a lot of Switch 2 to sell at launch. Lifetime sales and launch sales of a console often do not correlate, meaning that some consoles with small launches ended up doing incredibly well lifetime (PS2 only sold 400k in its launch month) while others with big launches ended up not doing as well lifetime. Since launch month demand is rarely satiated by available supply (and it is certainly not a great sign when it is, historically) all we can really get a read on at launch is the confidence of the manufacturer to make so many units available, and the ability of the supply chain to get those units into the market.
But having the biggest launch month sales for any new video game hardware platform is a helluva good start.
Across all platforms, Elden Ring: Nightreign was the best-selling game of the month for the second month in a row, followed by debut titles Death Stranding 2: On the Beach and Mario Kart World. Those numbers don't include Nintendo digital sales of Mario Kart World, and they also don't include physical hardware bundles, meaning Mario Kart World will likely have performed significantly better than is indicated here. Per analysis by Circana's Mat Piscatella, 82% of Nintendo Switch 2 buyers in June purchased Mario Kart World either via a standalone sale, or as part of a bundle.
Rune Factory: Guardians of Azuma debuted at No.10. Stellar Blade ranked No.5 on the overall charts and was the second best-selling game on PlayStation thanks to its debut on the platform last month. And while Final Fantasy XVI didn't crack the overall top 20, it was the fourth best-selling game on Xbox, also thanks to its release on the platform in June. Overall, content spending in June was up 6% year-over-year, largely driven by Switch 2 game sales.
Accessories spending also set a new June record of $293 million, in no small part due to sales of the Nintendo Switch 2 Pro Controller. It was the best-selling accessory of the month and has a 32% attach rate with Nintendo Switch 2 hardware.
* Indicates that some or all digital sales are not included in Circana's data. Some publishers, including Nintendo, do not share certain digital data for this report.
As someone who has gotten way too into in-person social deduction games in recent years, Killer Inn truly couldn’t have come at a better time. The delightful world of bluffs, social reads, mechanically obtained evidence leading to hidden baddies, and dramatic tension moments before all hell breaks loose is one of the most rewarding experiences in gaming. For this reason, it’s always been a wonder to me that we don’t see more of the genre despite the insane success of games like Among Us, but I have high hopes Killer Inn will be another powerhouse in this underutilized space. By smartly combining core social deduction philosophies with third-person combat and RPG mechanics, this murderous game of investigators and madmen carves a unique niche that had me cackling wildly in a matter of minutes. It might not have the most crisp gunplay or be the most intuitive game in the world (at least in its current beta state), but for a genre that’s criminally underappreciated, this could very well be quite the game changer.
Like any good social deduction game, Killer Inn divides its players into an uninformed majority (in this case, called Sheep), who work together to uncover the baddies, and a malevolent, informed minority (called Wolves), who attempt to kill all the good players before being found out. Wolves succeed when the Sheep fail to work together to solve the puzzle and allow themselves to be picked off, while the Sheep win when they trust one another and use their superior numbers to root out the evil players before the noose closes around them.
The main way this game of cops and robbers differentiates itself though, is in just how much depth there is to that familiar blueprint, as Killer Inn pulls in the design sensibilities of an action game to replace the more traditional sleuthing process. Instead of voting to decide which is the most untrustworthy player to be killed off, players must take it upon themselves to pull the trigger on or bury the hatchet into their fellow player. If they guess correctly, they can take an evil player off the board and make the good team that much more likely to succeed, but if they guess wrong they’re immediately punished by turning into stone and removing themselves from the match for good. This makes for a really neat dynamic, where you either need to gather enough evidence to know for sure that someone is a cold-blooded killer, or risk it all to take someone out before they get the chance to stab you in the back, which makes for a really tense dilemma.
On the other hand, if you’re playing as a Wolf, every time you kill another player you’ll leave behind a clue for the Sheep to find that will narrow down the pool of possible suspects, and if you intend to take out all the goodies in the match, then your unmasking is almost an inevitability. But you can also go for a more discrete approach and blend in with the Sheep, aiding in their efforts to complete quests and, ultimately, to take the one ship off the island, hoping to turn good players on one another and wait for your time to strike. In one match where just three players remained, I watched as a Wolf convinced the last two living Sheep to fire at one another, while he waited to pick off the loser. It’s moments like that where the magic of Killer Inn really shines, and the proximity chat, where players can make social plays to make a foe think them a friend, allows silver-tongued agents to walk away with a victory in the coolest possible way.
Before you turn on one another though, you’ll have to loot gold, find consumables and weapons, and level up your character, and that’s where Killer Inn’s clever use of RPG mechanics really give it a unique flavor. Whether you’re good or evil, you’ll want to take on quests around the hotel given by NPCs and build up a respectable loadout before taking the figh t to your fellow players, because even if you unmask a Wolf, there’s little you can do if he’s got the bigger gun. This adds a compelling layer to the game of cat and mouse, where you’re rushing arou nd to acquire gear, but might drop whatever you’re doing once a body is discovered, as you’ll want to rush to the scene of the crime to gather a clue left behind as to who the culprit might be. As an evil, you might find it appealing to take down good players before they’re properly leveled, but subject yourself to scrutiny pretty early on that can be quite dangerous, like that time I killed four players with grenades right at the start of a match and was immediately an outed evil player for the rest of the game. Worth it.
The actual quests you’re sent on aren’t anything special, as most just require you to go from point A to point B to collect an item, or complete a simple minigame here and there, but these minor chores serve as a great excuse to break up good players and baddies alike into various parts of the map, which offers lots of room for murders to take place. Good players will also want to focus on destroying mean little floating orbs that guard certain areas of the map as each contain a key that can help the Sheep escape the map before getting killed – an alternate win condition that requires quite a bit of cooperation on the good team’s part. Meanwhile, as an evil, you’ll be doing everything to cover your tracks, including one clue leading to your identity that spawns on the map right at the start of the match, which can be concealed if you managed to get there before a Sheep discovers it…but getting caught in the act of destroying evidence carries its own risks.
With all I loved about my time with Killer Inn, one area that could probably use a bit of polish is the actual third-person combat, which felt a bit wonky at times. I wouldn’t expect a game so squarely focused on social deduction to be the next Marvel Rivals, but there was definitely a bit of sloppiness to the gunplay and melee shenanigans that could not feel great – then again, I only had a few hours to hone my skill, so it’s quite possible I just need to git gud. There’s a handful of weapons to find out in the world by completing quests, or buying from a vendor by collecting gold, plus armor, consumables, grenades, and more to help you on your way. Not only that, but equipment can be upgraded at workbenches scattered throughout the map to make your gear a bit more effective and give you an edge when things go sideways. It was a bit tough to figure out the best builds and strategies during the demo (I didn’t get to try out melee or stealth based builds, for example), since I was too busy learning the systems while frantically looking over my shoulder, but it did seem to have a bit of depth to it and a variety of playstyles to choose from, including preset perks depending on which character you chose to bring into battle.
I only got to play a few short hours of Killer Inn, but it’s already won my heart. I can’t wait to betray all my friends and loved ones in the near future, and hope it turns out as good as this early build seems to indicate.
Prior to the release of Blade in 1998, the mid-to-late ’90s was the not-so-mighty Marvel era. Despite generating hundreds of iconic comic book heroes and villains for decades, the company had filed for Chapter 11 bankruptcy as the speculator boom in comics - peaking in 1993 with nearly a billion dollars in sales - was waning. There had not been a major theatrical movie ripped from the pages of the Marvel Universe since George Lucas' infamous Howard the Duck in 1986, followed by direct-to-video losers like 1989's The Punisher and 1990's Captain America.
It seemed like the company had hit rock bottom in 1994 when a Roger Corman-produced movie based on the Fantastic Four had been permanently shelved, yet this actually marked a new beginning that would eventually lead to an actual, big-budget, theatrically-released FF movie in 2005.
Come with us as we explore the long and winding road that eventually got Marvel’s First Family onscreen, including a look at the script for the film that Harry Potter director Chris Columbus wanted to make.
Since the early ’80s, German film producer Bernd Eichinger of Neue Constantin Film (The Neverending Story) had been pursuing the movie rights to the Fantastic Four, Marvel's Silver Age flagship created by Stan Lee and Jack Kirby. The team consisting of Mr. Fantastic, Invisible Woman, the Human Torch, and the Thing had been integral in establishing the more semi-grounded tone of what became the Marvel Universe (Spider-Man, the Avengers, etc.), and was also the subject of several animated series. Eichinger saw the potential of a big screen iteration, finally purchasing the screen rights for around $250,000 in 1986 with the assistance of Lee, who had made it his mission to bring Marvel's characters to movie theaters. Lee moved from New York (Marvel HQ) to Los Angeles in 1978 when TV shows like The Incredible Hulk began building momentum for Marvel heroes on the small screen… but the creator had little luck getting movie versions of Spider-Man, Doctor Strange, and others beyond development hell.
Even though there was interest from Warner Bros. and Columbia, Fantastic Four faced the same trouble getting off the ground in Hollywood due to high expense as well as low capability of VFX to realize them onscreen. The estimated initial budget in the early ’90s was in the $45 million arena, which would have made FF one of the most expensive films ever… not to mention the extreme likelihood of shooting past that number. When Eichinger's rights to the team were set to expire on December 31, 1992, if he did not have a film in production, he acquired the services of B-movie king Roger Corman to quickly dash out a $1 million to $2 million ashcan version of a Fantastic Four flick directed by Oley Sassone (Bloodfist III: Forced to Fight). Both cast and director were in the dark about the scheme, and began promoting the film in the press. They were set to hold a gala premiere at Minnesota's Mall of America to benefit the Children's Miracle Network in January 1994, but just before that Eichinger, Marvel owner Avi Arad, and producer Ralph Winter (the Star Trek franchise) shelled out $1 million to Corman to acquire the negative and shelve the film.
