Gaming in Announces. Reviews, Walkthroughs, News

Sonic the Hedgehog publisher Sega has announced five new projects at The Game Awards this evening: new chapters in a slew of classic franchises.

House House, the developer of Untitled Goose Game, has announced its next game called Big Walk at The Game Awards tonight.

Big Walk is a game about hanging out and getting lost in a big weird world, and it's currently in development by the team who brought us Untitled Goose Game and Push Me Pull You. Announced at the 2023 Game Awards, it's coming in 2025.

The Among Us beans are infiltrating Vampire Survivors in a new Emergency Meeting DLC out on 18th December for PC and Xbox.

THQ Nordic has announced another delay to its reimagining of 1992's Alone in the Dark.

After months of speculation and the odd leak, AMD has finally announced the first models in its new lineup of processors to feature the Ryzen 8000 branding at its Advancing AI event in San Jose, California. Specifically, a raft of new mobile chips under the codename «Hawk Point'' were unveiled, although those of you expecting something particularly exciting may be left wanting.

Twitch will officially be closing down services in South Korea at the beginning of next year due to high operating costs. 

Developer Starbreeze has announced a new game, codenamed Project Baxter, a cooperative multiplayer game presumably in the style of its PAYDAY series. Further, Starbreeze has managed to snag the official Dungeons & Dragons branding. However, we don't expect the studio to treat the RPG setting as reverently as Larian recently did with Baldur's Gate 3.

Do you want to get the latest gaming industry news straight to your inbox? Sign up for our daily and weekly newsletters here .

Last year’s addictive monster-slaying game, Vampire Survivors, is collaborating with Among Us for a new DLC called Emergency Meeting that is set to drop on December 18, 2023.

League of Geeks, the development studio currently working on space strategy sim game Jumplight Odyssey and turn-based political strategy game Solium Infernum, has announced cuts to over 50% of its workforce. That includes the entireJumplight Odyssey team, putting the early-access game’s development on hold indefinitely. 

Adding to its already vast portfolio of budget smartphones, Infinix says it is looking to revolutionize the budget smartphone market with the highly anticipated Infinix Smart 8 HD. It is slated to be competitively priced at under Rs. 6000. This makes it an exceptionally affordable choice for consumers looking for cutting-edge technology without breaking the bank.

Logitech G has announced the latest product in its premium gaming headset range; the Astro A50 X. This long-awaited follow-up to the Astro A50 headset boasts new features like PlaySync technology, which will allow players to switch between PS5 and Xbox Series X|S sources, seamlessly, via one of the headset's on-board buttons.

2023 isn't over yet, and neither are the game industry layoffs that have been such an ugly hallmark of the year. Electronic Arts has confirmed with IGN that it has laid off an unspecified number of employees from Codemasters, the developer of the Grid, F1, and EA Sports WRC racing games.

Dragon Age: Dreadwolf has been a long time coming, and a new teaser trailer – arriving on Dragon Age Day, appropriately – provides a glimpse of its continent, Thedas, while also announcing when Bioware will properly reveal the game. 

Starbreeze, the studio behind games such as Payday 3, Brothers: A Tale of Two Sons, and The Darkness, has announced a partnership with Wizards of the Coast to develop and publish a new cooperative multiplayer game set in the world of Dungeons & Dragons.

Fae Farm is getting its first DLC, Coasts of Croakia, on December 14th. The colorful new update will add a new zone to explore, new quests, and more to the cozy farm sim with a magical touch.

Starbreeze Entertainment has announced Project Baxter, a new game based on the Dungeons & Dragons intellectual property from Wizards of the Coast. It will launch in 2026 with cross-play for “all major platforms,” and is both published and developed by Starbreeze Entertainment.

Starbreeze, the developer of the Payday series of games, has announced an officially licensed Dungeons & Dragons game due out at some point in 2026.

Final Fantasy 15's director has revealed why he left Square Enix back in 2018.

Epic Games has been pushing Fortnite as a platform of its own for a while now, and the company is set to take that another step forward. It has announced three new games, all of which will be released and available only in Fortnite in the coming days.

