Stellar Blade finally has a release date on PC. The very good, vibes-filled action-RPG that began as a PlayStation 5 exclusive will hit Steam in June, according to an apparent early leak of the trailer on YouTube. I can’t wait to see how the modding community reacts. Suggested ReadingThe Week In Games: Reignited Rivalries And More New Releases Share SubtitlesOffEnglishSuggested ReadingThe Week In Games: Reignited Rivalries And More New Releases Share SubtitlesOffEnglishThe Week In Games: Reignited Rivalries And More New ReleasesA PC release date of June 11, 2025 flashed at the end of a trailer that was accidentally uploaded early, as captured on the r/GamingLeaksAndRumors subreddit. It’ll support DLSS4 and FSR3 for upscaling and frame generation tech, along with ultrawide screen mode and uncapped framerates. It’ll also include all content currently released for the PS5 version, like the NieR: Automata DLC and Goddess of Victory: Nikke DLC, along with some new cosmetics and an additional boss fight (which will also be hitting the console version). The 2024 sci-fi debut from South Korean studio Shift Up centers around the soldier Eve who’s tasked with saving a post-apocalyptic Earth from an alien race of monsters called the Naytibas. While it’s structured a bit like a Dark Souls game, with linear environments and bonfire-like camps where resting respawns enemies, the combat is more akin to a traditional arcade action game with modern twists like a parry and counter system. It’s a familiar but satisfying formula helped a lot by unique worldbuilding, interesting environments, and an excellent soundtrack. While a PS5 Pro update last year let players experience the console version at 60fps with 4K output, high-end PCs will likely be able to render the game at its best-looking (and will still support DualSense haptics for anyone with a PS5 controller). More importantly, it’ll give free rein to modders to do all sorts of things to the game, from expanding item shortcut options to making free-aim available during combat for all attacks. Also, more blood. I’m sure that’s all that fans will tinker with, and none of them will mess around with Eve’s allegedly uncensored costumes. .

Doom: The Dark Ages puts players back in the role of the Doom Slayer once more; but things look quite a bit different than they did in previous outings. Serving as a prequel to 2016's Doom, this newest entry in the franchise features a heavy medieval flavor, so you’ll need to master using a shield and flail alongside the usual bevy of deadly guns you’ve come to expect. If you’re diving into the game and want a few tips on how to approach this fresh take on the series, we’ve got you covered below.Suggested ReadingThe Week In Games: A Star Wars Classic Returns & More New Releases Share SubtitlesOffEnglishview videoSuggested ReadingThe Week In Games: A Star Wars Classic Returns & More New Releases Share SubtitlesOffEnglish1. Customize the experience2. Explore your environments (it’s worth it!)3. Master your shield5. Take on every mission challengeDoom: The Dark Ages doesn’t gatekeep. While you’re free to tackle the game on a pre-set difficulty, you can also customize your gameplay experience with a variety of sliders. These give you control over things like the difficulty and aggression of enemies, how much damage you do to demons, your parry window, and even the overall game speed. And remember: There is no wrong answer here. Gaming is meant to be fun, so adjust these settings to wherever they need to be for you to have a hell of a good time. Besides, if you decide you want to increase or decrease the challenge, you can hop into the menu and change the sliders at any time.Exploration has always led to useful things in the Doom franchise, but you’re really going to want to seek out every nook and cranny in Doom: The Dark Ages. By thoroughly exploring each mission, you’ll uncover vital upgrade materials that are necessary for improving your weapons and abilities. Without these killer upgrades, you’ll be leaving a lot of damage and utility on the table, so keep a close eye on any icons on your map and hunt those materials down!In addition to upgrade materials, you’ll also find plenty of collectibles and skins for your weapons scattered about missions. So if you’re a fan of looking stylish while you mow down Hell’s hordes, then you have even more reasons to chase down every question mark on the map. Doom: The Dark Ages differs from previous Doom titles in that you’ll spend a lot of time parrying with a shield, which deflects damage back at whatever demon thought it was a good idea to mess with you. While this might initially feel a bit at odds with the franchise’s fast-paced first-person shooting, you’ll soon find that parrying flows effortlessly into the rest of your kit to become one of your most useful strategies for making quick work of baddies.If you see demons coming at you with a green attack or firing green projectiles your way, that’s your cue to deflect and then lay into them. Once you master this thrilling dance between offense and defense, you’ll finally be the Doom Slayer we always knew you could be.Early in Doom: The Dark Ages, you’ll be introduced to mission challenges, which provide you with three optional tasks in a level. Completing these tasks earns you rewards like weapon skins or extra gold to be used toward all-important upgrades, so it’s a smart idea to always check them in your menu at the beginning of a level so that you can be sure to work on them as you explore.Moreover, mission challenges can sometimes give you vague hints as to where you may find some well-hidden secrets. For instance, one level has a mission challenge that specifically asks you to land at two secret spots while exploring an open-ended area with your dragon. If you didn’t know those existed, you may have been left frustrated about why you could never find the final secrets in the level. Thanks for all you do, mission challenges. We love you.Doom: The Dark Ages is available now on PS5, Xbox Series X/S, and Windows PCs.

nintendoMarioByEthan GachPublished12 minutes agoWe may earn a commission from links on this page.Image: NintendoJoy-Con mouse controls are one of the biggest innovations in a next-gen console that otherwise looks to be just a bigger, more powerful version of its predecessor. On Monday Nintendo showed off how Switch 2 owners will be able to navigate the home screen with a cursor and it looks neat, but raises the question of just how much the Mario maker will let fans tinker with sensitivity controls. Suggested ReadingThe Best Reveals From The Game Awards 2023 Share SubtitlesOffEnglishSuggested ReadingThe Best Reveals From The Game Awards 2023 Share SubtitlesOffEnglishThe Best Reveals From The Game Awards 2023One of the coolest parts about Joy-Con mouse controls is reportedly how easy they are to activate. If you want the cursor to appear, you flip the controller on its side so the optical sensor can make contact with a surface like a table or, more likely, your leg or couch cushion. Flipping it back to the normal position and using the thumbstick automatically makes the cursor disappear and switches back to conventional controls. A brief demo in the Nintendo Today! app shows the feature in action:But the preview also makes it look like the sensitivity for the controls will default to something less dramatic than most PC gamers are used to. DPI, otherwise known as dots per inch, measures how far the cursor moves on the screen in relation to the mouse. A high DPI means fast, sweeping movements even with relatively small flicks of the hand. The ideal level of sensitivity is different for everyone, but generally a higher-than-usual DPI is more efficient (and less exhausting) for high-level play. Will the Switch 2 let players set that number for themselves? That’s one of the things the above demonstration left me wondering. The controller menu on the home screen doesn’t seem to include an option for changing the DPI. Maybe it’s hidden somewhere in the more general system settings? I sure hope so! It would be a shame to see one of the Switch 2's new features hamstrung by a lack of customizability. In the meantime, we went hands-on with the mouse controls for Bravely Default Flying Fairy HD Remaster over the weekend and came away quite impressed. .