According to a March 1994 report in The Los Angeles Times, Corman stated that Eichinger was "always planning to do a $40 million picture but couldn't complete the financing before his option ran out… I was glad for the money, but I'm disappointed that I won't get to release it." He also confirmed that 20th Century Fox and director Chris Columbus (who apparently expressed interest shortly after Home Alone) were already attached to the planned big-budget version, although both those parties denied being interested, possibly to separate themselves from a sleazy rights scheme which cheated a children's charity out of a premiere benefit.
Enter Chris Columbus, who officially confirmed his FF involvement the next year.
"Chris Columbus is going to write it and direct it," Stan Lee blabbed to The Arizona Republic in February 1995. "He's the guy who did Mrs. Doubtfire."
A protégé of both Steven Spielberg and John Hughes, Columbus initially planned on becoming a comic book artist for Marvel. Having visited the set of his 2009 comedy I Love You Beth Cooper, this author can confirm that Columbus still draws most of his own storyboards for his movies.
"Comics are originally what I wanted to do with my life," Columbus told The San Francisco Chronicle in 1997. "I dreamed of going to New York and drawing Spider-Man. But when I realized I'd sit in a room for 12 hours a day and not talk, I decided to become a writer."
His attention shifted to film school at NYU before eventually selling his script for Gremlins to Steven Spielberg in 1981. He also wrote The Goonies and Young Sherlock Holmes for Spielberg before making his directorial debut with 1987's Adventures in Babysitting. That teen comedy featured an 8-year-old named Sara who is obsessed with Marvel's Thor, *sort of* depicted by future Kingpin actor Vincent D'Onofrio. Columbus hit paydirt in 1990 with the box office smash Home Alone, a Christmas comedy classic penned and produced by John Hughes that grossed over $475 million worldwide. He followed this with the inevitable Home Alone 2 as well as the Robin Williams megahit Mrs. Doubtfire, along with two smaller romantic comedies (Only the Lonely and Nine Months) before finally dipping his toe back into comic book waters.
In his spare time Columbus was a huge fanboy, haunting comic book shops in his San Francisco neighborhood and amassing a collection of around 2000 issues (mostly vintage Marvel) including Conan the Barbarian #1 and most of the early run of Amazing Spider-Man.
"When it comes to comics, you're either a DC guy or a Marvel guy, and the Marvel comics were very inspirational to me," Columbus told the Edmonton Journal in 1996. "The Marvel characters were the real characters as far as I was concerned. They always had the real problems, they were the characters with the hang-ups."
Although he harbored ambitions to make a movie about Marvel's famed web slinger (stating "Spider-Man would make a wonderful movie"), James Cameron had already been developing the property at the time. Instead, Columbus set his sights on Marvel's First Family, admitting it would not have been financially or technically feasible before mid-’90s VFX innovations, which included the squash-and-stretch of The Mask or the Silver Surfer-like T-1000 in Terminator 2. Columbus planned to max out those capabilities with his movie, telling The San Francisco Examiner, "For example, if the elastic Reed Richards and invisible woman Sue Storm get into a fight. Sue is likely to disappear, while Reed tries to woo her back by showing her he can turn into any shape of man he wants, tall or short, fat or slim."
His production company, 1492 Pictures, joined forces with Eichinger's Constantin Film to mount the ambitious Fantastic Four project. To pen the movie, these production companies along with their studio partner 20th Century Fox (where Columbus directed his previous five films) hired screenwriter Michael France of Goldeneye and Cliffhanger fame. Up until now two early drafts by the late France (who died in 2013) have been widely available on the internet, one from May 3, 1996, (160 pages) and another from a few months later on September 9 (136 pages). We were able to get our hands on a draft from December 6, 1996, that is a truncated (113 page) rewrite of France by Columbus himself. It gives us a glimpse into his vision, which retains many similarities to the film ultimately released in 2005 that was credited to France and Twin Peaks' Mark Frost.
Unlike the 2005 Fantastic Four, which opens with Reed and Ben soliciting funding for their space project from billionaire tech tycoon Victor Von Doom, Columbus' rewrite begins at 55-minutes to launch of the brilliant Reed's FF-4 Phoenix Space Plane. Reed and Sue (also the mission's financier) are already engaged, while he and Ben (described as a cigar-chomping Gulf War vet) have a lot of macho tension between them instead of being instigated by Victor. The 2005 scene of Johnny (a former Blue Angels pilot) arriving late with the intro of him on a motorcycle kissing a woman in another vehicle is on the page here. Funnily, when Sue asks the media-friendly Johnny why he broke quarantine, he replies, "I had a date" - Chris Evans' final line in the first Captain America film.
During a very Thunderbirds-esque scene of the Space Plane launching out of a mountain tunnel, Johnny uses his signature catchphrase "flame on!" to initiate a second-stage rocket boost, which Ben roasts him for. Their ship arrives at the massive Orion International Space Station, described pretty much as it appeared in 2005 with "pods and passages built around a central core." Onboard they find 35-year-old Victor Obtrech, a brilliant Russian scientist who was Reed's roommate at NYU (a nod to Columbus' alma mater). Victor "NOT Von Doom" has been stationed onboard Orion alone for 275 days, during which his wife and children were brutally murdered in Chechnya, turning him cold and self-serving in his grief.
The purpose of their mission is revealed in the form of the Nanochamber, an eight-foot tall room like the one in the Baxter Building in 2005 (the one that looks like Seth Brundle's pods in The Fly). Its purpose is to rearrange atom-sized molecules utilizing nanotechnology, which Reed and Victor demonstrate by turning a rotten piece of wood into gold inside said chamber. When Ben inquires why this couldn't have been done on Earth, Reed mentions the very slight possibility of their atomic alterations creating "self-replicating micromachines" (presumably not the tiny toy cars). Victor gets pissed when he learns Sue did not bring the animal test subjects he wanted to experiment on, which she feared could result in "mutant manifestation."
The fuming Russian returns to his private quarters, where he sneakily uses his computer console to overload the Nanochamber. Trying to avoid an explosion, Ben volunteers to repair it, foreshadowing with the quip, "My ass is turnin' to stone just sittin' around this place." During the repair, a laser mesh penetrates every inch of Ben's body, and then when the chamber's entrance explodes, the mesh penetrates the other three's skin as well. The blast sends the station hurtling towards low orbit (i.e. crashing), and although Reed tries to find Victor, he can't. A burned/charred Victor watches as the Phoenix ship with the four onboard leaves the self-obliterating station behind, screaming "Noooooooo!!!" He crawls inside the Nanochamber as pieces of metal debris meld with his body, turning him into a "hybrid of skin and steel." Even his voice sounds electronic as he informs mission control, "I shall be your doom."
Meanwhile, the Phoenix crashes in a wooded upstate New York mountain area. Reed, Sue, and Johnny make their way out of the craft, with the latter's hand melting an imprint in the hull (the first sign of things to come). We then cut to a scene almost identical to the 2005 movie where Ben wakes up in quarantine and Johnny does a psych-out pretending Ben has turned horribly ugly, only to reveal his normal face. The only difference is in this script Johnny does the punch line with an 8x10 of Ben, where the movie (more effectively) uses a mirror. Next up, Johnny goes from quarantine to jumping out of a helicopter to ski with a girlfriend named Frankie (in the movie it's Maria Menounos credited as "Sexy Nurse"), exactly like 2005 right down to a line about the loser having to pay for room service and Johnny discovering his flame powers.
Reed and Sue discover their powers during a romantic interlude at a secluded cabin, but the tone is more haunting than 2005's jokier version, with Sue's invisible frame revealed by a rolling fog. Reed is blown back by her force field, crashing into a railing and folding into a tangle of limbs. Over at Ben's Brooklyn brownstone he's about to propose to his girlfriend Carlene when a tactical squad arrives telling him he has to come back in due to an anomaly in his blood cells. Ben then begins to painfully transform into his rocky Thing form as Carlene runs away in horror. He is finally brought down by six tranquilizer darts after crumpling a lightpole with his newfound strength.
We cut to an aircraft testing center where Sue narrates about their mutations and their augmented flight suits (also exposed to the energy). Reed is run through a taffy-puller-type machine, Sue lifts a tank with her fields, and Johnny amplifies the flames of a jet engine. Reed concludes there is no danger of infection, so they can rejoin society, but Ben is still upset at his appearance, blaming Reed.
This is where the script takes a very different turn from the finished film by introducing a new antagonist: Marius Morlak ("Maris" in the comics), leader of Enclave. On New Years Eve, this mad former scientist (along with his machine gun-packing goons) manages to sneak an explosive disguised in a canister onto an under-construction NYC skyscraper, and threatens to incinerate six blocks of Manhattan if he does not get $100 million worth of diamonds in two hours. Machler, the government guy holding the FF under strict quarantine, thinks Morlak is bluffing, but Reed thinks it’s a legit threat.
MORLAK: "Start spreading the news, we're dying today. I want to blow apart… New York, New York."