The first Grand Theft Auto 6 trailer has a release date: this Tuesday, 5th December at 2pm UK time.

Apple has announced the winners of the 2023 App Store Awards, listing the 14 best apps and games across different categories. Fitness-focussed hiking and biking app AllTrails has emerged as the best app on iPhone this year, while miHoYo's latest RPG gacha title Honkai: Star Rail has been named as the iPhone Game of the Year. Other winners include machine learning-powered editing app Photomator, souls-like action RPG Lies of P, and curated film streaming platform Mubi. Last month, Apple had announced a list of 40 finalists, based on their technical and creative achievements, for its annual App Store Awards.

Thanksgiving 2 has officially been greenlit.

In a move that seems to codify a sort of «Bastards» franchise, Blue Manchu is following up its 2019 roguelike FPS Void Bastards with Wild Bastards, a more open-ended, space western take on the concept. First announced at our PC Gaming Show: Most Wanted Showcase, Wild Bastards is set to release some time next year. «Roguelike FPS» gets part of the story with Void Bastards, but it's really got a lot of that System/BioShock immersive sim DNA⁠—it has that same sort of hall-crawling light stealth, with RPG character progression closely tied to the limited resources you have at your disposal, encouraging you to tear through every cabinet in a room looking for sandwiches. You get a lot of those 'shock series' accidental eureka moments of leading enemies into traps or just barely scooting past them to make a daring escape. Wild Bastards looks to double down on that player freedom angle, trading the first game's System Shock-y labyrinths for open-air maps on planetary surfaces. «There's a lot more variety to Wild Bastards' levels compared to Void Bastards,» explains Blue Manchu designer John Chey. «We have six completely different environments, ranging from snow covered mountains to airless, low gravity hostile worlds. »Within each environment, there are small settlements, rail stations, roadblocks, and wilderness areas. Each of these levels plays very differently with different sight lines, amounts of cover, environmental hazards and so on." Blue Manchu is pursuing something similar with playable characters as well: in contrast with Void Bastards' anonymous, fairly interchangeable «Clients,» Wild Bastards has a cast of distinct, Wild West outcasts with special abilities and mechanics a la Overwatch or Borderlands.

Ahead of its launch into early access on February 22, 2024, Inflexion Games’ upcoming open-world survival game Nightingale is going to be conducting a server stress test, which select players will be able to join in early 2024.

Absurd Ventures, the company founded by Rockstar Games co-founder Dan Houser, has announced the creation of two original storytelling universes: American Caper and A Better Paradise.

Unity has announced another wave of layoffs as it ends its agreement with Lord of the Rings VFX studio as part of a company "reset," according to its current CEO.

Blizzard has announced how the Fyr'alath Legendary drops and explains how the Bad Luck Protection works. Here is a quick summary:

After rumors last year about NCSoft working on an MMO based on Guerrilla’s Horizon series, Sony Interactive Entertainment has announced a strategic global business partnership with the publisher. The partnership will see both companies collaborating in “various global business fields, including mobile” and fostering “strategic synergy.”

Sony Interactive Entertainment (SIE) and NCSoft have signed a strategic global business partnership.

Even though the delay was leaked amidst monumental layoffs at Bungie not even a month ago, Bungie has now officially confirmed that Destiny 2: The Final Shape has been delayed until June 4, 2024. According to the blog post, Season of the Wish which begins tomorrow will serve as the major content loop until The Final Shape releases in June.

It’s no secret that EVE Online developer CCP Games has been expanding its projects in the EVE Universe. One of their upcoming games, Project Awakening, is a blockchain-based project entering its Plase II playtest next week, and the team is looking for new testers.

Ubisoft has released a statement regarding players reporting that Assassin’s Creed games have started displaying advertisements for Ubisoft’s Black Friday sale. The company has taken to social media platform X to release its statement, referring to the ads being shown in games as a “technical error”, echoing an earlier statement released to The Verge.

The publisher of fighting game Them's Fightin' Herds has come under fire from angry fans after it abruptly announced the end of development.

