Games are often at their funniest when they’re not trying to be. It’s the Skyrim NPC who’s determined to deliver their stock line, apparently totally unperturbed by the dragon attack happening just behind him. It’s watching your custom character enter a sombre cutscene, standing eight feet tall and wearing a banana outfit. There’s something about the way games stoically keep up the pretense that this is all real, no matter how broken things have become in the moment, that’s sheer comedy gold.
What about the games who dare to be funny on purpose, though? That’s a rarer collective. If comedy’s all about timing, and games are all about giving you the agency to go and do what you like, when you like – well, you can see the problem. But some brave pieces of software still manage to pull it off in the face of that adversity, and we’ve corralled ten of the best ever to do so, from vintage point-and-clicks to more recent hits, from indies to blockbusters.
Trying to to decide a ranked list or order of funniness seemed like too serious a task for the subject matter – comedy is, of course, completely subjective, so your mileage may vary – but with that in mind, here are IGN’s picks for the ten funniest games of all time. Settle in, and be ready to wishlist a few titles to counteract that Last Of Us Part 2 playthrough.
Promise Mascot Agency
You could be forgiven for thinking at first glance that Promise Mascot Agency was yet another run-of-the-mill open-world mascot management simulator. It is not. Made by Paradise Killer developer Kaizen Game Works, what we have here is a town full of oddities, a van full of gas, and a story so convoluted and absurd that to describe it is to stare into the eye of madness.
There are kittens in railway administration roles. There are weeping mascots doing their level best to cheer up the patrons of a bookstore. There’s the constant threat of organized crime, looming in the background while you hit a dirt ramp in your van, which then sprouts wings to catch some sick air.
In simple terms, you’re a former Yakuza trying to lay low by operating a mascot business in the suburbs, managing the constant time and financial pressures that such a business must withstand. It’s narrative-led, but also totally freewheeling and nonsensical, and that gives Promise Mascot Agency the feeling that you’re playing one big elaborate, open-world improv. Yes, and... play it.
Frog Detective: The Entire Mystery
A small sloth is experiencing a haunting. A welcome sign for an invisible wizard has been vandalized, and corruption runs rife in Cowboy County. Grave, deeply serious matters, all of them, which, as a frog with a magnifying glass, you must address.
And yet here Frog Detective is on this list of funny games. Granted, you don’t often see detectives holding their sides and trying to contain their laughter on the job, but there’s just something about peering at a crime suspect through a giant magnifying glass and seeing only a sheep in a short-sleeved shirt giving you a benign and unwavering smile. It’s irrepressibly funny.
The mysteries are brief affairs, and exceptionally easy to solve. Instead of challenges for the grey matter, Grace Bruxner and Thomas Bowker’s trio of Frog Detective mysteries are just setups for wholesome farces, soundtracked by surprisingly catching low-fi jazz, and set in a universe of unwavering positivity and can-do attitudes. You might only be the second-best detective around, but you’re having the best time.
South Park: The Stick Of Truth
To say South Park creators Matt Stone and Trey Parker like pushing the boundaries of taste and decency is a bit like saying Nathan Drake’s got decent grip strength, or that Blizzard’s quite fond of a loot box here and there. As such, there are entire sequences in the wondrous South Park: The Stick of Truth that we couldn’t possibly describe – nor remain straight faced at.
Stone and Parker were deeply involved as collaborators with the role-playing masters at developer Obsidian for this razor-sharp 2014 RPG. A story about a new kid trying to befriend his peers during an elaborate game of fantasy LARPing, the duo’s involvement lends it the same quality of observational humour about gaming that made Make Love, Not Warcraft an all-timer of an episode
Why does it work? Well, let’s take farting as an example. If you’re older than seven, you’re probably not in a fit of hysterics when you first learn that farts can be used as an attack in combat. But The Stick of Truth commits to the bit and makes passing gas more than a passing gag, turning it into a shockingly detailed and nuanced mechanic, to the point that you’re learning new fart moves from NPCs like unlocking new dragon shouts in Skyrim. Considering all that, it’s hard not to submit to South Park’s confrontationally juvenile gag.
Octodad: Dadliest Catch
“Nobody suspects a thing.” That’s what the wonderful soundtrack for Octodad: Dadliest Catch keeps telling you as you do your best to maintain the facade that you’re just a normal, everyday human husband and father and not – and I’m not sure why you’d ever even think this – an octopus wearing a suit.
As core premises go, they don’t get much better than that. There’s a whole subgenre of physics-based slapstick to address when you’re talking about funny games, and the likes of Baby Steps, Goat Simulator and Surgeon Simulator deserve their dues. But nobody’s married the physical comedy of an obtuse control set to an genuinely emotional premise quite as well as Young Horses did in 2017. As you lollop around quaint suburban locations like grocery stores, offices and your own beautifully decorated home, trying to avoid suspicion by moving in as human a manner possible and knocking the bare minimum of objects over with your flailing tentacles, the real hook is that you actually care about keeping Octodad’s secret.
The Stanley Parable
If it wasn’t handled so precisely, The Stanley Parable would be too meta, too confusing, and too pleased with itself to enjoy. But somehow it avoids such a fate, instead making walking along the same corridor over and over again feel like a delight, and hearing a new line of Kevan Brighting’s silky voiceover akin to finding a super-secret armor set in Dark Souls.
