Epic Games: mobile "gatekeeping" is "at the heart of why the industry is in a rut"

Apple is rolling out the beta testing phase for iOS 17.5, offering developers and public beta users a sneak peek at its new features. The update is anticipated to hit devices sometime next month. Previous trends suggest a mid-May release, aligning with past x.5 updates such as iOS 16.5 on May 18, iOS 15.5 on May 16, iOS 14.5 on April 26, and iOS 13.5 on May 20. As of April 17, four beta versions of iOS 17.5 have been rolled out.

Fortnite could have added a Samus Aran Metroid skin for its players, but Nintendo's demands led to it not happening. This comes courtesy of Epic Games' former Chief Creative Officer, who revealed some interesting details about the potential Fortnite deal and how it fell apart.

As the calendar continues its ceaseless onward march, Epic has announced its next batch of weekly Epic Games Store freebies, which this time look very much like Cold War shooter Industria and post-apocalyptic RPG bundle Lisa: Definitive Edition.

Helldivers 2 is an extremely popular game, far more than probably either Arrowhead or Sony hoped for. That said, it isn't perfect, and the developers are well aware of that.

One former GTA 5 developer says they "barely recognize the game I worked so hard on" after seeing it in VR combined with an ultra-realistic graphics mod, and has revealed that Rockstar's lack of interest in making anything similar is part of why they stopped working there in the first place. 

Fallout 4 was the best selling game across Europe last week.

While Xbox Game Pass is set to gain a selection of fantastic Day-One releases in the back half of April, subscribers may want to act fast to play the six games leaving the service in the coming weeks. To offset the amount of titles the platform offers, Microsoft always removes a handful of games whenever it brings in a new selection for players to experience. While that might sound like a bad deal, it makes sense given the already massive catalog on offer and users can still pick up the departing games for a discount before they eventually leave.

Looking at Schell Games' recent output, it's pretty easy to spot a common thread. There's the VR puzzle franchise I Expect You To Die, the VR adaptation of social deduction game Among Us, the VR jumpscare horror game Silent Slayer: Vault of the Vampire…

GTA 6 publishers Take-Two Interactive have announced that they're "rationalizing" their "pipeline" and positioning/restructuring/streamlining for growth by, you guessed it, laying off a load of people and cancelling a bunch of games. As detailed in a Security Exchange Commission filing, Take-Two are doing away with five per cent of the approximately 11,000 people who work for them, and have cancelled several in-development projects worth tens of millions of dollars.

The last few days have been rough for Helldivers 2 players, to say the least. As the weekend began, we were hit with a new Major Order – halt the Automaton advance and hold the Menkent line, maintaining complete control over Menkent and Lesath in the process. It's just two planets, so simple enough, right?

Remember when Pac-Man got its own battle royale game where 64 Pac-People competed to eat each other and be the ‘Chomp Champ’? Me neither! But Pac-Man Mega Tunnel Battle apparently came out on Google Stadia - ah, that’d be why - back in 2020, and served up a massively (or at least medium-ly) multiplayer spin on the arcade classic. With Stadia dead and buried, Mega Tunnel Battle is chewing its way out of the streaming console’s grave with a new subtitle and a fresh Steam release next month.

Final Fantasy fans have a lot to unpack today, as the Final Fantasy 7 Rebirth Ultimania book has now launched in Japan, giving us more juicy details about the recent RPG as well as the next chapter in the Remake trilogy. Notably, we've gotten a little more indication as to how long we can expect to wait for Part 3, even if no release window has been confirmed yet.