Locked inside an underground cage, the team argues about whether or not to escape and try to save the city, with Reed and Sue convincing the other two to help. Ben knocks their titanium cell door down, then Reed rejiggers his face to look like Machler. They manage to make it to a hangar, where they board a Reed-designed experimental segmented vehicle (i.e. the Fantasti-Car, eventually seen as-described in the sequel to the 2005 film, 2007’s Rise of the Silver Surfer). The FBI give Morlak a suitcase full of diamonds, which the villain examines with a loupe and realizes are fake. "Their loss," he says.
The FF swoop in as the Fantasti-Car splits into four separate units in different directions. Reed's lands, and when an Enclave goon fires at him, the bullets bounce off and back at the goon, killing him. Ben's crashes because his fingers smash the controls, but he emerges. Morlak tells one of his helicopter pilots to "Take care of that… thing." The copter fires, but the bullets also bounce off of Ben, who grabs a 30-foot crane arm and does the Babe Ruth "pointing to right field" stance before knocking the helicopter out of the sky, causing it to explode into a fireball. Need we mention he says "It's clobberin' time" before doing this?
Morlak gets in his second copter to escape, so Reed begins trying to deactivate the bomb… but realizes it's a decoy. The real one is in the Times Square Happy New Year ball, rigged to drop in 30 seconds, right where Sue is. Reed tells her to get the heck out of there, but she is able to contain the explosion with her force field, struggling to maintain it as the bubble of fire ascends into the sky (shades of the Captain America: Civil War opening with Wanda). Reed asks her to send it horizontally to him, then asks Ben if he can use his rubbery body as a slingshot.
Meanwhile, Johnny flames on and flies after Morlak's helicopter, melting a hole in its windshield. Morlak grabs a machine gun and fires at Johnny through the hole, turning the chase into a dogfight. The villain uses a grenade to explode a rooftop water tower, which douses/extinguishes Johnny, who lays vulnerable on the rooftop as Morlak leans out to finish him off. Suddenly, the force field bubble crashes into the helicopter and incinerates Morlak. Reed then stretches his arms across Times Square to catch a fainted Sue, kissing her, before the Fantastic Four look down on the crowd to cheers.
A New York Post headline reads: FANTASTIC FOUR HALT MIDTOWN MELTDOWN
While all this might sound very climactic (right after this, Johnny creates the flaming "4" in the sky just like the end of FF 2005), this is only the halfway point of the script. It gives you a good idea of the humor, fidelity to the comics, and the slightly more edgy/violent approach Columbus and France's script took, as well as the differences/similarities to the 2005 film.
It's safe to say the script only gets wilder/more expensive-sounding from here. In the interest of space, here's a bullet-point rundown of highlights from the second half…
During early pre-production, Columbus began seeking a real-life actor couple to play Reed and Sue, with Meg Ryan and Dennis Quaid eventually attached to the picture. Several respected thespians (Alan Rickman and Geoffrey Rush) were eyed for Doctor Doom. Artist Tim Flattery, who had designed Arnold Schwarzenegger's superhero Turboman for the Columbus-produced Jingle All the Way, created several FF concept illustrations (dated 1997), including one with updated chrome-lined outfits for the team as well as Doom with more advanced metallic facial features. Flattery later designed the Fantasti-Car for 2007's Fantastic Four: Rise of the Silver Surfer, and would work on many MCU projects.
In March 1996, Avi Arad and Fox seemed to be getting ahead of themselves, announcing the development of a Silver Surfer spin-off movie parallel to FF. Meanwhile, what was originally planned as a modest $6 million to $9 million vampire hunter movie for New Line under director Ernest Dickerson turned into the $50 million event film Blade when Wesley Snipes signed on. A few big directors reportedly flirted with making it, including David Fincher and Sam Raimi, before Stephen Norrington came aboard.
The year 1997 proved a huge turning point in superhero movies with the failures of Spawn, Steel, and most resoundingly, Warner Bros' all-timer disaster Batman & Robin. It was rumored that there were over 20 comic book-based properties in development at Fox alone, including an Iron Man movie with Nicolas Cage. Knight Ridder reported an ambitious slate of Marvel flicks percolating all over Hollywood that year, including Silver Surfer (directed by Geoffrey Wright), X-Men, and a (according to Avi Arad) "action-adventure comedy" take on Fantastic Four with Columbus still attached to direct at Fox. Philip Morton (Fire Down Below) had by now contributed to the script. Columbus was also pulling double duty penning Fox's Daredevil, to be directed by Carlo Carlei (Flight of the Innocent, Fluke) and heavily inspired by writer Roger McKenzie's run on the comics in the late ’70s. Elsewhere at Universal, Gale Anne Hurd was producing a Hulk movie, Paramount developed Captain America, Columbia hired David Goyer to pen Doctor Strange, DreamWorks Animation worked on Mort the Dead Teenager, and director Philip Kaufman planned an environmentalist take on the Sub-Mariner.
By early 1998, word was that Columbus' Fantastic Four had been benched despite coming very close to production. Batman's Sam Hamm was hired to add more humor and help bring the costs down on what was rumored to be a Titanic-sized $200 million-plus budget, but by then Columbus had ultimately decided to bow out of the director's chair despite putting years into the film. The director stated publicly that there was worry the movie he envisioned could cost $280 million, and now that we have read his script, one can see why. He would remain as a credited executive producer, with Peter Segal (Tommy Boy) becoming the first of a rotating roster of helmers to attempt it.
1998 was also when Snipes' Blade became the first successful Marvel Comics feature film, taking in $131 million globally. In the midst of all this, Avi Arad brought a terrible TV movie into the world titled Nick Fury: Agent of S.H.I.E.L.D., starring David Hasselhoff as Fury and penned by Blade writer David S. Goyer. One step forward, two steps back. Despite all the development heat, several other big Marvel projects were stalled, with Bryan Singer's X-Men given a blinking greenlight by studio head Tom Rothman pending rewrites to bring costs down. Spider-Man's myriad rights issues had 20th Century Fox's legal department scrambling so Cameron could direct his finished script, even as Sony pursued the rights for Roland Emmerich to make the film. Universal pulled the plug on the Hulk movie once the budget swelled to $100 million and they had to can director Jonathan Hensleigh due to inexperience. Those three high-profile films would eventually get made in 2000, 2002, and 2003, respectively, kicking off the modern superhero era we are now immured in.
The year 2000 saw a new FF director with some Columbus "DNA" in the form of 41-year-old Raja Gosnell, the editor of many Columbus films as well as the director of Fox's Home Alone 3 and Big Mama's House. Gosnell was photographed in the LA Times next to a massive concept maquette of The Thing. Fox president Tom Rothman wanted to fast-track the FF project after the success of the X-Men film, with a budget to match ($75 million). Gosnell was working closely with Columbus alongside his co-producer Michael Barnathan and screenwriter Sam Hamm to get Fantastic Four off the ground and in front of cameras before the end of the year. The comedic helmer had lobbied hard for the job, convincing skeptical Fox execs he could deliver "a big action comedy thrill ride like Men in Black," sparking backlash from fans upset at the word "comedy." However, Warner Bros. was simultaneously courting Gosnell to direct the live-action Scooby Doo, and by October he had jumped ship.
With Columbus now entirely focused on making the first two Harry Potter films back-to-back, in 2001 Peyton Reed (Bring It On) was brought onboard Fantastic Four to direct. Like Columbus and all the other filmmakers who were attached to this version of the film, Reed had a flair for comedy. Yet his initial vision of setting the story during the 1960s space race when the comic book was conceived did not meet studio enthusiasm… even though that's exactly what Marvel Studios is doing with it in this year's The Fantastic Four: First Steps (albeit an alternate timeline ’60s).
Reed then pivoted to a contemporary approach inspired by A Hard Day's Night where the Fantastic Four are the biggest celebrities of the day, and a camera in the Baxter Building captured reality-TV style candid footage of the team ordering pizza and arguing about who has the best costume. Although Reed's Fantastic Four never hit screens, he did hire writer Mark Frost, whose work was retained to final screen credit. Reed would later pour some of his ideas for FF into Marvel Studios' three Ant-Man movies, which he directed (Quantum Realm substituting for Negative Zone, etc).
After the success of Sam Raimi's Spider-Man in 2002, writer Michael France told the Tampa Bay Times that he hoped another Marvel superhero movie he had written - Ang Lee's The Hulk - would ride its coattails into production, which it did. He was also writing The Punisher movie, which Hensleigh made in 2004. France upheld that if executives "spend the money to make it good and, most importantly, stick to the characters - have fun with it, but don't make fun of it - then there's a huge audience for that."
Five years after he delivered his last Fantastic Four draft to Fox, France reasoned that the film had not been made yet because "it's unbelievably expensive. It's probably one of the most expensive comic book movies you can make with special effects shots to portray the characters… Spider-Man is only Spider-Man for about 30 percent of the movie. With Fantastic Four, The Thing is in effect in every shot. Even outside of action sequences, the comedy always revolves around The Thing and the Torch fighting at home, so even the comic relief scenes are, like, a million dollars per minute… The Hulk is not a cheap movie to make, but all they've got to deal with is one character and a villain. With Fantastic Four you've got the four of them plus a villain. In my script the villain was Doctor Doom, so there's a lot of expense in that too."