Ellie finally got a little bit of revenge this week. How are we feeling? Not as cathartic as you thought it was gonna be, huh? HBO’s take on The Last of Usfew weeks of levity, or at the very least with its grisly revenge plot out of sight and mostly out of mind. It’s been interesting watching newcomers react to the show, roaring and ready for Ellie to exact her pound of flesh. But, unlike the game, the first taste the show gives us of her revenge tour starts with something just as disturbing as Joel’s death three episodes ago. It’s a complicated scene to unpack for several reasons, but we have a fair bit of television to get through before we get there.Suggested ReadingTHPS 3+4 Does Away With The OG 4's Career Mode, Here's Why Share SubtitlesOffEnglishview videoSuggested ReadingTHPS 3+4 Does Away With The OG 4's Career Mode, Here's Why Share SubtitlesOffEnglishSomething in the airThis episode starts in a Washington Liberation Front base. We see Hanrahan, whom we briefly saw Isaac (Jeffrey Wright) meeting in the opening flashback last week, walking through one of the group’s bases with dozens of troops looking at her with concern. Whatever she’s there to do must be important because the tension is palpable. She enters a room where a lone woman named Sergeant Park sits at a table with a cigarette in her hand. Hanrahan tells her that her soldiers are clearly very loyal to her, but Park thinks their worry might be misplaced, since if she were getting executed, she imagines Isaac would have come to pull the trigger himself. Hanrahan says Isaac is off dealing with more important matters, like fighting the Seraphite forces elsewhere in Seattle. This woman apparently killed several W.L.F. soldiers; however. So, despite her confidence based on Isaac’s absence, the jury’s still out on whether she’ll be executed.Park, we learn, was in charge of securing a hospital, and when her squad cleared the ground floor of infected, they headed to the basement where the original cordyceps patients were supposedly brought back when the outbreak began over 20 years prior. However, aside from the fungus that had grown onto the walls as it does anywhere the infected proliferate, they found no sign of infected. But as the squads investigated the basement floors, they started to exhibit respiratory symptoms along with the early signs of infection. There’s only one possibility: The infection is in the air. The squads above the basement floors hadn’t gotten sick, so they sealed the basements shut with their less fortunate comrades inside and fell back to the base. After Park recounts her tragic tale, Hanrahan says that as far as the W.L.F. is concerned, her actions were heroic and ensured the longevity of the group’s operations. She’s exonerated and left to mourn her squad, her son included.When season one aired, The Last of Us showrunner Craig Mazin made a big hoopla of changing how the cordyceps infection spreads. In the games, it’s an airborne illness, spread via spores that hang visibly in the air in environments where the fungus grows, but the show did away with this. Mazin admits that was done in part so that Pedro Pascal’s face wouldn’t be obscured by a gas mask every other episode. But now that we’re coming up on a scene that relies on the use of the original airborne virus, this seems like the show’s way of weaving it back into the world. Right now, only the W.L.F. seems to know about this, and it seems to only really be a danger in long-incubated spaces like the hospital basement Park’s squad was inspecting, so I doubt we’ll see Ellie and Dina putting gas masks on anytime soon.The boys are back in townBack at the theater, Dina is still on radio duty, listening to the W.L.F. chatter and marking up a map of the city. Ellie has managed to get the power running in the old building, but still wants to help Dina with whatever she can. Dina gives Ellie light shit for not being “school oriented” as she triangulates the probable location of their targets based on what she hears on the radio. When it becomes clear that Ellie’s out of her depth, she leaves Dina to figure it out. As she leaves, Dina calls out to her and just silently smiles at her when she turns around. “I just wanted to take another look at you.”Ellie explores the theater a bit more and finds the remains of a musical outfit that was performing on the stage some time before the outbreak. The show does a good job of pulling from the games’ soundtracks at exactly the right moments, like here, when it uses the gorgeous “Vanishing Grace” from the first game, which was most notably used when Joel and Ellie got a brief break from all the horrors to pet some giraffes in Salt Lake City. It gives this moment where Ellie looks at the empty theater a sense of cozy, nostalgic safety after the terrors of running away from infected and a crazed militia.She finally stops when she finds a line of guitars just waiting to be played. She picks up an acoustic one and sits on a stool on the stage to start playing. The guitar is miraculously somewhat in tune, so she only has to turn a few knobs to get it where she needs it to be. Then, she finally starts picking away at the strings and plays a few measures of “Future Days” by Pearl Jam before putting the guitar down in a huff.Any Last of Us game fan knows this song immediately, but this is the first time we’ve heard it performed on the show, even if it’s only for a few moments. The funny thing about the use of this Pearl Jam deep cut in the show is that there is no plausible reason for it to exist in the show’s timeline. For some reason, HBO’s series begins in 2003, rather than in 2013 as the games do. “Future Days” is from the grunge band’s 2013 album Lightning Bolt, which wasn’t even out by the time the outbreak began in the game’s timeline on September 26. Naughty Dog explained this by pointing out the song had been performed live and posted to YouTube months before the album was released, but that explanation doesn’t work for the show, since neither the song nor the video platform existed in 2003. Will the show have its own explanation for why a song that shouldn’t exist does? Or is it just too important to the story of The Last of Us to leave out, even if it makes no sense?Dina has mapped out a way for Ellie to reach the hospital where Nora is stationed, but her plan does require them to go through a building that the W.L.F. seemingly avoids. The only reason they can think of is that it’s likely overrun with infected. How does she know this? The W.L.F. never shut up on the radio. Ellie points out this is stupid, considering they’re just giving away their positions to their enemies, but based on the fact that the “scars” they’re facing use archaic weaponry and seem to be some kind of religious cult, Dina hypothesizes that they may not use technology, and she wonders if they’re like the Amish. (Sidenote: Dina, you know who the Amish were, but not what a Pride Flag is? What are they teaching about the old world in these post-apocalypse schools?)Image: HBOThe two head out and kill some time talking about baby names for the bun in the oven. Dina jokes that if it’s a girl, she’ll name the baby “Ellie,” and if it’s a boy, “Elijah.” Before she can offer a more serious option, the two stumble upon the bodies of a group of massacred Seraphites, which makes Dina sick to her stomach. Ellie tries to get her to turn back for her and the baby’s safety, but Dina presses on, offering her own reason for why she intends to see this through with Ellie. She brings up how Ellie never asked about the first person she killed after she’d asked Ellie about hers on the way into the city, and she proceeds to tell the story now. Dina recounts how, when she was eight years old, she lived in a cabin north of Santa Fe and would get bored because she wasn’t allowed to go outside to play. Despite her homophobic mother’s protests, Dina went out one day to explore, but brought a gun with her for protection. But, as it turned out, she wasn’t the one who needed it; her mother and sister did back home.A raider entered the cabin while Dina was gone and killed her family, and was still there when she ran back upon hearing the screams. Ellie didn’t kill her first human until she was a teenager, but Dina was half that age when she shot the raider for what he’d done to her family. Ellie apologizes for not asking before, but as she inquires about how she made it to Jackson, Dina says it doesn’t matter because it’s the past. What matters is right now. Joel didn’t deserve what happened to him any more than her mother and sister did, she says, and if the person who killed her family had gotten away, she would have hunted him down, too.The Last of Us has probably embellished Dina’s story more than any other this season, and with each passing episode, I’m more curious where her journey ends because it’s so starkly different from the source material. In The Last of Us Part II, Dina is devoted to Ellie’s cause because she’s being supportive of her girlfriend, whereas the show has gone out of its way to give her more personal stakes than before, and at times, she seems almost as consumed by the need for vengeance as Ellie. Maybe she still ends up in the same place as she does in Part II, but the more the show changes her, the more I wonder. The show’s given me zero reason to have any confidence in its vision of this story, but I guess I’ll take cautious intrigue over being bored and annoyed the whole time.Ellie decides to let Dina stay with her, and they finally reach this mystery building the W.L.F. refuses to enter. Inside is an office that seems empty at first glance, but the militia is still keeping an eye on it with a searchlight. At least, they’re looking at the perimeter around it. Dina notes that they haven’t positioned searchlights to see inside the building itself, which means the girls should be able to move freely throughout without worrying about the wolves. She offers to scout out the next room before Ellie says she should be the one taking point, since she can’t get infected. Now that the facade is over, the team can be a little more tactical. Ellie doesn’t see any infected, and Dina surmises that there are probably, at most, a few strays somewhere in the building rather than a full-blown horde. The two get into a little lovers’ spat when Dina accuses Ellie of being a loose cannon with her firearms, but says that her “crazy” side is exciting and one of the reasons she loves her. When she says the L-word (Lesbians), Ellie is a little starstruck and nearly says it back before Dina interrupts and says, “Oh, I know.”I am glad to see some of this confidence Dina exudes redirected at Ellie now that the relationship is official. But damn, these girls are slamming their feet on the gas like the most stereotypical U-haul lesbians. I keep getting pulled back and forth between how much I enjoy Merced’s performance and how the pacing of this relationship has been thrown all out of whack by Mazin’s timeline. Yeah, Dina has pretty much always loved Ellie, so dropping this less than 24 hours after they confessed their feelings and decided to raise a child together isn’t entirely out of the question. But damn, it sure feels like this relationship is being fast-tracked without taking a breath to accommodate the TV show format.The two move through the building and it’s unnervingly quiet, until they reach a boiler room and find the mangled remains of a wolf caught by an infected. Not just any infected, though; it’s another stalker.But it’s just one of them, right? If they coordinate, they can probably take it out, no problem. But unfortunately it’s not going to be that simple, because an entire pack of stalkers starts to circle the two. Dina starts to panic, and Ellie tells her to take shelter in a gated area while she lures them away. Dina’s not about this plan, but Ellie reminds her that she can get bitten as many times as she has to without getting infected. There’s no other choice right now. She sends Dina off with a kiss, and the girls get to work. Dina reaches the gated area and is able to seal herself inside, but the stalkers immediately start to tear through the rusted metal. Meanwhile, Ellie is quickly overpowered by them, and for just a moment it seems like this might be the end for our girls. Just then, however, gunfire starts ringing through the room. The infected collapse one by one as the mystery gunman takes them out with a trained and precise hand. As he reaches out to Ellie to help her off the ground, we see it’s Jesse, who has finally reached the city after leaving Jackson shortly after the girls.He asks if Ellie got bitten in the scrap, and seems a little unconvinced when she insists she wasn’t. But they don’t have time for a full body check, they gotta get moving before more infected show up. The trio books it out of the building and narrowly escapes a wolf squad by running into a park that the soldiers won’t enter. They assume that means the infected are lurking, so they’re still on guard. Ellie immediately starts bombarding Jesse with questions about how he found them, and he says he tracked them to the theater and found the map Dina had been marking up. Finally, after Ellie asks one too many questions, Jesse snaps and asks, “Do I look like I want to fucking talk to you right now?”Okay, mean ass. It feels like Jesse is taking on the role of “unlikeable hero” in the show now that HBO has siphoned all of Ellie’s irritability out of her to make her a loving mother-to-be. The Last Of Us (Craig Mazin’s Version) and all its creative liberties have felt fundamentally at odds with the story of self-destructive revenge that it’s based on in a seeming effort to make it more palatable, and one of the many casualties of this approach is that the golden retriever of the group has now become an angsty rottweiler so Ellie doesn’t have to be one. I sometimes worry too much of my criticism of this show reads like a jilted game fan mad that the show isn’t following the original script to the letter, but nearly every change the show makes is either undermining the actual point of the story, or is replacing the dynamics the characters once had with new ones that are not as interesting. The Bill and Frank episode in season one, a notable exception, is still one of the most drastic shifts away from the source material that the show has done, but it lifted up the larger themes of the story. This season, it seems like every effort is being made to ensure Ellie is still the hero of her own story, even if that means making the people who were originally there to ground her read more like scolding family members.Image: HBOJesse reveals that he and Tommy both left Jackson the day after Ellie and Dina snuck out, but they’re not here to help with the girls’ crusade; they’re just here to collect them and get them back to Wyoming. Ellie protests, but their argument is interrupted by the shrill whistles of the Seraphites. A group of cultists gathers in the middle of the park with a W.L.F. prisoner, who begs for his life as they tie a noose around his neck. The Scar leader says they have no interest in any secrets he can offer about Isaac’s plan, and then disembowels him with a scythe. The Jackson trio watches in horror before one of the cultists sees them and fires an arrow into Dina’s leg. Ellie tells Jesse to carry her out of there and back to the theater while she diverts their attention. The darkness of the night works to her advantage, and she’s able to disappear into the woods as Jesse and Dina escape. But even as the Scars give up on the chase, Ellie’s not retreating to the theater where her injured girlfriend waits for her just yet.“...I’d surely lose myself”Instead, Ellie heads for her original target: Nora. After evading the guards positioned outside the hospital, Ellie sneaks into the building through a hole in the wall too small for the average person to crawl through. Even as the W.L.F. guard dogs bark at the opening, their human owners hold them back, assuming some kind of animal must have set them off. They’re not entirely wrong, I suppose.We then see Nora working in the hospital’s sick bay and caring for the injured. As she leaves to put away some supplies, she’s greeted by none other than the girl she thought she’d left behind in Jackson. Ellie tells her to put her hands up and turn around to face her. She asks if Nora remembers her. She doesn’t answer, but her expression reveals she certainly does. Nora asks what Ellie wants, and she asks where Abby is. Nora claims she doesn’t know, but Ellie doesn’t believe her. If Ellie shoots Nora, her quarry points out, the gunfire will have every wolf in the building scrambling to her location. “You’ll still be dead,” Ellie replies.Nora tries to appeal to Ellie’s sense of mercy, pointing out that they could have killed her in Jackson, but they only came to Wyoming with one target in mind. Ellie says that was a mistake, and once again asks where Abby is. For a moment, it seems like Nora is about to confide in Ellie that she regrets what happened to Joel. She says she still hears the screams he let out as Abby tortured him at night, and she’s sorry that Ellie had to see it happen. But then, just as Ellie slightly lets her guard down, Nora’s tune changes: “Yeah, that little bitch got what he deserved.” Ellie is stunned just long enough for Nora to throw a bucket of water and supplies at her and give herself a window to run. Then Ellie gives chase. As Nora runs through the hospital she screams for her fellow soldiers to fire at the intruder, but then she reaches a dead end with her only way out a sealed elevator leading to the basement floors. You know, the ones where the infection is in the air. This scene is probably why the show had to bring spores into the fold. Short of a complete rewrite, the clash between Ellie and Nora requires the cordyceps infection to be an airborne illness to work. The difference this time around is that there’s a dramatic irony as Nora heads into the basement floors to escape Ellie’s wrath, only for us as viewers to know that a different danger entirely awaits.Image: HBOEllie gives chase and finds the overgrown fungus covering the walls. A few still-breathing infected are trapped within the structure, breathing out bits of infection with each wheezing gasp. Hearing the labored breathing of someone else in the next hallway over, she turns on the oppressive red emergency lighting in the electrical room, only to find Nora leaning against a wall, choking on the spores in her lungs. She hacks up a curse in Ellie’s direction and says that she’s “killed [them] both” by driving them to this sealed basement. But when she realizes Ellie isn’t struggling to breathe, she realizes the reports of an immune girl in Salt Lake City were real. Ellie confirms that she is, in fact, that girl, and asks, once again, where Abby is.Nora tries to appeal to Ellie’s humanity, telling her about all the people Joel killed, including Abby’s father and with him, any hope the world had of being rid of this infection. Then, to her surprise, Ellie says that she already knows and again asks where Abby is. Nora collapses on the ground and stays silent. Then Ellie looks around and, finding a pipe, holds it over Nora and asks her question one more time. Nora flatly says “no,” and Ellie starts to let loose, bringing the pipe down on Nora’s legs, repeatedly asking where Abby is until the screen cuts to black.Okay. There’s a lot to unpack here. This is arguably one of the most controversial scenes in The Last of Us Part II, and for good reason. But before we get into the uncomfortable optics, I do have to point out that part of what made this section effective in the game was that this originally served as the big reveal that Abby and company were once Fireflies, but the show instead told us that right off the bat. The game used this scene as a one-two punch to reveal both that truth bomb and the fact that Ellie was already well aware of what Joel had done by the time Abby had made her way to Jackson. So much of The Last of Us Part II’s excellent narrative tension comes from its calculated silence. The game tells you almost nothing about what Ellie is feeling, outside of her journal entries which conveniently write around the specifics of what she already knows. This exchange between Ellie and Nora is a moment of realization for both of them, as Nora realizes that Ellie is the immune girl Joel killed dozens of people to save, and Ellie discovers that this entire crusade against her surrogate father was carried out by people who suffered for her survival. All of these things could have been inferred by the player, but the game hadn’t said them outright by this point, and the sparse script and unnerving performances by game actors Ashley Johnson and Chelsea Tavares really sell the weight of that moment before any blood has been shed.Looking back at the original scene and how its dialogue elegantly reveals so much without having to beat you over the head with the most literal expository writing makes the show look like an amateurish rewrite by someone who thought that scene was a little too subtle. Plus, Ellie already told Jesse, and by extension, the audience, that she and Joel were getting past whatever conflict they had in his final days, so the reveal that she already knew about the Salt Lake City massacre isn’t really a surprise this time around. But that’s not really new for the show, as I’ve pointed out several times over the course of the season. Every time we get to what was a huge “oh shit” moment in the game, it feels like the show just goes through the motions of recounting it while cushioning uncomfortable moments like Joel’s death with quippy dialogue, or Nora’s interrogation with overexposition.In the end, neither of those reveals change anything. Ellie is still dead set on killing Abby, even if she has to torture her friend to do it. Which means it’s time to get into one of the more questionable moments in the entire Last of Us franchise. In Part II, Nora’s death was notable for a few reasons. On top of it being the first kill that really solidified Ellie’s revenge tour demanded more of her than she bargained for, it is framed much differently from any other in the game. Prior to this, Ellie had killed Abby’s hotheaded friend Jordan who wasn’t included in the show (Manny seems to have been made into a composite of himself and Jordan for the series), and that fight is a bit more cathartic because that dude was a shithead who taunted Ellie and didn’t spend his final moments begging for his life. Nora, meanwhile, is tortured for information, and the interrogation leaves Ellie absolutely shattered at what she had done. This is all in-line with the story The Last of Us Part II tells, in which Ellie goes down this violent path but is unable to stomach the reality. However, the difference is that when the player kills Nora, the woman herself isn’t even given the dignity of an on-screen death. The camera lingers on Ellie as the player is forced to press a button to strike her off-screen. It’s supposed to be a transformative moment in which the player is forced to look upon Ellie in her darkest hour and understand what this crusade is doing to her. But when you have a white woman beating the lone named Black woman in the game for information and you can’t so much as show her as it’s happening, it is the most damning example of a trend of The Last of Us subjecting Black characters to the worst fates it can imagine in its post-apocalyptic world.HBO’s take on the series has only slightly mitigated this by casting more actors of color, including Rutina Wesley as Jackson’s leader, Maria. But even so, Nora’s death still has an optics problem that the show can’t shake. If there had ever been a time for the show to reconsider the source material and make thoughtful, intentional changes, this was probably it. But here we are, watching Ellie torture Nora for information on Abby’s whereabouts. If nothing else, it’s still just as effective at communicating Ellie’s fall from grace.We end this episode with something a little more pleasant: a flashback. The sun shines through the window in Ellie’s old room in Joel’s Jackson house. She stirs awake as Joel enters the room with his signature “Hey, kiddo.” Ellie says “hi” as the credits roll. Rejoice, Pedro fans. Daddy’s back next week.New episodes of The Last of Us air on Sundays at 9 p.m. Eastern on Max.

Start SlideshowStart SlideshowScreenshot: Sandfall Interactive / Kotaku, Capcom / Samuel Moreno / Kotaku, Capcom / Samuel Moreno / Kotaku, Mistwalker / Kotaku, Sandfall Interactive / Justin Clark / Kotaku, Image: ASHIBI Co., Ltd., Bethesda, Raccoon Logic Studios Inc, Storm in a Teacup, SuperlouThis week’s tips hodgepodge will shed some light on Clair Obscur’s elusive Petanks, help you score the best weapons and armor in Monster Hunter Wilds, and highlight some great console commands you should try out in Oblivion Remastered. Previous SlideNext SlideList slidesWhat’s Up With The Petanks In Clair Obscur: Expedition 33?Screenshot: Sandfall Interactive / KotakuYou might’ve noticed among all the giant hammer-wielding, blade-swinging, death-dealing hate-puppets out there in the Paintress’ domain that there’s one enemy that absolutely, positively, categorically does not want the smoke from you at any point. And that’s these little cracked orbs on legs that take off like they’re trying to win the Boston marathon when you get within striking range. - Justin Clark Read MorePrevious SlideNext SlideList slidesFarming Hunter Symbols In Monster Hunter Wilds Will Get You The Game’s Best Weapons And ArmorScreenshot: Capcom / Samuel Moreno / KotakuMonster Hunter Wilds can be rather overwhelming once you unlock High-Rank hunts. Among the stronger monsters and new mechanics that the second half of the campaign introduces, there are also brand-new materials like Hunter Symbols. If you want to craft the best weapons and armor, you’re going to want to know how to get and farm these resources. - Samuel Moreno Read MorePrevious SlideNext SlideList slidesEverything You Need To Know About The Lunar Remastered CollectionImage: ASHIBI Co., Ltd.Fans of old-school role-playing games have been asking for remasters of Lunar: Silver Star Story and Lunar 2: Eternal Blue for ages. And now, with the arrival of the Lunar Remastered Collection, the long and tortuous wait for these beloved games is finally over. This updated collection combines both titles alongside plenty of improvements that will make returning and new players excited to dive in. Here’s what’s new, how long the games take to beat, and which platforms the Lunar Remastered Collection is available for. - Billy Givens Read MorePrevious SlideNext SlideList slidesMonster Hunter Wilds’ Artian Weapons Are Complicated, But Full Of PotentialScreenshot: Capcom / Samuel Moreno / KotakuThe grind is just as important as the hunt in Monster Hunter Wilds. While we all want to grind away to make stylish armor, Artian Weapons are a huge focus for grinding in this installment. They’re a new customizable weapon type that functions as endgame equipment and they can come across as a little daunting between the materials needed for their unique forging process and their reinforcement system. Read on below to find out what makes Artian Weapons so special. - Samuel Moreno Read MorePrevious SlideNext SlideList slides9 Games You Should Play If You Loved Fantasian: Neo DimensionScreenshot: Mistwalker / Kotaku2024 was an absurdly crowded year for RPGs, but it’s also a treasure trove—especially if you’re willing to look past all the big names. Fantasian: Neo Dimension is a neat middle ground. It’s a non-franchise IP from a less-known studio, but backed by Square Enix and led by some of the biggest legends from Final Fantasy’s classic era. So if that caught your eye over SaGa or Shiren the Wanderer, it’s understandable. But don’t sleep on SaGa, you’re missing out. - Lucas White Read MorePrevious SlideNext SlideList slidesCheat Your Way To Greatness With The Best Oblivion Remastered Console CommandsImage: BethesdaOblivion Remastered is a fantasy RPG that, on the surface, revolves around exploration and story, of uncovering minute details and lore tidbits in dungeons, all while fighting terrible beasts from other planes of existence. To some, it’s all about the power creep; it’s about becoming stronger, more robust than your opponent, wielding the best weapons and armor in the game. But the struggle to attain that doesn’t matter to some—those who are more than happy to tinker with the very code operating behind the scenes of every successful quest. If that’s you, then you’ll be satisfied to hear all about the cheats and console commands in Oblivion Remastered; some will even let you become the god of Cyrodiil. - Brandon Morgan Read MorePrevious SlideNext SlideList slidesHow Long Of A Trip Is Revenge Of The Savage Planet?Image: Raccoon Logic Studios IncRevenge of the Savage Planet is a colorful and hilarious sequel to 2020's Journey to the Savage Planet, taking everything that worked the first time around and building on it in creative and thrilling ways. It’s a hell of a lot bigger and longer, too. So, whether you’re new to the franchise or are diving back in for round two in this exciting universe, you’re probably curious how long it’ll take to finish Revenge of the Savage Planet. - Billy Givens Read MorePrevious SlideNext SlideList slidesSteel Seed Offers A Stealthy Action Experience That Won’t Overstay Its WelcomeImage: Storm in a TeacupSteel Seed merges action combat with tense stealth sequences in a high-stakes sci-fi journey through an underground facility. Though it may lack the polish of many of the games it borrows ideas from, it provides compelling enough gameplay that genre fans may find it worth their time to see how things play out for main character Zoe and her little drone, Koby. But how much time will you need to invest exactly? Let’s take a look at how long it takes to beat Steel Seed. - Billy Givens Read MorePrevious SlideNext SlideList slidesA Beginner’s Guide To Maelle In Clair Obscur: Expedition 33Screenshot: Sandfall Interactive / Justin Clark / KotakuUsually in an RPG, when you think “absolute assbeating swordwielder” in a video game, you picture the likes of Cecil from Final Fantasy IV, Auron from FFX, or even someone like Hulkenberg from Metaphor ReFantazio. What you’re usually not thinking of is a tiny befreckled orphan girl who wins the Mia Goth soundalike contest. - Justin Clark Read MorePrevious SlideNext SlideList slidesThis Horror Game Is Perfect For Short Spooky SpeedrunsImage: SuperlouWhat would happen if you blended the mascot horror of Five Nights at Freddy’s with the parkour goofiness of Fall Guys? You’d get developer SUPERLOU’s twisted game show adventure Finding Frankie. And yeah, it’s every bit as wacky and unsettling as you’re thinking. - Billy Givens Read More