Shadow Gambit: The Cursed Crew developer Mimimi Games has announced it'll release two DLC expansions for the supernatural stealth tactics game on 6th December.

Elon Musk-owned X (formerly Twitter) is going through advertising revenue troubles after many of its major advertisers such as Apple, IBM, Comcast, and others have pulled ads from the platform. But despite the hiccup, the platform continues to bring new features for the users. In a new announcement that came directly from Musk, the platform is introducing another way for its Premium subscribers to get a larger reach on the platform, this time with some strategic control over it. Musk has revealed that adding posts to the Highlights tab, which was introduced in August, will enable users to reach more users.

Survival MMO The Day Before is fast approaching its new launch date of December 7th, with the team at Fntastic confirming when players can jump into the game in their respective regions.

The Ilysia VR team has released a new video showing off the difference in graphics between the Meta Quest 2 and Meta Quest 3. We also get a roadmap from Team 21 Studios and some direction where Ilysia is now headed. 

Nippon Ichi Software has announced roguelike strategy RPG Bar Stella Abyss for PlayStation 5, PlayStation 4, and Switch. It will launch on February 29, 2024 in Japan.

By Jay Peters, a news editor who writes about technology, video games, and virtual worlds. He’s submitted several accepted emoji proposals to the Unicode Consortium.

Eight years after its release, The Witcher 3 is finally getting mod tools. Announced on Twitter, CD Project announced that modders will finally be able to develop original creations without having to edit content or quests already in the game. The tools are set to drop sometime in 2024, but no further information is available at this time.

Oppo users can rejoice as the company has not only announced the ColorOS 14 version but is also rolling it out to supported devices. The global beta version of the OS is going to arrive on the Oppo Find N2 Flip first, but the company has shared the timeline for a number of devices.

Pearl Abyss has a new Black Desert Online update, and updates from recent “Late Night Talks” where they unveiled some responses to community feedback, plans, and new items out starting today.

Apple has announced the 2023 App Store Award finalists. Each year, the App Store's editorial team select and spotlight some of the best apps across categories on Apple's Storefront. Apps and games on App Store are recognised for their technical and creative achievements. This year's App Store Award finalists include over 40 app and game developers across 10 different categories. Awards are given out to apps across Apple's lineup of devices, including iPhone, iPad, Mac, Apple TV, and Apple Watch. Popular apps like language learning tool Duolingo, professional video editing software DaVinci Resolve, and film streaming platform Mubi have made the cut this year.

Key, known for hits such as Kanon, AIR, and CLANNAD, has announced anemoi, its next full price romance visual novel. Platforms and a release date were not announced, but a full announcement live stream is planned for November 17 from 19:00 to 20:00 JST, which you will be able to watch on YouTube.

Bandai Namco has been collaborating with Nintendo on a number of the latter’s projects for several years running now, and now the company has cemented that partnership in a much more official capacity with the formal announcement of Studio 2 and Studio S, a team dedicated primarily to working on projects commissioned by Nintendo.

Bandai Namco has officially announced Studio 2 & Studio S, its internal studio that works with Nintendo on commissioned projects.

The Black Friday Sale is set to commence on November 24, but buyers can avail of a special opportunity if they wish to purchase Google devices. The company has already announced its Black Friday offers, and they will go live on November 16, running till November 27, giving customers ample time to get their hands on the latest Google devices, including the Pixel 8 Pro, and Pixel Fold. Check out all the Black Friday offers on Google devices.

An increased number of Kirin 9000S orders did not aid the finances of SMIC as China’s largest semiconductor manufacturer posted a massive 80 percent dip in profits for the third quarter of this year. This drop is the company’s biggest in quarterly income since 2019, which was 64 percent. Overall, total revenue surpassed $1.621 billion, with a $93.98 million profit. Looking at these statistics, SMIC has a ton of catching up to do before it can match the earnings capabilities of Samsung, though the U.S. export controls continue to make things difficult for the chip maker.

Netflix announced several new games coming to its in-app platform as part of its Geeked Week celebrations. The new game announcements have trickled in over the course of the week, but today Netflix finally revealed the list of 10 games that are coming to its platform, with some already being available. The list includes both original titles and classic games.

