Outside of having some of the best gaming headsets, Turtle Beach’s roster of peripherals has expanded over the years to include mechanical keyboards, high-end controllers, and gaming mice. I recently reviewed the Kone II and was impressed with its comfort and versatility, and its wireless version in the Kone II Air shares an identical build, but with some slight differences aside from cutting the cord. Unfortunately, most of those changes make it less desirable than its wired counterpart, even though it still strikes a decent balance between ergonomics and performance.

Turtle Beach Kone II – Design and Comfort

The Kone II Air still rocks the somewhat garish design with sharp contours and RGB strips along the sides to let you know this is a gaming mouse. By no means is it obnoxious, though – especially because it is appropriately shaped to fit my hand like a glove. One thing about its design is that I just wish the RGB strips were more transparent since the lighting looks a bit muddied from the slightly opaque material.

What’s more important is that it’s a comfortable mouse to hold, mainly with a full-on palm grip. This is one of the larger gaming mice and with its added weight, coming in at 110g as opposed to 90g for the wired version, it’s a little more challenging to wield in claw- and fingertip-style grips. This highlights one of the small yet noticeable differences between the two models – the Kone II Air’s added weight also contributes to a change in weight distribution. It isn’t quite as balanced since most of the added weight is on the backend of the mouse, making it less ideal in gaming situations where tight control of the mouse impacts performance. While it’s not exactly a dealbreaker, it’s worth mentioning as a notable difference.

The deep-set grooves work well for letting your thumb and pinky comfortably hold the mouse, and with just enough stickiness to the mouse’s material, holding onto the Kone II Air feels right. The mouse’s wider base adds to stability but it also works as extra surface area for your thumb to rest, so you don’t need to fully grip the mouse when using it in a more casual setting, which helps take some of the pressure off in long-term use.

The two side buttons are positioned and shaped the same as they are on the wired Kone II, which is to say they’re easy to use thanks to a slight gap between the two to help distinguish one from the other. The extra button below the thumb grip is the Easy Shift feature by default – when held down, your other mouse buttons double up for other functions, which you can program in the Swarm II software. It’s super useful for getting more utility out of your mouse if you prefer mapping in-game actions to mouse buttons or want more shortcuts for productivity or work environments. This additional thumb button is easy to hit, but not so much that you’ll accidentally activate it when using the mouse normally.

Looking to upgrade your keyboard, too?

Check out our roundup of the best gaming keyboards!

Another neat feature of the Kone II mice, wired and wireless, is the “4D” scroll wheel, which means you can flick it left or right as additional inputs. Like the thumb buttons, it's intuitive to actuate and isn’t prone to errant presses. One difference with the Kone II Air is that instead of up and down DPI buttons by the scroll wheel, there’s a DPI cycle button and a switch to swap between traditional tactile and frictionless scrolling. The tactile scrolling is quite a bit stiffer on the Kone II Air, and while I wouldn’t use the frictionless option normally, it’s well-implemented as a feature. However, the scroll wheel itself is loose in place regardless of which setting you use, so you can feel it jiggling as you’re swiping the mouse. It’s more of an annoyance than something that impacts performance.

As an ergonomic workhorse, it’s nice that the Kone II Air also includes Bluetooth connectivity, making it versatile and suited for casual use. There's also a convenient slot on the bottom side of the mouse to store the 2.4GHz wireless dongle so you can still get the best responsiveness even when taking it on the go.

Turtle Beach Kone II – Software, Customization, and Battery Life

Like all of Turtle Beach’s gear, the Kone II Air uses the Swarm II app, which is a streamlined software program that’s simple to use. Programming each button and setting the button mappings for the Easy Shift feature is straightforward since the app’s UI is clean and responsive, clearly laying out your options despite them seeming pretty sophisticated at first glance.

You can customize the RGB profile which is pretty neat for the Kone II Air considering it has five distinct lighting zones (one on the scroll wheel and two on each lighting strip), letting you set some cool looking color patterns – I just wish the material on the RGB strips let it shine more. You’ll also be able to set five DPI points up to 26,000 (in increments of 50), set debounce time and polling rate (which should be left at the max of 1000 Hz), and tweak the rest mode timer to save battery.

In terms of battery life, the Kone II Air is rated to last up to 350 hours via Bluetooth and 120 hours with 2.4GHz wireless, but those are under ideal conditions. After fully charging the mouse and using it three days straight for work and gaming (roughly accounting for 40 hours), the battery life was sitting around 60% which I’d chalk up as a win considering I had the RGB lighting on full blast and was using a rather modest rest mode timer.

Turtle Beach Kone II – Performance

The Kone II Air is comfortable and focused on providing an ergonomic experience while holding up in gaming, and all its features make it a well-rounded mouse. But when solely accounting for gaming, its performance depends on what you’re playing and the intensity of the gaming scenario. The Kone II Air uses the Owl-Eye 26K optical sensor and it's fast and accurate, and the Titan optical switch for its left and right mouse buttons are springy and responsive. While there were compromises to consider with the wired Kone II, some of those are exacerbated by the changes made for the wireless Kone II Air.

Again, it’s not a bad mouse for shooters, but I wouldn’t recommend it for competitive gaming. The ergonomic design also comes at the cost of being more nimble, since the wider base and added weight means you’re less agile. Such is the case with even another favorite in the Logitech G502. With the Kone II Air in particular, the extra 20g in weight and the slight imbalance you feel when lifting it up and swiping holds it back from being ideal for fast-paced shooters. It may seem like a nitpick, but when compared to other FPS-minded mice such as the Razer Deathadder V3 or Glorious Model D 2, for example, the difference can be stark. I didn’t have issues with the sensor or buttons because they’re still high performance parts, but if I’m diving into ranked matches in Valorant or Counter-Strike 2, I’m not going to use the Kone II Air.

I frequently swapped between the Kone II and Kone II Air when playing Final Fantasy XIV, and since I don’t need to have pinpoint accuracy in moments where split-seconds matter, the mouse held up really well. Being able to map so many frequently used actions to the extra buttons was clutch, even though I tend to rely on keyboard bindings for most things. Tinkering with Easy Shift to get more utility took some getting used to, but I definitely saw the benefits especially in an MMORPG. You’d probably consider something like the Corsair Scimitar if you want to go all-out on an MMO-centric mouse, but again, the Kone II Air excels in striking a balance between various use-cases.

It’s not a bad mouse for shooters, but I wouldn’t recommend it for competitive gaming.

As I mentioned at the top, I’d only recommend using a palm grip with the Kone II Air given its size and weight, which will also help mitigate its somewhat odd weight balance. And while its PTFE mouse feet help it glide across any kind of surface, the extra weight adds a bit more friction that can feel like dragging a hulking mouse around. These are the kinds of compromises that come with the territory of using a larger ergonomic-style mouse with a ton of features on top.

Earlier this week, Sony announced a limited edition PS5, PS5 Pro, and other accessories as part of a celebration of its 30th anniversary. And now, we've got some up-close photos of the consoles and the limited edition DualSense controllers that show off an incredible level of detail work on the hardware.

The photos in question show off the anniversary PS5 Pro and PS5, and the limited edition DualSense and DualSense Edge controllers and case. Up-close photos show off incredible detail on the Edge controller, showing little triangle, circle, X, and square patterns on the touchpad. There's ultra-tiny "30th anniversary" text hidden on the Pro itself, and further tiny patterns on the inner "fold" of the console.

The PS5 Pro bundle will come with the Pro itself, a vertical stand, a charging station, a DualSense Edge controller and case, an original PlayStation controller style cable connector, four cable ties styled after the sacred symbols, and a sticker, poster, and paperclip. Pricing has not been announced for the bundle yet, nor has it been announced for the other console, which is a PS5 Slim Digital Edition that comes with a regular DualSense controller, vertical stand, and the original PlayStation controller style cable connector, four cable ties styled after the sacred symbols, sticker, poster, and paperclip. Preorders will be available beginning September 26 to individuals with PSN accounts, as well as at participating retailers.

The PS5 Pro was one of the industry's worst-kept secrets for months before its official reveal earlier this month. The console is priced at $700, doesn't come with a disc drive, and launches on November 7 of this year. PlayStation fans reacted to the high price point with surprise when it was announced, and our own polls only between 10 and 15 percent of respondents indicated they would buy the console, largely put off by its expense. However, Sony has since said that it can justify the high cost due to lack of competition. Sony has since announced it will sell "certified refurbished" PS5s for half the price of a PS5 Pro, and PS5 Disc Drive sales have increased in the wake of the announcement as well.

Rebekah Valentine is a senior reporter for IGN. Got a story tip? Send it to rvalentine@ign.com.

This article is part of IGN’s Fantastic Fest coverage and contains detailed spoilers for its opening night film, Never Let Go, starring Halle Berry and directed by Alexandre Aja.

Are you wondering if Never Let Go has a post-credits scene? We’ll tell you right here: It doesn’t have a mid- or post-credits scene of any kind. Again, spoilers follow from here…

A common misconception over ending explained…s… — that term was never meant to be pluralized — is that they are definitive when, really, it’s just another critic offering you another opinion in a format that doesn’t happen to be a review. I say that because many films do not have a clear cut-and-dried ending that means the same thing to everyone who watches it. Alexandre Aja’s latest, Never Let Go, falls so much into that camp that Halle Berry (the film’s star) introduced it at Fantastic Fest with the note “decide what it means for yourself.” And, anecdotally speaking, everyone I spoke to after the screening had a completely different take so far as what the film’s ending actually means.

With that tremendous grain of salt in mind, let’s dig in!

Never Let Go: What Is the Evil?

A decent hunk of what makes Never Let Go successful is that you believe Mama (Berry) is completely off her rocker right up until you realize she isn’t. Except she is. Or maybe not? Let me explain.

Mama lives alone in a cabin in the middle of nowhere with her two sons Samuel (Anthony B. Jenkins) and Nolan (Percy Daggs IV). The family must stay in their home at all times unless they are grasping a rope tied firmly to the cabin’s foundation. You see, when the Evil started taking over the world, her father built the house for her mother and gave her the ropes so that she could wander the forest. We’re not going to talk about the logistical issues there — they come up in the film — but what you do need to know is that the Evil always has some kind of snake-like quality, regardless of what form it takes, and that neither of Mama’s boys can see these creatures. Only Mama says she can.

Now, the biblical implications here are clear from the start, as is the warning of what can happen when one holds too tightly to their beliefs without asking healthy questions. We know that Mama killed her husband, her mother, and her father when the Evil touched them; we know that Mama had a dark past and was “saved,” leaning into the trope of “born again” Christians becoming unwaveringly devout; and we know that Nolan is starting to have questions about the rest of the world.

