The fire-breathing dragons of the Game of Thrones universe are heading to the sea as war breaks out in the first teaser trailer for House of the Dragon Season 3.
Regardless of the tense conversations had in the Season 2 finale, Queen Rhaenyra Targaryen (Emma D’Arcy) and Queen Alicent Hightower (Olivia Cooke) are heading to war. Today’s trailer gives viewers just a glimpse of the battle ahead, showing fights filled with fire and blood as the factions in Dragonstone and the Red Keep fight for the Iron Throne.
Absolute power is within grasp. #HOTD Season 3 returns this June on HBO Max. pic.twitter.com/hFa3tRt58b
— House of the Dragon (@HouseofDragon) February 19, 2026
House of the Dragon Season 3 picks up where the show left off in 2024, and that means all of the story’s major players are back, too. Highlights from the footage (above) show Jacaerys (Harry Collett) warning against his mother’s decision to trust Alicent, while faces like Daemon (Matt Smith) and Corlys (Steve Toussaint) head to the front lines.
Meanwhile, as an injured Aegon II (Tom Glynn-Carney) leaves the Red Keep, it seems his brother, Aemond (Ewan Mitchell), is starting to get quite comfy on the Iron Throne. As the trailer reaches its conclusion, audiences are warned that Rhaenyra’s true reign as Queen of Westeros is almost here.
HBO has yet to announce a release date for House of the Dragon Season 3. However, as revealed with teaser art yesterday, we do at least know that the Game of Thrones spinoff show’s latest batch of episodes is set to premiere sometime in June. It means we have a few more months of waiting to do, and maybe even a few more trailers, before we see how its adaptation of the events of George R.R. Martin’s Fire & Blood will continue.
House of the Dragon originally launched in 2022 and has taken a two-year break between season premieres. Season 4 will be its last, and as revealed in a roadmap published by HBO last year, we can expect it to tie a bow on the story in 2028. For more, check out our 7/10 review of Season 2, and then learn about the behind-the-scenes tensions between Martin and the showrunners. You can also check out our review of episode 5 of A Knight of the Seven Kingdoms, another Game of Thrones spinoff currently airing on HBO.
Michael Cripe is a freelance writer with IGN. He's best known for his work at sites like The Pitch, The Escapist, and OnlySP. Be sure to give him a follow on Bluesky (@mikecripe.bsky.social) and Twitter (@MikeCripe).
How important is a left click?
Your answer might determine whether you love the Keychron M3 Mini, a wireless lightweight gaming mouse with impressive specs for less than $70. Its pinpoint sensor, fast polling rate, low click latency and marathon battery life match those of more expensive devices, and make me feel like I'm using a pro-level lightweight FPS mouse. But that left click is, under certain conditions, jarring, hollow, tinny, and unpleasant.
I did eventually make it work for me – which I'll explain later – but it points to niggling build quality issues with an otherwise excellent mouse.
Let's get the bad stuff out of the way before focusing on the pile of good stuff.
The left and right mouse clicks are absolutely fine, provided you touch the buttons towards the front. They feel relatively clean and crisp, and spammable if needed. No complaints. But if your fingertips stray down the mouse towards the middle of the buttons – which they can easily do in fingertip or claw grips – the clicks are awful. They sound echoey, feel loose and sloppy, and vibrate against your fingers.
With most mice, when you click the bottom of the button, the whole button will move as one. When you press the bottom of the buttons on the M3 Mini, the top doesn't click in, only the bottom does. It feels almost like those buttons are on a see-saw, with a pivot in the middle, rather than moving as a solid piece.
It's not the only issue I had with the M3 Mini. The side buttons feel pretty solid but the casing around them doesn't. If you squeeze the sides of the mouse they'll start to flex, and if you really squeeze you can actually activate the side click without touching a button.
Both of these problems sound alarming but neither ruined the mouse for me. In reality, you're never going to squeeze the mouse hard enough to flex the sides, and it felt sturdy and safe in my hand.
The mouse button is the more serious issue, and I had to adapt to get around it, training my hand to stay forward. In claw grip, I just bent my fingers a little less than normal to ensure the tips stayed in the right position. And when I got used to it this mouse was pleasant to use, mostly because of its light weight and comfortable shape.
At 55g, the M3 Mini is a genuinely lightweight mouse. Lighter doesn't mean better, of course: the most important thing is how it feels in the hand and how smoothly it glides across your mousepad. The feet on the M3 Mini aren't the slickest, and have more friction than higher-end mice, but because of the mouse's weight I never felt like I was having to drag it across my pad. The ride was effortless.
It certainly helps that its hourglass-style shape and curved base fills my hand surprisingly well for a smaller mouse, to the point where I could use it in a full palm grip – where your whole palm grabs the bottom of the mouse – with zero issues. Switching between fingertip, claw, and palm grips felt natural, and my fingers and hand always found a comfortable place to rest.
If you have particularly large hands (mine are slightly larger than average), you might struggle to find a stable position on its slim body, but it'll work well for everyone else.
The textured patterns on both sides of the mouse helped me grip it securely. If you run your thumb along them it feels scratchy, but when I was actually using the mouse I never felt any movement or irritation. The chalky plastic coating was easy to hold onto for hours at a time.
There are four variations of the M3 Mini, each with different combos of sensors and max polling rates, which is the number of times the mouse reports its position to your PC. They range in price from $40 to $70, although the top-of-the-range model that I tested is often available cheaper (it's close to $60 as I write this).
The ones you want to consider are the PixArt 3395 sensors (either 1000Hz or 4000Hz polling rate), or the 3950 sensor 8000Hz variant. Those two sensors are both widely used and will perform well no matter what you throw at them. I tested the 8K variant in a variety of genres– Arc Raiders, Fortnite, CS2, and Kingdom Come: Deliverance 2 – and was very happy. Quick flick-shots hit their mark and slower tracking felt smooth, with no noticeable hitches or stuttering.
Whether it's worth paying more for 4K or 8K polling rate is personal preference. It should make tracking less jittery and more responsive, but to feel a difference above 1000Hz you'll need a decent CPU-GPU combo and a high refresh-rate monitor – even then, not everyone thinks it's worth it. I can feel a very slight benefit as I move from 1K to 4K, but I think 8K is overkill.