Senior Art Director Samwise Didier announced his retirement from Blizzard Entertainment today. Credited with creating Blizzard's art style and even coming up with the Warcraft name, for 32 years he lent pen and voice to bringing these worlds to life. Beginning his career at Blizzard (then called Silicon & Synapse) after reading a terse newspaper ad in December of 1991 and being hired the very same day, Samwise since served as art director for each of Blizzard's major franchises, was credited as a producer of several games, and was further credited with creating Blizzard's distinctive house art style that has permeated the majority of their illustrations and games… but his contributions don't stop there.

Spatial announced today that it’s launching a new season of in-house games, releasing several games that will be available to play on web, mobile and VR. It’s also launching games from third-party studios IzyPlay and Zaibatsu later this year, allowing them to be played by users directly from browser. According to Spatial, it plans to launch more titles around the holiday season.

Unity has released its financial results for the three months ended September 30, 2023, announcing layoffs despite a significant growth in revenue and a drop in overall net loss.

Netflix Games, the streamer's game subscription service that comes bundled with a Netflix subscription, has grown over time to include nearly 90 games across different genres. The platform adds new games to the service every month, which can be played on Android phones and tablets, iPhone, iPad, and iPod touch. Now, Netflix Games is bringing four new titles inspired by popular films and shows on the streaming platform. As part of its ongoing Geeked Week 2023 showcase, Netflix has announced Money Heist, Shadow and Bone: Enter the Fold, Chicken Run: Eggstraction, and The Dragon Prince: Xadia — all mobile titles arriving soon for Netflix subscribers.

Valve has announced the Steam Deck OLED, a new model of their popular Steam Deck handheld PC that features a host of welcome hardware improvements.

UL Solutions, the makers of the ever popular 3DMark benchmarking software, has announced 3DMark Steel Nomad. It's set to replace the now aging Time Spy benchmark, and it's sure to bring even the best rigs to their knees, as any new 3Dmark software should!

Valve’s Steam Deck wasn’t the first portable gaming PC – but it was the first one to find a way to bring the technology into a price point that the general public could reasonably afford. As an early adopter, I’ve been overjoyed with my Deck for the past 18 months and now Valve has announced a whole new generation of the device with the Steam Deck OLED. It’s a great time for them to do so with the ROG Ally showing off the same kind of portable gaming tech to the mainstream with a far brighter screen, while the Lenovo Legion GO just launched and features a bright screen and detachable left and right controllers.

Valve today revealed a new model of its Steam Deck handheld gaming console. This new Deck has an OLED display, and comes with several upgrades over the older versions, including a bigger battery and heftier storage options. It appears that Steam is now shelving two of the three LCD models and will not sell them once supplies run out, with the OLED version supplanting them on the sales page. Both models (as well as a limited edition colorway) will be available to order on November 16.

Valve has just announced the Steam Deck OLED, due to release in very short order on November 16. Effectively an upgrade to the baseline Steam Deck model, the OLED variant will even have a substantially upgraded battery, making the device that much more appealing.

Over a year after making portable gaming PCs a mainstream gadget, Valve has announced the next iteration of the Steam Deck.

Ryan Reynolds has seemingly confirmed Deadpool 3’s new release window with the weirdest Deadpool variant ever: Dogpool.

By Tom Warren, a senior editor covering Microsoft, PC gaming, console, and tech. He founded WinRumors, a site dedicated to Microsoft news, before joining The Verge in 2012.

Nintendo is returning to live-action films with a new movie based on The Legend of Zelda, the company announced today.

Friends, the prophets spoke true. Mere hours after rumours began to spread that Rockstar was gearing up for an official Grand Theft Auto 6 announcement ahead of a proper trailer in December, Rockstar has gone and made an official GTA 6 announcement ahead of a proper trailer in December.

GTA 6 has been announced! The wait is finally over as Rockstar Games has just announced GTA 6, its next big game and the sequel to GTA 5.  No, this isn't any attempt to capture your attention. Taking to its social media handles, Rockstar made the big announcement. Just recently, Quoting people familiar with the matter, Bloomberg reported that the GTA 6 announcement could occur as soon as this week. And now, the announcement has taken place. Let us take a closer look.