Precisely what the eponymous parable is depends on your particular playthrough. Stanley’s experiencing a kind of Groundhog Day in which the only constants are that he wakes up at his desk in an office, and that all his coworkers have disappeared.
You’ll live for centuries in some playthroughs, depending on what seem at the time like arbitrary choices like going through one door or another. In other playthroughs, it’ll all be over in a few minutes and you’ll barely have left your desk before you reach an ending. The writing is playfully self-aware throughout as it deconstructs this whole interactive media thing, but the biggest joke of all is the silliness of its premise. Quite simply, how much game can one make about a character walking through an empty world devoid of characters, and whose only interactions come down to choosing between forks in the road? Enough to warrant an expanded Ultra Deluxe Edition almost a decade later, clearly.
West of Loathing
There probably wasn’t much worth laughing about for those living in the wild West, what with all the spoiled meat and dysentery (cards on the table, much of our historical knowledge comes from The Oregon Trail). But it’s certainly been a rich vein of comedy for everyone from Blazing Saddles, The Three Amiigos and City Slickers, all the way to West of Loathing, a black and white, 2D side-scrolling adventure RPG with an incredible gag rate.
Every book title, every item description, every NPC interaction, they’re all just jam-packed with warm, clever jokes. So much so that as you play, you find yourself turning into one of those completionist maniacs that read every book in Skyrim or piece together Dark Souls lore, just to ensure you soak up every last drop of the good stuff. The game’s smart about training you to play that way, too: in your home during the opening, if you look at enough books on the shelf you’ll eventually find one that grants you the ‘perk’ of having a silly walk. From that point on you know you’ve got to get your nose into every monochrome corner of this old West caper.
Portal 2
Feel free to swap in the first game here, if you’re particularly into the cake and the musical finale. Portal certainly set a high bar for humour in and around the Aperture Science test chambers and established an unforgettably menacing foil in GLaDOS. The only way to top it? Portal 2: the sequel featuring Stephen Merchant, a potato, and a double-cross that nobody saw coming.
Wheatley is comedy gold throughout the, er – ambitious AI’s character arc. At first it’s his simple ineptitude that tugs at the corners of your mouth. Then it’s hearing that friendly British regional accent spit absolute malice at you. Finally, the absolute absurdity of a final showdown between one sadistic rogue AI trapped in a potato and another who’s rapidly discovering their hunger for power is not matched by their problem-solving skills. Oh, and there’s another song.
Imagine how punishing all those puzzles would be if they weren’t punctuated by such immaculately delivered comedic beats. Would you have tried so hard to figure out exactly where to place all that colored goo? No, exactly. Nobody would.
Time Gentlemen, Please!
Ben and Dan have a humble ambition: they want to watch a Magnum PI marathon on TV. Quite how this turns into a cataclysmic event that accidentally enslaves all of humanity is not easy to piece together, but it is enjoyable.
It’s also the kind of setup that an early ‘90s point-and-click would have been proud of, and developer Zombie Cow Studios is ready to give a reverential nod to many of those classic titles. There are posters for Sam & Max and Full Throttle dotted around on walls in the background. There’s an undead kid called Gilbert, along with quoted lines from Ron Gilbert’s Monkey Island series. But rather than retread that old ground for nostalgia’s sake, Time Gentlemen, Please! Has its fun by poking fun at the old genre conventions, pointing out the inherent absurdity of carrying around massive inventories of random items in the hope they’ll be useful later. Not that making a TV aerial out of a coat hanger and accidentally time-travelling is any less absurd, of course.
The Secret of Monkey Island
LucasArts ruled the ‘90s when it came to point-and-clicks, but it’s 1990’s Secret of Monkey Island where the most precious comedy gold is buried. Guybrush Threepwood might walk around telling everyone he’s a mighty pirate, but his immutable golden retriever energy makes it difficult to believe that he’s the one who’ll pass the Three Trials required for full pirate status, take on the Dread Pirate LeChuck and win Governor Elaine’s heart. Not to mention his proclivity for stuffing random objects into his pants. Not your typical swashbuckler, this guy(brush).
This was the game that gave us insult sword-fighting, a verbal disagreement turned into a tense combat system that only Ron Gilbert’s LucasArts team could pull off. It’s also a game that manages to make (very) early nineties pop culture references sit flush with age-old pirate fantasy. Thus, we have a tropical island where a fast-talking used boat salesman in a bad tweed blazer is waiting to accost you, and where vending machines line the streets. The puzzle logic might be up for debate, but its ear for funny can’t be called into question, even three decades on.
Disco Elysium
Your first clue that this isometric RPG might not be entirely straight-faced comes in Disco Elysium’s very opening scene, in which your hungover protagonist can over-exert himself reaching for his necktie and simply die. Game over, try again. That’s a heck of a way to set a tone.
There are also frequent moments of real pathos, horror, and tragedy in ZA/UM’s 2019 RPG masterclass, and they’re so well written that it never feels dissonant that five minutes later when you’re smashing a lorry window, one of the options is to “smash it, apologetically.”
Pleasingly, the funniest character in the game is you, the player, in control of an alcoholic cop who can’t remember where he parked his car (it's in the ocean) and who, after asking his partner to borrow their gun, puts it straight in their mouth in front of the armed wing of a dockworker’s union. No matter how unseriously you take your role, Disco Elysium has a way of simply rolling with it without ever undermining the darker narrative beats when they arrive.