Base your choice on the price and your budget: personally, I think it's worth stumping up the extra $20 for the best sensor but if you don't want to, you'll still get solid performance.
I like how simple Keychron makes it to switch between polling rates and DPI. Both have a dedicated button on the bottom of the mouse, and both buttons have their own indicator LEDs so that you always know your current setting. As somebody who likes to switch regularly – I generally bump up my polling rate and lower my sensitivity as I move from work to gaming – I appreciated how streamlined it felt. There's also a switch to toggle between the fast 2.4Ghz wireless connection and Bluetooth.
If you opt for higher polling rates you'll sacrifice some battery life, but that's fine here because the M3 Mini lasts for ages. On the top two configurations, you should get 135+ hours at 1000Hz polling rate. Impressive. It runs out faster at higher polling rates, but I tested it on and off for a couple of weeks at various polling rates and only drained a third of the battery.
The battery life on the 1K mouse variant is less impressive: Keychron says it'll last roughly 70 hours. It's another reason to pick the meatier specs.
Keychron's launcher software is browser-based and there's no offline version, which will rule this mouse out for some people – although, again, you can change polling rate and sensitivity just by clicking the buttons on the bottom. I personally prefer web-based software to installing a new program on my PC for every mouse, and I found Keychron's intuitive. Tweaking the basics such as polling rate and DPI is simple, and you get the advanced settings you'd hope for, including ripple control, angle snapping, motion sync and adjustable lift-off distance.
Samuel is a freelance reporter and editor specializing in longform journalism and hardware reviews. You can read his work at his website.
If you haven't already, there's no better time to start monster huntin' than now. Starting today and running through Saturday, Best Buy is offering the PS5 version of Monster Hunter Wilds for just $19.99. This is by far the lowest price I've seen for the wildly popular PS5 game, the previous low being $30 during Black Friday.
It's easy to see why Monster Hunter is one of Capcom's best selling IPs. Monster Hunter Wilds is the latest game in the franchise and continues the series' trademark action-adventure gameplay of hunting down fearsome monsters and grinding for better loot. This open-world game offers dozens of hours of exploration, exciting combat, excellent creature design, statisfying loot progression, and most importantly, cats!
According to How Long To Beat, the main story takes 17 hours, with another 13 hours to tackle all of the sidequests. Completionists should expect to spend a whopping 90 hours to reach 100% and attain that Platinum Trophy. At just $20, it's absolutely worth adding to your collection.
Eric Song is the IGN commerce manager in charge of finding the best gaming and tech deals every day. When Eric isn't hunting for deals for other people at work, he's hunting for deals for himself during his free time.
Castlevania? Now that's a name I've not heard in a long time. After years of making almost no video games at all, Konami has decided to get back into the fray with a handful of new game announcements in beloved franchises. Among the upcoming releases is Castlevania: Belmont’s Curse, a new side-scrolling entry in the long-dormant action-horror series.
Belmont’s Curse is set to release sometime in 2026 for PS5, Nintendo Switch, Xbox, and PC. It’s already available to preorder for $39.99 (see it on Amazon). Below, we dive into what this game is and where you can place your preorder. Let’s get to it.
PS5
Switch
Xbox
Unlike many games these days, only one edition is available, so the standard version is all you get. That’s cool though, because it comes with the game, and that’s the most important component of any game release, if you ask me.
The digital editions aren’t even available at the time of this writing, so it’s possible a digital deluxe edition goes up for preorder when those go live. I’ll update the article when it becomes available on digital storefronts.
As yet, no preorder bonuses have been announced. If any become available in the future (which does happen from time to time), this is where you’ll find them.
Castlevania: Belmont’s Curse is the first brand-new side-scrolling Castlevania game since 2008’s Order of Ecclesia came out on the Nintendo DS. That’s 18 years! Dang! It’s published by Konami, but it’s being developed by Evil Empire, the company behind The Rogue Prince of Persia and several Dead Cells DLCs, including Dead Cells: Return to Castlevania. So they know their way around a side-scrolling action game. Motion Twin, the main developer of Dead Cells, is also on board in an advisory role.
Belmont’s Curse takes place in 1499 Paris, which is in the midst of a monster invasion. That puts it 23 years after the events of the NES game Castlevania III: Dracula’s Curse. It’s not 100% clear if this is a “metroidvania” or “search action” game in the vein of Castlevania: Symphony of the Night and the GBA and Nintendo DS installments of the early 2000s.
In terms of gameplay, it looks like you do plenty of jumping on platforms, swinging from rings, and whipping on enemies. Bosses can tower over you. Environmental hazards like saw blades are strewn about. You have access to additional weapons and abilities like a flame spell and a cross you can throw like a boomerang. It looks like fun. Watch the trailer above to see for yourself.
Chris Reed is a commerce editor and deals expert for IGN. He also runs IGN's board game and LEGO coverage. You can follow him on Bluesky.
This article contains spoilers for Paradise Season 1; Paradise Season 2 debuts on Hulu on February 23.
The first season of Hulu’s Paradise was extremely hard to talk about before it was released, particularly because the premiere episode’s big twist – that the show takes place entirely inside a suburban-style bunker under a mountain in Colorado after the apparent end of the world – was expressly forbidden from being mentioned in reviews. Well, the secret is out, and while there are plenty more twists and turns in Season 2 of the series – including a likely game changer in the finale (seven of the season’s eight episodes were provided to critics for review) – it’s a little easier to talk about this time around. With Season 2, Paradise continues to be one of the most propulsively binge-worthy dramas on TV.
To revisit Season 1 just a bit: After the murder of third term President Cal Bradford (James Marsden), Secret Service agent Xavier Collins (Sterling K. Brown) went down a conspiracy rabbit hole, unraveling some of the truth behind the bunker community of Paradise and how Samantha "Sinatra" Redmond (Julianne Nicholson), the billionaire behind its construction, was maybe not being so truthful about what went down outside its walls.