WhatsApp has been testing a lot of new features lately that could make their way onto the platform. A few days ago, it was revealed that the instant messaging app was testing a feature that lets users create alternate profiles. Another report claims WhatsApp Channel may be developing or testing new voice messages and sticker features. All these features could add to the platform's efforts to enhance the user experience. However, all these efforts could go down the drain as a WhatsApp official recently announced that the platform could show ads in Status. Let us take a closer look.

Fresh off of the news that the most recent Legend of Zelda game, Tears of the Kingdom, has sold over 19 million units, Nintendo confirmed that a live-action Legend of Zelda film is in the works. Shigeru Miyamoto is producing alongside Avi Arad, and Wes Ball (of the Maze Runner trilogy) will direct.

Even before the initial announcement of the Super Mario Bros. Movie Nintendo had begun to show more and more interest in moving into more purely visual media from shows to movies. With the insanely hit success that was Super Mario Bros. it comes as no surprise that more plans for future franchise adaptions were likely underway. We’ve seen hints of potentially more coming for Mario, but one other major franchise that seemed likely to crop up was The Legend of Zelda. Fans have discussed this at length online, but the direction it could take was unknown. Many wanted an actual episodic series covering the various games, while many were hoping for some sort of anime be it movie or long form series. Today we’ve gotten our very first look at what’s to come for new Zelda media and it’s taken the form of a planned live action film. While we don’t have many details on this revelation just yet, the news dropped without much fanfare at all coming directly from Nintendo’s official twitter account of all places in both Japanese and English.

Nintendo and Arad Productions Inc. have announced the start of development on a live-action Legend of Zelda movie. The movie will see Nintendo legend and Zelda creator Shigeru Miyamoto return to the role of producer following The Super Mario Bros. Movie, which was released earlier this year. He is joined in the producer role by Avi Arad, who has produced films like 2004's Spider-Man 2, 2008's Iron Man, and 2023's Spider-Man: Across the Spider-Verse. Arad has also produced a couple of video game adaptations including Uncharted in 2022 and Borderlands, which is slated for a 2024 release.

A new line of gaming peripherals is coming from STEELSERIES that feature a collaboration with one of the most prominent and influential gaming organizations in the world, FaZe Clan. The original eSports gaming grand will bring co-branded products that are available exclusively at Best Buy across North America.

Former Embracer Group chief operating officer Egil Strunke announced on LinkedIn today that he has formally resigned as the company's chief operating officer—essentially, Embracer's number-two guy—and that he's now launching an all-new game company of his own.

Sony has announced that PlayStation Network users will soon no longer be able to share media directly to their linked Twitter (now X) accounts.

If rumours are to be believed, the second half of 2024 will see the launch of the Switch 2, but in the meantime, Nintendo obviously has plans in place to continue pushing the sales of its current console. To that end, the company has announced new bundles and offers for the upcoming Holiday season.

New World Season Four, “Eternal Frost” is coming on December 12th. The team dives into the next major update, features, and some roadmap updates and changes.

Egil Strunke has confirmed that he’s left Embracer Group as chief operating officer, announcing that he’s ready to “embark on a new mission” after he “reached a checkpoint”. 

A new tour celebrating the «most iconic video game music» will kick off in May next year.

Billionaire Elon Musk's xAI has announced its AI model Grok. xAI has shared this announcement on the X platform saying, “Grok is an AI modeled after the Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy, so intended to answer almost anything and, far harder, even suggest what questions to ask! Grok is designed to answer questions with a bit of wit and has a rebellious streak, so please don't use it if you hate humor!"

Following on from last month’s Whiteout update, poncle is bringing even more Vampire Survivors goodness to the fans with the addition of an all-new Adventures mode. This mode, announced by the team on Twitter, is set to add new chunks of self-contained content for players who have already seen everything the game and its DLCs have to offer.

Three new heroes and a new PvP game mode for Overwatch 2 were announced at this year's BlizzCon opening ceremony.