And that concludes today’s listing of IGN’s pick of the funniest games of all time. We hope you agree with our choices, or at the very least are not angry at us for telling you about them in an effort to inform you about something that might make you laugh. What are your favorite comedy video games? Let us know in the comments below.
Phil Iwaniuk is a veteran hardware smasher and game botherer who has written for the likes of PC Format, Official PlayStation Magazine, PCGamesN, The Guardian, Eurogamer, Rock, Paper, Shotgun, and IGN. He won an award once, but he doesn't like to go on about it.
Fans of Stardew Valley are eager to get married... again. To whom? They don't know. But they're hoping their bride/groom will be a couple of individuals in particular.
To understand why, take a look back at our own interview with ConcernedApe, where he exclusively revealed to us that the next update, 1.7, would include two new marriageable characters. He wouldn't say who they were, and we don't even know if these will be brand new characters or existing characters that suddenly become available. While ConcernedApe will let us know later this month on the game's 10th anniversary, that hasn't stopped people from wildly speculating who it'll be, and there are a few theories reigning supreme right now.
Logically, we can put together that we will likely get both a man and a woman, as all the other candidates have opposite-gender pairings for events like the Flower Dance. To find out who the most popular people in the game for romance were, Reddit user JeffTheKillerFa put together a poll for fans to see who came out on top. They've since posted the results, showing Sandy coming out waaay ahead of the other single women (Marnie was in second place), and the Wizard winning the vote for single men.
But interestingly, fans have latched onto another possibility that we could see in 1.7: breaking up an existing couple. The poll also asked fans who of the currently married individuals in the valley they wanted to steal. Robin was the clear winner, with players clearly not losing any sleep over breaking her up with Demetrius. That's even something ConcernedApe has discussed as a possibility before! But Caroline (currently married to general store owner Pierre) was also a favorite.
As a bit of a gag, the poll also included a section for "non-giftable" characters, or individuals who you can't currently form even a friendship with due to a lack of ability to give gifts and limited dialogue options. Marlon of the Adventurer's Guild was a pretty obvious winner here, followed by Gunther from the museum. And in a final poll, it seems like people don't necessarily want to marry the Dwarf, but like Krobus, they wish she would move in as a roommate.
These poll results do seem to line up roughly with comments posted all over the community since our interview about who people want to see. However, there's one character that got some attention on socials who wasn't in the poll at all:
Yes, the Hat Mouse! I too would love to marry the Hat Mouse! We could run a little hat store together! Of course that's realistic!
Again, it's possible we're going to get two brand new characters in the valley, and all of this speculation will have been just silly wishcasting. But until ConcernedApe says otherwise, I will be eagerly awaiting the addition of my preferred combo of Hat Mouse and the Wizard, the most obviously romantic individuals in the game.
Rebekah Valentine is a senior reporter for IGN. Got a story tip? Send it to rvalentine@ign.com.
Luffy and the Straw Hat Pirates are still on their search for the One Piece treasure in this new sneak peek, which sees the characters leave East Blue and start their first adventure in the Grand Line — which is fitting for the season's full title, One Piece: Into the Grand Line.
During this portion of their journey toward the treasure, they stop in Loguetown and also meet the Baroque Works, a criminal syndicate who appear to have sinister intentions for Luffy and his gang.
All aboard for the ONE PIECE: INTO THE GRAND LINE trailer! 🏴☠️ The crew returns March 10. pic.twitter.com/or6GBSc6Fk
The new trailer also gives fans a glimpse of some really cool recognizable elements in the series that will get the TV treatment this season, like Zoro’s fight with members of the Baroque Works from the Whiskey Peak story arc, the Straw Hat Pirates getting eaten by a whale named Laboon, and Luffy’s group finding dinosaurs among the Baroque Works members they stumble upon on the Little Garden island.
The visual also highlights some new characters and actors being added in season 2, namely David Dastmalchian as Mr. 3, Charithra Chandran as Miss Wednesday, and Lera Abova as Miss All Sunday. Mikaela Hoover will also voice Chopper, a talking reindeer who serves as a doctor in the Straw Hat Pirates.
The show is an adaptation of the 1997 manga series by Eiichiro Oda and stars Iñaki Godoy as Luffy. Season 2 of the series is set to premiere on March 10 — and Netflix has already greenlit a third season, so we’re excited to jump back into the quest.
Lex Briscuso is a film and television critic and a freelance entertainment writer for IGN. You can follow her on Twitter at @nikonamerica.
Developer Embark Studios has published Arc Raiders update 1.15.0, adding a new PvE-focused event and new rewards while (finally) squashing an infamous duplication glitch.
Patch notes posted to its official website detail what is a surprisingly hefty update ahead of February’s Shrouded Sky content drop. While fans continue to wait for a new Arc threat and Raider Deck, today’s changes bring back a fan-favorite event while delivering a new mode with its own set of cosmetics to unlock.
You watch my back, I'll watch yours - that’s how Speranza keeps ticking 🫶 Join your fellow Raiders in celebrating the Shared Watch; team up with strangers, turn your barrels on the machines, and earn rewards in the process.
Arc Raiders players who drop into Speranza will find Shared Watch as update 1.15.0’s most notable addition. The limited-time event, which ends February 24, asks Raiders to team up with friends and strangers against Arc to earn merits. Merits unlock rewards that range from tools like a Vita Spray or acoustic guitar to permanent unlocks like the Slugger set or even a little rooster-sized helmet for Scrappy. Killing Arc is the best way to progress, making the Shared Watch Event more of a PvE mode as Embark warns that no Merits can be earned from PvP encounters.