Specifically, after a bit of the ol’ insurrection led by Xavier, he discovered that not only are there people alive outside Paradise, his wife – who he thought died the day a super-volcano exploded, causing a tsunami to wreck most of the world – is alive as well, and living in Atlanta. There’s a lot more that happened as the show jumped backwards in time to show how we got here, as well as moving the conspiracy plot forward in the present, but the most important bit of info to know is that the season ended with Sinatra on life support, Xavier exiting the bunker via a small airplane to go find his wife, and Cal (ostensibly the third lead of the show) still very much dead, though often popping up via flashback to give ghostly advice.
With the dual secrets of the premise and how the world ended out of the way, we’re in literal and figurative uncharted territory in Season 2. Granted, showrunner Dan Fogelman has a fair amount of post-apocalyptic TV shows and movies to pull from, as well as mystery box/flashback-heavy shows like Lost, which he picks and chooses from liberally as we explore more of the world outside as well as how life continues inside Paradise. But what characterizes the new season more than anything is that while Fogelman lays in new mysteries and new sci-fi concepts to replace the ones tied with a bow in Season 1, he also leans straight into his comfort zone: emotionally charged character studies.
The thing is that Paradise is an odd note on Fogelman’s resumé. He hasn’t shied away from more fantastical concepts in the past; he wrote Cars, Tangled, and even a draft of Indiana Jones and the Dial of Destiny. Most of the time, however, he’s been known for more grounded human fare like: Crazy, Stupid, Love; the late, lamented TV show, Pitch; and most notably, This Is Us.
Paradise Season 2 – at least in its first half – might as well be called This Is The Last Of Us without the fungal zombies. Yes, they’re in a post-apocalypse that’s been devastated by climate change – though the show rarely says those words – but everybody is so nice. We’ve been trained time and again by shows like The Last of Us and particularly The Walking Dead to expect that every time you encounter a new community, they might seem good at first, but it will turn out that they’re eating people, or they’re fascists, or they’re just not prepared to survive the circumstances of their particular apocalypse.
While Fogelman plays with that, he seems far less interested in what makes a world fall apart than what helps build it back up again. To that end, the majority of the season also takes the form of the more focused flashback episodes from Season 1. There, we got the full-on flashback episode of “The Day,” which revealed how the world fell in pulse-pounding real time. Paradise Season 2 isn’t quite on par with that high watermark episode, but instead channels the feeling of an extended sequence in the finale, where we met a construction worker helping build the bunker and followed him as he befriended his crew, discovered things weren’t quite right, tried to stop the bunker from being built, and ultimately failed.
Season 2 takes the feeling of that extended sequence and runs with it, almost becoming a Paradise anthology-style series where each episode is done in one, only lightly connecting to the episode that came before, and often keeping our main characters off-screen for episodes at a time. Part of that is utility, given we’re now following multiple characters in multiple locations versus the more focused locale of “just” Paradise in the first season. But another part of it is that it allows Fogelman the space to spend time emotionally with the characters, particularly new cast members like Shailene Woodley’s lost Graceland tour guide, and Thomas Doherty’s mysterious Link (yes, named after the Legend of Zelda character). We don’t know those folks yet the same way we know Xavier, Sinatra, and Cal, so while there might be some audience frustration about our Season 1 stars being in absentia for large chunks of episodes, when you’ve got good actors digging into meaty speeches and one-on-one scenes, you won’t really miss the folks you already know.
But don’t worry: Paradise falls back on a more conventional TV structure eventually. The level of restraint shown in the early part of the season is laudable, and particularly with Hulu dropping three episodes on premiere day, it should be less frustrating for fans of the series than if, say, you had to wait three to four weeks to find out what happened to Xavier, or what’s going on back in Paradise.
On that note, Sterling K. Brown continues to be the most ridiculously charming man on TV. While most of his arc falls under the heading of “I just want my wife back!” action heroes, and Brown’s chiseled muscles certainly make him convincing in the show’s infrequent but well-staged blockbuster action scenes, it’s Brown’s smile that makes viewers melt. Early on, there’s a swoon-worthy flashback to Xavier’s past that lets the actor flex all his rom-com muscles, and you will grin a goofy smile the entire time as Brown provides more raw romance power in a single scene than most movies can manage in their entire runtime. Other episodes let Brown flex his dramatic muscles as his hard-earned steely demeanor begins to melt thanks to Paradise’s Nice-pocalypse. And then other times, he just flexes his muscles, and when he does – hubba-hubba.
Nicholson also gets some substantial dramatic work this season, and though we may run out of rope eventually with the plotline that she’s been traumatized and motivated by the death of her son well before the end of the world, we haven’t gotten there yet. Nicholson is a master of the locked-up microexpression performance, and her sympathetic bad guy persona lets her play that to the hilt.
As for other members of the cast, Nicole Brydon Bloom continues to be a delight as the Wii-obsessed psycho secret service agent, Jane Driscoll; she bubbled in the background in Season 1, but the show knows what they’ve got with her unhinged performance and lets her freak flag fly in Season 2. And while he has less to do now that we know how he was murdered as well as his role in ending/saving the world, Marsden’s Cal is still incredibly engrossing in every flashback appearance. His folksy “I’m just a dumb, young guy who happens to be President” attitude belies a sharp judge of character, and an episode late in the season gives Marsden a stellar monologue. Cal may be back essentially because the show likes working with Marsden, but we like watching Marsden, so they get a pass here.
If Paradise Season 2 excels when it’s working with dramatic, human scenes, it struggles a bit with the sci-fi elements, which become more outlandish and farther from reality in Season 2. While this was never an expressly political show despite opening with the murder of the President, the idea of billionaires abandoning Earth to a climate disaster they caused is very present in our reality. The second season moves further away from that with new sci-fi ideas that are far less based in reality and seem more focused on the longevity of the series than reflecting something happening outside our window. It’s unfortunate, because it moves the show from pressing sci-fi warning to something more akin to naive fantasy. Granted, naive fantasy is where Fogelman lives, even when his shows are ostensibly set in the real world versus some time in the near future. But depending on how the finale pans out – there are big secrets being held back – it’s possible we could get something very timely, or we could end up diving completely into something less relatable and more fantastical.