Those questions, and Mama’s decision to kill the family dog so they don’t starve (he’s actually OK, don’t worry) result in Nolan hacking through Mama’s rope, leaving her exposed to the Evil. (Note: Nolan, at this point, does not believe in the Evil and is trying to show Mama that they can venture farther for food if she would simply believe him.) Rather than be touched by the Evil and thus, she believes, be forced to murder her sons with her own hands, she chooses to slit her own throat instead.

Woot! (owned by Amazon) is offering some huge discounts on Keychron's Q-series Keyboards. These are brand new, unused units with a full 1 year manufacturer's warranty. These top-of-the-line mechanical keyboards usually retail for $180 or more and are rarely discounted, but Woot! has them for up to 60% off. They have a lot of premium features you won't find on your standard gaming keyboards, like a full metal body, QMK/VIA support, pre-lubed mechanical switches, a double gasket design, and more. I myself use the Keychron Q2 as my daily driver, and it is the best keyboard I've used.

Featured in this article

Up to 60% Off Keychron Q-Series Keyboards

The Keychron Q-series models differ in their keys layout. The differences are as follows:

• Q1 - 75%
• Q2 - Exploded 65%
• Q3 - Tenkeyless (80%)
• Q4 - 60%
• Q5 - Exploded 96%

All Q-series keyboards feature a full aluminum CNC machined body. They are heavy, sturdy keyboards that are built like tanks. The shell will easily outlast any other part of the keyboard. These keyboards have a double gasket design which helps produce a pleasant sound profile while you type. Additional sound-absorbing foam is added to reduce any vibrations from the chassis. A polycarbonate plate allows some flex when typing to reduce fatigue and a softer bottom-out feel. PCB-mounted screw-in stabilizers are installed on the big keys like the space bar, shift, enter and delete keys. The keycaps are made from a PBT material that won't become oily or shiny with prolonged use. The legends aren't see-though, but the LEDs are south-facing so you still get a nice subtle RGB LED effect from the perimeter of the keys.

You can choose from Red, Brown, or Blue mechanical switches depending on your preference. These are all pre-lubed Gateron G Pro switches with up to 50 million keystroke lifespan. The Q-series keyboards have a hot swappable design that's compatible iwth most 3pin and 5pin MX mechanical switches on the market (including Cherry, Gateron, Kailh, Panda, etc). The keys are also all mappable via the open source QMK/VIA firmware. Every key can be remapped and macros are supported in Windows, macOS, and Linux. It's all browser based so there's no bloated software to download.

The recently released Ecoflow River 3 245Wh LiFePO4 Power Station is already on sale on Amazon. Right now it's $160.55 shipped after a $70 off instant discount and 5% off coupon code "I9TSDTDK". That's actually less expensive than the River 2 that it replaces. An even better deal is if you choose the bundle with a Ecoflow 45W foldable solar panel. It drops to $199, which means you're only paying an extra $40 for the solar panel. The River 3 is lightweight, compact in size, and is equipped with safe and reliable LiFEPO4 batteries.

Update: You can get a FREE Ecoflow Travel Bag with the purchase of either the Ecoflow River 3 or River 3 with Solar Panel Bundle. All you need to do is add it to your cart along with the power station and a $79 discount will automatically be deducted during checkout. This is a 30L roll-top travel backpack that can hold your River 3, or just use it as a regular laptop backpack. Note that if you do choose the free bag, the coupon code "I9TSDTDK" will no longer work.

New Release: Ecoflow River 3 Power Station for $160.55

Add a foldable solar panel for only $30

In celebration of One Piece anime's 25-year anniversary, Highground - a boutique keyboard manufacturer - has released a new lineup of licensed One Piece themed gaming keyboards. These keyboards are available in three trims: a base model for $145, a performance model for $175, and their flagship summit model for $260. Shipping costs an extra $9.

Featured in this article

The new Higround x One Piece keyboards all feature a 65% condensed layout. This is a great compact size for gaming use, but if you need a numpad, you'll need to look elsewhere. The keyboards are adorned with dye-sublimated keycaps that depict your favorite characters from the One Piece anime, including Monkey D. Luffy, Roronoa Zoro, Tony Tony Chopper, Nami, Vinsmoke Sanji, and Trafalgar Law. These keycaps use 1.5mm thick PBT, which is the highest quality material you'll find short of artisan keycaps.

One Piece x HG Summit 65 Keyboard

One Piece x HG Performance 65 Keyboard

Our recommended pick in terms of value

One Piece x HG Base 65 Keyboard

One Piece x HG Mousepad XL

Here's an interesting deal on a seemingly useful desk lamp. Right now LumiCharge is offering its flagship Lumicharge IIl Desk Lamp for $64.99. That's 50% off its original $130 MSRP but it gets even better. There's also a 25% off coupon code "LUMI25" floating around that drops the price even further to only $48.75. Shipping is only $2.99. As a comparison, this exact desk lamp currently sells for $69 from Amazon.

Lumicharge III LED Desk Lamp + Wireless/Wired Charger + Bluetooth Speaker + Digital Clock

For three days, LG has marked down the popular 34" LG UltraGear 34GP63A gaming monitor by 35% off. It's normally priced at $399.99, but today you can get it from LG for only $259.99 after a 35% off coupon code "ULTRA35". The GP63 has all the features you'd want in a gaming monitor, like a big ultrawide form factor, sharp resolution, fast response time, high refresh rate, wide viewing angles, and accurate color reproduction, all at an affordable price.

34" LG UltraGear Ultrawide Gaming Monitor for $259.99

The LG GP63A is a generously sized 34" curved display with a 3440x1440 ultra-wide resolution. Although it's not a true 4K monitor, it's still very sharp for just about any use case. In fact the pixel density (ppi) is identical to a 27" QHD monitor, which is considered the gold standard in terms of screen size to resolution. There's also another benefit; a 1440p resolution is less taxing on your GPU than 4K, so you can get away with a cheaper video card like an RTX 4060 or 4070.

The GP63A is equipped with a VA panel with a sub-1ms response time and 99% sRGB color gamut. It has wide viewing angles and a more uniform backlighting (less hotspots on a black screen) than an IPS panel. It supports VRR and MBR and is FreeSync Premium certified. Although it isn't officially G-SYNC certified, it is G-SYNC compatible just like every other FreeSync monitor. There are DisplayPort and HDMI ports, but you'll want to use DisplayPort for the 160Hz refresh rate.

If you're specifically looking for this size and aspect ratio, the GP63A is a great option. This has been one of LG's best selling 34" monitors for a long time and for good reason. It offers great features at a fair price that is made even better with this 35% off coupon. Nowadays monitor prices are getting out of hand with some top-end models selling for over $1500, potentially more expensive than your entire gaming setup. Don't hesiste, though, because this coupon ends soon.

Want more options? Check out our favorite gaming monitors of 2024.

Last week, Bloomberg reported that 25 people comprising the entire staff of Annapurna Interactive walked out the door in a group resignation. But while some of the circumstances around their departure emerged in the reporting, one pressing question was left unanswered: why?

Having spoken to multiple individuals close to the situation who requested anonymity due to fear of reprisal, as well as an Annapurna spokesperson, IGN has pieced together a somewhat complex answer. Disagreements over the direction of the Interactive division, chaotic departures, communication breakdowns, and a perceived lack of leadership transparency at Annapurna Interactive led to a staff walk-out that has left 25 individuals jobless, Annapurna leaders scrambling, and numerous developers concerned about their contracts with the publisher.

A Company Divided

Though the collapse of Annapurna Interactive as we once knew it started earlier this year, its roots lie in the company's historical leadership structure. Annapurna Interactive was initially conceived as the gaming division of Annapurna Pictures, which was founded by film producer and billionaire Megan Ellison in 2011. Annapurna Interactive itself was spun up in 2016, tapping a staff of industry veterans including including former Sony creative director Nathan Gary, former Sony executive producer Deborah Mars, and former Sony producer Hector Sanchez for leadership roles. Sanchez left the company in 2019, and former Capybara Games co-founder Nathan Vella was brought on that same year.

The film side of Annapurna's business has undergone well-publicized struggles. In 2018, it was bleeding enough money to prompt Ellison's father, multi-billionaire Larry Ellison, to step in. By 2019, Annapurna Pictures was reportedly teetering on bankruptcy, and in the ensuing years its film and TV output slowed significantly. Variety reports that Ellison disappeared from public life in 2019 almost entirely, leaving her business to largely run itself during the height of the pandemic. She reemerged in 2021, only to name Gary president over all of Annapurna, with Mars and Vella stepping into co-head roles at the Interactive division.

In the ensuing years, Annapurna Interactive continued to grow, releasing financial and critical successes such as Stray, Outer Wilds, What Remains of Edith Finch, and Cocoon. While the company claims the Annapurna Pictures side of the business hasn't struggled in recent years, saying that film and TV were more profitable than Annapurna Interactive in 2023, a spokesperson alleged to IGN that Gary was a less-than-ideal steward of Annapurna Pictures. Under his guidance, they claim, resources were pulled away from film and TV, key executives were pushed out, and the company was largely refocused on gaming. Annapurna tells IGN that Gary also elevated co-founder James Masi to chief administrative officer, a role the spokesperson suggested was unnnecessary at a company of Annapurna's size. Notably, Annapurna did launch an animation division under Gary's tenure that released the critically-acclaimed film Nimona just last year, though an Annapurna spokesperson reached out to IGN post-publication with the assertion that it was Ellison who brought in Nimona as the foundation for what would become the animation division. IGN has reached out to Gary, but he declined to comment.

IGN understands that opinions of Ellison within Annapurna Interactive prior to 2024 varied from indifference to latent mistrust given previous reports on her behavior toward employees. Anonymous sources I spoke to all cited a strong fear of reprisal from Ellison in particular, given her resources, history, and reach. A few people referenced creative or compensation disagreements during their time at Annapurna that contributed to a general feeling Ellison would not keep promises. Multiple sources we spoke to described Ellison as a largely hands-off leader and rarely present in the gaming division, an attitude that for years suited many of Annapurna Interactive's employees just fine.

Ad-Verset effects

This was the state of things at the start of 2024 according to our sources. Prior to March of this year, work at Annapurna Interactive was business-as-usual, they say, until employees were suddenly informed mid-month that James Masi had been unexpectedly let go. An Annapurna spokesperson confirmed Masi was made redundant, saying that Ellison had chosen to step back in at the company and oversee the Annapurna Pictures side again in an effort to re-invest in the film and TV side of the business. As a part of this, Annapurna claims that Ellison reinstalled Gary as head of Interactive, and deemed Masi's role unnnecessary.