“The Shared Watch is an annual holiday that reminds us of the true enemy, by celebrating those that look out for their fellow Raiders,” the studio said in its patch notes. “Tolerate, team-up, or take out some ARC - it’s all in the spirit of the Shared Watch.”
The Arc Raiders team has also brought back the winter Cold Snap event back as a map condition after its removal last month. Players will also notice the Trailblazer has been hit with a nerf that lowers its damage to large Arc like Leapers and Bastions, while removing its ability to do damage through walls.
These things, along with a list of bug fixes, are the headlines for update 1.15.0, but one of the most important changes actually arrived in a surprise hotfix just moments after the patch went live. In a post on X/Twitter, Embark announced the hotfix should do away with the item dupe glitch that recently wormed its way back into the game. As the studio continues to tackle reports of cheaters, the post also says players who “duplicated excessive amounts of items will be subject to further review and possible penalties.”
“Nothing beats earning your loot the hard way, now get back out there and stack those coins honestly!”
Arc Raiders players had been using the latest version of the dupe glitch to illegitimately hoard items and even make lots of quick cash. It resulted in some awkward situations, as Raiders found themselves coming across mountains of valuable little ducks.
We recently sat down with Embark CEO Patrick Söderlund for an interview to learn more about the post-launch roadmap, punishments for cheaters, hotels in Italy, and how the team plans to encourage PvE players. We also learned about how the success of Arc Raiders has changed the studio for the better.
You can see the full patch notes for the new update below.
Arc Raiders Update 1.15.0 Patch Notes
Raiders,
What happens topside, stays topside - Raiders have to leave their grudges at the tubes.
But Speranza also has a conscience. While Raider violence can’t be totally controlled, Celeste is keen to remind us why we took refuge under the dust of the Rust Belt; and that just because we live in the dirt, we don’t always have to act like it.
The Shared Watch is an annual holiday that reminds us of the true enemy, by celebrating those that look out for their fellow Raiders. Tolerate, team-up, or take out some ARC - it’s all in the spirit of the Shared Watch.
What’s New?
Shared Watch
This is an opportunity to team up in the fight against the machines.
The Shared Watch Event starts today and ends on February 24. Players will earn merits from destroying, assisting and damaging ARC and earn rewards. No merits will be earned from PvP encounters. Bring a friend or bring a stranger, but above all, bring enough ammo to make sure the machines notice you first.
Cold Snap Map Condition
Winter is not quite done with the Rust Belt - We are bringing back Cold Snap!
The map condition is back in rotation on outdoor maps with the same mix of risk and reward. Frostbite damage will make your trip topside a short one if you don’t seek shelter, but for those who do brave the tundra - there’s increased loot value at stake!
You can still collect Candleberries, but they are no longer tied to any event. You can also collect, and throw, snowballs! Use them wisely, or don't.
Cosmetics
The Vulpine set
The Slugger set
Content and Bug Fixes
Some of you have noticed changes in past updates that didn’t make it into the patch notes, thank you for flagging those and keeping us on our toes!
We’ve been building ARC Raiders for years, but we’ve only been live for a short while, and we’re still growing into the rhythm (and discipline) of live operations. Making patch notes that are complete, accurate, and easy to follow is a muscle we’re actively training.
We’re improving our internal process so fewer things slip through, and when something does, your reports help us catch it quickly and update the notes. Please keep letting us know when you spot something missing, it genuinely helps.
Miscellaneous
Improved instances where players sometimes could not reconnect after disconnecting from a game.
Fixed an issue where the match start tunnel scene sometimes wasn’t being shown.
Fixed an issue where trials’ objective rewards could fail to grant at the end of a round due to a timeout, ensuring partial rewards are awarded when earned.
Fixed an issue where the end of round screen would sometimes show incorrect merits, XP, and Live Event points.
Fixed an issue where players’ platform icons would sometimes show incorrectly.
Fixed an issue where crafting would sometimes get cancelled.
Utility
Trailblazer Grenade
The explosions no longer deal damage through walls.
Deals more damage to small enemies but less damage to bigger enemies such as the Leaper and Bastion.
Weapons
Fixed inconsistent weapon cycling when bound to keys other than the mouse wheel; keybinds now swap weapons reliably.
Known Issues
One of the Marco set helmet variants may appear incorrectly in preview and in the menu but will appear correctly in game.
Players may occasionally not receive a skill point as indicated in the result screen. A reboot/playing another round fixes the issue.
‘Purchase Raider Tokens’ page may appear in front of the inbox and profile page when switching between them.
Player animations may appear broken when interrupting a search of the Baron Husk.
Certain containers may be unavailable to be interacted with.
Ziplines placed onto destroyed ARC parts will not appear correctly.
Scrappy “Batting Helmet” and the “Slugger” outfit might not appear correctly in the event preview.
The “Blindsided” achievement may not trigger as intended on the first attempt.
See you Topside, //Ossen And the ARC Raiders Team
Michael Cripe is a freelance writer with IGN. He's best known for his work at sites like The Pitch, The Escapist, and OnlySP. Be sure to give him a follow on Bluesky (@mikecripe.bsky.social) and Twitter (@MikeCripe).