The Overwatch 2 team at Blizzard has unionized. That includes nearly 200 developers across disciplines ranging from art and testing to engineering and design. Basically anyone who doesn’t have someone else reporting to them. It’s the second wall-to-wall union at the storied game maker since the World of Warcraft team unionized last July. Suggested ReadingOverwatch 2's New Story Missions: Worth The Money? Share SubtitlesOffEnglishview videoSuggested ReadingOverwatch 2's New Story Missions: Worth The Money? Share SubtitlesOffEnglish“Game developers behind Activision Blizzard’s hit franchise Overwatch have joined the Communications Workers of America (CWA), becoming the latest group of video game workers at Microsoft-owned studios to form a wall-to-wall union,” the CWA announced in a press release shared with Kotaku on Friday. “A neutral arbitrator confirmed today that an overwhelming majority of workers have either signed a union authorization card or indicated that they wanted union representation via an online portal.”The Overwatch Gamemakers Guild-CWA is just the latest group to organize at a Microsoft-owned game studio since the tech giant entered into a labor neutrality agreement. The policy shift took frustrations that bubbled up with management back in 2021 and funneled them into an objective with assurances that company leaders wouldn’t interfere. Like unions at Bethesda Game Studios and Raven Software, the Overwatch Gamemakers Guild now has to bargain for its first contract, a process that Microsoft has been accused of slow-walking as negotiations with other internal game unions drag on for years.“The biggest issue was the layoffs at the beginning of 2024,” Simon Hedrick, a test analyst at Blizzard, told Kotaku. “Up to that moment I’d been really happy in what I was doing.” He began as a long-time fan of World of Warcraft and started playing Overwatch from day one in 2016. In 2022 he was hired to work at Blizzard on quality assurance for the sequel’s versus modes and matchmaking. Hedrick has had up to eight game clients running simultaneously to test for issues and keeps a Corgi plush (“a mascot of Irvine campus #blizzlife”) by his work desk. On Thursdays he meets colleagues in the Blizzard Irvine campus library to play Magic: The Gathering. When I asked him what he loves most about working there, his answer was the same as everyone else’s: the people. When nearly 2,000 layoffs swept through Microsoft last year, including at Blizzard where a new game was canceled and several members of the Overwatch team were cut, it was a wake up call for Hedrick. “People were gone out of nowhere and there was nothing we could do about it,” he said. ‘What I want to protect most here is the people’The post-merger shockwave—Microsoft had officially wrapped its acquisition of Activision Blizzard only months earlier—was one catalyst for the organizing effort at Blizzard’s Team 4, which was originally formed in the late 2000s to create the company’s planned MMO Titan, before the troubled project eventually morphed into Overwatch. Foster Elmendorf, a senior test analyst, was at Blizzard for all of it after joining the company back in 2004, a dream job he secured simply by applying online at the time. Image: BlizzardHe said other big drivers pushing the Overwatch team to unionize included pay disparities, work-from-home restrictions, and wanting codified protections around things like crunch, time off, and severance in the event of layoffs. Organizing Blizzard employees stress that improving their working conditions can also lead to better games, while the opposite—layoffs, forced resignations, and uncompetitive pay can make them worse. Overwatch 2 staff were particularly upset last spring when changes to the company’s profit sharing program left them with zero bonuses for an entire year. “If [concessions] are given without organizing they can be taken away without it, too,” Elmendorf said. He currently helps oversee testing for in-game cosmetics from the concept phase through implementation. He loves making games and wants developers to have a seat at the table, not just to protect their own interests but to make the games better, to prioritize fun and not just profit. “For a long time time I felt the video game industry needed more organizing,” he told Kotaku. He later added, “It’s been 20 years of asking for better pay and it hasn’t happened yet.”2025 is an important year for Overwatch 2. Despite ditching much of its promised PVE content, the hero shooter rolled out some big-swing design initiatives, including a new mode called Stadium that incorporates MOBA elements like mid-match upgrades. Season 16 is currently underway and the team just announced a Street Fighter VI collaboration that all but transforms existing characters into Capcom fighters like Ryu and Chun-Li.The effort to unionize the Overwatch team hasn’t just led by quality assurance testers. Other disciplines were also involved. UI artist Sadie Boyd became part of the push immediately after joining Blizzard last September, just as another round of layoffs was sweeping through Microsoft. She said someone posted a link to sign a union card in one of the Blizzard Slack channels, which she did immediately. After all, she’d already been part of a union drive at Prey and Redfall maker Arkane Austin before it had been shut down by Microsoft earlier in the year. “We’re not just a number on an Excel sheet,” Boyd said. “We want to make games but we can’t do it without a sense of security.” Unionizing doesn’t make a studio immune to layoffs or being shuttered, but it’s the first step toward making companies have a discussion about those things with employees rather than just shadow-dropping them in an email full of platitudes. Boyd sees the Overwatch union as a tool for negotiating a range of issues, like if and how generative AI is used at Blizzard, as well as a possible source of inspiration to teams at other studios. “Our industry is at such a turning point,” she said. “I really think with the announcement of our union on Overwatch...I know that will light some fires.”.

As you’ve probably heard, Grand Theft Auto VI just got a brand new trailer, giving us our best look yet at the world, characters, and story of Rockstar’s upcoming crime epic. The trailer tells us a lot more about the game’s leading couple, Lucia and Jason, and takes time to emphasize the atmosphere of GTA VI’s Florida-inspired setting, at one point showing Jason cruising down the highway listening to “Everybody Have Fun Tonight” by Wang Chung as an airplane flies overhead. And man, am I here for it. However, I see some folks on social media criticizing the trailer for not showing gameplay, suggesting that we can’t know if GTA VI is actually worth our interest until we see what it’s like to play it. I don’t fault anyone for feeling that way, but it’s not an argument that lands with me. For me, at this point Grand Theft Auto is probably more about vibes, environment, characters, story, and immersion than anything else. We know Rockstar can handle the gameplay stuff. It’s everything else I still need to be sold on. - Carolyn Petit Read More

After last week’s announcement that GTA VI was being delayed into next year, Rockstar Games surprised us this week with a new trailer for the upcoming crime epic, and we studied it for every cool detail it might offer and every hint it might provide as to what we can expect from the game. Also, we learned that Destiny 2 is getting a Star Wars-themed expansion called Renegades, and glimpsed a leaked image of an Xbox-branded PC gaming handheld. And oh yeah, there’s a new pope! Read on for all these stories and more.

Epic Games is taking a victory lap after its recent court win by asking Apple to put Fortnite back in the App Store and giving players bonus V-bucks if they bypass the iPhone maker’s fees and buy directly from the Epic Games Store. It’s the start of a potential revolution on the App Store, but could also have big consequences for PlayStation and Xbox which also earn commissions on in-game microtransactions.Suggested ReadingThe Week In Games: Co-Op Bug Blasting And More New Releases Share SubtitlesOffEnglishSuggested ReadingThe Week In Games: Co-Op Bug Blasting And More New Releases Share SubtitlesOffEnglishThe Week In Games: Co-Op Bug Blasting And More New ReleasesSee, Apple, Sony, and Microsoft take a cut of up to 30 percent of everything you buy through their storefronts. So if you decide to buy Darth Jar Jar on PS5, Sony gets a cut of that, even though the cosmetics, battle passes, and other content are available wherever you play Fortnite thanks to cross-platform progression. But if you buy it on the Epic Games Store, the Fortnite maker gets all of that money. To incentivize people to buy there, it’s going to start giving even more cash back on its in-game currencies purchased directly from the Epic Games Store. Image: Epic Games“Starting today, when you make a purchase in Fortnite, Rocket League, and Fall Guys using Epic’s payment system globally on PC, iOS, Android, and the web, you’ll get 20 percent back in Epic Rewards,” the company announced on Friday. “You can spend your rewards in Fortnite and our other games, or on the Epic Games Store when you use Epic’s payment system. These 20 percent rewards in Epic’s games are here to stay.”Alongside that new policy is a similar but temporary 20 percent cash back bonus on all Epic Games Store game purchases, including from third parties. That runs until August 31. So if you buy, say, Clair Obscur: Expedition 33 for $50, you’ll get $10 back to spend on other stuff. Epic is apparently feeling a bit generous after a federal judge recently ruled against Apple, forcing it to allow app makers to link directly to their webstores through their iPhone apps. Apple is supposed to comply even while it’s appealing. In the meantime, Epic’s ongoing feud with the App Store is netting everyone else some extra bonus rewards. .

A new report indicates that the recent delay of Grand Theft Auto 6, now scheduled to launch in May of 2026, has had a big impact across the gaming industry as studios and publishers try to plan their next moves fearing (or hoping) that Rockstar Games might push the release date back again for what is almost guaranteed to be one of the most successful video games in history. Suggested ReadingGTA 6 Beers Look Tasty As Hell Share SubtitlesOffEnglishview videoSuggested ReadingGTA 6 Beers Look Tasty As Hell Share SubtitlesOffEnglishLast week, Rockstar Games announced that GTA 6 wouldn’t arrive in late 2025 as previously announced. Instead the open-world sequel to one of the best-selling games of all time, GTA V, would launch on May 26, 2026. Many fans weren’t happy about the delay, but Rockstar was able to win them back with a massive new trailer and over 70 screenshots. Meanwhile, a lot of publishers and developers working on big games just had a wrench thrown in their plans. In a May 9 Bloomberg report, multiple devs anonymously talked about how the teams making some games that pushed their releases back internally to avoid GTA 6 are now hoping the game doesn’t slip again into late 2026 and screw up their plans all over again. Others are hoping for a delay so that they can push their own in-development games back into 2027 and get more time. Rockstar GamesOne developer working on a big multiplayer game told Bloomberg’s Jason Schreier that they had previously delayed their game from fall 2025 to spring 2026. This was mostly done because the title needed more time, but it also was done to avoid GTA 6. Now they’re in a tough spot. Delaying again would be very expensive and make it harder for the game to be profitable. But not delaying and landing right next to GTA 6 could be a disaster, as Rockstar’s open-world sequel is likely to suck up all the oxygen in the room the month it launches. However, there’s also the fear GTA 6 gets delayed again, meaning that if they move their release window to avoid it, they might land right next to it with no options to escape. Bloomberg reports that in meetings happening at major publishers and studios across the industry, business analysts are trying to figure out if Rockstar’s big sequel will arrive on time or get delayed again, and how that will affect their current in-development projects. And none of this factors in GTA 6's online mode, which might launch later. (In 2013, GTA Online’s release followed that of GTA V by a few weeks.) That could prove to be a huge problem for an online game that avoids the initial launch, but still gets devoured by GTA 6's multiplayer mode. We know of at least one specific game, EA’s upcoming Battlefield, that has changed its release plans since the delay of GTA 6 and is now aiming for sometime before March 2026. The company’s CEO told investors that he believed that “the window is clearer than it was before” for a new Battlefield game since the delay. .