However, at this time, Gary also left the company. Annapurna claims he left of his own accord in response to Masi's firing and his change in role. But sources say employees were told in the following days by leadership within Annapurna Interactive that Gary had been fired along with Masi. The belief that two of their leaders had been fired seemingly out of the blue sparked confusion and fury, and a handful of individuals quit in protest, including at least one other Interactive leader.

The sudden resignation of multiple key individuals came as a shock to the company, and IGN understands that Ellison held a video call with Annapurna employees to discuss what had happened and find a way to move forward. On the call, Ellison allegedly expressed a desire to keep the entire group, including those who had been fired or resigned, together. In the following days, all the departed staff returned, including Gary and Masi, and discussions began for a potential spin-off of the company that would allow Gary and Ellison to achieve their respective visions with minimal disruptions to partner developers.

Roughly, the plan was for Gary and the Annapurna Interactive staff to become a new company called Verset, with ownership split between Annapurna and Verset's leaders. Verset would oversee all currently existing signed Annapurna Interactive projects, with revenue split between itself and Annapurna proper in Annapurna's favor. It would also be free to sign its own, independent deals. Developers IGN spoke to report being made aware the spin-off was happening in the following months, and were reassured their contracts would be fulfilled.

While employees understood such a venture would take time to get off the ground, in the ensuing months a number of events occurred that made some skeptical of Ellison's commitment to parting with Annapurna Interactive. In early summer, sources tell us that employees discovered Hector Sanchez had been quietly rehired back at Annapurna by Ellison and was working on gaming projects without the knowledge of the rest of the Interactive staff. The news wasn't made official until August that Sanchez had been appointed president of interactive and new media at Annapurna — a title that seemed to some as potentially at odds with Vella and Mars' roles at Interactive.

Annapurna, for its part, claims that talks between Ellison and Sanchez began as far back as February for Ellison to fund a new venture Sanchez was planning after departing Epic Games. As talks continued, Annapurna says Sanchez began negotiating with Remedy Entertainment for a deal related to film and TV spin-offs of its properties. However, when spin-off negotiations began to crystalize at Annapurna Interactive, Ellison offered Sanchez a position at Annapurna. The intent, per the spokesperson, was for Verset to become the company's indie arm, and for Sanchez to lead efforts in the AAA and AA-gaming space, including transmedia properties.

Which is how, months later, Annapurna announced it was partnering with Remedy Entertainment on film, TV, and other projects including funding support for Control 2. The press release, which IGN received, referenced both Sanchez and Ellison. But it doesn't reference Annapurna Interactive at all, and IGN understands Annapurna Interactive employees were only informed the deal was happening that morning. Employees, unaware of Ellison's plans or the status of the spin-off, were confused, concerned, and frustrated about the direction of the company and the future of its Interactive division, Verset or no Verset.

While all this was going on, sources say that discussions with Ellison regarding the spin-off appeared to have stalled out, and in August Annapurna officially terminated discussion. Annapurna claims this was due to Gary's lack of response to requests for feedback on legal drafts, and in a statement sent to IGN after publication, doubled down. "Any implication Annapurna was backtracking on the deal is false. We agreed to high-level deal terms and signed a term sheet in early April, which makes it all the more surprising that we never got a response."

Meanwhile, multiple people told IGN that in those final months, they began to see signs of Ellison exercising greater involvement over Annapurna Interactive's deals, projects, and budgets in a way that began to make them further uncomfortable with the direction the company was taking overall.

All of this came to a head at the end of August when all 25 Annapurna Interactive employees including Gary, Vella, Masi, and Mars signed a joint resignation letter. The group gave two weeks notice and departed the company together on September 6 leaving Ellison, Sanchez, and newly-hired chief strategy officer Paul Doyle working on a semblance of Annapurna's gaming efforts. Sources tell IGN that up to the letter being sent and after, the group asked Ellison to work with them on other possible solutions such as the aforementioned spin-off, but did not receive any interest.

IGN also understands that despite the two-week notice, partner developers did not learn about the sudden exodus of all their Annapurna contacts until a day or two before it occurred. Annapurna claims they didn't have enough time to collect developer contact information to alert them sooner, while Annapurna Interactive sources say they received no guidance from the company during that period as to who should tell developers, when, and how. An Annapurna spokesperson reached out post-publication to IGN to deny this, claiming it had active and open conversations with the Interactive staff on how to communicate the news.

Annapurna Aftermath

While IGN couldn't glean any details on the future of the 25 departed employees, there are some indications that the group is collectively working on some new venture together. A website for Verset appears to be online at the time of publication with a PR alias, which IGN reached out to for comment. IGN was also unable to find any posts or other discussions from the departed members indicating they were looking for employment elsewhere. Whatever their future plans, IGN understands that the group did not have a ready-made venture waiting when they left, as some have speculated. If they build anything new, it will be largely from scratch.

Meanwhile, at Annapurna itself, efforts are underway to right the ship. Multiple developers I spoke to expressed a mixture of frustration and confusion at the sudden departure, but several told me they felt confident in Sanchez's ability to honor existing obligations. Several individuals with projects at different stages of development told me about meetings they'd had with Sanchez in the wake of the event that they reported had reassured them. Sanchez has previously stated his intention both to backfill roles as well as work with outside agencies to fulfill Annapurna's contractual obligations, and IGN has confirmed this process is ongoing. Earlier this week, Annapurna also posted an open role for a QA Manager overseeing "multiple external QA teams."

The unusual situation appears to have impacted a few specific projects in unique ways. On August 30, iam8bit shared an announcement that an upcoming PlayStation 5 physical edition of Outer Wilds: Archaeologist Edition had suffered from a manufacturing error, and did not include the Echoes of the Eye expansion as expected. Annapurna Interactive at the time said it would "continue to investigate", while iam8bit offered either a digital DLC voucher to impacted customers, or a replacement corrected physical copy. Both Annapurna and Interactive sources have told IGN that this issue is unrelated to the resignations, and Annapurna reassured that it will not be impacted by the upheaval at the company.

Then there's Blade Runner. Last summer, Annapurna Interactive announced it would be developing its first in-house game, based on the Blade Runner franchise, titled Blade Runner 2033: Labyrinth. However, game director Chelsea Hash appears to be one of the 25 individuals who resigned, per LinkedIn, and IGN understands that all other full-time members of the development team joined her. Annapurna has told IGN that development on Blade Runner 2033 will continue despite the departure of its entire team.

An Annapurna spokesperson also shared the following statement when asked for further comment:

"The whole situation is a baffler, but now we're focused on moving forward. We've had really great conversations with an overwhelming majority of our existing development teams and are grateful for their partnership. If our inbox is any indication, a ton of developers continue to want to be a part of what we're building, and we look forward to seeing their pitches. We've also had an influx of quality job applicants and are excited to build a team passionate about our mission to tell original stories that aren't being told elsewhere. P.S. We're hiring."

Annapurna has splintered into two groups, both of which are now working to pick up the pieces. The remains of Annapurna Interactive (or perhaps a future Verset) consist of 25 individuals who felt strongly enough about perceived mismanagement, poor communication, apparent spontaneous layoffs of leaders, and one another that they were willing to give up paychecks and stability at a time of overwhelming industry job and funding uncertainty. When IGN approached its sources close to this group about Annapurna's version of events (specifically, the conflicting information around Masi and Gary's alleged resignation/firing and the collapse of spin-off discussions), they reacted with skepticism, but did not feel they could safely provide more specific details.

Meanwhile, at Annapurna, a tiny leadership team is struggling to ensure that around 40 projects have the support they need, while the company's partners have been left at various stages of development and uncertainty as to what comes next.

Annapurna Interactive as we once knew it — a beloved publisher of critically-acclaimed, unique, beloved indie games — is no more. What, if anything, will rise to take its place?

Rebekah Valentine is a senior reporter for IGN. Got a story tip? Send it to rvalentine@ign.com.

Additional statements from an Annapurna spokesperson were added to this piece post-publication.

Each Friday, we round up the latest items at IGN Store! This week, IGN Store opened orders for new Warahmmer, Uzumaki, and Little Nightmares products. Additionally, the hottest items of the week included the Warhammer, Fallout, and Cyberpunk collections. Finally, items from Challengers, Tomb Raider, and The Witcher 3 are set to leave IGN Store very soon. Take a look at this week's roundup below!

What's New: Warhammer, Uzumaki, and Little Nightmares

Warhammer 40,000 Space Marine 2 - Original Soundtrack - 2LP Vinyl

Lenovo is offering an Lenovo Legion Tower 5i Gen 8 gaming PC equipped with a GeForce RTX 4070 SUPER graphics card for only $1349.99 after coupon code: "CRAZYLEGION1". That's a $950 price drop from its $2300 MSRP. The RTX 4070 SUPER GPU is an outstanding card that excels at 1080p and 1440p gaming, but has the chops to run most games in 4K as well. I personally gamed on a 4K monitor with a RTX 3080 GPU before I finally upgraded to a newer card.

Lenovo Legion RTX 4070 SUPER PC for $1349.99

The Lenovo Legion Tower 5 Gen 8 is equipped with an Intel Core i7-14700F CPU, GeForce RTX 4070 SUPER GPU, 32GB of DDR5-4400MHz RAM, and dual storage (1TB M.2 SSD and 1TB HDD). The 14th generation Intel Core i7-14700F Raptor Lake Refresh CPU boasts a max clock of 5.4GHz with 20 cores, 28 threads, and a 33MB cache. It's a great processor for both gaming and workstation tasks (on par with the newest Ryzen 7 CPUs).

The RTX 4070 SUPER video card is a significant improvement in performance over the 4070 (about 10%-15% faster at 1440p). Like all RTX 40 series cards, the RTX 4070 SUPER supports DLSS 3.0, which gives it an edge in performance over similarly priced AMD GPUs. Check out our RTX 4070 SUPER review for more details. This is the best NVIDIA card to get for 1080p or 1440p gaming; the RTX 4070 Ti/SUPER starts to get a little overkill at a higher price, and the RTX 4060 Ti is considerably underpowered compared to the 4070. It's also a perfectly capable card for 4K gaming, although at that point a RTX 4070 Ti or higher will give you noticeable gains. The RTX 4070 SUPER also has 12GB of VRAM compared to the 4070's 8GB, which makes it a better card for AI.

Why Choose Lenovo?