Even given that, and with some of the jankier decisions on the part of our characters later in the season – choosing niceness, all apologies to Fogelman, is not always the answer when the stakes are this high – Paradise remains engrossing pulp fun. There’s a lot resting on Brown’s prodigious muscles to keep this show going, but thanks to a game supporting cast and plenty of twists, turns, and flashbacks that will tug on your heartstrings, the Hulu hit may be almost paradise, but it’ll keep you knocking on Heaven’s door, begging for more episodes.
With a slim, comfortable feel and a premium-only feature at a 25% discount, the EasySMX S10 has a leg up on most of the market when it comes to great third-party Switch 2 controllers. While it doesn’t pack the same punch as the first-party Switch 2 Pro Controller, the S10 makes for a solid second option for anyone willing to sacrifice ancillary stuff like Amiibo support. Plus, it comes with better triggers and a customizable d-pad.
EasySMX has made a big push into the third-party controller scene with one big claim: remote wakeup. It’s odd that Nintendo locked this basic, highly convenient feature behind the $80 Switch 2 Pro Controller or its even pricier counterpart, a pair of Joy-Con 2 controllers. This confusing change from the original Switch keeps just about every pro controller option from waking up the Switch 2 with the Home button. Even the official Switch 1 Pro Controller falls short here, effectively paywalling what should be a universal, standard feature. Enter EasySMX with a somewhat awkward solution to the issue, promising remote wakeup with a strange workaround.
Per the instructions provided by EasySMX, I synced my shiny new controller, detached both Joy-Cons, and then reattached them within 20 seconds after the initial sync. After putting my console back into sleep mode and trying to wake it up again… I got nothing. A few frustrated tries later though, it did work. I haven’t had any issues since it clicked, aside from when I connected the controller to my PC and then went back to the Switch 2, but I just repeated the process without issue.
In motion, the controller itself is really comfortable, especially for anything that relies heavily on its two buttery-smooth sticks, with comfortable, textured grips that kind of remind me of the DualSense’s stick grips. I played the entirety of Once Upon A Katamari, which is controlled almost exclusively using both sticks, using the S10.
My only real gripe with the sticks extends to the rest of the controller’s face; it’s all too low-profile. The grip part of the stick, where it mushrooms out from the rest of the stick, is too close to the rest of the controller, considering the distance between each controller element. This gives a kind of claustrophobic feel to swapping between sticks, buttons, and the d-pad. Granted, my thumbs are a bit bigger than average, but I found myself accidentally bumping the stick when pressing up on the d-pad.
That flaw aside, this d-pad is great. Despite literally inventing the d-pad decades ago, Nintendo has repeatedly dropped the ball in recent iterations, with a design that often accidentally triggers a secondary input in an additional, adjacent direction. I can’t tell you how many games of Tetris 99 I’ve had to salvage because of an accidental input from Nintendo’s first-party Pro Controllers. The Switch 2 Pro Controller is a step in the right direction, but it’s not where I need it to be.
The S10 offers customization between a classic d-pad and a circular design similar to the one found on the current Xbox models. I usually prefer the circular setup, but the traditional mode is a little more precise. Either way, it’s nice to have a choice.
The mechanical face buttons press with a satisfying little click like a mechanical keyboard would. They’re also pretty low-profile – which unfortunately isn’t my preference, because they give each press a kind of soft feeling that I can’t get behind. The triggers and bumpers, on the other hand, are much more comfortable and satisfying to press. They’re still low-profile like the first-party options, but this works much better for non-analog triggers than it does face buttons.
The grip buttons are the weakest link, though. I can’t tell you how many times I’ve accidentally pressed them just by gripping my controller tighter. This won’t be an issue for everyone, especially people with smaller hands and fingers, and it only became an issue when I had those buttons mapped to an input. Still, I wish there were a tighter gate to minimize accidental presses.
Charlie is a freelance contributor for IGN. You can reach them via Twitter or Instagram at the handle @chas_mke.
Razer has announced a new high-end addition to its Huntsman line of mechanical keyboards. Called the Huntsman Signature Edition, this tenkeyless keyboard will be made of more premium materials, cost $499.99, and "is debuting in a limited drop of 1,337 serialized units," the company says in its announcement. Why that number? You know why. (But if you don't, here's a primer on l337 speak.)
It's in the construction and materials where the spendy new Signature Edition sets itself apart from the older Huntsman V3 models it resembles (and that don't quite measure up to the Razer BlackWidow V4 that IGN prefers for gaming). Where previous Huntsman keyboards are encased in plastic, the Huntsman Signature Edition will be housed in a CNC-milled, anodized aluminum chassis, with a shiny, mirror-like finish on the underside and other parts of the keyboard, such as the company's special triple-headed snake keycap.
The company also promises that the keyboard's interior is "carefully layered ... with tuned foams and sound-dampening materials" to create "a full, rounded typing sound while improving overall key feel."
Otherwise, this fancy USB-C-wired keyboard will feature the same analog optical switches and Rapid Trigger Mode found in the Huntsman V3 Pro, as well as the 8,000Hz polling rate the company has given the latest version of that keyboard.
So, if you liked the responsiveness of the V3 models, there's probably a lot to like for you here, as well. Look for other typical Razer Huntsman keyboard features, including RGB lights under the keys, adjustable key actuation (between 0.1mm and 4mm), and on-the-fly macro recording. The Huntsman Special Edition will be available on Razer's website starting at 8AM PT on February 22 for $499.
Wes is a freelance writer (Freelance Wes, they call him) who has covered technology, gaming, and entertainment steadily since 2020 at Gizmodo, Tom's Hardware, Hardcore Gamer, and most recently, The Verge. Inside of him there are two wolves: one that thinks it wouldn't be so bad to start collecting game consoles again, and the other who also thinks this, but more strongly.
Nowadays it's quite difficult to find an RTX 5070 Ti prebuilt for under $2,000, and when you do, it's usually stripped of any other high-end component. However, for this week only, Lenovo actually has two RTX 5070 Ti configurations priced under $2K, and they're actually pretty well equipped otherwise. This is made possible thanks to a 10% off coupon code "PDLIVE26" that went live on Presidents Day and is, fortunately, still avaialble.