February's line-up of games for the PlayStation Plus catalog have leaked online, and include a major PS5 blockbuster.
According to the ever-reliable dealabs leaker billbil-kun, Sony is set to confirm Marvel's Spider-Man 2 as this month's headline game for PlayStation Plus Extra and Premium subscribers.
Insomniac's well-received web-slinging sequel will be joined by PS5 online racer Test Drive Unlimited Solar Crown, plus arty indie Neva for both PS4 and PS5, all available to claim from February 17.
Originally released in October 2023, Spider-Man 2 is Insomniac Games' third major Marvel blockbuster, following its original Spider-Man game and follow-up Spider-Man: Miles Morales. Both Spidey men appear in the sequel, as the pair work together to defeat Kraven the Hunter and tackle the Venom symbiote.
The appearance of Spider-Man 2 in Sony's catalog comes at an interesting time. Just over a year on from the game's January 2025 launch for PC, Insomniac's adventure also arrives as hype mounts for its next game, Marvel's Wolverine, which we may well see more of later this week in PlayStation's big State of Play broadcast. Indeed, we may even see these games announced officially during the show.
"Marvel's Spider-Man 2 delivers Insomniac's best tale yet, and despite its open world falling short, is a reliably fun superhero power trip," IGN wrote in our Spider-Man 2 review, awarding it 8/10.
Test Drive Unlimited Solar Crown launched in 2024 to mixed reviews. "Forced online requirements, inconsistent AI difficulty, a stale car list, and chore-like progression all undermine Test Drive Unlimited Solar Crown's otherwise robust driving and eye-catching open world," IGN's 5/10 review noted.
Neva arrived in October 2024 to a positive response for its arty side-scrolling puzzle-platforming, meanwhile — catch gameplay of it just above.
Tom Phillips is IGN's News Editor. You can reach Tom at tom_phillips@ign.com or find him on Bluesky @tomphillipseg.bsky.social
Enjoy this exclusive new boss battle gameplay from Mouse: P.I. for Hire, the upcoming rubber hose-animated first-person shooter starring Troy Baker as Detective Jack Pepper. In this video you'll see Jack taking on the Third Wife in the Spooky Village.
In the four-minute gameplay video (which you can watch below), you'll see Jack's flashlight coming in handy as he attempts to take down the Third Wife. You also get a look at multiple weapons in action – all animated as if they came straight out of a 1930's Steamboat Willie cartoon.
Mouse: P.I. for Hire will be released on March 19 for PC, PlayStation platforms, Xbox platforms, and Nintendo Switch platforms. Wishlist it on Steam if you're interested.
Ryan McCaffrey is IGN's executive editor of previews and host of both IGN's weekly Xbox show, Podcast Unlocked, as well as our monthly(-ish) interview show, IGN Unfiltered. He's a North Jersey guy, so it's "Taylor ham," not "pork roll." Debate it with him on Twitter at @DMC_Ryan.
Mamoru Oshii, the director of legendary anime movie Ghost in the Shell, has said that he's played Fallout 4 for 10,000 hours while avoiding its main quest.
In a Japanese video interview to mark the 30th anniversary of Ghost in the Shell, Oshii chatted about his love of games — and specifically Fallout 4.
"Looking at Steam, my playtime (in Fallout 4) is around 8,000 hours but before that I played it on PlayStation, so I think altogether I've put in about 10,000 hours," explained Oshii, the director behind anime cyberpunk movie Ghost in the Shell and its sequel Ghost in the Shell 2: Innocence, in remarks translated by IGN. "I'm still playing now," he added.
So what is the appeal of Fallout 4 to Mamoru Oshii? The 74-year-old called it a "game that seems to have been made for my own desires," and described how he wanders the ruins of the post-apocalyptic world carrying a rifle and accompanied by the game's canine companion, Dogmeat.
Outside of Fallout 4, Oshi explains that he's also a big Hideo Kojima fan and plays every new game from the Metal Gear Solid creator — he recently finished playing Death Stranding 2: On the Beach, in which he actually appears as an NPC known as The Pizza Chef.
But for almost a decade, Oshi said he had followed a cycle where he breaks off from playing Fallout 4 to play Kojima's new game upon release, completes it, and then... returns back to Fallout 4 once more. "There are no other games I want to play," Oshii simply said.
"I once tried PUBG and racked up 250 hours," he casually noted, but said that he didn't really like online multiplayer games or first-person shooters that require quick reflexes. "They're not for me," he noted. (He does recall taking a commemorative screenshot after getting a Chicken Dinner in PUBG, but only once.) "After all is said and done, I prefer playing games on my own," he said.
"Fallout 4 is just right," he continued. "Although it's an action game, as people who play it will know — it has the VATS system." Fallout's slo-mo aiming system allows even people who are no good at aiming to land shots, he suggested. "If the game didn't have this, I probably couldn't play it."
Mamoru Oshii previously revealed in great detail to Automaton that he has a rather eccentric way of playing Fallout 4 - that he doesn't ally with any factions, and has ignored the main storyline in favor of spending hours on side quests and raids with Dogmeat as his sole companion. His playstyle seems to be that of a community-minded lone wolf, stripping all the gear off raiders and gunners.
"It's a win-win," he noted, "I get to enjoy the pleasure of stripping scumbags naked while also contributing to the local community’s welfare." He's said that he is particularly hostile towards Brotherhood of Steel members (who he likens to Nazis) and always sneak kills whole units (at one point, he amassed so many Brotherhood of Steel Power Armors that he used them to build a moat). Back when he played on console, Oshii apparently gathered so much loot at his base that his PS4 struggled to run the game.