Start SlideshowStart SlideshowScreenshot: Sandfall Interactive / Larian / Raccoon Logic Studios Inc.It’s been a pretty neat week! Maybe even a good one? In 2025? Are we allowed to have those?Well, at the very least I do say neat because, hey, there’s a new trailer for Grand Theft Auto 6 which, jaded as I am about this series, looks pretty neat to me. We also got a new pope! And he plays video games! (Don’t think I would’ve told you about this guy otherwise). And here on the site, we also have Zack’s review of the new Doom game, and Kenneth shared with us his thoughts on one of the Switch’s 2 more interesting new features based on his time with it at PAX.So that’s what you need to catch up on. But what about once you’ve done that and are ready to stop reading about gaming and start doing it? What to play? Well, we have some recommendations. And yes, I, Claire, have chosen the same game again for the third week in a row. Why? Read on to find out.Previous SlideNext Slide2 / 6List slidesClair Obscur: Expedition 33List slidesClair Obscur: Expedition 33Screenshot: Sandfall Interactive / Claire Jackson / KotakuPlay it on: PS5, Xbox Series X/S, Windows PCs (Steam Deck YMMV)Current goal: Maybe finish the story? (If I’m ready to say goodbye?)Another weekend, another few days I will be playing Clair Obscur. Of all the pleasures and surprises of Expedition 33, one was particularly unexpected: It’s making me social! As I go out into the world and chat with people about games, this one keeps coming up. It seems, from my small sample size anyway, that this game is a rewarding nostalgia trip for us 30-somethings who grew up playing a ton of late-‘90s-era Final Fantasy and other JRPGs. In our last couple of entries of the Weekend Guide, I’d said that while I may have been enjoying other aspects of it, I wasn’t totally sold on the game’s story yet. Well folks, that’s changed. Clair Obscur has a fantastic plot and premise, but its characters are what really pushed me over. This is a crew of complex 30-somethings (well, 32-year-olds and one 16-year old, to be precise), pondering how they should respond to a crisis. Yeah, that’s pretty relatable right about now. Like in a good, classic Final Fantasy, these characters clearly need each other to get through the unexplainable journey they find themselves in. In that, the story also provides me with some headcanon-adjacent metaphors about getting older, relying on others, and living in fear of powers that loom over you. Stuff like this is why I’m a lifelong lover of Final Fantasy VIIVIII (IX also has these elements, of course, but I haven’t spent enough time with that one). So if you’re looking for something to play and have ignored my recommendations for Clair Obscur the past two weeks, maybe the third time’s the charm! Seriously. This is one of the most enjoyable experiences I’ve had playing a game in the past 10 years at least. — Claire JacksonPrevious SlideNext Slide3 / 6List slidesRevenge of the Savage PlanetList slidesRevenge of the Savage PlanetImage: Raccoon Logic Studios Inc.Play it on: PS5, Xbox Series X/S, Windows PCs (Steam Deck YMMV)Current goal: No goals, just chaosI’ve already played a bunch of this excellent sequel to the splendid Journey to the Savage Planet. I enjoyed that game, but I really love this one. It’s third-person, a lot sillier, and it makes kicking the tiny little creatures who inhabit its perilous worlds all the more cruel. I’m not entirely convinced the sense of humor in its spoof ads is for me, but exploring ever-further around these bonkers planets with my ever-growing suite of abilities and weapons is such a satisfying experience. I’m on the second planet now, about to find the third, and it’s a blast. — John WalkerPrevious SlideNext Slide4 / 6List slidesDrop DuchyList slidesDrop DuchyImage: Sleepy Mill StudioPlay it on: Windows PCs (Steam Deck YMMV)Current goal: Protect my kingdomIn some ways it feels like the makers of Drop Duchy took a bunch of genre mechanics, dropped them into a blender, and then flung the resulting concoction against the wall to see what stuck. It’s a deckbuilding roguelike puzzle strategy game that mashes a minimalist city builder into the mold of Tetris. Tiles fall and you have to arrange them inside of a grid. Get a full line and instead of clearing away it will transform into part of a map, granting you resources from the corresponding terrain that appears. Cards, meanwhile, are placed to create buildings or to wage war against enemy units that eventually appear.It’s both kind of bonkers and surprisingly clever. Time is not really of the essence. Drop Duchy is a pretty chill game from what I’ve played so far. But the formula feels like a neat spin on tile-placing city builders like Dorfromantik. I wish it leaned a bit more into the frenetic urgency and planning of actual Tetris, but for now I’m enjoying myself enough to see if more playthroughs end up yielding deeper strategic tradeoffs in other parts of the game. — Ethan GachPrevious SlideNext Slide5 / 6List slidesBaldur’s Gate 3List slidesBaldur’s Gate 3Image: LarianPlay it on: PS5, Xbox Series X/S, Windows PCs (Steam Deck OK)Current goal: Survive the ShadowlandsI gave Baldur’s Gate 3 the old college try back when it first came out but, while I admired much about it, the combat didn’t quite click with me, and I abandoned the attempt somewhere late in Act 2. Following the recent news that the game’s final major patch has now landed, though, I opted to give it another shot, starting fresh from the beginning, and it’s all going much better this time around. Something in my brain has shifted, and where the combat once often felt like a slog, I’m now enjoying making the most of my party members’ varied abilities to overcome the game’s many challenges. However, that doesn’t mean that things always go my way. I’ll avoid spoilers, but early in Act II, there was a battle which my party survived, but in which a number of innocents perished. I know it’s possible to handle the battle such that this doesn’t happen, and I thought long and hard about loading an earlier save and preventing this tragedy from occurring. Ultimately, though, I decided that the story is more interesting to me if I keep it pure, accepting the consequences of this failure, even if it means I miss out on some “content” later on, as no doubt some of the characters who died would have had more to do in the game’s third act if they’d survived. I think of it this way: if this were an actual tabletop RPG campaign I was playing and one battle wound up having dire consequences, I probably wouldn’t beg and plead with the DM to let me try the battle again from the start. That’s not really how D&D works; failure is interesting in its own way, and I think this tragedy should only make my party members hate the game’s main villain even more. Plus, this way I have an incentive to play the game again at some point in the future and keep all those characters alive. Part of what makes Baldur’s Gate 3 so impressive is the way that its story can flow in many different directions and accommodate the results of so many successes and failures. I personally wouldn’t feel right about forcing things to go the way I’d like them to. Here’s to living with our failures! — Carolyn Petit And that wraps our picks for the weekend. Happy gaming!

This week brought us three more new episodes of Andor, and one step closer to next week’s series finale. This trio was probably the most impressive and devastating yet, bringing the events on Ghorman to an incendiary head and bringing some character arcs to a sudden and permanent end.Suggested ReadingTHPS 3+4 Does Away With The OG 4's Career Mode, Here's Why Share SubtitlesOffEnglishview videoSuggested ReadingTHPS 3+4 Does Away With The OG 4's Career Mode, Here's Why Share SubtitlesOffEnglishIf you missed our conversation about last week’s outstanding episodes, you can find it here. Now, let’s talk about three of the most compelling episodes of television in recent memory. Zack Zwiezen: So I think these last three episodes are my favorite Andor episodes of season 2 so far and maybe the entire series. From what happens on Ghorman, the stuff with Mothma, and the heartbreaking ending seen in Episode nine... it was all so good!Carolyn Petit: It was. In the past I’ve taken notes as I watched, just so I had a few things to refer back to when we do these chats, but with this week’s trio of episodes I was just so captivated and horrified by the slow, inexorable buildup to the events of episode nine that I totally forgot. I almost couldn’t believe how good these episodes were. But let’s start at the beginning. First of all, it was cool to get a glimpse of life on Yavin, to see the beautiful home that Andor and Bix share there. Now if I ever rewatch A New Hope, I’ll have a fuller picture in my mind of how important this place was for the Rebellion in establishing its foothold, and what life was like there when its members weren’t off engaging in operations to subvert the Empire’s efforts.Ethan Gach: We obviously need to start with the weird force healing stuff, which I’m sure Zack can explain. It was an odd nod to the mystical side of Star Wars we never see in Andor.CP: Hahaha. I did like the mention of Maarva hating Force healers, or at least hating one Force healer. You have to think that’s a field inhabited to some degree by scammers and the Star Wars universe’s equivalent of manipulative woo-woo YouTubers. ZZ: We see some of that in the Obi-Wan show, with the guy pretending to be a Jedi. I imagine fake Force Healers are a thing and I get why Andor is wary about them. Honestly, I love that modern Star Wars is making it clear that the Force isn’t something everyone believes in or understands. For many, its this weird magical thing they scoff at.As for Force Healing, we mainly see Jedi doing it—like Grogu and Rey—but it’s been a thing in Legends and Canon for some time before that and anyone with a deep connection to the Force could in theory do it. But there’s also debate that the person isn’t really healing them, but instead the Force wants to make sure that the injured person is healed to continue on their important journey or purpose. The Force Healer even mentions that it doesn’t always work to Andor.And we know Andor is going to do some important stuff in Rogue One. So it makes sense that the Cosmic Force would intervene to make sure he’s healthy and able to keep moving forward on his journey. And I think that’s what the woman sensed.Did you all like the Force being included in Andor? I’ve seen some mixed reactions onlineCP: I don’t mind it as this kind of fleeting bit of worldbuilding detail that informs our understanding of the characters. I think it helps that the actor playing the Force healer was so good, she really made the most of her brief time. I wouldn’t want it to become a larger element or to overtly influence the story in any way, but here I saw it as a plot device that illuminated the fact that Cassian is feeling uptight and closed off in larger ways, and it also gave Bix something to think about.EG: And now Wilmon is back with “One Last Job...” and Cassian is running out of time to decide if he’s going to become a professional rebel or not. I at first thought the plan to go snipe Dedra was their own as payback for Ferrix, but it seems maybe Luthen is keen to finally bag the spy that’s been tracking him for years before she can come back and finish the job.ZZ: Yeah, I thought it was revenge too. And it might still be, but I agree. I think Luthen is trying to tie up some loose ends.I think the one year leaps between each three episodes has worked well. But it was used perfectly here to show us how much Ghorman has changed since we last saw it. Seeing the plaza filled with Imperial troops, blockages, and reporters spouting propaganda really showed how much progress the Empire has made in taking this place over and crushing the people.Lucasfilm / DisneySo where do we land on Syril and Dedra? I think these episodes seem to show that she genuniely cared about him. The kiss, the way she is worried about his safety, wants him to be kept in the building away from the protestors and chaos outside, etc. I got the feeling that in some twisted sick way she really loved Syril. She had a connection with him and maybe it was simply that she needed to have something to look forward to after doing what she did on Ghorman and being with him back on Coruscant was that end goal. (edited)EG: Yes I think it did a really good job of showing two different accomplices to fascism. The one is obsessed with fighting “outside agitators” and the other is just chasing the next carrot from their boss. They are both unnerved by what’s going on, but more at the unpleasantness and because of how it complicates their self-mythologizing, rather than because of the actual evil and pain involved. She’s like just forget about this genocide. A dozen more people were ready to pull the trigger if I didn’t. But now we can go back to Coruscant and chill and maybe get invited to some fancier parties.CP: Yeah, that connection with Syril, strange as it was, was also the most genuine human thing in her life. Some part of her really was looking forward to that point where this was behind them and they were together again on Coruscant.I think the show navigates that line well. It doesn’t ever make Syril or Dedra truly sympathetic (not yet, anyway), but it does explore how fascism strips those who carry it out of their potential humanity as well.ZZ: Speaking of Syril, that moment when he sees Andor was perfect.Everything in his life is falling apart. The woman he loved betrayed his trust. The Empire he worked for is truly evil in a way he’s finally understanding. His entire life is shattering and falling apart. And right at that moment he sees the motherfucker who sort of put all of this in motion for him. And he just loses it.CP: Right, it was another example, maybe the best one yet, of something I think the show has done a remarkable job of across all three episode drops we’ve gotten: taking conflicts that exist on both a personal, intimate level, and on a larger, more political level, and weaving them together such that they really build up, complement each other, and then collide in ways that have big emotional payoffs in the climax to each little mini-trilogy. The personal is political, and boy does Andor know it.ZZ: Yes! We this happen in later when Andor saves Mothma. They are both struggling with personal conflicts and that directly ties into the bigger political conflict engulfing the galaxy. Lovely stuff.But back to the chaos at Ghorman. After Syril leaves Dedra, but before spotting Andor, we see the empire shove out some young soldiers into the angry crowd as baitCP: My heart sank as that happened. What a way to depict the utter ruthlessness of the Empire, deliberately sacrificing its own greenest recruits for this false flag operation.ZZ: The moment that bastard sent them out, you knew what was coming. And then the Imperial sniper aiming at not the protestors, but the guards, and starting the most brutal and hard to watch sequence in a Star Wars show or movie.CP: Right. The show wants us to know, wants us to feel the inevitability of it all, as the Ghors stand there beautifully protesting. It really was gutting, not to mention just exceptional television.EG The show has been jumping around so much this season, both in time and location, it was nice to finally see all of the tension erupt in one place for a prolonged period of time. Shame on the Ghormans for using their fellow citizens as human shields though.ZZ: One of the best moments in all of this, going back to Carolyn’s point about the show weaving smaller and bigger conflits together, is when Syril tackles Andor and they fight for a bit.From Syril’s perspective he’s trying to kill the asshole who ruined his life and put him in this place. He hates Andor. But from Andor’s perspective he’s like “Who is this random dude attacking me?”CP: It’s amazing! “Who are you?”ZZ: You can see Syril in that moment realize that Andor never cared about him. Never knew about him. Nothing. He means nothing to him. And then he gets killed. No special death. No redemption. Just an angry dude who thought he could be a good person in fascist evil empire realizing how small he was. Then death.CP: Everything he’s poured his energy into for all these years, and for what? To be hated by those he’s seemingly learned to respect, like the Ghorman leader, and to be completely unknown to the focus of his obsession. I do wonder what the ramifications of his death will be in the final run of episodes, though. I somehow suspect that we haven’t seen the last of his mother.Also, speaking of all the chaos on Ghorman, one little detail that I really liked was the hotel employee uttering that famous line, “Rebellions are built on hope.” Very often I think one of the worst tendencies of contemporary Star Wars is its impulse to explain everything, to fill out every mysterious space in its mythos, but this little nod resonates for me. It feels authentic and human, a little way of recognizing that every individual’s contribution to the struggle matters. Like, I totally believe that Cassian would remember that, and remember his interactions with the man who said it.A dozen more people were ready to pull the trigger if I didn’t. But now we can go back to Coruscant and chill and maybe get invited to some fancier parties.ZZ: Yeah! I agree that Star Wars far too often wants to explain every detail and place it neatly in a timeline or a wiki. But that was a moment that worked for me because it showed that no voice is too small in a rebellion. This random hotel clerk on Ghorman ends up having a big impact on Andor and later Jyn Erso and her allies. In some ways, you could connect him to the successful mission to steal the Death Star plans as seen in Rogue One. And then after Ghorman we get Mon Mothma’s plan to call out the Empire publicly at the senate. A moment we’ve know about in canon for years, but finally get to see. And what a speech.CP: What. A. Speech.EG: Followed by one of the best escort missions I’ve ever seen. I like that even as the Rebellion is gearing up and there’s more and more outright insurgencies brewing, we still get a big dose of Star Wars spy craft. What might be just another blaster light show takes a much sharper focus with the double-agents in Senator Organa’s circle and Cassian’s willingness to exploit the people around him to flip the odds.CP: And it did something Andor has repeatedly done which is use action both as action but also as something that informs character. It’s the second big moment this season when Mon Mothma is confronted with the reality of “Holy shit, what have I gotten into? What does this really demand of me?” and now I think, she very quickly has to learn to make her peace with it and move on.ZZ:CP: And I don’t want to gloss over the speech itself too quickly. I mean, my mouth was hanging open as I listened to it, as I felt the truth of it in my body.I know the show was in production some time ago and it’s not like the writers intended to directly comment on the present moment in some ultra-specific way, but I really urge folks who are enjoying the show to read Roxana Hadidi’s piece for Vulture, “Andor Dared To Say ‘Genocide’.” I think she illuminates a big part of what makes these episodes extraordinary not just for Star Wars, but for television as a whole right now.EG: I was kind of shocked Disney (which is currently facing a BDS boycott) let them do it. ZZ: Same. Thankfully, we don’t live in a timeline where a ruthless evil old guy has control over a large legislative body and can use fear to make them worship him and avoid directly criticizing him or pushing back on his plans.And now for the moment that truly broke my heart. Andor telling Bix he’s done. That he wants a life with her. He chooses her over everything else. And her realizing, quietly as he says this, that she has to leave. It mirrors Dedra and Syril’s moment. Syril walks away from the person he loves because he no longer believes in the cause. Bix walks away from her love to save the cause she knows is more important. EG: She fired him over Zoom just like any great media executive would.CP: Absolutely crushing, and in a way I do have mixed feelings about. We knew Bix had to be out of the picture by the time the series ended one way or another, of course, given that she’s not in Rogue One, and I do understand why she would make this choice. I think the story and our understanding of who she is support it well. But I did see someone on Bluesky remark that it’s almost as if Andor, as a show, thinks that to be really committed to a rebellion or a resistance movement, you can’t have other close attachments, when in truth of course you can. Ultimately I’m cool with Bix making this choice, sad as it is, but it did make me feel that maybe somewhere in the midst of all of this, there could have been one lasting, healthy, happy relationship instead of a whole rebellion of Luthens who have made of their minds a sunless space. Well, I take it back. K-2SO did just show up so we know there’s some light in Cassian’s life!ZZ: I totally get that criticism. And I think there are smaller examples of relationships lasting in this rebellion. Mothma and Erskin (not romantic, but still) and Wilmon and that woman in the Ghorman resistance. So I’m not sold on the idea that the show is trying to say that, but I get the criticisms.Screenshot: Lucasfilm / KotakuAnd yes, Cassian has met K-2SO! It was nice to hear Alan Tudyk’s voice at the end. Tony Gilroy mentioned in the behind the scenes video about this episode that having Bix leave Andor right as K-2SO enters his life felt like the right move. And I agree. I really really really hope we get to see them be friends and rebel buddies. We deserve that!EG: For now it feels like they haven’t really resolved Bix’s struggles. Her leaving felt as much about her running away as it did forcing him to commit.CP: I agree. I wonder if we’ll see any more of her in the final episodes, or maybe learn about what she does in some spin-off comic or other story. I’d be curious to find out!ZZ: I hope so! I feel like taking Bix out of the series like this lets them race to Rogue One, which the final three episodes will do, without having to figure out reasons she wasn’t around. And now they have this awesome character people like from a popular show that they can use in future stories set during the Original Trilogy. I’d love to see Bix in more stuff. I also know the moment she learns about Cassian will be heartbreaking.And so, here we are. The next three episodes will be set in the days before Rogue One. It’s coming to an end and I’m both excited to see it wrap up and sad its ending. Are you all ready to say goodbye to Andor?EG: No. I keep wishing there was an Andor immersive sim or Cyberpunk 2077-style RPG.CP: Not really! That’s the one drawback of the three-episode drop format: it all comes to an end so much faster. But I’m also glad the show has burned so brightly, that Tony Gilroy and co. made it so dense with drama and character and relevance and didn’t try to spread it out or water it down. At this point, I’m just hoping for a strong ending, one that cements Andor’s position even further as one of the greatest works of storytelling ever set in the Star Wars universe.ZZ: I’ll see you all next week for the end. I’m not ready either.