People like the fact that Lenovo does not use very many proprietary components in their rigs, so Legion gaming PCs are generally DIY upgrade friendly with easily obtainable off-the-shelf components. Lenovo gaming rigs generally also utilize solid cooling, especially for the CPU, even if you opt for the less expensive air cooled option. Check out our best budget gaming PCs of 2024 to see what other alternatives we recommend.

Looking for more options? Check out the best gaming PC deals today.

The return to the office has been unrelenting, but that hasn’t slowed brands down from releasing new products for content creation to enhance your streams and virtual meetings. The Obsbot Tiny 2 is a unique little webcam – and I mean that literally. At less than two inches square, it’s as unobtrusive a webcam as we’ve seen that offers 4K resolution and advanced features like AI framing. At $129.99, it’s a great value.

Obsbot Meet 2 – Design and Features

The Obsbot Meet 2 is designed to fade into the background of any environment. It’s tiny, measuring only 1.78 x 1.4 x 0.87 inches, smaller than a large paperclip. It’s unobtrusive compared to many other webcams, and that’s especially impressive for the kind of quality it offers. At the same time, Obsbot has aimed for style with three different colors available at launch: white, gray, and teal. It’s minimalist, but in an Apple-esque kind of way that’s nicer to see perched upon your monitor.

The simple, sleek design lets the lens take up the majority of its front. Two pinholes signal the dual microphones it houses on either side. In the upper corners is a small Obsbot logo to the left and an LED to the right that indicates when the camera feed is on. The only other design feature is the USB Type-C port on the back and a ¼-20 mounting thread on the bottom.

Even with its minimalist design, there are still some interesting aspects outside of its tiny build. For example, it uses magnets for mounting to its monitor stand, so there’s nothing to screw in. The same goes for the lens cover, which is a bit less appealing since it’s incredibly easy to lose. The chassis is metal and conducts heat away from the camera’s internals. It gets warm but was never hot to the touch. It comes with an angle-adjustable monitor mount. The magnets inside the camera are surprisingly powerful – it snaps in place and doesn’t move on its own. Making small adjustments can be a bit finicky, however, as it’s hard to avoid touching the camera and shifting its angle when you’re adjusting the mount.

The internals of the camera are respectable for the price. It uses a 1/2-inch CMOS sensor, which is significantly larger than what’s in typical webcams, and is paired with an f/1.8 aperture lens. Together, they allow the camera to gather more light so it performs better in darker scenes, as well as provide a small amount of natural bokeh (depth of field). In practical terms, this design means you won’t need to keep a ring light on for every meeting just to avoid looking dark and grainy.

Pair your new webcam with a high-quality mic

Check out our roundup of the best gaming and streaming microphones!

Spec-wise, the camera can record video up to 4K30 or 1080p60 with or without HDR. It has a 79-degree field of view, which is narrower than competitors like the Logitech MX Brio and Elgato FaceCam Pro (both top out at 90-degrees) but it’s still wide enough, similar to the kit lenses packed in with mirrorless cameras and DSLRs. The FoV also stops short of image warping (a distortion that comes from a wider FoV), which is nice because that’s usually a dead giveaway that you’re using a webcam. I don’t mind it, but if you’re looking to show off a lot of your streaming area, this may not be the camera for you.

Where Obsbot pulls ahead is with its AI features and software. Obsbot leans heavily on AI in its cameras – I know, the most overused term of 2024 – but it’s actually used to good effect here. Within the software, you can enable smart object tracking. This isn’t uncommon by itself, but the Meet 2 allows you to designate the type of shot, or even the part of your body, you would like it to track. Looking for a pulled-back view so you can present standing up? There’s a toggle for that and the shot will adjust its FOV under its maximum range to capture your upper body. Looking for a punched-in headshot for your face cam? It’s one button away, and the camera keeps that subject centered in the frame, even as you move around. It’s also able to recognize when multiple people are in the frame and adjust if one of them should walk away.

There are also some fairly excellent picture and beauty enhancements you can apply. The best of these is adding background blur while the AI engine intelligently tracks you and ensures you remain in focus, leaving the background blurred. It’s leagues better than the built-in blurs in Zoom and Google Meet. If you look close, you can still sometimes see where the transition happens. But for the most part, it’s something you need to actively look for to notice, and is implemented very well overall.

Similar to Snapchat and countless photo apps, you can also apply an array of cosmetic filters. Skin smoothing, coloring, eye size, and more can all be adjusted. It’s not revolutionary or something I would ever use personally, but I could definitely see others finding this to be a useful feature. When used in moderation, the enhancements are pretty convincing.

Elsewhere in the software, you’ll find a wide array of picture settings. Simple sliders allow you to adjust the brightness, contrast, sharpening, color temperature, and exposure compensation. You can set focus manually or leave it set to auto. If you’re familiar with camera settings, you can even manually adjust the ISO (100 to 6,400) and shutter speed (1/30 to 1/6,400s). There are also options to capture in portrait or landscape modes if you need vertical video.

The autofocus is one of the best available in a webcam today. It uses phase detection, similar to Sony mirrorless cameras, and can reliably swap between your face and something held close to the camera within just a few seconds. It can also be set to focus on faces or have it apply to objects in the scene more universally, and in face latch mode, the swap back from the near-held object is almost instant.

The Meet 2 also comes with a pair of omnidirectional microphones for capturing audio. They’re on the quiet side but offer good clarity and detail. Sitting about two feet away, people on the other end of the line reported that they could hear me very well. In test recordings in Audacity, it never approached the level of a standard desktop mic (-12 to -9dB when properly configured). But, there was also a minimum of ambient room noise. There’s a trade-off there, but they are high quality for built-in webcam mics.

Obsbot Meet 2 – Performance

The Obsbot Meet 2 is a great camera overall, offering great picture in most situations. With halfway decent lighting and the bokeh effect applied (lightly), it could pass as video from a mirrorless camera. That’s high praise for a webcam that only costs $130 and is as portable as it is.

When I test webcams, I start with three different lighting scenarios: well-lit, normal room lighting, and low light. For the well lit scenario, I have two key lights bouncing light from the ceiling and walls, a normal lamp, and a third light off-scene in the back. The “normal” scene involves a single floor lamp in the corner of the room and the light from my monitor. The low light scenario is completely dark except for whatever illumination is shed from my monitor.

With good lighting, the Meet 2 shines – it’s crisp and clear. At 4K, you can make out fine details in my hair and beard, and my cat’s fur. The white balance, saturation, and contrast are all very good, creating an accurate image. With just a lamp, it still performs very well. This image is still accurate and really doesn’t lose much detail at all.

Turning off all of the lights brings about the expected graininess, but it still offers a surprising amount of detail and accurate color. The 6,400 maximum ISO and ½-inch sensor allow it to gather enough light to still be very usable. Exploring this mode, I also realized that the camera cannot drop to anything lower than 30 FPS, so motion remains smooth as well. In the same scenario, more common webcams for streaming like the Logitech C922 become very blurry with any kind of motion. It’s less of an issue on modern 4K webcams, especially those with STARVIS sensors like the Razer Kiyo Pro Ultra, but they’re usually significantly more expensive.

Its HDR implementation is a bit more mixed. It usually just seems to brighten the image and drop some of the contrast so it appears flatter. For the most part, I like the picture better with HDR turned off. Under bright lights in SDR mode, hot-spots of skin glare can sometimes be an issue (like most webcams). HDR mode tends to cut these out and lead to a more balanced image, so it has its uses.

I mentioned it up top but it bears repeating here – the autofocus on the Meet 2 is phenomenal. It can be set to Global or Face modes, and under both settings, you can still hold objects up and the camera will shift focus. The big difference is that in Global mode these focus changes are almost instant whereas Face mode tries to hang on your face for a few seconds and is only instant when returning. And crucially, the close-up detail it can deliver is excellent.

The biggest disappointment is how it integrates portrait mode. Instead of cropping the image to 9:16 like you would expect a social media-friendly mode to do, it just adds unsightly black bars on the top and bottom. A letterboxed landscape isn’t what anyone has in mind for portrait mode.

It also isn’t great with handling bright background lighting. In the most challenging scenario, where you have sun shining in a window behind you, exposure drops as low as possible, leaving your face obscured in darkness. This is a hard scenario for any webcam, but it’s a key situation you’ll want to avoid.

And if you demand a built-in privacy shutter, you’ll need to look elsewhere. It comes with a lens blocker, but it’s a small magnetic disk that will almost certainly get lost over time. It’s better than nothing but it’s certainly no integrated shutter like the MX Brio.

Warning: This story contains potential spoilers for Gladiator 2's ending.

It took Ridley Scott more than 20 years to bring Gladiator 2 to life, but that isn’t stopping him from getting a head start on Gladiator 3.

The director spoke about the future of his Roman Empire action series during a conversation with French magazine Premiere (via Variety). While the upcoming sequel won’t arrive in theaters for more than two more months, Scott has high hopes that he'll be able to continue the story with Gladiator 3. It’s all early stages and it seems nothing is set in stone, but the filmmaker is at least excited about the series enough to spark a few ideas.

Transformers One is a major change of pace for this long-running Hasbro franchise. Not only is it the first feature-length animated movie starring the Robots in Disguise since 1986’s Transformers: The Movie, it’s also one set far earlier in the Transformers timeline. Rather than taking place on Earth, this film flashes back to the glory days of Cybertron, when Optimus Prime and Megatron were still close friends and allies.

This change of pace is just what the Transformers series needed after what could politely be described as an uneven track record on the big screen. In fact, Transformers One serves as a reminder that animation, not live-action, is where this franchise tends to succeed best. Here’s why animation should be the priority for Transformers movies going forward.

Why the Live-Action Transformers Movies Have Failed Critically

Given that it deals with giant, talking robots transforming into massive vehicles and battling one another to the death, it should probably come as no surprise that it took the Transformers franchise as long as it did to make the transition from comics and cartoons to live-action. Director Michael Bay brought the Autobots and Decepticons to life in 2007’s Transformers, before following up that film with a further four sequels.

But while those movies certainly delivered on spectacle (particularly 2011’s Transformers: Dark of the Moon and its depiction of a devastating battle in Chicago), story-wise the live-action series was basically dead on arrival. The Bay movies are widely derided for their paper-thin characters, storytelling cliches, cultural stereotypes, and overly juvenile humor (we’re looking at you, 2009’s Transformers: Revenge of the Fallen). All five Bay movies were rated rotten on Rotten Tomatoes, with Transformers leading the pack at 57% and 2017’s Transformers: The Last Knight bottoming out at 16%.