In the end, the version of the FF script that got the movie greenlit was an uncredited polish by Simon Kinberg (Mr. and Mrs. Smith), who toned down the celebrity aspect of Frost's draft while honing in on the idea of "an origin story of superheroes who didn't accept themselves as superheroes until the final sequence of the film." Once Tim Story (Barbershop, Taxi) was onboard to direct, he did go back to the many previous iterations for inspiration, telling the LA Times, "I read quite a few of them. You try and take the greatest hits. We would just take the older scripts and try to find the best of and see if there was anything we wanted to keep."
When the second feature iteration of Fantastic Four finally reached screens in 2005 under the direction of Story, their solution to the Thing problem France discussed was to simply build an elaborate suit for performer Michael Chiklis instead of employing CGI the way the eventual 2015 and 2025 FF movies did. The result was satisfactory, though not much more streamlined from the version worn by Carl Ciarfalio in the Roger Corman production. Or, as 2005 Fantastic Four's executive producer Kevin Feige spun to Knight Ridder, "If it was really three people and a ball on a stick, we thought we'd be missing out on a lot of the fun. We really wanted the actors to be able to play off each other."
Fantastic Four was a hit in mid-2005, earning $333 million globally (on par with that summer's Batman Begins' $356 million), yet critics pilloried it with 27% on Rotten Tomatoes. Online fans were also very dismissive of Story's two FF movies, to the point that a planned third film (possibly featuring Djimon Hounsou as Black Panther) was scuttled by Fox despite adequate returns from the first two. Although the 2005 version at times feels cheap or generic, it is not a betrayal of the material at all, staying faithful to the delightful and earnestly familial nature of Lee/Kirby's original creation while bringing it into the 21st century. Placed next to more questionable Marvel movies of this era like 2003's Daredevil or Hulk, Story's film has a kind of noble integrity.
"I grew up on comic books," Story told the Baltimore Sun in 2005. "I definitely knew the world of Fantastic Four and thought if it was going to happen as a movie, I would go after it 100 percent."
One problem is the effects read like they are (quite literally) stretching the boundaries of the movie's ample $100 million budget, even as the story itself more-or-less isolates the characters within the Baxter Building for a good chunk of the runtime. Fantastic Four also feels a little at odds with its own light tone, with Chris Evans' Johnny Storm living his Maxim lifestyle, or the chamber Reed Richards constructs to rid he and his fellow four of their freakish powers resembling something from Cronenberg's The Fly. Even when it threatens to tread into existential body horror, the movie does not stray far from being (relatively) kid-friendly.
This indecisiveness has been highlighted by some of the film's actors. During an interview with ScreenRant's Grant Hermanns shortly before his death this past July, Doctor Doom actor Julian McMahon said the following of the two FF films he made with Story: "When we did the movies years ago, we were at the precipice of all that stuff happening. So, we were finding our way a lot, and we were trying to figure out what space the movie itself lived in. Was it a kid's movie? Was it a family movie? Was it more comedy-driven, or was it more trauma-driven? We were trying to find all that stuff as we were shooting."
Feige also hinted at this tonal tension when discussing the perceived battle between his summer movie and Batman Begins to The Gazette in 2005: "Batman, as it should be, is going to be very dark. Fantastic Four will have its share of drama, but it's also going to have a level of humor and fun that I think will make it stand out."
One bit of little-discussed off-screen drama? Chris Columbus was given the boot from the 2005 Fantastic Four (and its sequel) in pre-production, despite being credited on both films. He had no involvement at all with the final film, even though his initial creative direction came through in the final product.
"We were fired off of Fantastic Four," Columbus told Wilson Morales in 2015. "We had a meeting with the director and the producer. I’m a pretty gentle guy. I don’t go in as an 800-pound elephant and say, 'You got to this, and this, and this.' We wanted to see the conceptual art. We walked in, my partner and I, Michael Barnathan, and we said, 'Oh, this looks good,' nothing but compliments really. I may have asked a question about whether we were going to do a Ben Grimm CGI. I said, 'You really never get the size of Ben Grimm if he’s not CGI or something.' We left. About an hour later we got a call from the studio, and they said, 'We don’t think you guys should be creatively involved anymore. We’d like to take you off the movie.' I said, 'You don’t want us to produce?' and they said, 'No. We’ve got a producer. You guys will just be executive producers.' That was the end of that. That was the end of Fantastic Four for us."
At its heart, the Fantastic Four has always been about a loving dysfunctional family, something the new film from Feige and Marvel Studios appears to be adhering to. Through years of persistence and the initial juice of Chris Columbus' involvement, Bernd Eichinger was able to bring the group properly to the screen despite contractual, financial, and personnel setbacks. A nascent slate of films based on Marvel characters was still in the awkward stage, and FF was similarly grasping to strike the right tone while trying to capture what was already indelible on the four-color page. It took an army of at least 12 creatives to generate a workable script from logistically challenging material.
The seams certainly show in how the movie barely – but ultimately does – function… kinda like a family.
Top image credit: Marvel Comics and Caroline Schiff/Getty Images
Julian LeFay, Bethesda's former chief engineer known among fans as the 'Father of The Elder Scrolls' series, has died aged 59.
It was announced last week that LeFay, now co-founder and technical producer at OnceLost Games, had stepped back from game development after a lengthy battle with cancer, in order to spend time with his family and loved ones.
A statement from OnceLost Games, published today, has now confirmed LeFay's passing — "with profound sadness and heavy hearts".
"Julian LeFay was not just a colleague — he was a visionary who fundamentally shaped the gaming industry as we know it today," OnceLost Games' statement reads. "Known as the 'Father of The Elder Scrolls', Julian directed the creation of legendary titles including Elder Scrolls 1 and 2: Arena, Daggerfall, and Battlespire.
"His pioneering work established the foundation for open-world RPGs and influenced countless developers and games that followed."
Born in Denmark in 1965, LeFay began his career working on early Amiga and NES games, before becoming one of Bethesda's earliest employees in 1987.
After working on a string of Elder Scrolls titles, his career next took him to Sega, and then ultimately to found OnceLost Games in 2019 to develop a new open-world RPG, Wayward Realms, that was successfully pitched on Kickstarter as a Daggerfall spiritual successor.
"Throughout his courageous battle with cancer, Julian never wavered in his passion for The Wayward Realms," OnceLost Games' statement continues. "Even during his illness, he continued to share his vision with our team, mentor our developers, and ensure that every aspect of the game reflected his commitment to creating something truly extraordinary. His strength, determination, and unwavering focus inspire us all."
Development on The Wayward Realms will now continue under the guidance of fellow former Bethesda veteran and OnceLost Games co-founder Ted Peterson, the studio concluded, with its team "more committed than ever to bringing The Wayward Realms to life exactly as Julian envisioned it".
Image credit: Shae Jensen/Julian LeFay
Tom Phillips is IGN's News Editor. You can reach Tom at tom_phillips@ign.com or find him on Bluesky @tomphillipseg.bsky.social
Tolkien’s Middle-earth has captured the imagination of fantasy fans worldwide ever since The Hobbit was published in 1937. And although Peter Jackson is the film director who successfully brought the books to life on the big screen, you might be surprised to learn Middle-earth also has a rich video game history that goes back decades.
The earliest video game adaptation was created in 1982 by Beam Software, which developed a text-adventure game based on The Hobbit. The game was a huge hit and went on to sell over 500,000 units in Europe, despite middling reviews from critics. Such is the power of Tolkien’s works.
In total, there are over 50 video games based on the works of J.R.R. Tolkien that span numerous genres, like action-adventure, RPG, strategy, and more. As we prepare for another new Tolkien game just on the horizon, we’ve gone through this long history and chosen the 11 best Lord of the Rings games ever made.
The legal rights to adapt The Lord of the Rings into video games are almost as complicated as Middle-earth’s lore itself. In the early 2000s, Tolkien’s literary works and Peter Jackson’s film adaptations were treated separately, with Vivendi and Tolkien Enterprises owning the rights to adapt the books for games, while EA owned the rights to adapt Peter Jackson’s The Lord of the Rings movies. In 2009, Warner Bros. was able to bring together both movie and book rights and, at long last, develop games that incorporated story elements from both the literary and cinematic worlds of Tolkien.
The Lord of the Rings: War in the North is the first Middle-earth game to feature story and design elements from both books and films. This hack-and-slash RPG stars a trio of original characters: The Ranger Eradan, the Dwarf Farin, and the Elf Andriel, each with their unique playstyle. The trio goes on a journey parallel to the events of the film trilogy after they’re enlisted by Aragorn to help the Fellowship, all while Frodo makes his way to Mount Doom to destroy the One Ring. While the combat is generally considered enjoyable, albeit typical of its time, the real draw is that Lord of the Rings fans get to role-play as self-insert friends of Aragorn during the iconic events of the Peter Jackson movies.
Since 2007, thousands of players have ventured into the many regions of Middle-earth itself thanks to the extensive digital world of The Lord of the Rings Online. While certainly not as popular as other MMORPGs like World of Warcraft or Final Fantasy 14, Lord of the Rings Online has cultivated a dedicated player base thanks to the way it brings the world of Tolkien to life, allowing players to explore the far corners of Eriador, Rhovanion, Gondor, and Mordor. A visit to The Lord of the Rings: Online can even be considered essential for any Lord of the Rings fan.