Borderlands 4 is now just a few months away, and if it’s anything like the previous games in the looter shooter series it will be one of the top-selling blockbusters of 2025. But how much will it cost? Will publisher 2K try to undercut the competition or match it as some new releases creep up to $80 this year? Gearbox Entertainment CEO Randy Pitchford says even he doesn’t know.Suggested ReadingFirefight’s Back In Halo! What Is Firefight? Share SubtitlesOffEnglishview videoSuggested ReadingFirefight’s Back In Halo! What Is Firefight? Share SubtitlesOffEnglish “We’re going to have a price set soon,” he told fans at a Borderlands 4 PAX East panel on Friday, GamesSpot reports. “It might be the new price that Nintendo and Microsoft have led with. It might be that we stay back. It’s going to be the people at the publishing house that decide that. We’ll know soon. I think it’s going to be fine, whatever the [price is]. It’s worth it.”Pitchford added that the upcoming sequel, which features new vault hunters, big open maps with no loading screens, and the ability for guns to drop with parts mixed-and-matched from different in-universe manufacturers, had “more than twice” the budget of Borderlands 3, which was released back in 2019 for the last generation of consoles.Borderlands 4 is coming at an unusual time for game pricing. We usually only see hikes when jumping from one console cycle to another. This time around, however, we’re seeing pressure from ballooning development budgets and trade wars bump up pricing for the most premium releases. Mario Kart World is $80, and Microsoft has hinted that the next Call of Duty will be as well. Meanwhile, some of the top-rated games of 2025, like Clair Obscur: Expedition 33, are only $50. That’s the case with Mafia: The Old Country as well, another 2K-published “premium game” that’s being positioned by the company as a more focused, cinematic release. It will “provide a linear highly-polished narrative experience that can easily complement the other more persistent games our players also love and engage with on a more consistent basis,” 2K announced this week. It seems unlikely that Borderlands 4 will drop that low, though it could surprise everyone by sticking to its predecessor’s last-gen price point of $60. An $80 price point seems more likely, though Pitchford said that while he wants his team to get paid and to be able to reinvest that money into future projects, he also wants as many people as possible to be able to pick up and play the game. And I’m sure that regardless of the base price, there will be a $100 or even $120 deluxe edition for the day-one super fans out there. “I’ll tell you the truth, I don’t know,” Pitchford told the audience at PAX East. “That is the truth.” It’s hard to see from the Twitch stream whether his nose started growing after he said that. .

Yesterday, the world was introduced to the newest leader of the Catholic church, Pope Leo XIV aka Robert Francis Prevost. He was elected after just two days and was born in Chicago, making him the first American pope in history. He also is very likely the first pope to regularly play video games. Suggested ReadingGTA 6 Beers Look Tasty As Hell Share SubtitlesOffEnglishview videoSuggested ReadingGTA 6 Beers Look Tasty As Hell Share SubtitlesOffEnglishOn May 8, shortly after Prevost was officially announced as the new pope, NBC Chicago spoke to his older brother, John Prevost, about how wild it is that your younger bro is now the pope. The reporter asked him if he had spoken to his brother right before conclave—the period of time where Cardinals seal themselves away from the world and vote on a new pope. Prevost confirmed he spoke to the future pope right before conclave and described the conversation. NBC“First we do Wordle—because this is a regular thing, okay—then we do Words With Friends. It’s something to keep his mind off life and the real world,” said Prevost. Sure, , Wordle and Words With Friends. That’s a strange sentence to think about. And while its possible Pope Francis found time to muck about with Wordle on his phone, the way the new Pope’s brother talks about Wordle makes it sound like its a common activity for Leo XIV. So I’ll call him the first gamer Pope. Sure, why not? The new Pope’s brother also confirmed that Leo XIV watched the movie Conclave right before entering an actual conclave. “[I asked him] did you watch the movie Conclave so you know how to behave? And he had just finished watching the movie Conclave, so he knew how to behave. So it’s that kind of stuff, because I wanted to take his mind off it. You know, laugh about something.” .

Start SlideshowStart SlideshowScreenshot: Blizzard Entertainment / Capcom / KotakuI love Overwatch 2. I love Street Fighter. Put the two of them together for a skin collaboration, and that should, in theory, speak to me directly. But I don’t know, I feel like I’m becoming desensitized to all the collaborations Blizzard has been shoving into its hero shooter, even when they involve things I enjoy. It sometimes feels like this is the only way the company knows how to drum up hype for the hero shooter, which is a shame because the game is in such a good state these days that it shouldn’t have to rely on other properties.I don’t want to diminish how much cool shit Blizzard has put into Overwatch 2 in the past few seasons. The Perks system, which allows you to upgrade your hero’s kit over the course of a match, has reinvigorated several heroes in its roster in standard play. The build-centric Stadium mode is easily one of the biggest overhauls the game has gotten in the past decade, and is an incredible new way to play the game. Blizzard’s doing some really incredible stuff right now, and is making the most of a bad situation after years of broken promises. But man, I’m less enthusiastic about the reliance on collaboration skins because it feels like the game is slowly becoming Fortnite. There have been so many crossovers in the past few years that you could conceivably play a match made up of players all cosplaying other properties, rather than existing in the rich, underutilized world Blizzard has created.Blizzard EntertinamentThe Street Fighter crossover event will begin on May 20, bringing with it eight skins that dress Overwatch 2’s heroes as some of the most iconic fighters in Capcom’s legendary fighting game, and for what it’s worth, some of the choices are inspired. The full list is as follows:Hanzo as RyuJuno as Chun-LiWidowmaker as CammyKiriko as JuriSoldier: 76 as GuileSigma as M. BisonWinston as BlankZenyatta as DhalsimFor now, we’ve only seen Hanzo as Ryu in-game, and it looks like he’ll get emotes based on the iconic Hadouken and Tatsumaki Senpukyaku attacks. We do see every other hero in the event in the animated trailer announcing the collaboration, and it kinda seems like the skins aren’t so much the “Overwatch characters cosplaying” sort that Blizzard used to aspire to as they are just Street Fighter characters dropped wholesale into Overwatch 2. Maybe they’ll look more distinct when they’re released later this month. Click through to see all eight.Previous SlideNext Slide2 / 10List slidesJuno as Chun-LiList slidesJuno as Chun-LiScreenshot: Blizzard Entertainment / Capcom / KotakuPrevious SlideNext Slide3 / 10List slidesWinston as BlankaList slidesWinston as BlankaScreenshot: Blizzard Entertainment / Capcom / KotakuPrevious SlideNext Slide4 / 10List slidesSigma as M. BisonList slidesSigma as M. BisonScreenshot: Blizzard Entertainment / Capcom / KotakuPrevious SlideNext Slide5 / 10List slidesZenyatta as DhalsimList slidesZenyatta as DhalsimScreenshot: Blizzard Entertainment / Capcom / KotakuPrevious SlideNext Slide6 / 10List slidesSoldier: 76 as GuileList slidesSoldier: 76 as GuileScreenshot: Blizzard Entertainment / Capcom / KotakuPrevious SlideNext Slide7 / 10List slidesKiriko as JuriList slidesKiriko as JuriScreenshot: Blizzard Entertainment / Capcom / KotakuPrevious SlideNext Slide8 / 10List slidesWidowmaker as CammyList slidesWidowmaker as CammyScreenshot: Blizzard Entertainment / Capcom / KotakuPrevious SlideNext Slide9 / 10List slidesHanzo as RyuList slidesHanzo as RyuScreenshot: Blizzard Entertainment / Capcom / Kotaku

President Trump hit a 90-day pause on a whole raft of “reciprocal” tariffs aimed at U.S. trading partners around the world. While many seem skeptical that the heavily criticized and widely unpopular import taxes could come back, what if Trump decided to do just that? A new report models what would happen under that worst-case scenario and predicts a crisis for the video game industry in the process. Suggested ReadingThe Best Reveals From The Game Awards 2023 Share SubtitlesOffEnglishSuggested ReadingThe Best Reveals From The Game Awards 2023 Share SubtitlesOffEnglishThe Best Reveals From The Game Awards 2023“The imposition of the new Administration tariffs on U.S. imports of video game consoles boosts their costs significantly,” the Consumer Technology Association (CTA) writes in its May 2025 report. “Video games are not exempt from the reciprocal tariffs and face tariffs up to 145%. Imports of video game consoles were duty free until now, but average tariffs would increase to 130 percent under the new rates. The increase is owed to the fact that China is currently the source of 87 percent of U.S. imports, and those imports face a new tariff of 145 percent.”Screenshot: CTA / KotakuIf the pause lapses, reciprocal tariffs of up to 46 percent on Vietnam and other countries return, and the rest of the current import taxes continue, the CTA predicts that game console prices would jump by as much as 69.4 percent if the full tariff costs were passed on to consumers. That could mean a hike of up to $428 on the most expensive machines like a PS5 Pro. “American consumers would pay $12 billion more for video game consoles,” the report claims. “As a result, U.S. consumers reduce overall [game console] purchases by 73 percent.”That worst-case scenario would come close to crippling console gaming in its largest market in the world. Fewer consoles sales mean fewer new games being bought, with knock-on effects that quickly filter out to the rest of the ecosystem, especially as each dollar spent on tariffs takes away from money that might have otherwise been spent on a new indie release or battle pass. Trump’s original rollout of the reciprocal tariffs was enough to get Nintendo to halt pre-orders for the Switch 2. Once the freeze was announced, the Mario maker later declared that the upcoming console would remain priced at $450, though individual accessories including controllers and cameras would each go up by $5. But that freeze is currently set to run out on July 9 at midnight. “Our basic policy is to recognize tariffs as a cost when determining sales prices in any country or region and to incorporate them into the price,” Nintendo President Shuntaro Furukawa said during a press conference following the company’s latest earnings report on Thursday, according to Reuters. “If the assumptions regarding tariffs change significantly, we would like to consider what price adjustments we should make and implement them after considering various aspects.” Even if the reciprocal tariffs don’t come back, it’s unlikely that other gaming consoles predominantly still manufactured in China will remain at their current prices. Microsoft already hiked up the price of the Xbox Series X by $100, and is expected to make this year’s Call of Duty the first $80 entry in the multiplayer shooter franchise. It now seems like only a matter of time before Sony does the same, sending the PlayStation 5 up to $600 and the PS5 Pro closer to $1,000. If you were already planning on picking one up at some point, you probably don’t want to wait any longer..

Usually in an RPG, when you think “absolute assbeating swordwielder” in a video game, you picture the likes of Cecil from Final Fantasy IV, Auron from FFX, or even someone like Hulkenberg from Metaphor ReFantazio. What you’re usually not thinking of is a tiny befreckled orphan girl who wins the Mia Goth soundalike contest.Suggested ReadingThis Innovative Hades-Like Feels Built For Speedrunners Share SubtitlesOffEnglishview videoSuggested ReadingThis Innovative Hades-Like Feels Built For Speedrunners Share SubtitlesOffEnglishBut don’t get it twisted, once the rapier comes out, everything that ain’t part of the Expedition is about to get their life expectancy cut real short. Maelle is Clair Obscur’s indisputable five tool player, and we’re gonna show you how to start running shit the second she’s in your party.Screenshot: Sandfall Interactive / Justin Clark / KotakuMaelle’s weapon of choice is a fencing rapier; and you best believe she knows how to use it. Actually, so should you, since nearly all of her additional moves are, basically, fencing strategies disguised as stat changes. With only a couple of late game exceptions, and a couple of stray Fire abilities we’ll get into, the vast majority of her obtainable skills are about doing either heavy Physical damage, or applying some diabolical shit to enemies in order to do heavy Physical damage. Even if she’s not the one to do the damage, she’s got the skills to set someone else up for success. “Oh ho ho ho,” you might say, “but those are all 1-3 hits and Fire skills. She still has her work cut out dealing with shields.” Au fucking contraire, mon ami, she’s got a skill called Breaking Rules that’s not even terribly far into her skill tree that literally nullifies shields, no matter how many the enemy’s got slapped on. You know that one Nevron with the floating orbs, and shooting one puts six shields on everybody else on the field? Light work. The game should literally come up with a prompt that asks “Are you sure you want to make the biggest mistake of your stupid life” if you ever try to remove Maelle from your party? Screenshot: Sandfall Interactive / Claire Jackson / KotakuBut of course, there’s the real reason you’re here, which is to figure out how to effectively use the Stance system. And the key word is “effectively,” because it’s extremely easy to get caught out there in Offense Mode, wondering why Maelle just got merked by a leaf hitting her face in a stiff breeze. To be fair, the game explains her mechanic way too quick, so let’s go over bascis again.. Every one of Maelle’s abilities puts her into one of four Stances each with their own perks/drawbacks:Stanceless: Where you start in every battle. No effects. Defensive Stance: Take less damage; gain 1 extra AP on every successful dodge or parry.Offensive Stance: Deal 50% more damage, but also take 50% more damage.Virtuose Stance: Deal 200% damage.Now, while Maelle’s skill set can absolutely slay a field of enemies, you still have to think of her in fencing terms. Overextension can get you stabbed, while being a turtle on constant defense doesn’t get things done. Meanwhile, the game actually incentivizes you to keep moving by giving you an additional AP every time you change stances. So, figuring out what to put on her to give you the least vulnerability while still being as effective as she needs to be is the trick of it, but there’s a lot of flexibility therein. The dream, of course, is to get in Virtuose Mode, where Maelle is become death, destroyer of worlds. But even then, you only get two turns to do the most damage with that, and your team may have other needs, like with one of her skills that grants Shell, or if, say, they’re all dead, and you need to use Phoenix Flame to rez them all. For much of the game, the only elemental damage Maelle will have access to is all Fire-based. You get Void damage way down the line. You’ll figure out how that plays out on your own by then. And even then, Fire is going to be enough, especially since the easiest way to get Maelle into Virtuose Mode most of the time is Burning an enemy and hitting them with Swift Stride. Yes, that means go get that off your Skill Board ASAP; it’s gonna be a mainstay through much of the first half of the game. So, naturally, giving Maelle or her companions Fire abilities to back her up and take advantage of the constant Burn is gonna be an imperative. But, even if you decide otherwise, Maelle’s got plenty of her own. She’ll start with Spark which will get the job done, just know that you’ll have to blow a turn to cast it and it’s already gonna cost you another one to cast Swift Stride. Screw that, let somebody else get that ball rolling, least till you pick up the far more devastating Rain of Fire skill for her later. Both are effective, though worth noting that while Spark will put Maelle in Defensive Mode, Rain of Fire ends with her in Offensive. Be prepared for whatever’s coming next. Once she’s Virtuosed out, though, you’ll need to capitalize as best you can, and in the early going, the Critical Burn Picto/Lumina (Critical Hit chance goes up 25% on Burning enemies) is a pretty easy place to start. It’d be nice if one of your companions can slap a Mark or Defenseless on your prey, but the irony there is that if the enemy is Burning already, that first hit will remove the status. Be mindful of the play order on the left of the battle screen so you can line that up just right and have Maelle go right after an enemy’s been afflicted. Percee and Fleuret Fury are usually a death sentence for enemies after that, and since she’s likely gonna be the last thing a lot of lesser enemies see, Maelle can get a lot of use out of the Dead Energy Picto (3 AP after killing an enemy). But in the event those two skills don’t put a Nevron out of its misery, Fleuret Fury will at least re-up on Virtuose. The main issue here is that Fleuret Fury’s expensive. Keeping Maelle topped off on AP is crucial but, especially for a character like Lune who’s less useful in a fight where the elements aren’t as effective, it’s worthwhile having someone whose primary job it is to keep Maelle juiced up if her Pictos haven’t gotten to kick in.Once she’s tapped out, though, your new job is making sure Maelle can build up to a full bar of AP again. And early on, that’s not as easy as it sounds. A Picto like Energising Pain (1 AP after taking damage) can help, but this is the exact situation Defensive Mode is good for, making sure she can take a hit and likely survive longer than her friends.Nail these principles and our little fencer will be an absolute menace against anything that threatens the Expedition.Clair Obscur: Expedition 33 is available now on PS5, Xbox Series X/S, and Windows PCs.