Critically, things definitely improved with the release of 2018’s Transformers: Bumblebee. This prequel/pseudo-reboot took the series in a much different and more character-driven direction, resulting in a far more respectable 90% fresh rating on Rotten Tomatoes (check out IGN’s Transformers: Bumblebee review for our thoughts on the film). However, 2023’s Transformers: Rise of the Beasts failed to continue that critical momentum, sliding back down to 51%.

And commercially, there’s been a clear case of diminishing returns with the Transformers franchise in recent years. Where both Dark of the Moon and 2014’s Transformers: Age of Extinction crossed the $1 billion mark globally, The Last Knight barely broke $600 million. Bumblebee and Rise of the Beasts made even less money, with both coming in at less than $500 million globally. Yes, that is still a lot of money, but it’s clear that fans aren’t as enthusiastic about the franchise as they once were.

At some point, audiences seem to have grown bored of watching CGI robots punch each other repeatedly. The spectacle of these films is ultimately hollow. We’ve seen Peter Cullen’s Optimus Prime stabbed, blown up, and shot countless times, yet it never seems to make a difference in the end. He just shrugs it all off and keeps on trucking (pun intended).

Nor have these films built a compelling, ongoing narrative over the course of seven installments and counting. The characters are still cardboard cutouts. The mythology fueling these films is more convoluted than compelling, particularly as the most recent movies have become trapped in that “not quite a prequel, not fully a reboot” limbo. Hasbro and Paramount’s solution for revitalizing the live-action movies seemingly isn’t to simplify and refocus, but instead coast on the fan-service appeal of a Transformers/G.I. Joe crossover movie. But with the G.I. Joe franchise facing its own major problems in live-action, can we really count on a crossover movie to solve the woes of both franchises?

Clearly, a more fundamental overhaul of the Transformers series is needed to address these serious flaws. And that’s where Transformers One comes in.

What Transformers One Gets Right

Simply put, Transformers One is the clean, fresh start the franchise needed on the big screen. While One could be viewed as a distant prequel to the live-action movies, it also stands completely on its own. It flashes back many years in the past, when the Autobots and Decepticons still had a society of their own on Cybertron.

Immediately, this clean break from the other movies is a welcome relief. There’s no need to worry about how One connects to the other films or that convoluted mythology. The movie doesn’t have to worry about shoehorning in one-dimensional human characters. It can actually develop the Autobots and Decepticons for a change.

Lenovo is offering its Lenovo Legion Tower 5i Gen 8 Intel Core i5 RTX 4060 gaming PC for only $769.99 shipped after coupon code "CRAZYLEGION5". This is an excellent deal for an RTX 4060 gaming PC and even better than the recent LOQ RTX 4060 deal, mainly because the Legion 5 Tower is a nicer chassis with more fans. Lenovo Legion gaming PCs feature better build quality than what you'd find from other comparably priced PCs, with mostly non-proprietary parts that are easy to upgrade on your own.

Lenovo Legion Tower 5i RTX 4060 Gaming PC for $769.99

The Lenovo Legion Tower 5i is equipped with an Intel Core i5-1440F CPU, GeForce RTX 4060 8GB GPU, 16GB of DDR5-5800MHz RAM, and a 512GB NVMe SSD. The latest generation Intel Core i5-1440F Raptor Lake "Refresh" CPU boasts a max clock of 4.7GHz with 10 cores, 16 threads, and a 20MB cache. It's cooled by a robust 120mm tower heatsink fan. This is a very capable desktop processor that performs nearly as well as the Intel Core i7 in gaming.

The RTX 4060 is considerably more powerful than the RTX 3060 and almost nearly matches the RTX 3060 Ti. This is a great budget card for 1080p gaming. You could also run games at 1440p with relaxed graphic settings, but at that point I'd recommend upgrading to an RTX 4060 Ti or higher. Because it's a current generation card, the RTX 4060 supports DLSS 3.0, which gives you a noticeable performance boost compared to equivalent AMD cards without sacrificing visual quality.

For those of you on a budget, the RTX 4060 is usually going to be the best NVIDIA GPU you'll find in a gaming PC that's priced under $1000, and this Lenovo rig is well below that threshold. What's more, Lenovo prebuilt gaming PCs include a 1 year manufacturer's warranty, so you'll avoid the hassle of building DIY and dealing with separate component warranties. Check out our best budget gaming PCs of 2024 to see what other alternatives we recommend.

Looking for higher-end options? Check out the best gaming PC deals today.

As part of a limited time Lightning Deal, Amazon is offering the excellent 8BitDo Ultimate Wireless Controller for only $39.99 - a 20% discount - but it's selling out quickly. It's compatible with Nintendo Switch, Steam Deck, PC, Android, and even iOS (officially supported by Apple). The 8BitDo Ultimate is often considered one of the best 3rd party wireless controllers for the Nintendo Switch and it's a lot cheaper than the Pro controller. Check out our 8BitDo Ultimate review.

8BitDo Ultimate Wireless Controller (Switch Compatible)

Note: These impressions are based on my early experiences with EA Sports FC 25. So far, the focus has been on core gameplay in Career and Rush modes, but I’ll explore how the changes impact Ultimate Team and other online modes after spending more time with them.

Every year, I start with the same overly optimistic questions: What has actually changed in FIFA—sorry, EA Sports FC—this time around? Is it really new, or just the same old experience with a fresh coat of paint? There’s always a laundry list of flashy new marketing terms designed to grab attention: Hypermotion V, FC IQ, BallTouch, Rush, etc (okay one of those is made up). Yet, even with all the buzzwords, there’s often a lingering feeling that these changes are merely surface-level, just enough to warrant a new bullet point on the box without truly changing up the gameplay in an innovative way.

Well, so far the changes made to FC 25 make it feel like the latter scenario: a series of incremental improvements and adjustments that do add to the fun through their novelty if nothing else, but they’re hardly enough to usher in a sweeping revolution of any kind.

Career Mode: Finally a Welcome Refresh

As someone who prefers the depth of Career Mode (I’ve spent hundreds of hours playing out multiple season-long campaigns over the years) over the microtransaction-driven Ultimate Team, I was pleased to see that FC 25 finally gives it the attention it deserves and brings some meaningful updates. One of the biggest improvements this year is simply in the ways you can customize the experience. There’s more flexibility in how you set up your career—board expectations, for instance, can now be set to lenient, sparing you the frustration of being sacked for not spending every penny of your transfer budget. The ability to customize training plans and match tactics to a greater degree, deciding how hard your players train and which roles suit them best, is a welcome step towards giving us more control over our players’ development, particularly when it comes to managing youth talent and squad rotation.

Then there’s also the addition of weather effects like wind and rain, which surprisingly aren’t just cosmetic—they’re modifiers that genuinely affect how matches play out. In smaller stadiums, for example, a strong gust can make the ball swerve unpredictably. It’s a satisfying touch and adds a new level of realism for offline modes like Career that feels long overdue. That said, it’s a shame this isn’t available in online modes due to balancing reasons. I understand how it could frustrate those who don’t enjoy forces outside of their control becoming a deciding factor, but I’d love to see it as an optional setting for casual Ultimate Team matchups to spice things up just that bit more for those of us who like to live dangerously.

Beyond the weather, another interesting feature is the integration of a social media feed featuring none other than the seemingly omnipresent transfer guru Fabrizio Romano. His trademark "Here We Go" catchphrase now pops up during in-game transfer announcements. It’s a fun, slightly gimmicky, if borderline cringeworthy addition—but I’m still waiting for a “There We Land” before I’m truly impressed.

FC 25’s welcoming of several major women’s leagues is long overdue and much appreciated, and the ability to seamlessly drift between the men’s and women’s leagues and teams within one career mode save is particularly neat. Plus, you can now start a save as one of FC’s many icons, allowing me to finally live out my dream of Andrea Pirlo running the show at the base of Gillingham’s midfield.

There are new ways to play within Career Mode as well. Rush is a new 5v5 mode found throughout FC 25 (essentially replacing Volta) and it’s used through the introduction of youth tournaments, giving you a chance to test your wunderkinds in high-pressure scenarios throughout the season. It’s a cool, fast-paced break from the standard matches and some much-needed variety to the often-repetitive nature of Career Mode seasons.

This new, futsal-inspired mode brings a fresh twist with a set of unique rules that introduce a fun dose of chaos to the gameplay. Kick-offs are revamped, in that players race toward the center of the pitch as the ball is launched into play, much like Rocket League. The offside rule only kicks in within the final third, a departure from the usual halfway-line restriction. Red cards are swapped out for blue cards, sending players to a one-minute sin bin for serious fouls, though their time is cut by 15 seconds for every goal the opposition scores during that period. Penalties also get a shakeup, taken from the "final third line" in a one-on-one duel with the goalkeeper, similar to hockey shootouts.

Rush mode is also available in Kick Off, Ultimate Team, and Clubs, making it perfect for players who don’t always have a full squad but still want to jump into the action with a few friends. Outside of Career, matches take place in the custom-designed Rush Stadium, developed in partnership with Nike, featuring a futuristic flair, vibrant drone shows that enhance the atmosphere, and unique commentators specific to the mode. With online modes kicking off in early access, Rush already shows plenty of potential to evolve into something truly unique. Whether that potential will be fully realized, or discarded like The Journey and Volta, remains to be seen.

The Good, the Bad, and the Ugly

Graphically, EA Sports FC is once again a hot pot of good and bad, shining on the pitch while appearing neglected off it. During matches, the presentation is particularly sharp—especially in Premier League games, where the new scoreboards, broadcast-style overlays, and team-specific on-screen graphics packages really stand out. A nice surprise is the option to re-enable team walkouts in the pre-match build-up, after the feature was suddenly removed in FC 24.

Unfortunately, the user interface is a different story. What’s most infuriating is how the menus feel like they were designed for a touchscreen—soft edges, clunky, and far from intuitive with a controller. Worse, they seem to provide less information than ever before. Despite the ever-increasing bloat of the menu items directly in front of you, key information is buried behind layers of tabs that disappear if you scroll too far, leaving you hunting for crucial menus.

For a game that actively encourages you to slow down, tweak tactics, and customise player roles, the new menu system that plagues every game mode feels like it’s chugging two steps behind every input, making what should be an enjoyable experience feel like a chore. This was especially notable in menu-heavy modes like Career which, while it has had several cool additions, is now aggravating to try and navigate through.

There’s also the new ‘Cranium’ system, which aims to make players without facial scans appear more natural alongside top-tier talent from leagues like the Premier League, La Liga, and beyond. It’s great to see a greater range of “generic” faces now, and even unscanned players look a little like their real-life counterparts. Likewise, it’s neat that there’s a greater level of customization in the personal player or manager models as well. However, the results are inconsistent: Under ideal conditions and lighting, some players look significantly better than in previous entries, but these conditions are rare, and more often than not everyone in FC 25 looks like they’ve been pulled from a waxy, uncanny valley hell.