Thinking of saving money by building your own DIY RTX 5070 Ti system? Think again. The RTX 5070 Ti graphics card is currently selling for at least $250 over MSRP. Other options, such as the Radeon RX 9070 XT or RTX 5080, also have a steep markup. With the rising prices of GPUs and RAM, you don't want to miss out on this rare opportunity.
First on the list is a Lenovo Legion Tower 5 Gen 10 GeForce RTX 5070 Ti gaming PC, which drops down to $1,799.99 aafter coupon "PDLIVE26". Specs include an Intel Core Ultra 9 275HX CPU, GeForce RTX 5070 Ti 16GB GPU, 32GB of DDR5-5600MHz RAM, and a 1TB SSD. Rare for a Legion Tower 5 system, the CPU is cooled by a 240mm all-in-one liquid cooler.
Something to note is that this PC is equipped with an Intel Core Ultra 9 275HX CPU on a customized Intel HM870 mATX motherboard. The 275HX is traditionally a laptop CPU, and laptop CPUs are permanently soldered onto the motherboard. That means you won't be able to swap out the CPU for a better one in the future. If you don't intend on swapping the CPU (and let's face it, most of us who buy prebuilts probably never will), then you'll get excellent performance out of this chip.
The RTX 5070 Ti offers the best bang for your buck amongst the new Nvidia Blackwell cards in terms of 4K gaming performance. It performs neck-and-neck with the previous generation RTX 4080 Super and pulls ahead in any game that supports multi-frame generation, especially with the recent DLSS 4.5 update.
If you don't like the idea of a soldered-on CPU, Lenovo is offering a noteworthy deal on another 5070 Ti gaming PC. This time it's equipped with a desktop-class Intel Core Ultra 9 285K processor. This is Intel's best consumer CPU at the moment, featuring a max turbo frequency of 5.6GHz and a whopping 24 cores, excelling at any task. The superior, upgradeable CPU isn't the only perk that you get. The system is housed in a roomier Legion Tower 7 chassis that includes more fans for airflow and an enthusiast-grade 360mm AIO liquid cooler.
This configuration is equipped with a liquid-cooled Intel Core Ultra 7 265F CPU, GeForce RTX 5070 12GB GPU, 32GB of DDR5-5600MHz RAM, and a 2TB M.2 SSD. The RTX 5070 is the best GPU for up to 1440 gaming without overspending. Compared to the previous generation GPUs, it offers a slight performance improvement over the RTX 4070 Super, which was and still is an excellent GPU. The fps gain is greater in games that support DLSS 4.5 with multi-frame gen.
Eric Song is the IGN commerce manager in charge of finding the best gaming and tech deals every day. When Eric isn't hunting for deals for other people at work, he's hunting for deals for himself during his free time.
Amazon has killer deals on Ravensburger puzzles and Nintendo Switch digital games. Beyond that, you can grab Avatar: Frontiers of Pandora From the Ashes Edition for PS5 for only $28, or grab a Godzilla-themed monopoly for $30. Be sure to grab your MTG x TMNT preorders; some have even gotten a serious discount.
Avatar: Frontiers of Pandora From the Ashes Edition for PS5 is down to its lowest price ever at Amazon and Walmart. For just $28, you can get the base game along with the From the Ashes expansion. This single-player, 3rd-person expansion follows So'lek on a dark campaign set about a year after the first game, and it ties in perfectly with the Avatar: Fire and Ash film. As for the base game, we reviewed Avatar: Frontiers of Pandora, and Tristan Ogilvie found it “features a stunning alien world to explore, but doesn’t contain as many genuine surprises as other modern open-worlds.”
Duck Dodgers: The Complete Series on Blu-ray is down to its lowest price ever on Amazon. The three-disc set features all 39 episodes of this Looney Tunes series from the early aughts. Starring Daffy Duck and Porky Pig, this fun, out-of-this-world adventure follows them as they clash with Marvin the Martian and parody some sci-fi classics along the way. Oh, and the theme song, arranged by The Flaming Lips and sung by Tom Jones, is awesome.
Amazon has discounted digital versions of Nintendo Switch games. A whole bunch of titles are on 33% off or more. Everything from Luigi Mansion 2 HD to Donkey Kong Country: Tropical Freeze is a part of this deal. One game you might be particularly keen on grabbing is Xenoblade Chronicles X: Definitive Edition, as Nintendo just launched the Switch 2 upgrade, which you can purchase directly from Nintendo for just $5. It brings support for 4K/60fps on TV and 1080p/60fps when playing on the Switch 2.
Monopoly got the Godzilla treatment, and it’s awesome. You’ll be buying and trading kaiju monsters and locations inspired by Monster Island, Goro's Workshop, and plenty more from the iconic franchise. Six sculpted figures of monsters from the films serve as game pieces, while the usual community chest, chance, and more have all been rebranded to fit the Godzilla lore. Best of all, this game is on a lightning deal and discounted to $30, the lowest price ever.
The Logitech G Pro X 2 is an awesome gaming headset, and it’s currently discounted by up to $90 on Amazon. With high-end features like 50mm Graphene drivers, 7.1 surround sound, long battery life, a sound-isolating mic, and a low-latency LIGHTSPEED wireless dongle, it offers serious gaming chops. Comfort isn’t forgotten either, thanks to rotating soft memory foam earcups, and you get two pairs: leatherette and cloth.
Ravensburger jigsaw puzzles are on sale at Amazon. However, all the puzzles are lightning deals, so once a certain amount is sold, the deal expires, and they’re selling fast. There are discounts of 30% to nearly 50% off, offering solid savings. Tolkien fans may want to grab the Lord of the Rings puzzle, but there are plenty of other options, from adorable illustrations to stunning scenery.
Anno 117: Pax Romana for PC is only $35.99 from Ubisoft when you use the 20% off coupon code “PROMO20” at checkout. It’s currently selling for $60 on Steam, so this is one heck of a deal. This antique city-building game set during the Roman Empire in 117AD, hence the name, is absolutely stunning. From building modest homes and planning out districts to naval combat and trade systems, there’s a whole lot of exciting possibilities. It even scored a 9/10 in our review, and for this low price, Anno 117 is definitely worth grabbing.