Have you heard the news? There’s a new Pope. Pope Leo XIV to be precise, aka Robert Francis Prevost. He was born in Chicago. Graduated a Villanova wildcat. Now he’s the first American Pope, which was such an honor to realize. Catholics make up less than 20 percent of the global population, but everyone’s got an opinion about the newest guy wearing the holiest robes. Suggested ReadingGTA 6 Beers Look Tasty As Hell Share SubtitlesOffEnglishview videoSuggested ReadingGTA 6 Beers Look Tasty As Hell Share SubtitlesOffEnglishThe internet has changed a lot since the last Pope was selected back in 2013. For example, Pope Francis was not a known poster at the time, unlike Pope Leo XIV who has tweets going back years. Here’s one about how the death penalty is bad. Here’s him retweeting priest memes. He’s from the south of Chicago but is reportedly a Cubs fan. He might be the first Pope ever to have eaten a Chicago hot dog. When the white smoke was first spotted rising from the Vatican on Thursday, many hoped it meant their boy Pizzaballa had won the Conclave royale. Maybe next time.Screenshot: Bluesky / KotakuScreenshot: Bluesky / KotakuScreenshot: Bluesky / KotakuScreenshot: Bluesky / KotakuScreenshot: Bluesky / KotakuHopefully, he’s a good pope, for whatever that amounts to. In the meantime, the Giant Bomb (rip) wiki remains online and has a decent list of all pope sightings in video games. While his holiness’ depiction in the Assassin’s Creed games is well established, I had no idea the pope is also featured in Electronic Super Joy. The 2013 indie action platformer also features a level in which you need to fight the pope. Doing so restores peace to Groove City and the new pope helps you on your adventure. While it remains unknown at this time if Pope Leo XIV has ever played a video game—perhaps a few rounds of Pac-Man or Space Invaders in the back of a pizza shop in the ‘80s—the Catholic Church did recently make young Pokémon and Halo fan Carlo, who died of leukemia, into the first gamer saint. Maybe Leo XIV can become the first gamer pope. .

Fallout’s highly anticipated Season 2 is done filming as confirmed by some of the stars of the show, including The Ghoul himself, Walton Goggins, who is now free to rip off all those prosthetics and smile. And that’s nice. I’m happy for you, Mr. Goggins. Suggested ReadingWhy Fallout: New Vegas Is Still Canon After The TV Show Share SubtitlesOffEnglishview videoSuggested ReadingWhy Fallout: New Vegas Is Still Canon After The TV Show Share SubtitlesOffEnglish Amazon and Bethesda’s live-action Fallout TV show show premiered back in April 2024 to positive reviews from critics and (most) fans. The post-apocalyptic series was also nominated for a ton of awards, won two Emmys, and was one of the most watched TV shows of 2024. Its success led to a massive surge in popularity for basically every Fallout game currently available. So nobody was shocked to learn that shortly after Fallout premiered, Amazon ordered a second season. That next season will be set, at least partially, in New Vegas, as teased by the season one finale. Since then, we’ve seen some sets from season 2's version of New Vegas leak online. And now we know that filming for the upcoming season has wrapped.On May 8, the official Fallout TV show Twitter account posted the message: “Achievement unlocked! Fallout Season 2 has wrapped production.” Included in that post was a short video of Walton Goggins, who plays The Ghoul, ripping off all his prosthetics and makeup. By the end he has got most of it off and can be seen smiling. Elsewhere, Ella Purnell—who plays Lucy in Fallout—posted on Instagram that the show had wrapped production. She also shared a selfie with Kyle MacLachlan, who plays her dad in the series. I’m very jealous that she gets to hang out with MacLachlan while making Fallout. That sounds awesome. I’d be willing to wear some gross ghoul prosthetics to get a chance like that. Fallout season 2 doesn’t yet have a release date. It will likely not be available on Amazon Prime until early 2026. .

In new interviews, the devs behind Tony Hawk’s Pro Skater 3+4 have explained why the popular career mode from the original THPS4 isn’t going to be included in the upcoming remake. Suggested ReadingThe Week In Games: What’s Releasing Beyond Exoprimal Share SubtitlesOffEnglishview videoSuggested ReadingThe Week In Games: What’s Releasing Beyond Exoprimal Share SubtitlesOffEnglishAnnounced in March after a bunch of rumors, Tony Hawk’s Pro Skater 3+4 looks to be a fantastic remake of two of the best skateboarding games ever made. THPS 3+4 is set to launch in July on consoles and PC, boasting improved visuals, quality-of-life features, and new levels. But the open world and the NPC quest givers found in THPS4's original career mode won’t be included. Instead, they have been replaced by the same two-minute runs and objectives found in the first three games. This upset a lot of hardcore players. And now Iron Galaxy, the team behind the remaster package, has explained why it cut the OG career mode. Speaking to Game Informer, THPS 3+4 design director Mike Rossi said that the team looked at THPS 1+2 and thought it was a good representation of the essence of those OG games. So they looked back at 3 and 4 before developing this new remake. “We looked at 3, and that was obviously another very highly regarded title in the franchise. So then it was, ‘Let’s look at 4. It’s quite different, but what, at its essence, is it?’ Our goal here is to make the ultimate package of 3 and 4. So ultimately, we felt that taking it into feeling more towards the 3 format, as opposed to what 4 did originally, was a better representation for a cohesive package that we were making.” In a different interview with Gaming Bible, THPS 3+4 game director Kurt Tillmanns said that once they put the timer in THPS 4's levels, they knew that “this is totally going to work.”“We recreated some of those classic goals that you remember [from THPS 4]; skitching the professor’s car, freeing the prisoner — in this new format all of those things still work.”Activision / PlayStationSpeaking to Press Start, Rossi was asked if the inclusion of an option to extend the timer in THPS 3+4's career mode for up to an hour—as opposed to the hard and fast two minutes found in the old games—was a reaction to the negative feedback they received from fans who wanted the open-world career mode of THPS 4. “No,” said Rossi. “We knew going into it that it was going to be tough and that people were going to be looking at it. But we felt this was the right way to approach it, and it made it a more cohesive package. We had already been thinking, you know, we’ve got the mods, which, in our eyes, is another way of putting accessibility things in.”“And a lot of the feedback we were getting internally, plus we’d see online, was that people didn’t always love the two-minute timer. You know, they’d want just a little bit more time. ‘Oh, I was just about to figure that out, or finish this thing. If only I had one more minute.’ And so why not give them that extra minute, or whatever extra time they want? It doesn’t feel like that impacts the overall goal that we’re trying to accomplish; it doesn’t impact progression,” said Rossi. “So we just threw that in, it’s a nice coincidence, and now, hopefully, we can point to that as a solution for those people who are looking for more time in those levels.”I’m not sure these answers will calm fans who believe the open-world format of THPS4's levels was a big part of the game’s identity. But at this point we are just a few a months away from launch and the devs sound committed to the objective-based run format for THPS 4. It’s a shame for fans of the OG game, but at least the original game is still around for those who prefer it. Tony Hawk’s Pro Skater 3+4 launches July 11 on Xbox, Game Pass, PlayStation, Switch, and PC. .

If you spend any amount of time online, you’ll find that, as is common with anything cool on the internet, there’s a ton of discourse surrounding the Huntress in Path of Exile 2. Some find her incredible, myself included. Others think she’s weak, subpar, and squishy. To those doubters, I’d like to emphasize that I’m pushing endgame with a homemade build, playing almost entirely solo, and I find the Huntress to be stronger than any I’ve played previously. If you want to enjoy her the same, here are a few tips to help you get the most out of the Huntress!Suggested ReadingWhat Is Dragonsplague? Dragon’s Dogma 2’s Devastating Contagion Explained Share SubtitlesOffEnglishview videoSuggested ReadingWhat Is Dragonsplague? Dragon’s Dogma 2’s Devastating Contagion Explained Share SubtitlesOffEnglish 1. Dexterity is essential2. Lightning Spear dominates all3. Ask for help in the chat!Screenshot: Grinding Gear Games / KotakuDexterity in Path of Exile 2 measures agility, attack speed, accuracy, and evasion. It’s movement incarnate, and if you’re wise enough to invest in additional attribute points for Dexterity on the Passive Skill Tree, you’ll find the Huntress becomes a highly mobile, hard-hitting, and accurate woman with a grudge and a spear. That said, don’t be like me. Initially, I incorrectly assumed that dropping points into Strength would ensure a higher damage output with my melee-based attacks and Spear Throw. While helpful in some odd cases, Dexterity reigns supreme here. So hit those nodes!Screenshot: Grinding Gear Games / KotakuThere are numerous viable builds for the Huntress, including a powerful Bleed build that will likely wind up the go-to for many. However, I’ve found that during my playtime, it’s Lightning Spear dominating enemies. It’s especially useful in clearing groups with the following combo:Whirling Slash x3DisengageLightning SpearWhirling Slash is an excellent AOE (area-of-effect)attack that creates a whirlwind with your spear, dealing melee damage and causing knockback. Hit that two or three times, then pop Disengage to create a bit of breathing room, and immediately launch Lightning Spear into your Whirling Slash. It’ll combine with the whirlwind, enhancing your lightning damage significantly and wiping mobs with a satisfying pop!Screenshot: Grinding Gear Games / KotakuAs an active member of the Path of Exile 2 community, I’ll be the first to tell you that those who hang around in global chat tend to be some of the sweatiest die-hard fans in the game. They’re looking to discuss the merits of specific builds or prophesize the end of PoE 2 due to Grinding Gear Games’ decisions. Despite the loud-mouth players bogging down chat, if you take a moment to type out a quick message, a simple, “Hey, can anyone help me beat this boss?” you’ll find numerous players willing to drop everything to help.That said, Huntress proves rather powerful. I managed to push through to endgame primarily solo, only asking for help for four or five of the big bosses, including Ketzuli and Viper Napuatzi, the former because my build didn’t have enough fire resistance. The latter because, well, it’s Viper. Everyone could use help with Viper.The point is, don’t hesitate to ask for help, no matter your class!Path of Exile 2 “Dawn of the Hunt” is on now, and players are rushing to the endgame, so join the fun on PS5, Xbox Series X/S, and Windows PCs!

Grand Theft AutoByKenneth ShepardPublished18 minutes agoWe may earn a commission from links on this page.Screenshot: Rockstar Games / KotakuI was gonna play Grand Theft Auto 6Jason and Lucia. While Jason is in a loving relationship with Lucia and seemingly straight (to be determined), that hasn’t stopped gay men from latching onto the guy after he was shown shirtless, sweaty and gross in the latest trailer. Grand Theft Auto 6 may still be a year away, but its male lead is already becoming a sex symbol among the gay community after just two trailers.Suggested ReadingYou Should Play Grand Theft Auto III Before GTA VI | Total Recall Share SubtitlesOffEnglishview videoSuggested ReadingYou Should Play Grand Theft Auto III Before GTA VI | Total Recall Share SubtitlesOffEnglishIt’s easy to see why gays are latching onto the guy. Rockstar probably knew what it was doing when it led the latest trailer with a scene of Jason working hard while his jacked upper body glistened in the sunlight. Though choosing this scene probably had a double meaning, as Jason mentions that he’s “fixing some leaks” on a rooftop, which is likely a nod to the giant leak GTA 6 suffered in 2023. While Jason’s filthy, country trashbandit disposition may win over some ladies, too, it’s the kind of thing gays flock to. Sure, there’s probably something to unpack about gay guys gravitating towards men who look like they wouldn’t respect them, but that’s a psychologist’s job, and I am simply a gay man who is predictably drawn to men who look like they would call me a slur. But I’m not alone. Plenty of us are thirsting for the next Grand Theft Auto protagonist in the out-of-pocket ways they tend to.This is a win for the girls and the gays. A mere 20 seconds of footage has piqued the interest of every gay gamer you’ve ever met. That’s exquisite targeted marketing on Rockstar’s part, and now the game will get even more free promotion through the inevitable bump in Rule 34 searches for Jason in the coming months. Not that the game really needs that much promotion. This is the kind of game that sells millions of copies on the first day, then stays near the top of the charts for several years. But it’s nice to see Rockstar is aware of every market it can possibly corner..