Create a unique character and travel around Middle-earth during the events of The War of the Ring and undertake quests and raids crafted after events from the novels. What’s more, the game is still going strong after 18 years, with the most recent expansion, Legacy of Morgoth, released in late 2024. It also remains the only Lord of the Rings MMORPG, and will remain so for the foreseeable, especially after Amazon canceled its own planned Lord of the Rings MMORPG in 2021.
TT Games, formerly Traveller’s Tales, has transformed beloved franchises into wildly popular, comedic adventure Lego games for years. Lego The Hobbit follows the same formula that made the studio’s Star Wars and Harry Potter games such beloved hits.
A zany re-telling of Peter Jackson’s Hobbit movies built of plastic bricks, players can adventure through the events of the trilogy’s first two films, An Unexpected Journey and The Desolation of Smaug (the third film, The Hobbit: The Battle of the Five Armies, had not yet hit theaters.) You can unlock and play as dozens of different Hobbit movie characters in this humorous adventure, which splices plenty of great skits and sight gags into an otherwise pretty faithful (if heavily condensed) recreation of the movies. Expect to battle goblins, ride barrels, and steal from a colossal dragon. But as enjoyable as this all is, just know there is a better Tolkien movie trilogy with a better Lego adaptation slightly further down this list.
EA Los Angeles launched a series of real-time strategy games based on Middle-earth in 2004, during the height of the genre’s popularity. The Battle for Middle-earth is rooted in the tried-and-tested Command & Conquer formula: you take command of either the forces of Gondor or Mordor, establish a base by building unique structures and units, and then send out an army that will fight a war to determine the fate of Middle-earth.
Battle for Middle-Earth was a critical and commercial success when it was released, thanks to its satisfying single-player story mode that included separate, complete campaigns for both Gondor and Mordor. Many praised the way it perfectly translated the world of Middle-earth to the RTS genre, and EA LA would go on to one-up their achievements with a far superior sequel that you’ll also find in this list.
The Lord of the Rings is the kind of property that allows for all kinds of adaptations. RTS? Sure! MMORPG? Absolutely. How about a Final Fantasy-esque turn-based RPG? Surprisingly, also yes – you’ve found your way to The Lord of the Rings: The Third Age.
Criticized for being maybe too inspired by Final Fantasy 10, right down to having a similar battle menu, The Lord of the Rings: The Third Age nevertheless combines a familiar, turn-based combat system and class-based party system with the world of The Lord of the Rings. The result is a satisfying RPG that has become an enduring fan-favorite. The Third Age, like War in the North, is set parallel to the events of the Peter Jackson films, with players taking on the role of characters who are hot on the trail of the Fellowship. Along the way, you visit many of the same locations that appear in the film trilogy, and battle familiar foes like the Balrog. There are even moments where you can temporarily team up with members of the Fellowship itself in battle.
It’s not the most original game on this list, but The Third Age is a great way to feel like a part of The Lord of the Rings movies without simply playing as Aragorn, Gandalf, or Frodo.
EA LA followed up their Tolkien RTS with a superior sequel, The Battle for Middle-earth 2. Like the first game, you can choose between a Good or Evil single-player campaign. The former’s story is centered on the Elf Glorfindel, who allies himself with the Dwarves to defend Rivendell from Sauron. Meanwhile, in the Evil campaign, Sauron sends his commander, the Mouth of Sauron, and the Nazguls to invade the North.
Similar to the first game, players raise armies consisting of infantry, bowmen, pikemen, cavalry, and siege machines and command them using characters from The Lord of the Rings. The sequel also adds even more factions, including Goblins, Dwarves, and Elves, for a total of six factions. It’s the better game of the two Battle for Middle-earths by far, but sadly, neither is available to buy today thanks to EA losing the Lord of the Rings licence, and even owners of the old physical editions cannot battle online as online servers were shuttered in 2010.
Like the Hobbit game we’ve previously spoken about, Lego The Lord of the Rings is TT’s brickified adaptation of the original trilogy of movies directed by Peter Jackson. And if you’re only going to play one of them, this is the one you want to play. You can play as any of the 80+ available characters in Lego form, from Frodo and Aragorn to Lurtz and Tom Bombadil, all while running, jumping, and building your way through the events of the superior Tolkien film trilogy.
The Lego games usually live or die depending on which popular franchise they're adapting, and TT had a great foundation in the vast, varied world of The Lord of the Rings. There’s something particularly charming about seeing Middle-earth brought to life in Lego form, which makes it easy to recommend to any fan. Do you like The Lord of the Rings? Do you like Legos? Do you like fun platformers? Boom, one of the best Lord of the Rings games ever.
Back during the era of official movie tie-ins in the early 2000s, , EA published a couple of hack-and-slash games based on The Lord of the Rings films where you took control of members of the Fellowship and made your way through the key events, leaving a pile of orc corpses in your wake.
The Gauntlet-like gameplay suited the fantasy swords-and-sorcery battles of The Lord of the Rings well, but The Return of the King was especially notable for its inclusion of local co-op, allowing you to form your own mini-Fellowship and go through the adventure together. Using actual scenes from the Peter Jackson movie to serve as cutscenes (a benefit unlocked thanks to the PS2’s DVD drive) and gameplay that captured the scale of the films’ battles, Return of the King was head and shoulders above many official tie-in games released at this time. But it didn’t quite beat its own predecessor…
The Lord of the Rings: The Two Towers and The Return of the King are very similar games built on the same hack-and-slash foundations, and so your favorite of the two is largely up to personal preference. Which scene from the movies do you most want to experience? For our money, the Helm’s Deep level in The Two Towers is among the very best moments in any Lord of the Rings video game.
Like in The Lord of the Rings: The Return of the King, you’ll find many of The Two Towers’ key moments re-created here (as well as a few from The Fellowship of the Ring, too.) But the real joy is found in taking control of one of the members of the Fellowship themselves. Whether it’s the hack-and-slash sword combat of Aragorn, the speedy ranged bow attacks of Legolas, or the heavy axe swings of Gimli, The Two Towers’ combo-heavy combat felt as good as any action game released in the early 2000s. Throw in amazing visuals taken straight from the movies, and The Two Towers is a standard-bearer for official movie tie-in games.
As previously mentioned, complications around the rights to The Lord of the Rings have led to a variety of restrictions. The Middle-earth: Shadow games, though, were developed during a time when Warner Bros. had the rights to both Tolkien’s works and Peter Jackson’s movies, which meant developer Monolith Productions was able to take inspiration from the wider universe detailed in the legendarium, the lore bible that The Lord of the Rings is built on.
Shadow of War, the second game in the series, goes to some unusual places because of that freedom. It involves figures like Shelob (here depicted as a woman, rather than a spider, because of lore reasons) and the never-before-seen Entwives, and ties protagonist Talion’s fate directly into the story of the Ringwraiths. Shadow of War’s overly complicated story, with its convoluted attempts to tie its world to the movies, is the reason why many have the sequel ranked below its predecessor when it comes to Monolith’s two Middle-earth games.
But story isn’t everything. Shadow of War features a much larger, more varied world than its scorched brown predecessor, allowing you to explore more of Middle-earth. The same fantastic combat and, of course, the Nemesis system, all return from the first game, but they’re bolstered by a fortress siege system that captures the epic scale of iconic battles such as Helm’s Deep (albeit you’re fighting alongside an amassed army of brainwashed orcs, rather than men and elves.) All this helps skyrocket Shadow of War towards the top of our rankings, beaten only by its fantastic predecessor.
Set between the events of The Hobbit and The Lord of the Rings, Middle-earth: Shadow of Mordor sees the Gondorian Ranger Talion bond with the wraith of Celebrimbor, the elf who unwittingly aided Sauron forge the Rings of Power. Together, they go on a journey through the depths of Mordor to get revenge on Sauron’s generals who murdered Talion’s family. With fewer ties to the movies than in the sequel, Shadow of War, Shadow of Mordor tells a more cohesive story of revenge in Middle-earth.
But the true star of Shadow of Mordor is Monolith’s patented Nemesis system. Every Orc in Shadow of Mordor is unique to your playthrough, each given a random design, traits, and name. But beyond just procedurally generating an army of unique foes for you to kill, the Nemesis System shifts and changes each Uruk’s relationship with both you and their peers depending on how you interact with them. If one kills you in combat, for example, they will get promoted for their valiant deed and will bring up their victory the next time you encounter them.
This system, combined with the satisfying, Batman Arkham-style combat and a story that isn’t just a retread of Peter Jackson’s movies, easily makes Shadow of Mordor our favorite Lord of the Rings game of all time. Sadly, Monolith Productions was shut down in 2025, and so we’ll likely never see another Shadow game, nor the Nemesis System again. And so the two Middle-earth games serve as a proud legacy for this departed studio.
With a new line of The Lord of the Rings movies on their way, as well as the ongoing Rings of Power TV show on Prime Video, there will likely be even more Tolkien games coming in the future. Next up is the cozy game Tales of the Shire from Fictions and Weta Workshop, which will deliver an entirely different video game take on Tolkien’s world.
Matt Kim is IGN's Senior Features Editor.
Blades of Fire, the most recent game from Lords of Shadow and Metroid Dread studio MercurySteam, has "underperformed".
Announcing the news, Digital Bros — which owns 505 Games, Blades of Fire's publisher — blamed "challenging competitive dynamics, driven by an oversupply of new releases and increasingly selective consumers."
"This confirms the challenges faced by most industry peers and competitors in attracting consumers to new titles, particularly when these are not backed by an established brand driving a loyal player community," the company said in a financial statement, warning of a further decline in its revenue for the fiscal year.