"Around 4 years ago, I ran out of things to do (in Fallout 4)," Oshii explained. "So I installed mods." However, the Angel's Egg director noted that Fallout 4's new version (i.e. the 2025 Fallout 4 Anniversary Edition update) rendered his mods unusable. Upon launching Fallout 4 after the update, Oshii says that instead of his customized character, "some random bald guy wearing a suit suddenly appeared, and it took a lot of effort to get the game back to normal. I wish they'd stop changing things without asking."
Verity Townsend is a Japan-based freelance writer who previously served as editor, contributor and translator for the game news site Automaton West. She has also written about Japanese culture and movies for various publications.
Amazon's sale on select PS5 games has been filled with great offers. If you're a Sonic fan, we've spotted some especially nice discounts for PlayStation 5 that are worth taking advantage of while they're still available.
We found a lot to enjoy in all of the above games. Both Sonic Racing: CrossWorlds and Sonic x Shadow Generations earned 9s in their respective reviews from IGN's Jada Griffin. So what makes CrossWorlds stand out? It "fires on all cylinders with a fantastic roster, excellent courses, and lengthy list of customization options." And as for Sonic X Shadow Generations, it "takes an already excellent game and spring jumps it to new heights with a creative Shadow campaign and an appreciable graphical upgrade."
On the other hand, Sonic Superstars and Sonic Frontiers each earned a 7 in their respective reviews. Griffin found that Sonic Superstars "has a mix of both interesting and ill-advised new ideas, making it an enjoyable Sonic game but not exactly a Super one." Sonic Frontiers was reviewed by writer Travis Northup, who said it's "an ambitious open-world adventure that mostly succeeds at mixing up the Sonic formula, even when some of its ideas fall flat."
No matter what kind of Sonic adventure you're looking to drop into, these offers seem well worth taking advantage of before they're gone. Amazon has plenty more worth checking out in its sale on select PS5 games right now as well, including discounts on Metal Gear Solid Delta: Snake Eater, Silent Hill f, and more.
Hannah Hoolihan is a freelancer who writes with the guides and commerce teams here at IGN.
Whereas we didn’t get any Universes Beyond Commander Precon decks for Magic’s most popular format in the Spider-Man and Avatar: The Last Airbender sets, however, we’re getting just one in the TMNT set - and Amazon has knocked $10 off the price already.
Save $10 On The Magic: The Gathering TMNT Precon
Amazon is currently selling the Turtle Power preconstructed deck for $59.94, down from its MSRP of $69.99.
If you were going to preorder anyway, there’s no better time to do it, and if the price drops further then Amazon’s preorder price guarantee will adjust accordingly. Still, it’s worth noting we don’t know a great deal about the decklist just yet.
We do know that the deck’s strategy is to ‘Partner with Allies’ and ‘Buff your team’, but how that plays out, we’ll find out soon. The set is due to go on sale on March 6, so we’re now less than a month away.
It’s also worth noting that both the Lorwyn Eclipsed decks are great, suggesting Wizards of the Coast is finding its groove after a couple of sets that launched without any.
For those totally new to Magic: The Gathering, Commander is the game’s most popular format, and these preconstructed decks (here's the full list) are a big reason as to why - once you buy one, you can jump straight into a game.
Lloyd Coombes is an experienced freelancer in tech, gaming and fitness seen at Polygon, Eurogamer, Macworld, TechRadar and many more. He's a big fan of Magic: The Gathering and other collectible card games, much to his wife's dismay.
Are you ready for the whole bloody affair? If you’re a Quentin Tarantino fan, you should be, because the ultimate version of his fourth film, Kill Bill, now officially has a VOD release date for the complete version, Kill Bill: The Whole Bloody Affair.
According to Apple, the Tarantino opus will be available to rent beginning on February 17 with a $19.99 price tag. It is currently available to pre-order on their platform. As for Amazon, it does not have the new version listed for rent yet at the time of this writing, so keep your eyes peeled if that’s your preferred platform.
As the story goes, Kill Bill was originally conceived as one film by Tarantino himself, before he was forced to split the four-and-a-bit hours of film down the middle. In doing this, the movie was forced to be released in two parts, though Tarantino avoided the cuts that would have been necessary to trim everything down to just one part — a small price to pay. However, Tarantino has specified that The Whole Bloody Affair represents the true way to watch the film.
That said, it’ll be great for fans who didn’t get a chance to catch the film during the limited theatrical run to finally get to see it at home. The release was announced back in October 2025 and a trailer dropped the following month in November. The nationwide theatrical run began on December 5, and on top of seeing the two films as one, the new version included never-before-seen scenes and a Fortnite tie-in short film at the end.
In late January, it was also confirmed that a 4K physical release of the film will be coming as well, but there's no word yet on exactly when to expect the set. Until then, you’ve got the digital version coming your way very soon, so sharpen your Hatori Hanzo sword.
Lex Briscuso is a film and television critic and a freelance entertainment writer for IGN. You can follow her on Twitter at @nikonamerica.
It Takes Two and Split Fiction director Josef Fares has posted the first photo from the set of developer Hazelight Studios' next project.
