Harrison Ford has the best ever reaction to finding out a snake has been named about him – and it involves singing to plants

Happy Friday, Polygon readers!

“A bear and a mouse busk for their supper” reads like a classic bar joke setup, tuned to suit children’s sense of humor and guileless outlook. “A bear and a mouse confront a musically anhedonic kritocracy” is more of a mouthful, and much less kid-friendly. So the education about rigid forms of government nestled in Ernest & Celestine: A Trip to Gibberitia, Julien Chheng and Jean-Christophe Roger’s sequel to the 2012 animated feature Ernest & Celestine, feels a bit out of the blue.

By Phil Owen on

Bethesda's Todd Howard is currently taking part in the great big Starfield marketing push of 2023. But, it isn't just the studio's upcoming space game that we have all been waiting for. Another of Howard and Bethesda's flagship series is Elder Scrolls, and ever since it was announced that The Elder Scrolls 6 was indeed in the pipeline, many have been eager to hear more about what's next.

Many iconic characters in cinema have had equally iconic entrances. Movie fans are sharing their favorite introductions, with Indy in Indiana Jones: Raiders of the Lost Ark taking the number one spot for many.

Over the last year, Xbox has been under one massive spotlight: a giant acquisition and court case, speculation about its upcoming AAA portfolio, Starfield on the horizon, questions around third-party game parity across both its consoles, Game Pass, and so much more. Naturally, we have tons of questions about all of this, and at gamescom 2023, we were finally able to get some answers from Xbox head Phil Spencer about almost everything.

This year is shaping up to have a killer line-up of fighting games between the launches of Mortal Kombat 1 and Street Fighter 6, but unfortunately, Tekken 8 won’t be completing the holy trinity as it just got a new release date: January 26th 2024. Not too far away from 2023’s punch-a-thon, though, and to tide us over, publisher Bandai Namco dropped a brand new trailer at Gamescom’s Opening Night Live. Bears, arcades, and lots of kicking down below.

Gamescom's Opening Night Live showcase kicked off with a brand-new live action trailer for Starfield and an appearance by game director Todd Howard, who said that despite everything we've been shown so far, there are still «a lot of surprises» in store.

A demo for Twin Peaks: Into the Night, a PS1-style reimagining of the cult hit TV series, is available to play right now.

It’s pretty surprising that it’s been over a decade since the iconic comic series, The Adventures of Tintin, has appeared in games – the goofy characters, larger-than-life adventures, and adorable sidekick dog seem like they’d make for the ultimate all-ages adventure game. But this is a missed opportunity that developer Pendulo Studios plans on correcting with its upcoming video game adaptation of the classic story: Cigars of the Pharaoh, and from the hour I played so far, it’s incredibly impressive just how faithful and enjoyable that adaptation is shaping up to be. Whether it’s the cartoonish and colorful environments, creative puzzles, or memorable minigames, this is definitely one for adventure game fans to keep a close eye on.

Season 5 may still be a long way off, but the gateways to the Upside Down are opening once more this November, with a new Stranger Things comic from Dark Horse. Rather than taking place in Hawkins, Indiana, however, the new series is set on a boat that's about to sail into real danger.

August rolls on and so do the Kickstarter campaigns. We’ve got a few new games for you to check out this week, so hopefully you find something that catches your eye. And speaking of games, if you missed it last week we posted our Gen Con wrap-up, be sure to check out the best games of the convention.