It's unclear what, if any, impact this may have on MercurySteam or its development plans. The 23-year-old studio has quite the portfolio, having previously worked on Metroid: Samus Returns, Metroid Dread, and several Castlevania games, including Lords of Shadow, Mirror of Fate, and Lords of Shadow 2.
As some players posit on video game fan forum ResetEra, however, it's possible Epic Game Store PC-exclusivity may have limited its audience. "Maybe not putting it exclusively for EGS could have helped," wrote one. "I very much enjoyed the demo on EGS, but not enough to buy it on EGS, would have bought it on Steam though."
"Blades of Fire’s blacksmithing burns bright, but overly simplistic combat and a mediocre story mean it doesn’t forge a sharp enough edge to put its customizable weapons to good use," we wrote in IGN's Blades of Fire review, awarding it 5/10.
Vikki Blake is a reporter for IGN, as well as a critic, columnist, and consultant with 15+ years experience working with some of the world's biggest gaming sites and publications. She's also a Guardian, Spartan, Silent Hillian, Legend, and perpetually High Chaos. Find her at BlueSky.
I’ve played over 120 hours of Super Mario Party Jamboree since I reviewed it on Nintendo Switch last October. I loved it from the jump – giving it a 9 in my original review – and it’s continued to be a top choice on game nights with family and friends. So I was thrilled when Nintendo revealed that this would be one of the first Switch 1 games to get a Switch 2 expansion, thinking an upgraded version with great mouse control minigames and interesting new ways to party would be a total slam dunk. Unfortunately, Super Mario Party Jamboree - Nintendo Switch 2 Edition + Jamboree TV is just as sloppy as its overly wordy title, with a handful of problems stemming from the frustrating decision to completely separate its new and old content. The fantastic base game is still hidden underneath a pile of annoying choices, but it’s tough to recommend the Switch 2 Edition as the clear, definitive version of the best Mario Party there’s ever been.
Before I get into the major differences between Jamboree on Switch 1 and Switch 2, I highly recommend you check out my original review from last year if you’re looking for in-depth thoughts on the base game, because it all holds true. Super Mario Party Jamboree itself is still an amazing time, with fantastic boards and items that emphasize strategy more than ever before, a great selection of minigames that features returning classics and new favorites, and a gorgeous presentation and attention to detail that elevate the whole package. I’ve been playing Mario Party pretty much my entire life, and now that I’ve had it for almost a year, I can definitively say that Jamboree is my favorite entry in the series. If you don’t own it at all, I can’t recommend the Switch 1 version enough.
However, with that all said, that doesn’t mean the Switch 2 Edition + Jamboree TV is worth the upgrade. This new version is essentially an entirely unaltered port of the Switch 1 release with the Jamboree TV expansion glued on. When you first boot it up, the menu will look familiar to anyone who’s played Super Mario 3D World + Bowser’s Fury: You select between Super Mario Party Jamboree (complete with a Switch 1 icon in the top left, indicating this is just the old game and nothing more, not even a resolution bump) and Jamboree TV, which displays a Switch 2 icon and actually makes use of the new tech. The difference between this and 3D World’s expanded version, however, is that 3D World and Bowser’s Fury are wholly unique games that make sense to separate, while these two share a majority of their content but differ in strange, limiting ways.
Jamboree TV is where all of the new minigames and modes that take advantage of the Switch 2’s hardware live. The clear highlight is the set of 14 new minigames that use the Joy-Con 2’s mouse controls. Switch 2’s mouse controls may not be comfortable for extended periods of time, but they work super well in the context of a 45-second Mario Party minigame, and I was surprised by how much I loved the entire lineup. Highlights include Stuffie Stacker, where you work with a partner to build the tallest tower possible out of blocks and Yoshi plushies, and the chaotic Goomba Scoopas, where you drive a snow plow to frantically shove piles of Goombas into your team’s gate. Playing with mouse controls means everyone has to use a single Switch 2 Joy-Con instead of a pair or a Pro Controller, but with the improved, larger design over the original Joy-Con, it feels like less of a concession and more of a legitimate option this time. Every mouse minigame is 2v2, which adds a ton of variety to the lineup of team games that appear in Mario Party mode.
Speaking of which, Jamboree TV adds two great rulesets to try out alongside the original that put fun spins on the classic dice-rolling action. The first is Tag-Team Rules, which pits two teams of two against each other. Every player still takes their own turn, but each pair shares the same pool of stars, coins, and items, so you need to work together on every decision to come out on top. It’s a fun way to shake up the traditional format and it builds even further upon the strategic foundation of the base game.
I also love the new Frenzy Rules as a fast-paced way to fit a whole game of Mario Party in without it taking upwards of 90 minutes. Frenzy games only last five turns – or roughly 30 minutes – and each player starts out with 50 coins, a Double Dice, and even a star. Every roll and minigame feels crucial when you only have five turns to set yourself apart from the pack, and this is an exciting mode I never knew I wanted.
Unfortunately, it’s a shame Jamboree TV doesn’t add any new boards to the mix, instead focusing on side modes that are pretty forgettable. Carnival Coaster is a cooperative mode where you use mouse controls in an on-rails shooter, completing team minigames as you go to add more time to the clock. I play Mario Party to compete, not cooperate, and it starts to feel repetitive after just a couple of runs.
Meanwhile, Bowser Live uses the Switch 2’s built-in microphone and optional camera in an attempt to put you into the game. You enter Bowser’s lair and pop out of a warp pipe and – if you have a camera plugged in – see a live image of yourself. You then compete in completely controller-free minigames where you stack Goombas on your head or just literally scream into the microphone as loud as you can to score points.
We’ve known since the days of WarioWare: Snapped! that minigames control better with an actual controller than with a camera or microphone, and Bowser Live doesn’t do anything to change that truth. A microphone minigame where you clap to the beat, for example, is so much less precise than the Donkey Konga minigame where you do the same thing but with actual buttons. As a result, the appeal wears off after just a couple of minutes, and at my most cynical, it feels like a tacked-on mode designed to sell Switch 2 cameras and nothing more.
Jamboree TV in general makes use of the Switch 2’s ability to use a camera, as live feeds of you and your friends’ faces are visible throughout the party – although you don’t need a camera to access these modes and can play everything but Bowser Live without missing out on any content. I guess it’s a nice novelty and kids might like seeing themselves or their parents on the TV, but it’s not something I ever see myself using outside of testing it for this review.
Even though some of the new content is worthwhile, things get really frustrating when you consider how Jamboree and Jamboree TV split up their content. As I mentioned, the Jamboree side of the fence is a straight port of the Switch 1 game, which means there’s no mouse control minigames, camera functionality, or option to do the Frenzy and Tag-Team Rules. That wouldn’t be a problem if the Jamboree TV side of things was an outright replacement and included everything Jamboree has to offer, but it’s inexplicably missing a ton of content from the Switch 1 side.
Jamboree TV completely lacks Pro Rules, which was one of Jamboree’s best additions. It reduces luck and focuses on strategy, and I praised it in my original review. Here, it’s only available on the Switch 1 side, and so are all of Jamboree’s original side modes – that’s Koopathlon, Bowser Kaboom Squad, Paratroopa Flight School, Toad’s Item Factory, Rhythm Kitchen, the single-player campaign Party Planning Trek, and every mode in Minigame Bay besides Free Play.
More importantly, Jamboree TV lacks all of Jamboree’s achievements, customization, and unlockables. In the Switch 1 version, you have to earn Party Points to buy additional stickers and finish achievements to unlock three of the boards, but Jamboree TV just gives you everything right from the start, taking away the fun sense of progression and incentive to play single-player that I really valued. It also means if you’re buying this new on Switch 2, you’ll have everything unlocked in Jamboree TV, but nothing unlocked in Jamboree, which is just odd.
What’s stranger is that these two sides don’t talk to each other whatsoever: If you’re playing Jamboree TV and do something that would normally earn you an achievement over in Jamboree, nothing happens and the Switch 1 version doesn’t recognize it at all when you return there until you do it again.
Another example is minigame records. My group and I love to chase high scores in minigames – whether in Free Play or during a Mario Party game itself – but Jamboree TV doesn’t track records at all. Did you get a new crazy high score on the button-mashing Domination? Switch 1 Jamboree will congratulate you with the iconic “New Record!” sound effect and display that score until someone else beats it, while Switch 2’s Jamboree TV won’t track it anywhere.
Even worse, the Switch 1 side didn’t receive any performance or resolution updates to take advantage of the new hardware. Jamboree TV runs in 1440p docked, but Jamboree is 1080p docked and still a noticeable 720p handheld, which was the maximum resolution of the Switch 1 screen. Nintendo is charging $80 for the Switch 2 Edition at launch, when more than half of it is quite literally an unchanged Switch 1 game. And while it’s only $20 for the upgrade if you already own it, I’m still not sure that’s worth the compromised way this expansion works.
Do you want to play Pro Rules with the enhanced resolution? It’s simply not possible. How about include the mouse control minigames while still working toward achievements? You can’t do that, either. It also takes so long to swap between the two versions that you’re better off just closing the software altogether and rebooting: the staff credits roll every time you leave TV, but at least they’re skippable. One of my favorite things about Jamboree is how many choices it gives you to make your Mario Party experience exactly what you want it to be, but Jamboree + Jamboree TV has entirely lost that graceful design just nine months later unless you only stick to the unaltered base game, which defeats the entire purpose of upgrading.