For serious screen space, a stunning picture, and gaming chops, the Alienware AW3423DWF is one of the best gaming monitors around. Right now, it’s back down to its lowest price ever on Amazon. With its QD-OLED display wrapped around you at a 1800R curvature, you’re in for impressive contrast, striking colors, and a near-instantaneous response time. The 165Hz refresh rate in WQHD and FreeSync Premium Pro also ensures all the action remains butter smooth. It’s no wonder that in our review of the Alienware AW3423DWF, it scored a 9/10.
Ahead of its release in just over two weeks, the MTG x TMNT Draft Night Box preorder is down to $104.99. Best of all, if the price drops even further, Amazon offers a solid preorder guarantee. In the Draft Night kit, you’ll get everything you need for a 4-player Pick-Two Draft, including 12 play boosters and 90 lands. A collector booster is even in the box, but you might just want to keep that for yourself.
After you’ve secured this pre-order, there are plenty of other MTG preorders worth grabbing on Amazon. The MTG x TMNT Booster Box even got a nice price cut, too. Check them all out below:
Super Mario Galaxy + Super Mario Galaxy 2 for Switch is down $11 at Amazon and Walmart. With this game package, you are essentially getting two for the price of one. Both Super Mario Galaxy and Super Mario Galaxy 2 received rave reviews, and now, with this combo deal, you get even more. You’ll find improvements to the UI, a new in-game music player, and the ability to play using buttons and sticks or motion controls. There’s also a boosted resolution that goes up to 4K on Switch 2, while Rosalina's in-game storybook has some interesting new pages.
After you’ve gotten the game, grab the new Super Mario Galaxy amiibo preorder. A Mario and Luma amiibo, along with a Rosalina and Lumas amiibo, are available and will drop on April 2.
With the prices of PC components rising, it’s harder to find great deals on rigs. However, during Dell’s Presidents Day Sale, you can get the Alienware Aurora R16 RTX 5080 gaming PC for just $2,129.99 with free delivery after a $700 instant discount. Those graphics, along with the Intel Core Ultra 7 265F CPU, 16GB of DDR5 RAM, and a 1TB SSD, ensure this PC can tackle games in 4K at high settings with ray tracing enabled.
Note: This is a spoiler-free review of the first four episodes of the Scrubs revival series. The first two episodes will premiere on ABC on Wednesday, February 25, and stream on Hulu on Thursday, February 26.
In an era where it seems easier to count the hit shows that haven’t received a big-budget streaming revival, it was inevitable that Scrubs would make its return. The original series is still beloved by fans, despite that underwhelming final season and its failed attempt to spin off into something new. Those fans needn’t worry about Season 10. The series immediately captures that old magic upon its return, even if it’s not all smooth sailing at Sacred Heart.
Original creator Bill Lawrence and stars Zach Braff, Sarah Chalke, and Donald Faison are all back for Season 10, which immediately rectifies the big problem with Season 9. There’s a strong argument to be made that Scrubs simply isn’t Scrubs without the core bromance between Braff’s Dr. John “J.D.” Dorian and Faison’s Dr. Christopher “Turkleton” Turk anchoring each and every episode. The new season wastes as little time as possible before reminding us of how fun these two are together. Their chemistry is just that good.
That’s what’s so immediately striking about the Scrubs revival. It’s as if it hasn’t been 16 years since the series’ cancellation. Sure, everyone has a few extra lines on their faces and a little more gray in their temples, but Braff, Chalke, and Faison have that same youthful energy and charm that characterized the show back in the day. Watching the first episode is like settling in with an old friend who doesn’t mind that you haven’t called or written for the past decade. It’s all good.
For anyone who adored the first eight seasons of the series, this is the epitome of sitcom comfort food. Even with a new showrunner in Aseem Batra, the new Scrubs clearly isn’t out to reinvent any wheels or blaze new trails for medical TV dramas. The series isn’t completely oblivious to the harsh realities of life in a modern American emergency hospital – The Pitt is right there if that’s more your speed – but that all takes a backseat to the camaraderie of the doctors and J.D.’s zany inner life.
Of course, a lot of time has passed, and not everything is like it was back in 2001. That’s where hardcore Scrubs fans may be in for a bit of an adjustment. Some of the series’ core supporting cast also return (most notably Judie Reyes as Turk’s other life partner, Nurse Carla Espinosa, and John C. McGinley as the fiery Dr. Perry Cox), but there are some notable gaps. Perhaps most head-scratching is the absence of Neil Flynn’s Janitor. Between that and the relative lack of focus on Dr. Cox in these first four episodes, the series struggles to fill the void when it comes to antagonists in J.D.’s life. It almost succeeds with the introduction of his new professional rival, Joel Kim Booster’s Dr. Eric Park, but here again, Dr. Park isn’t in the spotlight enough in these first four episodes.
Enter the new batch of medical interns. Sacred Heart is, after all, a teaching hospital at the end of the day, so it’s necessary to introduce a new batch of wide-eyed, ambitious doctors-in-training to take the place once filled by J.D. and friends. There’s certainly an appeal in watching that role reversal play out. But, on the other hand, the shadow of Season 9 still looms large, and there’s the all-important question of whether the newbies can hold their own against the old guard.
The initial verdict is… fine? None of these intern characters are particular standouts in these early episodes, but the show only gives the actors so much to work with. The characters aren’t necessarily shoved in our faces the way Season 9’s new cast was. Most of these interns have one distinguishing characteristic (the handsome one, the British one, the social media-obsessed one) and exist to play the straight people to J.D., Elliott, and Turk more outlandish doctors. Only by Episode 4 does it feel like they’re starting to develop more coherent personalities and foibles.
Luckily, the new season does find plenty of success with Vanessa Bayer’s Sibby, Sacred Heart’s new medical wellness director. Sibby is there to embody the changing culture that has cropped up since the heyday of the original series and put a hard kibosh on Cox’s withering rants and The Todd’s (Robert Maschio) rampant sexual harassment. Bayer gets ample room to shine in these four episodes and quickly emerges as the strongest of the show’s new ensemble cast. Also of note are Michael James Scott and X Mayo as a tag-team nurse duo who help fill the void left by Aloma Wright’s Nurse Laverne.