Speaking of jank, expect some of the typical weirdness in FC 25. Commentary is still often disconnected from the action on the pitch, cutscenes glitch out in bizarre ways, and there are moments where the world briefly collapses into a pinky-purgatory void. For those of us who’ve been around the FIFA/FC block, these graphical quirks are nothing new, but that doesn’t make them any less annoying.

Unfortunately, it’s a similar story across many annual sports titles. In Madden, bizarre animation bugs still see players warping or phasing through each other, while NBA 2K has its own share of uncanny character models and awkward animations. It feels like these issues are simply glossed over with each new installment. In fact, they’re becoming increasingly indefensible as the same problems resurface year after year.

Gameplay: Tweaks That Matter (And Many That Don’t)

When it comes to gameplay, FC 25 delivers some fun, if incremental, improvements – just like clockwork. One of the standout new features is FC IQ, which effectively replaces the old system of work rates, where players’ movement was dictated by set verbal descriptions of their effort in attack and defense. Instead, player movement is now determined by their “role” and the “focus” assigned to them within that role. Each position offers a choice of three to five roles. For example, a central attacking midfielder (CAM) can be assigned roles like shadow striker, playmaker, and others, altering how forward-thinking you want them to be throughout a game.

There’s a new level of automation that comes hand-in-hand with this change and actually feels significant. For example, attackers feel a bit more useful while on the break, and no longer having to constantly manually trigger players’ runs in behind or down the wing with button presses is great. Players will make smarter runs based on their roles, too. However, the level of control still pales in comparison to the more tactical-heavy sims found in Football Manager, and the initial impressiveness of the change wears off fast. It’s certainly an improvement, but the desired depth isn’t quite there yet.

In terms of how the on-pitch action feels with the controller in your hand, passing is a touch snappier than last year, especially when pinging long balls across the pitch. Shooting also has a nice weight to it—smooth, responsive, and satisfying. When the weather effects are in play in offline modes, even the physics in wet conditions adds a layer of unpredictability, with the ball sometimes skidding to a halt as the rain pours down. It’s these moments when you’re battling the elements that are a great example of the enjoyment found in the imperfections of the beautiful game.

But then there’s the defense, which still feels frustratingly loose. A tale as old as time, pacy players can turn and breeze past a defense with ease, and defenders are often a step behind, even slower than they should be. Even near-track-athlete-level speedsters like Mickey Van de Ven sometimes find themselves unable to catch up with the less-than-zippy attackers. If the opponent gets in behind your defense, you might as well start planning your next kickoff because there’s little you can do to stop them.

Defensive issues are compounded by the new FC IQ tactical options, which are supposed to give you more control over how your team plays, not quite extending to defenders how I’d like. For example, there are no longer instructions to tell players to press heavily after losing the ball. Defending is half of football, yet it currently feels like an afterthought that needed a lot more time in the oven. No matter if you’re playing a low, medium, or high-aggression style, it just feels the same: slow, boring, and lacking tight control. At times, it felt like someone was holding onto my players' heels, keeping them back; When they finally did accelerate, it was rigid and unnatural, like they were moving along a predetermined path.

More of the Same… Again?

After my first day with EA Sports FC 25, it feels like the game is in a tough spot. For Career Mode fans like myself, there are some positives—the expanded customization options, enhanced tactics, dynamic weather effects, and added depth create a much richer experience than in previous years. However, despite the improvements to offline modes like Career and the clear potential of Rush, there’s still an underlying sense of frustration. As a long-time fan, I can’t help but feel disappointed by how long issues like defensive slipperiness, choppy menus, and graphical inconsistencies have remained unaddressed.

After more than 20 years of EA Sports football games (yes, it’s been that long), the cracks aren’t just beginning to show, they are upsetting the very foundations. The ever-growing focus on increasingly expensive microtransactions in Ultimate Team has left the other modes still feeling left behind, no matter the smattering of custom gameplay tweaks, new menus, or weather effects added in.

The improvements, while welcome, are largely incremental, and the gameplay remains frustratingly familiar in all the wrong ways. For the leading football simulator, EA Sports FC continues to lack the fluidity, polish, and excitement it seems like it could and should deliver. While it’s still early days, first impression-wise, FC 25 currently feels like a small but reasonable step forward for Career Mode enthusiasts, but it’s still hard to see the appeal of all of this as a whole. There’s fun to be had, but it’s tempered by lingering disheartenment and a sense that EA is, as always, playing it safe.

I’ll be back soon with some more developed thoughts on EA Sports FC 25 next week, once I’ve spent time more time with Rush, Ultimate Team and how the online experience is shaping up over its early days.

Four months after it took home the award for Best Screenplay at the 2024 Cannes Film Festival, where it received a 13-minute standing ovation, Coralie Fargeat's body horror satire The Substance lands in US theaters this weekend. Our 8/10 review of The Substance said it "indicts celebrity culture’s obsession with youth and beauty in a sick, twisted, and squirm-inducing parable."

If you're wondering how and where you can watch The Substance this weekend, take a look at the info below.

How to Watch The Substance – Showtimes and Streaming

The Substance is now available in theaters everywhere. To find when and where you can watch the movie near you, check the local showtime listings at the main theater sites below:

• Fandango
• AMC Theaters
• Cinemark Theaters
• Regal Theaters

The Substance Streaming Release Date

The Substance will eventually be released on Mubi, rather than Netflix, Max, or Disney+. Mubi is subscription-based, but offers a seven-day free trial. (It goes up to 30 days for students.)

Mubi has yet to announce a streaming date for The Substance. Movies like The Substance have typically been available to stream between 21 and 77 days after their theatrical debuts. Given the box-office potential of The Substance, we're guessing it will potentially end up on Mubi in December.

What Is The Substance About?

The Substance is a satirical body horror-thriller from writer-director Coralie Fargeat. Here's the official synopsis from Mubi:

Elisabeth Sparkle (Demi Moore), a former A-lister past her prime, [is] drawn to the opportunity presented by a mysterious new drug. All it takes is one injection and she is reborn – temporarily – as the gorgeous, twentysomething Sue (Margaret Qualley).

The only rule? Time needs to be split: exactly one week in one body, then one week in the other. No exceptions. Easy, right?

The Substance Cast

The Substance was written and directed by Coralie Fargeat. It stars the following actors:

• Demi Moore as Elisabeth Sparkle
• Margaret Qualley as Sue
• Dennis Quaid as Harvey

The Substance Rating and Runtime

The Substance is Rated R for strong bloody violent content, gore, graphic nudity, and language. The film runs for a total of 2 hours and 20 minutes including credits. It does not have a post-credits scene.

Jordan covers games, shows, and movies as a freelance writer for IGN.

God of War Ragnarök has a ‘mixed’ user review rating on Steam following its PC launch, with most of the complaints revolving around Sony’s controversial PlayStation Network Account requirement.

Sony had made it clear on the God of War Ragnarök Steam page that a PlayStation Network account would be required to play Sony Santa Monica’s purely single-player adventure, but that doesn’t seem to have prevented a number of negative reviews singling out the policy.

One negative Steam review, from a user who refunded the game after just 20 minutes of play, called out the PSN requirement. “Creating a PSN account was something I knew was necessary in advance and I was prepared to do so, until I was met with the reality of it,” they said. “For UK residents at least, it requires submitting a mobile phone number to verify your age just to start with, and if that fails (which it did, no texts were ever received) your only recourse is to submit a photograph of your face or a government-issued ID to a third party website. If you're happy with that, go right ahead.”

“Yeah I'm not linking my account to PSN especially for a single-player game,” reads another negative Steam user review, which also includes a list of Sony data breaches.

Sony’s PSN account requirement for its PC games was thrust into the limelight with the release of Arrowhead’s explosive PC and PS5 co-op shooter Helldivers 2 earlier this year. Helldivers 2 suffered a review bomb campaign on Steam after Sony made PSN accounts mandatory for PC gamers on Valve’s platform (Arrowhead subsequently decided to turn the user review history graph into a cape, which is ready for launch but has yet to release).

Sony eventually backed down and reversed Helldivers 2’s PSN account requirement, but the game remains unavailable in the many countries that lack PSN. And indeed all Sony’s games on PC now suffer from this problem, which means God of War Ragnarök is unavailable on PC in over 100 countries.

It seems unlikely that Sony will change its mind again for God of War Ragnarök, which means the game may have to live with its ‘mixed’ Steam user review rating for some time. As for how popular God of War Ragnarök is on PC, Steam's official concurrent figures show 25,471 playing at the time of this article's publication. That's down significantly on the PC launch of God of War, which saw a peak of 73,529 players on Valve's platform.

God of War Ragnarök continues the stories of Kratos and his now teenage soon, Atreus. The sequel was praised as an enthralling spectacle on its release, earning a 10 in IGN's review.

"Impeccable writing, pitch-perfect performances, knockout action – it’s a complete work of art from top to bottom. Reflecting its core themes, it's everything a sequel should be: respectful of its legendary lineage, but not afraid to take it to exciting new places," we wrote at the time. "God of War Ragnarok is an almighty achievement and creates a new high that makes many of its peers look positively mortal by comparison."

Wesley is the UK News Editor for IGN. Find him on Twitter at @wyp100. You can reach Wesley at wesley_yinpoole@ign.com or confidentially at wyp100@proton.me.

Originally released as a PlayStation 2 game in 2005, Yakuza (Ryu ga Gotoku in Japan) spawned a lengthy and beloved video game series that follows the many conflicts and schemes of yakuza families in the game’s fictional neighborhood of Kamurocho, Tokyo. (The series was renamed to Like a Dragon, the English translation of Ryu ga Gotoku, in 2022.)

The games are notably action packed, melodramatic, cinematic, and intentionally super goofy all at once. (If you skip the side quests, you're missing out on an key part of the games' sense of humor.) It took years for the franchise to start receiving the renown it's finally achieved outside of Japan, and its reputation only grows thanks to a scarily consistent output of localized re-releases, spinoffs, and new games – including the Majima-centered next entry that RGG Studio just announced. An Amazon Prime TV series adaptation titled Like a Dragon: Yakuza will also hit the streaming service in late October.

With such a sprawling saga available to play, where should a curious newcomer jump in? We'd recommend either the chronological start with Yakuza 0, or jumping ahead to the clean slate of a new generation with Yakuza: Like a Dragon. Below, you’ll find the proper series chronology if you want to take in the entire series from the very beginning.