As questions swirl over the future of Doctor Who, one of the its most prolific writers has suggested the series may be due a "rest".
Almost two months after the airing of Doctor Who's most recent season finale, the BBC's flagship sci-fi show is still to be recommissioned for new episodes. The return of co-production partner Disney remains uncertain, and a notable Doctor Who insider recently suggested the series will likely now remain off-air for several years while production sits paused.
Amid all of that, Doctor Who writer and actor Mark Gatiss has been asked his view on what might be next for the veteran series. In response, Gatiss referenced the era where Doctor Who was previously off-air for a considerable period, between 1989 and 2005, and suggested it might be time for the franchise to take another break.
A friend and frequent collaborator of previous Doctor Who showrunner Stephen Moffat, Gatiss has written nine episodes of the series since its 2005 reboot, and acted in five episodes.
"It's been back for 20 years, which is an awfully long time," Gatiss told Prospect magazine. "Almost as long as its original run. That's pretty spectacular. So maybe it's time for another rest."
"I really don't know," he continued. "I only know that I still love the show with all my heart."
Gatiss is one of the most senior figures to comment on the uncertain future of Doctor Who, following the series' most recent episode which saw the departure of star Ncuti Gatwa via a reshot ending, and the unexplained appearance of Billie Piper in a role that remains to be confirmed.
Even the mere suggestion that Doctor Who might enter another 'dark period', such as the 16-year hiatus between its Sylvester McCoy and Christopher Eccleston eras, would have previously seemed inconceivable. But such is the uncertainty around the show's future now, with no actor officially confirmed to hold the series' title role.
Russell T Davies, Doctor Who's showrunner for its past two seasons, has meanwhile simply said that the series' makers "don't know what's happening yet."
In the meantime, the BBC will plug the gap with an already-shot spin-off miniseries, The War Between The Land and The Sea, which is expected to debut in 2026. There are also early plans for an animated Doctor Who series for UK children's channel CBeebies — though with a production partner yet to be found, this sounds much further off.
Photo by Daniele Venturelli/Getty Images for Italian Global Series Festival
Tom Phillips is IGN's News Editor. You can reach Tom at tom_phillips@ign.com or find him on Bluesky @tomphillipseg.bsky.social
Along with stock of the Nintendo Switch 2 being back at My Nintendo Store, UK fans can also grab at least 25% off select digital first-party games to grab and enjoy on whichever console you have until August 3.
While My Nintendo Store also sells physical versions of its exclusive Nintendo titles, this is a premium incentive to opt for the digital editions this time around. While PlayStation has its own regular selection of sales, like the ongoing PlayStation Direct Summer Sale, big Nintendo offers are few and far between.
Sure, there is the Summer Sale’s hub page at the regular Nintendo website shows a ton of games on sale from multiple platforms, but this is a rare opportunity to score big savings on those that are either published by Nintendo or are developed in-house.
While not on offer as part of the Summer Sale, we’re pleased to see Nintendo Switch 2 stock becoming more steadily available at My Nintendo Store UK, both with the console on its own (£395.99) or in bundles with Mario Kart World and/or Donkey Kong Bananza.
As most who’ve been shopping in this space for a while will know, the Switch 2 + Mario Kart World bundle is still a great deal for £429.99, since you get both the console and a download code for the digital version of the game, essentially half-price compared to buying it à la carte.
Unfortunately, the same sentiment has not been carried over to the Donkey Kong Bananza bundles, also sold as digital copies. Both the Switch 2 + DK Bananza bundle and the Switch 2 + Mario Kart World + DK Bananza bundle are priced at £454.98 and £488.98 respectively, the same totals you’d pay if you just bought digital versions of Donkey Kong’s new adventure individually for £58.99.
Still, if you were planning to buy DK Bananza or both games digitally anyway, it does make things slightly more convenient at least.
While not putting the most popular hits like Pokemon Scarlet & Violet, Breath of the Wild, or Tears of the Kingdom, or Super Mario Odyssey on offer, there are some solid winning Switch game deals in the eShop Summer Sale, that are at least 25% off compared to their physical versions.
For starters, there are a few which have been given free Nintendo Switch 2 upgrades: recent hits like New Super Mario Bros. U Deluxe, Splatoon 3, Captain Toad: Treasure Tracker, and Big Brain Academy: Brain vs. Brain.
Others may not have dedicated Switch 2 upgrades, but there are also offers on top-quality Switch games that are still worth playing on the new console.
Plus, with the well-known Nintendo trait of big first-party games either dropping much slower compared to other platforms, or just staying the same with a very rare sale, there are a good number of titles from the last few years that are worth grabbing now if they’re on your ‘to buy’ backlog.
For instance, Metroid Prime Remastered, which has still sat at £34.99 since coming out over two years ago, is not £26.19 until the Summer Sale’s end.
The best savings in this sale, though, are the bigger games which still sit at their £49.99 RRP. Fire Emblem: Three Houses, a beloved entry in the tactical RPG series, but is six years old now, can now be grabbed for just £33.29.
New Super Mario Bros U Deluxe is in the same boat, being a 2019 Switch port of a 2012 Wii U game still being sold for £49.99, has been dropped to £37.49.
Outside of occasional retailer-specific offers of new physical copies or eBay listings for used, it will likely be a long time before we see first-party savings like this on Nintendo games again.
While you have until August 3 to make up your mind on these digital games, though, we don’t expect stock of the Switch 2 + Mario Kart World bundle to last long, so grab that if you’ve yet to buy one and want to save some cash.
Ben Williams – IGN freelance contributor with over 10 years of experience covering gaming, tech, film, TV, and anime. Follow him on Twitter/X @BenLevelTen.
As the hype ramps up for Nintendo's The Legend of Zelda live-action movie, Google is getting in on the action with a couple of secret messages for anyone looking up either of the movie's two big stars: Bo Bragason and Benjamin Evan Ainsworth.
Nintendo announced the pair of young actors set to portray Link and Zelda in its upcoming film last week. The casting came as a surprise to some, as whilst the actors are certainly not newcomers to acting, they're relatively unknown when compared to the actors cast in Nintendo's Super Mario Bros. Movie, such as Jack Black and Chris Pratt.
Perhaps unsurprisingly then, there's been quite a bit of interest in the actors, and it would appear a number of us have Googled the pair to get a rundown on their credits. And, seemingly because this has been a common trend, Google has also jumped onto the hype train.
If you Google Bragason's name now, "excuse me, Princess" will jump up and down at the top of the results page, complete with an female elf emoji. Ainsworth, on the other hand, gets: "KYAAA! HYAAAAA!" and a male elf.
The former is particularly funny. Though stemming more from the animated Zelda series rather than the games themselves, it makes reference to Link's numerous responses to the Princess throughout the show (thanks, Eurogamer).
The latter, meanwhile, is of course synonymous with Link's efforts to chop, stab, and destroy whatever baddies stand in his way — and typically all the character says in most Zelda games.
It follows a similar Easter egg implemented for Oasis fans earlier this month which cheekily corrected any Google search for the term "Oasis tour" or "Rock 'N' Roll Star" with "Did you mean: Madferit" and "Did you mean: Rock 'N' Roll Staaaaaaaaaar", respectively. Before that, Google searches for Lewis Capaldi briefly came back with the heartfelt message: "Welcome back Lewis — Someone we love."
With less than two years to go until The Legend of Zelda opens in theaters, Nintendo is still yet to say anything of the film's story or setting. Discussing the film in May 2024, however, director Wes Ball said The Legend of Zelda should feel "grounded" and "real," with as little motion capture as possible.
Curious to read more of Bragason and Ainsworth's careers so far? We've got a guide to everything they've been up to, and where you might have seen them already.
Vikki Blake is a reporter for IGN, as well as a critic, columnist, and consultant with 15+ years experience working with some of the world's biggest gaming sites and publications. She's also a Guardian, Spartan, Silent Hillian, Legend, and perpetually High Chaos. Find her at BlueSky.
Long before Pedro Pascal took on the mantle of the Fantastic Four's Reed Richards, the Mandalorian and The Last of Us star appeared in another comic book movie: Wonder Woman 1984.
Suiting up for Marvel's rival DC, Pascal played villainous businessman Maxwell "Max Lord" Lorenzano in the second Gal Gadot-starring Wonder Woman movie — which is notable for being one of Pascal's few roles to feature the actor clean shaven.
And it's this lack of facial fuzz that sticks in Pascal's mind of his time on the film — as he says now he remains "appalled" by how he looked without his trademark moustache (which thankfully returns once again in The Fantastic Four: First Steps).
"I grow such s**t facial hair, but if I were to shave it all off... I really look very [awful]," Pascal told LadBible, via Variety. "Strongly disagree with a clean shaven me.
"I was so appalled by the way I look in Wonder Woman 1984. I loved the movie, but I was so appalled by the way that I looked that I never have gone back unless it were completely necessary."
While Pascal might not have had much say over his appearance in the DCEU, the actor has said he was able to discuss the look of Reed Richards with Marvel and come to a "collaborative" decision that the moustache would stay.
"If they asked me to be clean shave for Fantastic Four and insisted then I would've done it," Pascal noted. "But it was a very collaborative creation for all of our looks in the movie."
Thankfully, Pascal will not be reviving his DC role anytime soon, with plans for a third Wonder Woman movie scrapped following the arrival of James Gunn, and the launch of the new DCU with the just-released Superman. When we next see the character, in a fresh Wonder Woman movie that's currently being written, it will be a new incarnation.