If it's time to upgrade your gaming monitor, you can't go wrong with an OLED. And if you've got the funds to get the biggest and best, LG's highest-end OLED is the 45" LG UltraGear 45GX950A-B 5K2K gaming monitor. It normally retails for a hefty $2,000, but Amazon has just discounted it to $1350.18 with free delivery. This is the lowest price I've ever seen for this particular monitor, just make sure your desk has enough space to accomodate this ultra-wide behemoth.
Update: LG is offering "Outlet Pricing" at $1389 (scroll down until you see it). As-is it's not as good of a deal, but you may be able to get a lower price if you have a coupon code sitting in your inbox or by signing up for the newsletter. Sometimes LG will also send you a coupon code if you just leave the item sitting in your coupon code for a little while. YMMV.
The LG UltraGear 45GX950A-B is the first OLED monitor featuring a 5120x2160 resolution. That averages out to a pixel density of 125ppi, which is excellent for a monitor of this size. As a comparison, a 42" 4K monitor, 34" 3440x1440 monitor, and 27" QHD monitor all have an industry standard 109ppi. Since this is such a wide monitor, it features a fairly aggressive 800R curve for maximum immersion and so you can keep the screen's edge in the periphery of your vision.
The 45GX950A-B uses a true OLED panel that boasts a near-instanteous (0.03ms) response time and a near-infinite (1.5 million : 1) contrast ratio with the ability to produce true blacks. OLEDs simply have the best image quality compared to any other panel type, with no smearing, no blooming, no "gray is the new black", and no uneven backlighting or haziness. This is a "dual-mode" monitor with refresh rates of up to 165Hz at 4K and 330Hz at down-scaled 1080p. The monitor also supports adaptic sync technologies including FreeSync Premium Pro and G-Sync.
Current generation connectivity specs include one DisplayPort 2.1 port and two HDMI 1.4 ports. There's also a USB Type-C port with 90W of power delivery. Rare among high end monitors, the 45GX950A-B has built-in speakers and even a 4-pole headphone jack with DTS Headphone:X spatial audio support.
Finally, the monitor comes with a 2 year warranty that includes OLED burn-in coverage.
Eric Song is the IGN commerce manager in charge of finding the best gaming and tech deals every day. When Eric isn't hunting for deals for other people at work, he's hunting for deals for himself during his free time.
I’ve played all of the God of War video games, including that one with the Reject Your Child quick time event, and that crappy mobile game from back in the Bush Administration. I played at least one game I only half remember of the God of War card game. I was a Kratos main in PlayStation All-stars Battle Royale. I like the guy, is what I'm saying, as a sort of cathartic avatar of the Id taken to its very tragic limits in Greece, and as a clunky conversation starter about guilt and finding power in something other than grievances in Midgard. But I can’t recall ever wondering “I want to know more about pre-Ares Kratos’ teenage years.” And as an answer to a question I would probably never ask, Sons of Sparta is a pleasant character rehabilitation of a largely unlikable guy couched in a largely boring adventure about Kratos learning the value of responsibility.
It’s also a pretty mediocre metroidvania, clearly taking the form and function of these games but failing to meet the high bar set by the titans of the genre, let alone bringing anything novel to this specific experience. You’ll move through colorful locations, doing the kind of running, jumping, button pressing, object pushing, and monster slaying that will be second nature to your inner Belmont, but you’ll do so at a pace so slow that it makes the journey feel like aimless wandering, fighting through hordes of baddies with combat that tries too hard to be special but ends up crowded and cloying.
I found this young Kratos to be a well-meaning, earnest guy piously (maybe naively so) devoted to the gods and the stubborn defender of his younger brother, Deimos. These are better times for the pair, who have just been granted permission to leave Sparta in order to adventure through and protect the surrounding lands at their own leisure. The well-written banter between them, and the other young people living in the Spartan agoge, reveals the Kratos that could have been, a charismatic, duty-bound leader that is tough when necessary, but also introspective, open to learn, and most jarring of all, funny.
Even the brief moments of pre-Ares pledge adult Kratos in Sons of Sparta, who is telling his daughter the happenings of the game as a fable while she’s grounded, reveal a man who actually has capacity to love his wife and child in the present, and not just be consumed by rage because of their passing. They banter back and forth in the background as notable in-game events go down, and the way Calliope will cast doubt on the seemingly tall tales of her father, or follow up on moments that either seem contradictory or wrong was charming in the way The Prince attempting to recount his journey in The Sands of Time was.
Ultimately, these don’t really save the story from feeling dull and rote. Sons of Sparta is full of interesting characters that you meet after long stretches of not very interesting travel and exploration. The many locations that Kratos and his brother romp through, like the fiery foundry of Daedalus or the dense and spooky Veiled Bog, look good but there’s nothing all that special or memorable about them. A lot of them seem to be begging to tell the story of what got them to the state they're in, like a haunted Winery that is covered in a goop and being possessed by Grecian Ivan Ooze, or a farming village where all of the residents have been replaced by cultists. But Sons is content with just marching you through a place in service of one long goal, to find a missing student of the Agoge, without stopping to elaborate on any of these side stories.
The around 20 hours of my journey was a lot of me wishing I could know more about a cool place I was in, knowing the best I was going to get was a blurb in the lore compendium, checking off every single Metroidvania trope without really any hope of seeing much innovation on the concept. The only “new” idea Sons has about the genre is when the player can expect to gain the signature abilities these games are known for. There's no explicit right or wrong time to gain mechanics, of course, but I went about 10 hours before gaining the ability to drink a healing potion and got a double jump a few hours later, things you might expect to do at the beginning of similar titles. But you spend so much of the early parts of Sons of Sparta running such rudimentary obstacle courses that every time I gained something like the ability to sprint, I felt like I had to wrestle through a fugue state to give it a fair shake.