Yakuza/Like a Dragon Games in Chronological Order:

• Yakuza 0
• Yakuza / Yakuza Kiwami
• Yakuza 2 / Yakuza Kiwami 2
• Yakuza 3
• Yakuza 4
• Yakuza 5
• Yakuza 6: The Song of Life
• Yakuza: Like a Dragon
• Like a Dragon: Infinite Wealth

Beware: Mild spoilers for the plots, characters, and some major events of each game follow.

1. Yakuza 0 (2014)

The sixth game released is actually the first chronological Yakuza game. In Yakuza 0, we play as a two protagonists during the economic boom in the late 1980s. The first: a young Kazuma Kiryu, member of the Dojima family, who is being framed for a murder that took place at the Empty Lot, an undeveloped piece of land that will be a crucial asset for whoever owns it.

The second is former Shimano family member Goro Majima, who is working in a cabaret as a punishment for being part of an assassination years ago. He’s tasked by his ex-patriarch, Futoshi Shimano, to kill a blind woman named Makoto for unknown reasons. (It’s later revealed that she’s the legitimate owner of the Empty Lot.)

By the end of the game, Kiryu gets back to the Dojima family after defeating all the lieutenants, Majima leaves Makoto to live her life, and the Empty Lot is destroyed; the Millennium Tower, a key location in the series, is built on the land.

2. Yakuza (2005) / Yakuza Kiwami (2016)

The first Yakuza game stars Kazuma Kiryu after he goes to prison for taking the blame for a murder he didn’t commit in 1995. The victim was Sohei Dojima, Kiryu’s boss, who was murdered by Akira Nishikiyama, Kiryu’s best friend. The reason behind this crime was that Sohei tried to rape Yumi Sawamura, a friend of both Kiryu and Nishikiyama.

When Kiryu is released from jail after a 10-year sentence, he’s expelled from the Tojo Clan, someone has stolen ¥10 billion from the clan’s account, and Yumi is nowhere to be found. In the middle of this, Kiryu meets Haruka, the daughter of a woman named Mizuki. Haruka has a pendant that seems to be a key element related to the lost money. Also, Nishikiyama shoots Kiryu’s former captain and adoptive father, becoming an antagonistic force.

During the climax, Kiryu finds Yumi and the lost money, and fights Nishikiyama. Kiryu is asked to be the Fourth Chairman of the Tojo Clan, which he accepts. Moments later, however, he names Yukio Terada, a former Omi Alliance yakuza, as the new chairman, and he quits the yakuza to raise Haruka as his adopted daughter.

3. Yakuza 2 (2006) / Yakuza Kiwami 2 (2017)

Yakuza 2 starts with Terada, the Fifth Chairman of the Tojo Clan, asking Kiryu to help him prevent a war between his clan and the Omi Alliance, their eternal rivals. After being shot in an ambush, Terada seems to be dead and Kiryu looks for Daigo Dojima, son of Sohei Dojima, to appoint him as the new chairman of the clan.

While helping Daigo, Kiryu meets Ryuji Goda, the son of the Omi chairman, and they become enemies because Ryuji refuses a truce with the Tojo Clan. Another character, detective Kaoru Sayama, comes into play and tries to help Kiryu while learning about her parents, who disappeared when she was young.

4. Yakuza 3 (2009)

The first game in the series released on PlayStation 3, Yakuza 3 starts with Kiryu far away from the yakuza lifestyle. Instead, in 2007, he’s taking care of the Morning Glory Orphanage in Okinawa. He’s assisted by Haruka, and he looks after many new kids living there.

Unfortunately, peace doesn’t last for long. Our protagonist has to face multiple troubles with different characters, involving new yakuza families, multiple assassinations, shootings, betrayals, an arms smuggling group, and even the CIA.

5. Yakuza 4 (2010)

One year after the events of the previous game, Yakuza 4 raises the stakes in a tale of families, betrayals, and crime from the eyes of four protagonists.

Apart from Kiryu, three other new faces join the streets of Kamurocho. The first one, Shun Akiyama, is a loan shark who runs his own firm, Sky Finance, and finds himself in the middle of a conflict between the Tojo Clan and the Ueno Seiwa Clan. He’s also asked for a ¥100 million loan from a mysterious woman named Lily.

Taiga Saejima, Goro Majima’s blood brother, went to prison after performing a hit against the Ueno Seiwa Clan in 1985. Twenty years later, after successfully escaping, he looks for Majima, who abandoned him when they had to perform the hit.

Detective Masayoshi Tanimura, another new protagonist, is investigating one of the recent murders in the Tojo Clan. While doing so, he meets Lily, who is actually Saejima’s sister, and she’s being attacked by the Shibata family. Tanimura later finds out that the patriarch of that family was related to the hit Saejima participated all those years ago.

Ultimately, Kiryu meets his new partners and finds out what happened to all the characters involved in the ongoing conflicts.

6. Yakuza 5 (2012)

If Yakuza 4’s story got complicated with multiple protagonists’ points of view, Yakuza 5 went even further. This time, you play as five protagonists in different scenarios in 2012, making this one of the biggest and most ambitious games in the series.

First you follow Kiryu, who left Kamurocho and moved to Fukuoka without Haruka, leaving his orphanage behind. As usual, he won’t enjoy calm for long before he learns that Daigo is missing, and the peace between the Tojo Clan and the Omi Alliance is about to break.

Saejima is in prison once again, but he’s looking to escape with his cellmate Shigeki Baba when he hears that Majima is dead. (After they escape, they learn Majima had actually faked his death.) In the meantime, Haruka is already a teenager and she’s following her dream of becoming a J-pop idol. Things get complicated when the president of her talent agency, Mirei Park, is found dead in what seems like a staged suicide. Returning protagonist Akiyama appears to help Haruka learn who was really behind Park’s death.

The last piece of the puzzle is the brand-new character Tatsuo Shinada, a former professional baseball player who was banned after being framed for fixing an important match. A mysterious man, who’s actually Daigo, will meet Shinada and ask him to find out the truth of what happened.

7. Yakuza 6: The Song of Life (2016)

Yakuza 6: The Song of Life is presented as the final beat in Kazuma Kiryu’s spotlight in the Yakuza series. Our protagonist spends three years in prison, but this time it's for his past crimes he actually did. At the end of the previous game, Haruka revealed in a concert broadcast that Kiryu was her father and that he was an ex-yakuza member.

After getting out of prison in 2016, Kiryu returns to Kamurocho, but only for a little while. He learns that Haruka is in a coma after a car accident, and she has a child named Haruto. Haruka was in Onomichi, Hiroshima for a long time before the accident, so Kiryu goes there to investigate what happened and who Haruto’s father is.

While finding clues, important characters like Daigo, Saejima, and Majima are imprisoned, and rival groups, the Chinese Saio Triad and the Korean Jingweon Mafia, are looking to make their moves in Kamurocho.

8. Yakuza: Like a Dragon (2020)

A major turning point for the series, Yakuza: Like a Dragon begins the transition away from the Yakuza name. It also introduces a new turn-based combat system and a brand-new main character: Ichiban Kasuga, another Tojo Clan member who, like Kiryu, starts his journey by agreeing to take the hit on a criminal charge for his yakuza family and go to prison for a murder he did not commit. On his release 18 years later, Kasuga quickly learns that major changes have happened while he was away, chiefly that the Omi Alliance defeated the Tojo Clan.

Kasuga goes to confront Masumi Arakawa, his former patriarch and father-like figure who seemingly sold out the Tojo Clan, about what happened and is greeted by his former compatriats with hostility. Arakawa shoots Kasuga and dumps his body near a homeless encampment in Yohokama's Isezaki Ijincho. (New city unlocked!)

Ichiban wakes up and finds himself in the care of Yu Nanba, a former nurse who treated his gunshot wound. This is the starting point for Kasuga, who will meet multiple new faces for the Yakuza series to round out his fighting party, including members from area criminal groups the Yokohama Liumang, the Geomijul Mafia, and the Seiryu Clan. Together, they dig around Yokohama, Sotenbori in Osaka, and Kamurocho to uncover the bigger picture behind Arakawa’s play.

9. Like a Dragon: Infinite Wealth (2024)

The biggest Like a Dragon game to-date teams up the old and new guard – Kiryu and Kasuga – in a true two-protagonist saga that takes the crew from Japan to Hawaii and back. Jumping ahead to 2024 after the events of Yakuza: Like a Dragon (if you were curious, the pandemic also exists in the Like a Dragon universe), Kasuga and friends are trying to live above-board lives in Ijincho until a popular VTuber posts a viral video that upends their normalcy. Soon after, Kasuga learns that his mother, who he thought was dead, is alive and hops on a plane to Honolulu to find her.

After immediately getting into some trouble after landing (classic), Kasuga runs into Kiryu, who is also in Hawaii to find Kasuga's mother on behalf of the Daidoji faction that agreed to give him sanctuary and keep him in hiding (play Like a Dragon: The Man Who Erased His Name for the full backstory there). Kiryu also reveals that he's been diagnosed with cancer from exposure to nuclear waste (which is connected to the Big Bad of the game). That's just the very tip of the setup to the massive story that embarks on new Hawaiian adventures, sentimentally reflects on Kiryu's past, and builds a dramatic arc that involves multiple international mob groups, a religious cult, live streamers, a national conglomerate, and world governments, just to name a few players in this soap opera.

How to Play the Yakuza/Like a Dragon Games by Release Date

• Yakuza (2005) / Yakuza Kiwami (2016)
• Yakuza 2 (2006) / Yakuza Kiwami 2 (2017)
• Yakuza 3 (2009)
• Yakuza 4 (2010)
• Yakuza 5 (2012)
• Yakuza 0 (2015)
• Yakuza 6: The Song of Life (2016)
• Yakuza: Like a Dragon (2020)
• Like a Dragon: Infinite Wealth (2024)

How Many Yakuza/Like a Dragon Games Are There?

Sega and Ryu Ga Gotoku studio have released nine main Yakuza/Like a Dragon games, two remakes – Yakuza Kiwami (2016) and Yakuza Kiwami 2 (2017), with a third promised down the road – and 10 spinoffs since the series’ debut in 2005. They were originally PlayStation exclusives, but later ported to Xbox and PC, with every new game since Yakuza: Like a Dragon releasing simultaneously for every system with the exception of Nintendo Switch. However, as announced in the Nintendo Direct from August 2024, Yakuza Kiwami will be the first of the Like a Dragon games to get a Switch port in October 2024.