Marvel fans should expect to see much more of Reed Richards, however. After his debut this week in The Fantastic Four: First Steps, Pascal will reprise the character for a key role in Avengers: Doomsday — just don't call him the new leader of the Avengers.
Tom Phillips is IGN's News Editor. You can reach Tom at tom_phillips@ign.com or find him on Bluesky @tomphillipseg.bsky.social
Since the Nintendo Switch 2 launched in June, we’ve only had one first-party bundle available. We knew the Mario Kart World bundle would be a limited-time offer, but now we know that the next big console exclusive to get a bundle will be Pokémon: Legends Z-A.
The new bundle, announced right after the Pokémon Presents July 2025 livestream, will mirror its Mario Kart counterpart by offering the system with a digital download code for the game, and is already available for preorder at retailers like Target and Best Buy.
Notably, the new bundle is simply a standard Switch 2 with Pokémon: Legends Z-A packed in as a download code.
There isn't anything to set it apart from the standard console just yet, such as the Pokémon Sword and Shield Switch Lite, or the various special edition OG Switch consoles we saw over its life cycle.
At the time of writing, Best Buy, Target, GameStop, and Nintendo have the latest console SKU up for preorder for $499.99 (the same as the Switch 2 + Mario Kart Bundle). It will release on October 16, 2025.
Still, if you already have the console, you can preorder the game from Amazon or Target, and each includes the Switch 1 version and the Switch 2 Upgrade Pack.
Yesterday’s Pokemon Presents event showcased more about the upcoming title, including the appearance of Mega Dragonite which makes its debut.
While the game will be available on the original Nintendo Switch, it’s getting “Improved performance with higher frame rate and resolution” according to the Switch 2 version’s store page.
If you've not been able to get hold of a Switch 2 just yet, but are looking to pick one up before the new Pokémon bundle, the console is not only back in stock at Target, but the retailer also has the Mario Kart World bundle, with both options being offered at MSRP and with delivery available for this week.
Lloyd Coombes is an experienced freelancer in tech, gaming and fitness seen at Polygon, Eurogamer, Macworld, TechRadar and many more. He's a big fan of Magic: The Gathering and other collectible card games, much to his wife's dismay.
Buffy the Vampire Slayer star Sarah Michelle Gellar has given fans a promising update on the series' upcoming reboot, which has just held its first table read.
Gellar, who serves as an executive producer and will also star in the series' new pilot episode, joined other cast members and crew this Monday, July 21, for a read-through of the episode's script, as seen in a couple of behind the scenes photos posted on Instagram.
Now, resourceful fans are attempting to analyse that script for clues, via a classic case of enhancing images — and believe they may have worked out the names of some key characters.
Behind the scenes photos show Gellar's script for the episode, simply titled Episode 101 "Pilot". Curiously, however, the name of the reboot series has been censored by Gellar — is it not called Buffy the Vampire Slayer anymore?
But fans are more interested in the reverse of the script's top page, which appears to feature a list of characters seen in the episode. Buffy herself looks to be at the top of the list, as Buffy "Anne" Summers, and fans say they can then see a number of other names — including Poppy, Hugo, Gracie, and Mr. Burke.
Intriguingly, several of these names were previously noted in a casting breakdown, leaked back in March by entertainment industry insider Daniel Richtman.
Gracie was reported to be the best friend of the series' new lead character played by young actress Ryan Kiera Armstrong (more on her in a moment). Gracie is also apparently a fan of Buffy — a figure who is presumably now famous after repeatedly saving the world.
Hugo was reported to be a "nerd from a wealthy family" who has a crush on Armstrong's character. Mr. Burke, meanwhile, was reported to be the new school librarian — stepping into the same shoes as Giles in the original series.
That leak named Armstrong's main character as "Nova", whereas fans say the pilot episode's script looks to list her as "Poppy" — with top billing just under Sarah Michelle Gellar herself. So what's going on here — will it be Nova or Poppy, or something else? For now, we don't know — though it's not unusual for character names to change during pre-production, or be obscured with codenames to avoid leaks such as this.
"I love the name Poppy," wrote one fan. "Honestly, Poppy as a Slayer would be hilarious," wrote another in response.
As for why Buffy herself is credited as Buffy "Anne" Summers, fans have suggested the Slayer is once again attempting to operate under the radar, and using her middle name as pseudonym once again.
Gellar previously said that she wanted the reboot to bring back the show's original cast of characters — including "everyone who has died." Speaking to IGN, Charisma Carpenter, star of Buffy and its spin-off Angel, has said she was hopeful of a role in the franchise's upcoming reboot, despite her character Cordelia's "unjust" demise.
Image credit: Maya Dehlin Spach/Getty Images
Tom Phillips is IGN's News Editor. You can reach Tom at tom_phillips@ign.com or find him on Bluesky @tomphillipseg.bsky.social
Call of Duty fans believe they've discovered proof that Call of Duty: Black Ops 7 will let players carry over their Black Ops 6 skins.
With the ESRB rating now confirming Black Ops 7 will be rated M 17+ and available on PC, PS5, Xbox Series, and last-gen consoles PS4 and Xbox One, a throwaway line in the rating summary reveals there'll be weapons that feature "marijuana/joints/paraphernalia: players' characters inhaling marijuana from a bong-like structure attached to a rifle; players' characters smoking joints or inhaling through bongs as part of execution sequences."
Many players are interpreting this as reference to the Dank Days Tracer Pack from Black Ops 6, a bundle that includes a number of skins, finishing moves, and perks like weapon charms and sprays associated with weed.
If fans are on the money, this would indirectly confirm that the premium content available in Black Ops 6 — yes, even the silly stuff — will carry over to Black Ops 7. And while some players are delighted that they get to keep their skins for the new Call of Duty instalment, not everyone's happy about it.
"So all the stupid s**t is being carried over," said one player, while another simply wrote: "Carry forward confirmed, huge L."
Developed by Treyarch and Raven Software, Call of Duty: Black Ops 7 — which was announced at the Xbox Games Showcase 2025 last month — is the first ever consecutive release within the Black Ops sub-series. Matt Cox, General Manager of Call of Duty, insisted that “as a team, our vision from the start was to create a back-to-back series experience for our players that embraced the uniqueness of the Black Ops sub-franchise.” It's set to star Milo Ventimiglia, Kiernan Shipka, and Michael Rooker, with Ventimiglia portraying David Mason, Shipka as new character Emma Kagen, and Rooker reprising his Black Ops 2 role of Mike Harper.
We know it'll feature the Skirmish and Overload multiplayer modes as well a 20v20 wingsuit option as details of a developer-only Call of Duty: Black Ops 7 playtest were accidentally released to all fans on the Call of Duty app. Whoops.
Last month, Activision pulled controversial adverts placed inside Black Ops 6 and Warzone loadouts, insisting they were a “feature test” published “in error.” It’s worth remembering that Black Ops 6 is a premium, $70 game, and this year’s Black Ops 7 is expected to jump to $80 after Microsoft said that gamers will see Xbox charging $79.99 for new, first-party games around the holiday season.
Vikki Blake is a reporter for IGN, as well as a critic, columnist, and consultant with 15+ years experience working with some of the world's biggest gaming sites and publications. She's also a Guardian, Spartan, Silent Hillian, Legend, and perpetually High Chaos. Find her at BlueSky.
Modder gabdeg has released the first version of his RTX Remix Mod for Manhunt. Manhunt Remixed adds full path-traced lighting and high-res environmental and character textures to all 20 levels of the game. As such, players will be able to play it, from start to finish, with Path Tracing. Going into more details, the game’s … Continue reading Manhunt RTX Remix Path Tracing Mod V0.1 Released →
The post Manhunt RTX Remix Path Tracing Mod V0.1 Released appeared first on DSOGaming.
Want codes for Grimoires Reborn? This is the follow-up to Grimoires Era, so if you're looking for codes for that Roblox game, we've got everything you need to know. This page also explains how to redeem codes if you're unsure of how it works!
Here are all the current active codes you can redeem in Grimoires Reborn, as well as the rewards you'll get from them:
Unfortunately, these codes have expired and will no longer work:
Before you can redeem codes for Grimoires Reborn you'll need to follow a few simple steps:
There are two main reasons why a code usually doesn't work in any Roblox game and the same goes for this experience:
If a code has been entered incorrectly or has expired, you'll see a message that says, "Failed to redeem code" To stop this from happening, we recommend copying and pasting the code directly from this article. We check and test each code before we add them to our article. However, when copying them, you can sometimes accidentally include an extra space somewhere. This is why you should always double-check that there aren't any additional spaces!
We'll update this article when new codes are added so you can always check back here and keep up-to-date with the latest codes. But, if you'd prefer to search for some Grimoires Reborn codes on your own, you can check the dedicated Discord server. If you're already in the Discord for Grimoires Era, this is the same one.
Grimoires Reborn is a fantasy RPG inspired by the Black Clover anime. It's a rework of the original Roblox game Grimoires Era with new systems and enhanced visuals. Hop back into the grind as you defeat bandits to complete quests and level up. You'll want to take advantage of the codes in this guide so you can get the best grimoires for how you want to play. Whether that's speeding through quests or battling other players in PvP.
Jeffrey Lerman is a freelance game journalist for IGN who has been covering games for over a decade. You can follow him on Bluesky.
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