Start SlideshowStart SlideshowScreenshot: Lucasfilm / KotakuStar Wars Andor is back just over two years after its first season ended on Disney+. The first three episodes of season two premiered on Disney+ on April 22 and the show is just as good as before, with lots of great dialogue, intense action, and a whole bunch of tension. And sprinkled throughout Season 2 are some fantastic Easter eggs and references to the greater Star Wars universe. Like season one, Andor’s second season (so far) hasn’t been packed with Easter eggs and callbacks. Instead, these nods to the rest of theStar Wars franchise are a bit more buried or integrated organically with the story, so you might have missed some of them. Don’t worry, I’m always here to help. Here are 24 Star Wars Easter eggs, secrets, and references I spotted in the first nine episodes of Andor season two. We will be updating this list each week with new stuff as more episodes drop. Screenshot: Lucasfilm / KotakuPrevious SlideNext SlideList slidesYes, that was Yavin-4List slidesYes, that was Yavin-4Screenshot: Lucasfilm / KotakuLet’s start with the biggest and most exciting Easter egg. When Andor finally escapes the dysfunctional rebels, we get a shot of his ship flying away and see that all of this has been happening on the jungle moon of Yavin-4. Yes, the same Yavin-4 seen in the original Star Wars movie. This will eventually become the HQ of the Rebellion, but for now its temples remain abandoned.Previous SlideNext SlideList slidesA little girl with an AT-ST toyList slidesA little girl with an AT-ST toyScreenshot: Lucasfilm / KotakuA smaller Easter egg I spotted was the appearance of an AT-ST puppet held by a child as seen in the third episode, Harvest. Bit odd to let your kids play with a war machine controlled by the evil empire that rules over you. But hey, parents let kids play with toys referencing the US military so... (Oh and yes, another kid has a bowcaster toy, too. Chewbacca would be proud. Or confused.)Previous SlideNext SlideList slidesMore info about the Rakatan invasionList slidesMore info about the Rakatan invasionScreenshot: Lucasfilm / KotakuBack in season one of Andor, Luthen mentioned the Rakatan invasion. This is a direct reference to Knights of the Old Republic and some old “Legends” era lore. Now, in season two, Luthen has given us more detail and confirmed that, in canon, the alien invasion happened 25,000 BBY. That lines up with the dawn of the Jedi and could confirm that the Rakatan will show up in James Mangold’s Star Wars movie set that far back in the timeline.Previous SlideNext SlideList slides“Unlimited Power”List slides“Unlimited Power”Screenshot: Lucasfilm / KotakuAt one point, during Director Krennic’s super-secret meeting with other Imperial higher-ups, he mentions that the Emperor wants an energy source that could provide “unlimited power.” Of course, this is connected to the Death Star, but that specific line also calls back one of the Emperor’s most famous quotes from Star Wars Episode III. Previous SlideNext SlideList slidesWulf Yularen / Tarkin referencedList slidesWulf Yularen / Tarkin referencedScreenshot: Lucasfilm / KotakuAlso during that same super-secret space-Nazi meeting, Krennic explains that the only people who can know about this gathering are the people in the room. He then directly namedrops two Imperial higher-ups: Moff Tarkin and Wulf Yularen. Of the two, Tarkin is perhaps the most interesting namedrop, as we know the two of them have some beef which we see in Rogue One. It’s very funny to think that Krennic specifically made sure Tarkin was kept out of the loop on his Ghorman plans.Previous SlideNext SlideList slidesCanon debut of the TIE AvengerList slidesCanon debut of the TIE AvengerScreenshot: Lucasfilm / KotakuIn the opening minutes of the first episode of season two, we see Andor steal a prototype TIE Avenger. This is an advanced Imperial starfighter we had only previously seen in some “Legends” stories. Seeing it in live-action was a treat, even if Andor nearly crashed it like 10 times.Previous SlideNext SlideList slidesRange Troopers returnList slidesRange Troopers returnScreenshot: Lucasfilm / KotakuWhen Andor steals the TIE Avenger he is attacked by Stormtroopers, but we also see a different kind of trooper during the fight. This fluffy soldier with a rocket launcher is a Range Trooper. We first saw them in Solo: A Star Wars Story on the planet Vandor. They are highly trained troopers normally deployed in places where the Empire needs a lot of security.Previous SlideNext SlideList slidesErskin Semaj appearsList slidesErskin Semaj appearsScreenshot: Lucasfilm / KotakuI don’t need to explain how awesome it was that Erskin Semaj appeared. Okay, I probably do. During episode three, when Luthen is talking to a young man about where he is from, they are interrupted by a drunken Tay bumping into them. That young boy is Erskin Semaj, an aide of Mon Mothma’s first seen in Star Wars Rebels. Is he an important character? No, but hey, it was cool to see the show include him as it makes sense he’d be at that wedding.Previous SlideNext SlideList slidesThe importance of ‘Kafrene’List slidesThe importance of ‘Kafrene’Screenshot: Lucasfilm / KotakuThe password, Kafrene, given to Andor by the Imperial engineer at the start of episode one isn’t some random planet or made-up nonsense. (Okay, well, this is all made-up nonsense, but you know what I mean.) Kafrene is actually where we first meet Cassian Andor in Rogue One. Specifically, the Ring of Kafrene is a seedy mining colony where Cassian learns of the Death Star and kills a dude. Kafrene is also set to appear in the upcoming tactical game Star Wars Zero Company as the squad’s HQ.Previous SlideNext SlideList slidesFirst look at GhormanList slidesFirst look at GhormanScreenshot: Lucasfilm / KotakuIn Star Wars, the planet Ghorman is the site of the infamous Ghorman Massacre, an event that we know happened in canon, though we don’t know the specifics of it. This season of Andor seems to be building toward the massacre, which is a pivotal event in Star Wars as it kickstarts the rebellion and pushes Mon Mothma to publicly stand up against the Empire. We actually see Mothma stand against the Empire and then escape into hiding in an episode of Rebels. It seems Andor is going to fill in that part of the timeline and show us the massacre.Previous SlideNext SlideList slidesThe Ghorman Massacre From LegendsList slidesThe Ghorman Massacre From LegendsScreenshot: Lucasfilm / KotakuA big moment in Star Wars history, one that we’ve never seen before, is the Ghorman Massacre. This moment is what spurs Mon Mothma to publicly call out the Emperor and helps galvanize the rebellion. In Legends, the massacre happened when Grand Moff Tarkin landed a large ship on a group of protestors. And now we know that it still happened, but it isn’t the massacre that will eventually lead to Mothma taking a public stand against the Empire. It’s an interesting way to honor the past and old EU stories, while still letting series creator Tony Gilroy and company tell their own new story. And if you don’t know anything about Star Wars lore, it just adds some extra flavor to the world.Previous SlideNext SlideList slidesPodracing!List slidesPodracing!Screenshot: Lucasfilm / KotakuThis is an easy-to-miss Easter egg, but when Syril returns to the office to get his notes (and contact someone about his secret mission), he distracts some guards from watching a podrace. We first saw podracing in The Phantom Menace, and it’s fun to see it still being a sport all these years later.Previous SlideNext SlideList slidesThe Resistance HQ From The Force AwakensList slidesThe Resistance HQ From The Force AwakensScreenshot: Lucasfilm / KotakuDid Saw’s HQ on the planet D’Qar in episodes 4 and 5 look a little familiar? That’s because we’ve seen this grassy military base before in The Force Awakens and The Last Jedi. This is where Leia’s Resistance is headquartered before they are attacked by the First Order and have to escape.Previous SlideNext SlideList slidesMassiff mealList slidesMassiff mealScreenshot: Lucasfilm / KotakuWhile on D’Qar we see Saw’s rebel group eating an alien that is being cooked over a fire. This being Star Wars, it shouldn’t surprise you that this isn’t some random alien created just for this scene. Nope! This is a Massiff, a spiky lizard-alien-dog that is common on Tatooine. Tusken Raiders often have them as pets and guard dogs. How did it end up here? I don’t know. I await the five-part comic miniseries explaining this alien dog’s origins.Previous SlideNext SlideList slidesYes, That Was Bail OrganaList slidesYes, That Was Bail OrganaScreenshot: Lucasfilm / KotakuNo, you’re not going crazy, that was Bail Organa that popped up briefly to say hi to Mon Mothma during the Imperial Ball. However, this time around, the character wasn’t played by Jimmy Smits but instead by Benjamin Bratt. Don’t worry, Smits isn’t dead or anything like that. Instead, he just couldn’t appear in the show due to a scheduling conflict. It’s a shame that Smits won’t get to finish out Organa’s pre-New Hope storyline, but Bratt is a solid replacement, and I’m happy Organa will be a part of Andor’s final season as the character is a key part of the rebellion.Previous SlideNext SlideList slidesGrand Vizier mentioned aka that big blue alien dude from the prequelsList slidesGrand Vizier mentioned aka that big blue alien dude from the prequelsScreenshot: Lucasfilm / KotakuA very tiny Easter egg, but one I love, is that at some point, Luthen and his assistant Kleya were able to overhear a conversation by the Emperor’s Grand Vizier Mas Amedda aka that big blue guy from the prequels. Amedda is a fascinating character in Star Wars as he’s one of the very few people in the galaxy who know about the Emperor’s true nature as a Sith Lord. Previous SlideNext SlideList slides“The Lab at Eadu”List slides“The Lab at Eadu”Screenshot: Lucasfilm / KotakuIn a conversation with Dedra Meero, ISB Major Partagaz mentions that they really need the Kalkite buried in Ghorman, as Krennic and his science team back in “the lab at Eadu” haven’t figured out a suitable synthetic replacement. Eadu is the rainy, rocky world first seen in Rogue One where Jynn Erso’s dad, Galen, is being held as he is forced to work on the Death Star project. Previous SlideNext SlideList slidesForce healerList slidesForce healerScreenshot: Lucasfilm / KotakuWhile on Yavin, Bix takes Andor to a Force healer to help him with a blaster wound. He’s not a big believer in the Force, but the healer senses Andor and immediately shows up to talk cryptically about his future and his spirit. We first saw Force healing in canon in The Clone Wars, but it became a big deal when Rey did it multiple times in Rise of Skywalker.Previous SlideNext SlideList slidesDraven and MelshiliList slidesDraven and MelshiliScreenshot: Lucasfilm / KotakuWhile on Yavin Andor talks to General Draven, who isn’t happy about him leaving whenever he wants. This is a character who first appeared in Rogue One. Later, in the comics, he was killed by Darth Vader after helping delay the Empire and letting Leia and other rebels escape after the events of The Battle of Yavin. Meanwhile, we see Vel pick up a blaster she recognizes as something used by Andor and asks who owns it. Turns out that person is Melshi, a soldier we see in Rogue One but who was also a prisoner in Narkina 5 with Andor. And yeah, they probably should have given a bit more context about him because I think most people were like “Who is that?” Previous SlideNext SlideList slides“Rebellions Are Built on Hope”List slides“Rebellions Are Built on Hope”Screenshot: Lucasfilm / KotakuThis famous Cassian Andor line from Rogue One probably didn’t need an origin story, but it was nice to see a random hotel clerk on Ghorman provide it. Truly, anyone can be a rebel in the fight against fascism.Previous SlideNext SlideList slidesThe Ghorman MassacreList slidesThe Ghorman MassacreScreenshot: Lucasfilm / KotakuAnd here we are. We knew going into this season that we’d eventually see the Ghorman Massacre on screen for the first time. After years of it being mentioned in shows like Rebels and other reference books, we finally got to see it, and it was a horrific moment that only could have happened in a show as grounded and mature as Andor.Previous SlideNext SlideList slidesCassian’s familiar rifleList slidesCassian’s familiar rifleScreenshot: Lucasfilm / KotakuWhile on Ghorman to assassinate Dedra, Cassian brings a modular blaster rifle that can be modified into a pistol. This is the same rifle he uses in Rogue One to try and kill Galen Erso.Previous SlideNext SlideList slidesK-2SO origins changedList slidesK-2SO origins changedScreenshot: Lucasfilm / KotakuFor the most part, Andor has been careful not to change canon or ignore past Star Wars events. But a big shift happened in the show’s eighth episode, as we now have a brand new origin story for how Andor found K-2SO. Previously, before the events of Rogue One, a comic book established that the droid arrested Andor during a mission and was turned off and partially reprogrammed into the sort-of-helpful-but-still-sassy robot companion we see in the movie. Now, he tried to kill Andor and was destroyed by a Ghorman rebel before being taken back by Cassian to Yavin, where he was rebuilt by a team of slicers who, instead of reprogramming K-2SO, just suppressed some of his “impulses” and “orders” to make him a useful ally. Personally, I don’t mind retconning this because the original origin wasn’t that interesting. I don’t think this new version is much better, but at least it connects the droid to a big moment in Star Wars history.Previous SlideNext SlideList slidesSenator Mothma meeting up with Gold SquadronList slidesSenator Mothma meeting up with Gold SquadronScreenshot: Lucasfilm / KotakuAfter saving Mothma from the Empire after her powerful speech against the Emperor, Andor isn’t given the mission to take her back to Yavin. Instead, she is to be handed off to Gold Squadron via another ship and will make a bigger speech about the rebellion in an effort to rewrite the narrative. We see this moment and this speech in the animated show Rebels. It’s interesting that, after giving a big speech about truth, Mothma is about to help create some propaganda herself. I guess, as Luthen said himself, sometimes you have to use the tools of your enemies to defeat them. .

Are you looking for a new video game to play on your PlayStation 5, PS5 Pro, or even your aging PS4 console? Do you not want to spend more than, like, $20 bucks? Well, today is your lucky day. Sony is running a massive PSN sale focused on $20-or-less video game deals. Suggested ReadingThe Week In Games: What’s Coming Out Beyond Assassin's Creed Mirage Share SubtitlesOffEnglishview videoSuggested ReadingThe Week In Games: What’s Coming Out Beyond Assassin's Creed Mirage Share SubtitlesOffEnglishThe sale started on May 7 and features over 1,000 video games across basically every genre imaginable, and all of them are priced at or under $20. There’s a solid mix of newer games—stuff released in the last five years or so, like the fantastic Resident Evil 4 remake—and older titles, like Assassin’s Creed Syndicate which turns 10 years old this year. Wild! But don’t let the age scare you off. Not that long ago Ubisoft updated it to run at 60FPS on PS5 and PS5 Pro, so now is the best time to jump in and check it out. This big under $20 sale is live now and ends on May 21, so you have about two weeks to scrounge up $20 and pick up something cheap. Here are some recommendations from us to help you find your next game:Resident Evil 4 [Remake] - $20 ($40) Assassin’s Creed Valhalla - $15 ($60) Assassin’s Creed Odyssey - $12 ($60) Assassin’s Creed Origins - $9 ($60) Assassin’s Creed Syndicate Gold Ed. - $15 ($50) Need For Speed Heat - $6 ($60) Need For Speed Payback - $5 ($20) RoboCop: Rogue City - $9 ($60) Call of Duty: WWII Gold Ed. - $20 ($60) Call of Duty: Ghosts Gold Ed. - $20 ($60) Call of Duty Advanced Warfare Gold Ed. - $20 ($60) The Last of Us Remastered PS4 - $10 ($20) Bloodborne - $10 ($20) Dark Souls Remastered - $20 ($40) Dark Souls II: Scholar of the First Sin - $20 ($40) Uncharted Collection - $9 ($20) Dragon Age Inquisition - $10 ($40) Mad Max - $5 ($20) Soul Calibur VI - $10 ($60) The Outer Worlds - $10 ($30) Evil West - $18 ($60) MGS V: The Phantom Pain - $12 ($20) Psychonauts 2 - $12 ($60) Just Cause 3 - $3 ($20) Watch Dogs 2 Deluxe Ed. - $9 ($60) XCOM 2 - $15 ($60) Prey - $6 ($30) Journey to the Savage Planet - $7.50 ($30) Rage 2 - $8 ($40)   .

