Another month, another Assassin’s Creed Shadows update, again one that comes with a list of quality of life changes, but also one that comes with another surprising collaboration. Let’s start with that one, which is, weirdly, a new story pack made in collaboration with Critical Role, the wildly popular actual play series. For some context, Critical Role did an official Assassin’s Creed themed oneshot a little while back. In said oneshot, Hi-Fi Rush‘s Robbie Daymond played a character called Rufino, who’s being added into the game through this new mission in update 1.0.6.
Frontier Developments is walking back the use of generative AI in Jurassic World Evolution 3 following backlash from fans.
Jurassic World Evolution 3 finally sprouted legs when its official reveal trailer was published as part of Summer Game Fest 2025 earlier this month. Its existence marked the end of a four-year wait for a third game in the dinosaur strategy simulation franchise, but much of the excitement was quickly soured when fans discovered that Frontier had used controversial generative AI technology to create certain scientist portraits in-game.
Shortly after this realization, fans gathered to campaign against the use of AI in Jurassic World Evolution 3 in hopes that Frontier would reverse its decision in favor of content created by actual human beings. It’s a movement that seems to have achieved the desired results, as the team behind the Jurassic Park video game now replied to a popular Steam post to confirm that generative AI portraits will be removed.
“Thanks for your feedback on this topic,” the post says. “We have opted to remove the use of generative AI for scientist portraits within Jurassic World Evolution 3.”
Those who visit the Jurassic World Evolution 3 Steam page will now find that Steam’s AI Generated Content Disclosure can no longer be found above the list of its system requirements. It’s a move that’s already being celebrated by the Jurassic World Evolution 3 community as they look forward to seeing art that wasn’t created by artificial intelligence.
“Thank you. As a dev myself, this was wholly unnecessary from the start and such an own goal that I’m happy to see the pivot, and to be able to wish the team the best for a successful launch,” one Steam user said. “Been such a fan of JWE1+2 (and PC/PZ), so this change takes me from a never-buy to a buy-at-launch!”
Frontier W
Jurassic World Evolution 3 will not use any generative AI!
I repeat: Jurassic World Evolution 3 will NOT USE ANY GENERATIVE AI!
Frontier confirmed in a statement to GameWatcher that Jurassic World Evolution 3 still has a release date of October 21, 2025, for PC, PlayStation 5, and Xbox Series X and S. In the meantime, you can read up on how other companies, such as Epic Games, Microsoft, and Capcom, are using AI in their video games.
Michael Cripe is a freelance contributor with IGN. He’s best known for his work at sites like The Pitch, The Escapist, and OnlySP. Be sure to give him a follow on Bluesky (@mikecripe.bsky.social) and Twitter (@MikeCripe).
Earlier today, Nintendo dropped a surprise on everyone by revealing Drag x Drive‘s release date on the Nintendo Today! app. And now, a few hours later, pre-orders are open — and that means the price has been revealed, too.
You can snap up the digital-only wheelchair basketball game for just $19.99 USD / GBP £16.99, which is a pretty bargain price all things considered. Many didn’t expect the game to retail at a high price given its premise, but it’s good to have confirmation.
Brilliance of the Pioneers of the Stealth Genre Recaptured by an Indie Game
Mateusz Filipek, Head of Marketing, Hyperstrange
Summary
A brief History of the Stealth genre.
Recapture the brilliance and atmosphere of the genre from an indie developer.
Aesthetics and the importance of art in stealth action.
Hideo Kojima’s Metal Gear, released in 1987, defined what we know today as the Stealth-Action genre. Not long after, the second installment of Thief along with the burgeoning series of Hitman and Splinter Cell further expanded on the concept and shaped our modern understanding of what makes a good stealth experience. Nowadays, Stealth-Action games are ever expanding in their complexity; however, during this pursuit the brilliance of the original core gameplay became somewhat lost and that is what No Sun to Worship wishes to recapture.
A Return to the Roots of the Art of Infiltration
The premise of the game’s six bite-sized chapters is quite simple: enter the area, eliminate the targets and extract safely. Your character is given the same set of tools and resources and here the developer, Merlino Games, asks the questions – how will you make the most of it? This limitation starkly contrasts with a with total freedom of how to approach each level, giving the player the power to master their craft. By sneaking, crawling, disabling surveillance, smashing light sources and moving undetected precious bullets are saved for key target or isolated threats with each mishap becoming a drain on resources. However, even once these run out, your creativity can shine: no one needs to know your trained gun is empty – as they yield all the same.
Art and the Echoes of a Dying World
No Sun To Worship not only recreates the gameplay of the pioneers of the genre, but also the retro aesthetics and the mood of the games from that era. The game’s world is a bleak one, where your role emerges through action and environment as you travel through a dying post- nuclear world .
If you yearn for the stealth games of old and wish test your infiltration and assassination skills today, then No Sun to Worship is here for you to play.
No Sun To Worship is a minimalist, stealth-action game that captures the brilliance of the first pioneers of the stealth genre and recreates their retro-aesthetic charm within an echo of a dying world.
Punishment Delivered
Each of 6 bite-sized chapters will challenge your art of infiltration and assassination by giving you freedom to approach the levels as you see fit. Sneak, crawl, disable surveillance and smash light sources to move undetected. Isolate and eliminate targets silently or start firefights on your own terms. Manage your resources wisely or be forced to get creative – The enemy doesn’t need to know the gun aimed at their head is empty.