In addition to the mainline games, Like a Dragon has tons of wildly different spinoffs. Kurohyō: Ryu ga Gotoku Shinsho (2010) and its sequel Kurohyō 2: Ryu ga Gotoku Ashura Hen (2012) are two games exclusive to the PlayStation Portable featuring Tatsuya Ukyo, a completely new character. Judgment (2018) and Lost Judgment (2021) star another new face, lawyer-turned-detective Takayuki Yagami, who's investigating strange murders in Kamurocho, and has a peripheral crossover with Kiryu and the others in that he brushes up against Tojo Clan subsidiary families.

Then there’s the zombie-infested spinoff Yakuza: Dead Souls (2011), which features the classic cast of characters in a dystopian setting. Yakuza Online (2018) is a free-to-play TCG available on mobile and PC which soft-launched Ichiban Kasuga, the protagonist of Yakuza: Like a Dragon. The popular Japanese series Fist of the North Star received the Yakuza treatment with Fist of the North Star: Lost Paradise (2018), which shares Kiryu's games' structure and gameplay elements.

Two spinoff games are set in older Japanese eras and feature historic figures as their main protagonists: Ryu ga Gotoku Kenzan! (2008) and Ryu ga Gotoku Ishin! (2014). The latter has been released in the west as Like a Dragon: Ishin! in 2023.

Lastly (for now, at least), RGG released Like a Dragon: The Man Who Erased His Name (2023), which takes place at the same time as Yakuza: Like a Dragon and explains what happened to Kiryu following the dramatic ending of Yakuza 6: The Song of Life.

What’s Next for Yakuza/Like a Dragon?

The Like a Dragon story is far from over. Like a Dragon: Infinite Wealth, released this January, quickly became the fastest-selling game in the franchise and one of our favorite games of the year so far. The game series' director, Masayoshi Yokoyama, has confirmed another game is in development. Revealed at the Tokyo Games Show on September 20, the next game is confirmed to be Like a Dragon: Pirate Yakuza in Hawaii coming out Feburary 28, 2025. RGG had promised that fans would be "surprised" by the new announcement, and it was definitely not wrong. The upcoming game – which is bringing back real-time brawler combat – stars Goro Majima seemingly entering his One Piece era in Hawaii shortly after the climactic showdown on Nele Island from Infinite Wealth. Check out the seven-minute trailer announcement below:

A live-action adaption series loosely based on the original 2005 Yakuza game is also set to come out on Amazon Prime later this year in two batches, on October 25 and November 1. It's directed by Masaharu Take (Netflix's The Naked Director) and stars Ryoma Takeuchi (Kamen Rider Drive) as Kiryu. "The game developers at Sega told me the show is faithful to the games and that my performance was faithful to Kiryu, so that’s enough for me!” Takeuchi told IGN in July.

Leanne Butkovic is an Editorial Project Manager at IGN who wishes they could befriend Seonhee.

Following Sony’s shock decision to haul live service hero shooter Concord offline two weeks after launch, its game director has reportedly stepped down with some staff concerned about the future of the studio.

Kotaku reports that Ryan Ellis, who has served as Concord’s game director since January 2018, has told staff he has stepped down from the role and into a support function.

Ellis’ name was attached to the statement published on the PlayStation Blog that announced Concord would be taken offline. Ellis said that "while many qualities of the experience resonated with players, we also recognize that other aspects of the game and our initial launch didn’t land the way we’d intended."

Concord is one of the biggest video game disasters in PlayStation history. After years of costly development, the PvP first-person shooter launched August 23 priced $40 on PC and PlayStation 5, but its sales were estimated to be around only 25,000 and its peak Steam concurrent player count was shockingly low (Sony does not make PlayStation player numbers public). Sony then removed Concord from sale just 11 days after launch, issuing refunds in the process.

According to Kotaku, staff at the 150-person Firewalk, which Sony acquired in 2023 for an undisclosed fee, are anxiously awaiting their fate. While Ellis has indicated that Firewalk would “explore options” that suggest Concord may return in some form, some staff are said to be skeptical. Kotaku reports that some have been asked to pitch ideas for new games, some are speculating they may be drafted in to help develop another Sony game, while others fear mass layoffs or even a studio shutdown.

Sony’s gaming business has already suffered significant cuts in 2024. In February, it announced a round of layoffs affecting 900 staff, or about 8% of its global PlayStation workforce. The layoffs impacted a number of PlayStation studios, including Insomniac, Naughty Dog, Guerrilla, and Firesprite, but PlayStation's London studio was hit hardest with a notice of closure. Since then, Sony-owned Bungie has also suffered devastating cuts as Destiny 2 struggles to find commercial success.

While Concord the video game is no more, it will live on later this year as part of Amazon’s Secret Level adult animation anthology series. But Sony faces tough questions about its live service plans, which include Bungie’s Marathon and Haven’s Fairgame$.

Last year, Sony president Hiroki Totoki committed to launching just six of 12 live service games in development, and one based on The Last of Us has already been canceled.

Wesley is the UK News Editor for IGN. Find him on Twitter at @wyp100. You can reach Wesley at wesley_yinpoole@ign.com or confidentially at wyp100@proton.me.

Warning! This piece contains spoilers for The Lord of the Rings: The Rings of Power and the books and writings of J.R.R. Tolkien that it is based on.

The Lord of the Rings: The Rings of Power has been expanding on the lore and world of J.R.R. Tolkien's beloved books and writings since it debuted in 2022. Melding both lesser known characters and fan-faves with new creations and set in the Second Age, the series often delves into events that we've only heard about in passing. From the first moment that the show introduced us to Númenor, Lord of the Rings fans immediately knew that the world of men was destined to take a tragic turn. In Episode 5, the series begins to pave the way to the kingdom's downfall as the political shifts in the idyllic kingdom set the stage for tragedy, but to understand the end of Númenor and Queen Regent Miriel's trials that will precede it, we have to revisit its beginnings to explore the connections between Númenor and some of Tolkien's most enigmatic creations, the Valar.

What Are the Valar and Why Do They Matter?

Much of the lore of the Valar is laid out in the pages of The Silmarillion, published posthumously by Tokien's son Christopher featuring stories, writing, and folkloric tales that establish the early days of Middle-earth. It's there we learn about the closest thing to a Christian god in Tolkien's lore "The One" also known as Ilúvatar or Eru. It was he who created the Valar simply by thinking of them, creating 14 of the "divine spirits" or "Holy Ones" who would craft and create the world of Arda with their own hands and powers in preparation for the arrival of life like elves and men.

While both elves and educated humans once worshiped Eru in the First Age as the creator of their world, the Númenorians are a special case. Their connection to the Valar goes back to the beginning of the Second Age, when they were gifted the island of Númenor by the Valar after the destruction of their home country of Beleriand in the War of Wrath that took place after the Valar Melkoth rebelled against Eru. Much of the country was destroyed but Lindon survived and the Valar decided to raise the island of Númenor out of the sea for the three faithful houses of Edain who they pitted after seeing they had survived the war but with great casualties.

The early inhabitants of Númenor had expanded lifespans and saw the Valar as generous beings who had given them a home and the tools to form a society that soon grew to be incredibly wealthy. The only rule that the Valar put on Númenor was the so-called Ban of Valar, which forbade humans from sailing too close to the Undying Lands. For some men, this became a sticking point. The feeling of being kept from the potential of an eternal life in paradise playing a major role in inciting the eventual rebellion that led to Númenor's downfall.

Each of the Valar was able to transform and take on the physical appearance of any of the life in Middle-earth, though they don't have a natural form of their own. When it came to their powers, they were that of creation as well as immortality. Although at times they were called "gods" in the writings of Tolkien, in one of his letters he explained that they were more akin to emissaries for "The One" rather than gods to be followed in their own right.

Interestingly, the humans who originally lived on Númenor known as the Dúnedain were seen as leaders due to divine right because of their connection to the Valar and their long life spans. This continued into the Third Age as King Aragorn took the throne and lived to be 210 years old. But he was the last of the King of Men who would benefit from the extended lifespans that came from a direct connection to Númenor and its original inhabitants.

The Rings of Power has taken great pains to build out the world of Middle-earth and Númenor, allowing us inside the temples of the Valar for the first time, showing us how they worshiped and grieved perhaps as we head towards the finale we'll get a more expanded view on the relationship between the Númenorians and the Valar, perhaps even a glimpse at Valinor itself.

What are the Undying Lands?

Also known as Valinor and the Land Across the Sea, the Undying Lands are the realm where the Valar or Quenya chose to live after Melkor's war that ravaged much of Middle-earth and the surrounding territories. Little is known about Valinor, as both the Undying Lands and the Valar were each left purposefully ambiguous by Tokien.

What we do know is that in the First Age anyone could venture to Valinor by boat, but in the Second Age only elves could make the trip to live blissfully in the Undying Lands. We've now seen what the trip to Valinor looks like thanks to Season 1 when we witnessed Galadriel choose not to go to the Undying Lands and instead swam back to land via a little shipwreck with Sauron. Interestingly, we also know that there are exceptions with the "elves only" rule as Frodo Baggins and Samwise Gamgee were both welcomed into Valinor to live forever as a reward for their destroying the One Ring and managing to survive wearing the ring at all.

We'll have to see just how the Valar and the Undying Lands play into the rest of the season, but it feels like we'll at least get a glimpse of them before Season 2 ends.

What Does Pharazôn Want?

During a telling interaction with his son, Pharazôn reveals that he thinks the elves have long been taunting men, building the ivory tower that signifies the entrance to the Undying Lands just within their sight so that they'd always be reminded of their mortality in the face of the Valar. It's a telling tease that hints at his story to come. In the books we know that Pharazôn is the last King of Men because his greed and jealousy of the elves leads him to sail on the Undying Lands, which unsurprisingly doesn't go well and causes the Fall of Númenor.

Now that he is about to take the throne and is sharing his disdain for the elves, it's clear we'll see him embark on his deeply flawed mission sooner rather than later. With the support of his son Kemen (Leon Wadham) and the traitorous Eärien (Ema Horvath), it's clear that he's lacking sensible counsel to suggest that he tries to make peace with the elves rather than war. Of course we also see in this episode that Pharazôn himself is planning to consult with the Palantir knowing that it has guided all the leaders of Númenor that have come before him. Perhaps he'll find some guidance there but it feels unlikely now that he's already set his sights on Valar.

With only three episodes remaining it'll be interesting to see just how much of Valinor Rings of Power will deign to show and how close to the Fall of Númenor we'll get before the finale.

Rosie Knight is a contributing freelancer for IGN covering everything from anime to comic books to kaiju to kids movies to horror flicks. She has over half a decade of experience in entertainment journalism with bylines at Nerdist, Den of Geek, Polygon, and more.