Rockstar Games are known for their big open worlds and ambitious cinematic swings, but they are just as much about painstaking attention to detail and meticulously fusing the real and the imaginary into an uncanny send-up of American culture that’s both fun to play and hard not to marvel at. So it’s not entirely surprising that the beer looks incredible in Grand Theft Auto VI, but it’s still worth obsessing over. Suggested ReadingGTA 6 Trailer 2: 13 Details You Might Have Missed Share SubtitlesOffEnglishview videoSuggested ReadingGTA 6 Trailer 2: 13 Details You Might Have Missed Share SubtitlesOffEnglishCold ones were a major motif throughout the second GTA VI trailer, and not just because bars, clubs, and other fixtures of Vice City nightlife make up important locations in the game. It’s hot down there in not-Miami and the rest of Rockstar’s pastiche of southern Florida, a fact visually underlined by the beads of perspiration gathering on bottles even after the sun goes down. While it’s been a glaze-fest out there over the level of visual detail on display in the trailer, many fans have pointed to the beers in particular. Some are even calling them the horse testicles of GTA VI, as fans might remember that the ones in Red Dead Redemption 2 had their own physics and also got bigger or smaller depending on the temperature.One part of the trailer shows a scene in a room with the TV on (is that you, Phil Cassidy?) and two beers on the table, and the individual bubbles can be seen floating up to the surface beneath the amber glass. “If beer bubbles are 1tb of textures and graphics… I support this whole heartedly,” one person wrote. Screenshot: Bluesky / KotakuThere’s also a moment when romantic leads Jason and Lucia are outside clinking glasses on a deck. You can practically feel the gold foil peeling off of the tops of their parody Modelo bottles. The liquid even splashes inside when the bottles collide. And then there’s the treasure trove of new screenshots Rockstar released after the fact. How closely they resemble GTA VI as it will actually look when running at home on your own PlayStation 5 or Xbox Series X/S remains to be seen, but they’re certainly flexing a similar level of sudsy exceptionalism. The one that appears at the top of this article shows light glistening off the side of a beer bottle in Jason’s hand as the translucent arm of his friend Cal Hampton can be seen through the tinted glass.Another screenshot shows Cal in a pool with a beer can floating in the water next to him as little bubbles trickle up to the surface from the backwash that’s still leaking out. Warmed-over dregs of carbonation popping in 4K is as big-budget “next-gen” blockbuster as it gets. More than a decade has passed between GTA V and GTA VI, and Rockstar is clearly not taking that lightly. It seems impossible to think that the most anticipated game release ever can live up to the hype. Whether the game as a whole does or doesn’t, though, it sure looks like the beer bottles will. .

Grand Theft Auto 6's second trailer is packed with a lot of action, crime, and vehicular mayhem. This is the kind of stuff you expect to see in a GTA game. But what it also contains is something we’ve never really seen before in a Grand Theft Auto sequel: a couple cuddling and having a real relationship. And that’s the part of GTA 6Suggested ReadingGTA 6 Delay Has Enormous Implications For The Industry Share SubtitlesOffEnglishview videoSuggested ReadingGTA 6 Delay Has Enormous Implications For The Industry Share SubtitlesOffEnglishReleased on May 6 with no warning, Grand Theft Auto 6's second trailer arrived over a year after its first and featured a lot more of Jason and Lucia, the two main characters in this upcoming Rockstar open-world sequel set in Vice City and its surrounding state of Leonida. We already knew that this new sequel would feature the couple in a big way, but that trailer seems to suggest that Rockstar is aiming to make them a believable, relatable, and dare I say, cute couple. Rockstar GamesOne moment that really stuck out to me in the trailer as something we’ve never really seen in a GTA game before happens at the very end. Jason is laying on the couch half asleep and watching TV. Lucia enters the living room, tosses her keys on the table and collapses onto Jason to cuddle with him. It’s the kind of moment that most people in loving relationships have experienced. Your significant other gets back from a big trip, a hard day at work, or some other grueling experience and lands directly next to or on top of you for some comfort and love. It’s a cute and genuine moment. And it’s in the middle of a GTA trailer! Strange. This is a franchise that has mostly treated relationships as jokes. Think back to how CJ and Catalina are portrayed in GTA San Andreas. She’s a lunatic and frequently called horrible names. Similarly, in GTA V Michael’s relationship with his wife is shown to be a mostly toxic and hostile experience that only gets better at the end due to violence. There’s also the bit in GTA V where Trevor kidnaps an old woman and they fall in love. And the earlier GTA games, like Vice City, mostly treated relationships as silly punchlines about how women are annoying and controlling. In GTA 3, after saving the woman he apparently “loves,” Claude shoots her offscreen for talking too much! Yikes. The closest GTA has ever gotten to a real relationship is Nico and Kate in GTA IV. But that’s barely part of the game, and if you choose the wrong option she gets gunned down by the end. However, in the trailer for GTA 6, we see Jason and Lucia being a real couple. They seem genuinely enthralled with each other. The moment where Jason picks Lucia up out of prison and they smile warmly for a second is so unlike anything in GTA before. And throughout the trailer we see them snuggling, getting intimate, holding each other, kissing, dancing together, and even at one point holding hands. In a series that has featured so much violence and sex, it’s surreal to see two people in love and holding hands. Screenshot: Rockstar Games / KotakuNow the real question is: will Rockstar be able to pull off a full 30-70 hour game featuring a relatable and caring relationship? I don’t know. We are truly in uncharted waters for this franchise right now. But I hope they nail it. I think if Jason and Lucia’s relationship is the core of GTA 6's story, it could help it not only stand out from past GTA games, but it could signal that Rockstar has grown up a bit.Sure, it will still put in silly joke products and background signs that make me roll my eyes. But if, at the front and center of this massive AAA video game, there’s a realistic and well-done take on a real relationship between two people, that would be a wild accomplishment that I didn’t expect from a franchise famous for letting you kill sex workers to get your money back. .

The grind is just as important as the hunt in Monster Hunter Wilds. While we all want to grind away to make stylish armor, Artian Weapons are a huge focus for grinding in this installment. They’re a new customizable weapon type that functions as endgame equipment and they can come across as a little daunting between the materials needed for their unique forging process and their reinforcement system. Read on below to find out what makes Artian Weapons so special.Suggested ReadingWhat Is Dragonsplague? Dragon’s Dogma 2’s Devastating Contagion Explained Share SubtitlesOffEnglishview videoSuggested ReadingWhat Is Dragonsplague? Dragon’s Dogma 2’s Devastating Contagion Explained Share SubtitlesOffEnglish1. How to get Artian Materials2. How to Forge Artian Weapons3. How to reinforce Artian WeaponsScreenshot: Capcom / Samuel Moreno / KotakuThe best way to gather and farm Artian Materials is to go out and hunt some Tempered Monsters. You’ll earn Weapon Shards as rewards for defeating these powered-up monsters, which are then immediately appraised as one of the following four Artian Materials:Broken BladeCracked DiscCrushed TubeRusted DeviceEach of these will have a specific element type and Artian Bonus (boosting either Affinity or Attack) as traits. Both the type of material you receive from the Appraisal and its traits are completely random. The only thing that’s different across the Tempered Monsters is that tougher foes will grant higher rarity materials, similar to Hunter Symbols. My recommendation is to either hunt the strongest Tempered Monsters for rarer materials or take on quests that involve two of them so that you leave with double the amount of rewards.Hunting strong enemies isn’t the only option to attain these rare items. Another way to get Artian Materials is to visit the Melding Pot in Suja to turn unwanted Artian Materials into randomized new ones. This works just like Smelting in the Oilwell Basin, with each material you use filling up a point gauge. The option is labeled as Meld Relics and will first unlock after completing the Chapter Five Storm-Cold Vortex quest. Once you reach hunter rank 100, you’ll also unlock the option to directly craft a high-rarity material of your choice.Screenshot: Capcom / Samuel Moreno / KotakuAll of the above leads to finally forging one of these special weapons. You can do so by using the “Forge Artian Weapons” option in Gemma’s Smithy menu and offering up three Artian Materials. Not only does each weapon type use a different mix of materials, but they all need to be the same rarity to be forged together as well. Don’t be surprised if you need to hunt quite a few Tempered Monsters before it’s possible to create exactly what you want.Selecting two materials with the same element type will grant that element to your weapon. If the third material also shares the element type, it will add an element stat bonus. Although this won’t apply when forging an Artian Heavy or Light Bowgun, it will enable the use of the corresponding ammo type.Screenshot: Capcom / Samuel Moreno / KotakuWe can still take it one more step after Forging. Choosing the Reinforce/Dismantle Artian Weapons option in the Smithy menu can increase the power of these new weapons with up to five Reinforcement Bonuses. This process requires materials you gain from Festival Shares or through smelting ore. The only wrinkle is that what you receive is randomly distributed among the following bonuses:Affinity BoostAttack BoostElement BoostSharpness BoostAmmo Capacity (only for the Bowguns)Technically, you can re-roll Reinforcement Bonuses until you have what you need for your dream weapon. There appears to be an internal seed list for these enhancements that are assigned to an Artian Weapon once they’re initially forged. That means you’ll need to forge and reinforce multiple trash weapons, preferably without saving, until you find the best set of bonuses.Let’s say you want to make the dream Charge Blade, because who wouldn’t? You’ll have to keep maxing out these Artian Weapons until you discover that the sixth weapon will have the stats you want. Now you’ll need to exit without saving and reload your previous save. Forge five of those trash Artian Charge Blades again, and then finally forge your ideal Charge Blade that will pair seamlessly with the perfect Reinforcement Bonuses.It’s a tedious process that can require a lot of money and a lot of materials. I would only recommend doing this if you’re super serious about min-maxing your stats. Unless the RNG completely screws you over with the bonuses, most of the time these Artian Weapons will be a beneficial option.Monster Hunter Wilds is available now on PS5, Xbox Series X/S, and Windows PCs.

A new team has joined the ranks of PlayStation’s first-party studios. Alongside Naughty Dog, Sucker Punch, Housemarque and others now sits teamLFG, a group of ex-Bungie developers working on a mysterious “frog-type” multiplayer project. I have a lot of questions, too.Suggested ReadingWhat Is Dragonsplague? Dragon’s Dogma 2’s Devastating Contagion Explained Share SubtitlesOffEnglishview videoSuggested ReadingWhat Is Dragonsplague? Dragon’s Dogma 2’s Devastating Contagion Explained Share SubtitlesOffEnglishPlayStation Studios head Hermen Hulst announced the latest addition to his portfolio over on the PlayStation Blog in a post that was conspicuously light on actual information, including who actually works at the new studio. “TeamLFG originated at Bungie, but has also rallied developers from across the industry to bring to life an ambitious incubation project that I’m very excited about,” he wrote. “The studio is now fully formed and ready to be introduced to the world.”Headquartered in Bellevue, WA, teamLFG bills itself as a multiplayer-centric studio working on making not just games but entire virtual hangouts. “We will make immersive multiplayer worlds propelled by action games that players can learn, play, and master for countless hours. We want to build our games with our communities, inviting players to be a part of our development process through early access playtests,” an anonymous statement from the team reads. Made up of developers who worked on Destiny, Halo, League of Legends, Fortnite, Roblox, and Rec Room, teamLFG’s first project is described as “a team-based action game that draws inspiration from fighting games, platformers, MOBAs, life sims, and frog-type games.” Hmmm. It goes on to call the world players will inhabit “lighthearted” and “comedic,” and the overall aesthetic “mythic” and “science-fantasy.” Sounds like it’s aiming to be the kind of vibrant mishmash you’d expect from, say, Blizzard. The only thing that really sticks out is the “frog-type” descriptor. The term has been puzzling Bungie fans for years, ever since it was first mentioned in a hiring post back in 2023. TeamLFG was spun out of Bungie last summer amid mass layoffs at the studio as Sony took more direct control of the company behind Destiny 2 which it acquired for an eye-popping $3.6 billion in 2022. Its game was called Project Gummy Bears at the time, and was rumored to be a mix of elements from MOBAs, platformers, and life sims, combining them into a new sort of online multiplayer experience. I have no idea why it’s called “frog-type,” though tight moment-to-moment gamefeel has always been core to Bungie’s DNA and Destiny 2 has proven the developers there are masters of first-person traversal, from double jumps and blinking to satisfying booster thrusts and gliding. Maybe teamLFG’s first game will wrap all of that into an MMO-like experience where just hanging out in the world (and spending money in it) is as much a part of the experience as completing objectives. .

Steel Seed merges action combat with tense stealth sequences in a high-stakes sci-fi journey through an underground facility. Though it may lack the polish of many of the games it borrows ideas from, it provides compelling enough gameplay that genre fans may find it worth their time to see how things play out for main character Zoe and her little drone, Koby. But how much time will you need to invest exactly? Let’s take a look at how long it takes to beat Steel Seed.Suggested ReadingGTA 6 Delay Has Enormous Implications For The Industry Share SubtitlesOffEnglishview videoSuggested ReadingGTA 6 Delay Has Enormous Implications For The Industry Share SubtitlesOffEnglishSteel Seed?Steel Seed is a pretty linear game with a clear and focused campaign that should take the average player somewhere between 10-12 hours to complete. That game length doesn’t take into account finding its many collectibles, buying every upgrade, and other optional tasks.And yeah, there is a decent amount of extra stuff to do in Steel Seed if you want to go for full completion. For those who enjoy collecting everything in this type of game, though, that won’t be a bad thing, especially since it’s all relatively straightforward.You’ll need to buy every upgrade in the game from each of the three skill trees. You’ll also need to find all 114 glitch crystals, as well as various health modules, drones, notes, and more as you explore levels. In other words, you’ll have plenty to look for when you’re not engaged in the game’s stealth and action gameplay. You should expect a completionist run to add another two or three hours.If you’re going for every trophy or achievement in Steel Seed, you’ll definitely have to do all of the above—and then some. You’ll need to eliminate a certain number of specific enemy types, ensure you kill 50 enemies using your drone, and even play a couple of melodies on a piano at some point in the game. Whether you want to do everything in the game or simply see the campaign through, you can pick up Steel Seed now on PS5, Xbox Series X/S, and Windows PCs..

The next year of Destiny 2 includes a massive homage to Star Wars. Destiny 2: Renegades is an expansion coming in December complete with lightsabers and a destination that looks very reminiscent of Tatooine.Suggested ReadingStar Wars Outlaws Lost Me With Its Story Trailer Share SubtitlesOffEnglishview videoSuggested ReadingStar Wars Outlaws Lost Me With Its Story Trailer Share SubtitlesOffEnglishWhat exactly will Renegades entail besides Star Wars fonts and iconic weaponry from a galaxy far, far away? Bungie isn’t saying just yet. The announcement came as a “one more thing” tease at the end of its Year Of Prophecy showcase focused on what the future of its sci-fi MMO shooter looks like, and there’s no information yet on just how closely it will bleed into the actual Star Wars universe, though the team isn’t being shy about the inspiration.A full reveal will come in September, but for now here’s the initial teaser trailer:Bungie said the expansion, which launches before the end of 2025 pending any delays, will take players to a lawless frontier within the Destiny solar system that channels the sci-fi Western style of the Star Wars universe. Presumably there won’t be any actual fictional cross-over, even if Bungie has been known to do plenty of branded collaborations and multiverse references in the past. Players already went hands-on with their first taste of Star Wars in the world of Destiny a few months back when Stormtrooper costumes and other Star Wars-themed cosmetics were put up for sale in the game. Despite their lore-crushing vibes, live-service games have embraced more and more crossovers in recent years, presumably because despite their grumbling, that’s the stuff players are actually willing to spend money on.In fact, the Destiny 2: Year of Prophecy Ultimate Edition even comes with skins for Darth Vader and other Star Wars villains. Yes, there are about to be Darth Vaders running around Bungie’s planet-hopping space wizard playground like it’s Star Wars: Battlefront 2 or something (though unfortunately for Hunter and Warlock mains, he seems to be class-specific to Titans). It’ll be interesting to see how an entire expansion like Renegades walks the narrative continuity tightrope. Maybe it’ll remain a strictly Destiny expansion in Star Wars cosplay, or maybe it’s a chance for Bungie to try something completely different now that a decade of storytelling around its Light and Darkness saga is finally wrapped up following last year’s Final Shape climax. Destiny 2's next expansion, The Edge of Fate, will arrive on July 15 and will likely give players plenty to do in the wait for Renegades.Update 5/6/2025 3:02 p.m. ET: added info about Darth Vader skins. .