Combat, for better and worse, was the most reliably compelling thing going on for a lot of the game. Kratos has a lot of offensive options but none that really resemble the God of War’s barbarism. Armed with a spear and a shield, you'll mash a single attack string, poking and bashing enemies into submission. Normal attacks cause spirit orbs to float out of your targets, which fill your gauge that can be used to turn your blows into spirit attacks, doing less damage but generating health orbs and significantly more stun meter, which you want to build especially on stronger enemies as a stunned opponent is one that can be executed.
I immediately missed the attack paths of the other series’, that let you mix light and heavy attacks or control tempo with delay strings. Instead, you can equip different spear shafts that change your combo-enders, providing one big damage attack but very few of which stand out from one another outside of this. One adds a Brad Pitt-style leaping spear thrust that gives your combo a little more range, but I didn’t find fussing over the right last hit to be worth much.
Instead, the real effective ways to spice up your damage dealing comes from attaching different spear tips that add passive effects. They unlock active abilities as you upgrade them. Not all spear tips are made equal and there are clear stand outs, like one that extends your reach. The reach-extending one’s active ability made every attack hit twice for a brief period of time. These have a more dramatic effect on your playstyle than the shafts, but I rarely strayed away from this tip as it seemed to clearly be the most versatile. I didn’t find many opportunities to get the most out of some funkier ones like the poison tip or ice tip, which do damage over time and slow enemies, respectively, as they’re effects never gave me a clear enough advantage against tougher enemies that seemed just as dangerous under these conditions.
Pommels can be added to the bottom of the spear to give Kratos another active ability, these being more like special attacks that spend your spirit meter to do. The differences between these were more dramatic - one allows the spartan to deliver a flurry of thrusts in quick succession while another sends him marching, spear swinging in wide arcs around his body. I changed these up the most to adapt to challenges because each felt tailored to handling specific sorts of the threats.
The most dramatic offensive tools are those that come from the gifts of the god that Kratos and Deimos invite themselves to possess. These operate like spells that, mostly, give Kratos options he can’t get from his spear and shield - namely good ranged options like Apollo’s sling that lets you launch pellets of solid light at foes, or Hestia's shrub whose leaves toss bouncing flames. They also double as keys to specific sorts of locks that litter the vast world of Laconia, Apollo’s light can power specific generators and Hestia’s fire can burn away prickly bushes. But in combat, they are often your strongest and most restricted tool, limited by a magic gauge that can’t be refilled through your attacks like health and spirit can.
There’s quite a lot of ways to attack the enemies of Sparta, many little ways to modify these, and even more ways to grow and change these modifications through the upgrade crafting system. But so few of these options have remarkable gameplay consequences that incentivized me to explore past my early game habits. I didn’t even consider upgrading any of my spear tips past the level required to get their special abilities, and that was only just so I could see them in action. That isn’t to say the combat is easy, per say, but most of your most effective battle plan is to mash attack when able, after getting a safe moment or two to do so.
Enemies can be diligent and lethal, attacking often and in groups, requiring you to get pretty familiar with Kratos’ powerful defensive tools in order to survive. The parry is great for breaking up combos and putting stun damage on a foe, but it isn’t so strong that you autowin the skirmish after a successful swat, like some other games that might reward a good parry with a free execution. You still have to stay locked in, because the enemy will recover quickly to get back to the beating. Dodges, and the handful of follow up attacks that you can nail after, are necessities as well, and mixed together can make getting out of tougher binds feel rewarding. All of these actions can be modified or enhanced through equipment as well - shield rims can make counter attacks stronger or simply raise your armor and make you tougher to take down, for instance.
Bad guys get a little too cute with the kinds of offense they can dish out, though. Most action games feature enemies who flash red to denote an unblockable attack, but Sons of Sparta can feature enemies with a whopping four different kinds of special attack conditions, modifying whether an attack can be blocked but not evaded, ones that guard break but can be parried, or ones that you can defend in no way shape or form outside of simply not being around when it happens. This maximalist approach to defensive Simon Says creates too many variables in combat with lots of foes, and losing in scenarios where multiple enemies might hit you with different kinds of attacks at once always feels like whatever the Greek word is for bullshit.
Boss fights turn the screen filling attack machine up to 10, which is definitely a change of pace They don’t start getting tricky until about the last third of the adventure, but those baddies make you earn through extended chains of pattern recognition and reflex checking bullet storms. The easier ones in the earlier in the game can be more disappointing on the difficulty side, but what all bosses share is that they further remove the opportunity to take advantage of many of your offensive tools, since they seem to be largely immune to status effects and don’t have stun bars.
PlayStation has shut down Bluepoint Games, the studio behind the remakes of both Shadow of the Colossus and Demon's Souls.
This comes from Bloomberg, which confirmed the news with PlayStation. Roughly 70 employees are going to be impacted by the closure when it officially occurs next month.
“Bluepoint Games is an incredibly talented team and their technical expertise has delivered exceptional experiences for the PlayStation community,” a PlayStation spokesperson told Bloomberg. “We thank them for their passion, creativity and craftmanship."
According to a previous report by Bloomberg, Bluepoint was working on a live-service God of War game up until January of 2025, when the projet was canceled. The studio then spent last year pitching new projects, but ultimately was shuttered before it could get one moving.
Bluepoint was founded in 2006 by former Retro Studios employees, and proceeded to work on a number of PlayStation games, including several collections of existing games such as the God of War Collection, Metal Gear Solid HD Collection, and Uncharted: The Nathan Drake Collection. It also served as a support studio on ports of games like PlayStation All-Stars, Flower, and Titanfall.
But Bluepoint's claim to fame was its 2018 remake of Shadow of the Colossus, followed by its 2020 remake of Demon's Souls, both of which were highly praised by critics and fans. It wasn't until after Demon's Souls that Sony acquired Bluepoint in 2021. Under Sony's management, Bluepoint did some co-development work on God of War Ragnarok, but otherwise did not release or announce any new games.
Rebekah Valentine is a senior reporter for IGN. Got a story tip? Send it to rvalentine@ign.com.
In September 2025, we informed you about Super Mario Bros Remastered for the PC. And a few days ago, its team released a new major update for it. So, let’s take a closer look at it. For those who did not know, Super Mario Bros. Remastered is a fan remake of the classic NES Mario … Continue reading Super Mario Bros Remastered PC Update 1.1 Released →
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