The image shows Fares, dressed in a cosy-looking sweater, in front of three actors in performance capture suits. Clearly, work has now begun on Fares' next game — and intriguingly, he seems to be doing his best to disguise who the actors are.
With his arm outstretched and thumb raised, Fares is successfully blocking most of all three actors' faces — and this appears to be by design. "Next game in the making," Fares captioned the post, with a thumbs up emoji. "We're back in the kitchen, cookin' up something really delicious," the official Hazelight Studios social media account responded, adding: "Now with Strategic Arm Placement Tech."
✌️We’re back in the kitchen, cookin’ up something really delicious! 🥘
Fans of Fares' games have commented on the post to say they are suitably uncertain who the actors involved might be — though many more have noted the fact that Fares is using this first sneak peek to showcase three actors being visible. Could this signify a three-player game, after the studio's recent focus on titles featuring a pair of prominent characters?
"Three-player Hazelight Game?" wondered one fan, Spenny99. "It Takes Three?????" questioned Jcbartlett25. "It Takes Three lookin great Mr. Fares," added hotpicklepizza.
Co-op adventure Split Fiction launched last year to rave reviews, and went on to sell more than 4 million copies. Its story focuses on a pair of writers, Zoe and Mio, who become trapped in their interweaving sci-fi and fantasy narratives.
"An expertly crafted co-op adventure that pinballs from one genre extreme to another, Split Fiction is a rollercoaster of constantly refreshed gameplay ideas and styles – and one that’s very hard to walk away from," IGN wrote in our Split Fiction review, awarding the game 9/10.
Fares' previous game It Takes Two also proved popular, with its story focused on a husband and wife who plan to get a divorce. We called it "a beautiful, breakneck-paced, co-op adventure that’s bubbling over with creativity," in IGN's It Takes Two review, which also returned a 9/10.
Before that, Fares previously released prison escape adventure A Way Out, starring two convicts, and Brothers: A Tale of Two Sons, starring... two sons. Should Fares actually be making a three-player game, it would indeed be a break from the norm.
Tom Phillips is IGN's News Editor. You can reach Tom at tom_phillips@ign.com or find him on Bluesky @tomphillipseg.bsky.social
Joining next month's lineup of LEGO releases is another very cute set: the LEGO Ideas Floating Sea Otters. If you're dying to add this delightful build to your collection, preorders are already live so you don't have to wait. Both Amazon and the LEGO Store have it up for preorder right now for $119.99, so you can secure the set for yourself ahead of its March 1 release date.
Preorder LEGO Ideas Floating Sea Otters
This adorable set certainly seems like a sweet display to have as well. Coming with 1,234 pieces, it sees you creating a mother otter relaxing in water, but it also comes with a removable brick-built otter pup that she can be posed snuggling with. Seriously, it's too cute.
The mother otter's head, mouth, arms, and flippers can be moved around and posed in different ways as well, so you can choose how you want to show her off once you've finished building. There's even a buildable clam that can be added into the environment. Have a look at this sweet set in closer detail below.
Supermassive Games has finally nailed down when we'll get to play Directive 8020, its next slice of narrative horror.
The sci-fi survival game will launch on May 12 for PC via Steam, PlayStation 5 and Xbox Series X/S. On consoles, pre-orders are available now, and physical editions will also be offered. Pre-orders unlock a free Deluxe Edition upgrade containing an outfit pack and collectables themed around the studio's past Dark Pictures games, a cinematic filter pack, plus a digital soundtrack and artbook.
Starring Bond actress Lashana Lynch, Directive 8020 sees Until Dawn, The Quarry and Little Nightmares 3 maker Supermassive Games tackle sci-fi, in a story set on the crashed colony spaceship Cassiopeia.
Directive 8020 features various familiar hallmarks from past Supermassive games: multiple protagonists, choice-based gameplay, and the ability for main characters to die mid-story if you're not careful. But there are notable upgrades here too — which is part of the reason why the game has taken so long to launch.
In development since at least 2022, Directive 8020 marks a shift away from the studio's annual release pattern seen in previous The Dark Pictures Anthology titles. The game was previously announced for launch in October 2025, though was pushed back due to the impact of a fresh wave of redundancies.
Alongside improved visuals, controls and stealth mechanics, another new feature is the ability to rewind and revisit key "Turning Points" in the story to explore alternate storylines and potentially save character deaths. (For series veterans, an option to play without this will also be featured — ensuring your decisions stay final.)
Single-player and up to 5-player couch co-op will be available from launch on May 12, though online multiplayer will arrive in a free post-launch update.
Directive 8020 will arrive three and half years after the launch of the last main The Dark Pictures Anthology title, The Devil in Me. This time around, however, Supermassive has said Directive 8020 is planned to be even more standalone (so don't expect to see much of the franchise's recurring Curator).
Tom Phillips is IGN's News Editor. You can reach Tom at tom_phillips@ign.com or find him on Bluesky @tomphillipseg.bsky.social
While the X-Men made their name in comic form, the X-Men movie adaptations have become beloved in their own right, with such fan favorites as Patrick Stewart’s Charles Xavier and Hugh Jackman’s Wolverine. These films are also pretty notorious for their messy timelines, with origin stories, retconning, and time travel to really spice things up. There are plenty of different ways to watch these films, and the choice of how you watch them will determine how certain reveals and moments will pay off.
While it can be easy to just watch them as they were released, we’ve organized the 14 films into how they roughly fit into one big timeline. This will allow you to experience the X-Men story from the beginning and follow each character’s journey from its earliest point.
With the original X-Men cast returning in Avengers: Doomsday llater this year, we thought the best way to get ready for the future was to honor the past. Without further ado, here is our mostly spoiler-free look at how you can watch the X-Men movies in timeline order!
Just looking for a quick list of the X-Men movies in the order they originally came out? Here you go:
Which X-Men Movie Should You Watch First?
If you're new to the X-Men movie franchise, you can choose to start with First Class and make your way through the timeline chronologically. However, if you want to experience the films how they were originally released to audiences, you'll want to start with X-Men (2000) where the series officially began.
X-Men Movies in Chronological Order
1. X-Men: First Class (2011)
X-Men: First Class is the start of a new X-Men chapter that rewinds the clock to the earliest point on the film franchise’s timeline. The film begins in 1944 at the Auschwitz concentration camp before jumping ahead to 1962. The story follows a young Charles Xavier and Erik Lehnsherr/Magneto and the origins of both the X-Men and the Brotherhood of Mutants.
X-Men: Days of Future Past is a bit hard to place on the timeline as it features the X-Men from both the original films and the newer ones. Much of the story takes place in 1973, but plenty of time is spent in an alternate version of 2023 as well. Certain story elements we won’t spoil here make us comfortable placing it here on the timeline, but having an affection for the original crew definitely does help make it a more special moviegoing experience. This means it can also fit right near the end of this list if you so choose.
The first X-Men spinoff movie starts back in 1845, but the bulk of the story is set in 1979 and explores the… well, origin of Hugh Jackman’s Wolverine. Not only do we get to see how he got his iconic adamantium claws, but we also get our first introduction to Ryan Reynolds’ Wade Wilson/Deadpool. It's an essential part of the Wolverine timeline.
X-Men: Apocalypse stars Oscar Isaac as En Sabah Nur/Apocalypse and pits him against our reboot X-Men crew. While the film starts all the way back in 3600 BC, much of the story is set in 1983.
X-Men: Dark Phoenix is the last film starring the X-Men crew led by James McAvoy and Michael Fassbender, and it tells the story of the transformation of Sophie Turner’s Jean Grey into Phoenix. The film begins in 1975 but takes place mostly in 1992.
Due to how these movies play out, the switch from Dark Phoenix into X-Men doesn’t happen as smoothly as a film like Rogue One transitions to A New Hope, but the first X-Men live-action film does fit next into the timeline as it takes place in the early 2000s. While James McAvoy and Michael Fassbender played their younger versions in the previous films, Patrick Stewart and Ian McKellen take on the role of the older versions of Charles Xavier and Erik Lehnsherr/Magneto in these films.
Taking place not too long after the original, X2: X-Men United picks up the story as a brainwashed Nightcrawler attempts to murder the President of the United States. Some big events happen at the end of the film that set up The Last Stand and tease the arrival of this trilogy’s iteration of Phoenix.
X-Men: The Last Stand was the first live-action film to tell the Phoenix story, but in terms of the series’ internal chronology, it is the second. Either way, we get to see Famke Janssen’s Jean Grey resurrect as the dangerously powerful Phoenix and go up against our favorite X-Men in this final film in the original trilogy.
The Wolverine is a sequel of sorts to both X-Men Origins: Wolverine and X-Men: The Last Stand and takes place shortly after the latter film and deals with the fallout of the events it portrayed. It also introduces Yukio, a later version of whom would appear in Deadpool 2.
While he made his first appearance in X-Men Origins: Wolverine, Ryan Reynolds Wade Wilson/Deadpool makes his solo feature film debut in 2016’s Deadpool. This film is mostly separate from the happenings of the mainline films, but Deadpool is in the same universe so this would give you a complete picture of the franchise. There is no specific time Deadpool takes place, but it seems to take place around the time it was released - 2016. As one of the best Ryan Reynolds movies, you can watch this one out of order if you need to.
Much like the original, Deadpool 2 doesn’t have an exact date it takes place and its events mostly happen outside of everything else going on in the X-Men franchise. That being said, this sequel does feature some returning, younger X-Men and a spoilery moment/reference for Logan, so it’s possibly set in the late 2020s. All that being said, it’s Deadpool and all jokes are fair game for this fourth-wall-breaking merc with a mouth.
The New Mutants appears to take place sometime in the late 2020s as it features a connection to Logan, which is set in 2029. Much like Deadpool, The New Mutants mostly tells its own contained story and can be safely viewed at this spot or somewhere around it.
If things were already all over the place, timeline-wise, they got even more complicated with this 2024 crossover. Deadpool & Wolverine is set in its release year, 2024, so technically before Logan. But it's not really that simple because this movie makes references across all the X-Men (and Marvel) timelines, seemingly existing in the same universe and an entirely different one at the same time. So, yeah, it's set in 2024, but this movie's got its own thing going on.
As previously mentioned, Logan takes place in 2029 and follows Hugh Jackman’s Wolverine and Patrick Stewart’s Charles Xavier in a world where mutants are basically extinct. This is clearly the film that takes place farthest ahead in the timeline and thus should be the one to finish them all off. And it’s a great one to end on.
The first major X-Men project since Marvel Studios re-acquired the rights to the franchise was X-Men '97, an animated series outside of the MCU timeline that picks up where the original animated series left off. Season 2 is in the works and expected to come out in 2026.
Connexion