Echo of a dying world
Discover your role and the broader canvas through environmental and non-verbal storytelling as you travel through an echo of a dying world, left in agony after a nuclear war with its inhabitants trying to stitch its broken pieces back together as the onlookers from another world observe in silence.
Ah, hello again little Visitor. It’s been a while, but we’re so pleased to see you here in the Spiral, ready to discover more about one of the picturesque amusements you’ll be touring in Little Nightmares III, coming to your PS5 and PS4 on October 10, 2025.
When you enter the world of Little Nightmares, you’ll be visiting the Nowhere, a vast and surreal land where the odds are stacked against you; where children must use their wits and courage to survive. It’s a place made for adults, you see. Where the rotten cruelty of the grown-up world is an ever-present danger, constantly permutating into new and frightening places and hosting new Residents to populate them.
This time, you’ll play Low and Alone, best friends ever since they found each other in this lonely nightmare. They have been traveling together in search of what every Visitor wants: an escape from the Nowhere. Like other Visitors, they’ve been through many harrowing moments, only surviving thanks to their teamwork and quick thinking.
Now, they have a plan that will supposedly let them leave this unpleasant dream behind, but to get to their destination, they’ll have to explore, hide, and even defend themselves, working together as a team.
Today, let’s go on an outing to Carnevale.
Low and Alone find themselves on a rainy pier in the middle of the night. In the distance, the glow of lights beckons, and once again, the smell of candied treats lingers in the air.
They are suddenly in the midst of a ramshackle fun fair, faded greasepaint and flickering bulbs shout distractions from every direction. Fortunately for the children, the local Herd are too busy playing rigged games and eating Factory sweets to notice the children sneaking around – unless they draw too much attention…
That being said, there are times when drawing the attention of the Herd is advantageous. Sometimes, you can lure these lumbering creatures into danger or use them to destroy obstacles to your progress. Then, it’s simply a matter of escaping before they can catch up to you. That shouldn’t be too hard, right, little ones?
Each broken-down attraction is hosted by a puppet barker with no visible strings and unpiloted by any visible hands. These child-sized marionettes are not very welcoming to Visitors, and will attack any little guest who wanders too close for comfort. With a bit of cooperation between Low’s bow and Alone’s wrench, they can disable these pugnacious puppets before they can strike.
It might seem like an atypically pleasant place for the Nowhere, with the relatively cheerful atmosphere, but not all is well in this three-ringed circus.
You can see it in the rotted planks of the pier, the strangled customers standing in for pinatas; and yet, the Herd marches on through the midway, dazzled by strings of flickering carbon lights and tantalized by the sighing pipes of a distant calliope, all of them unaware that death is lurking somewhere among the sodden painted canvas walls of the Carnevale big top tents.
As Low and Alone stowaway on the rickety rollercoaster headed for the main attraction, they have no idea what terrors might be waiting for them on the other side.
Someone is running this show, but who?
Find out for yourself when Little Nightmares III launches on PS5 and PS4 on October 10, 2025. Pre-order today and get access to more content!
Sony has given PlayStation VR2 (PSVR 2) owners some much-needed love by showing off four new VR games coming to fans within the next year.
The company detailed some of the PSVR 2 games players can look forward to in a PlayStation Blog post. The four titles are Dreams of Another, Grit and Valor – 1949, Hotel Infinity, and Meteora, with each offering a completely different virtual-reality experience from the last.
Dreams of Another
Topping the list of new PSVR 2 games is Q-Games’ latest entry in the PixelJunk series, Dreams of Another. This is one VR game that players already knew about, but its appearance today still comes with a new look at its mesmerizing gameplay and how virtual reality will allow players to thoroughly explore dreamlike worlds in both first- and third-person. It’s currently set to come to PC, PlayStation 5, and PSVR 2 later this year.
Grit and Valor – 1949
If you’re looking for something less serene and more action-y, then Milky Tea Studios’ Grit and Valor – 1949 might be for you. This is a real-time tactics rogue-lite from earlier this year that will soon allow PSVR 2 players to control alternate history battlefields in World War II. That means navigating through menus with the tips of your fingers and even picking up and placing units as if they’re real-life models when it launches August 21, 2025.
Hotel Infinity
Manifold Garden developer Studio Chyr is bringing its puzzle expertise to PSVR 2 with Hotel Infinity, a mind-bending experience that looks to twist player perspectives in more ways than one. Its gameplay trailer shows the slightly creepy hotel — and puzzles — VR fans can get lost in when it arrives later this year.
Meteora
Rounding out the list of Sony’s new PSVR 2 games is Meteora, a space racing game where players step into the rocky shoes of a flaming meteor in what is described as a “combat racing” game. This one is about rising to the top of leaderboards in what looks like a colorful and explosive experience, and it’s coming to PSVR 2 in 2026.
Today’s announcements at least show that Sony has a bit more gas in the tank when it comes to PSVR 2. For more, you can check out our original PSVR 2 review, where we gave the device a 9/10.
Michael Cripe is a freelance contributor with IGN. He’s best known for his work at sites like The Pitch, The Escapist, and OnlySP. Be sure to give him a follow on Bluesky (@mikecripe.bsky.social) and Twitter (@MikeCripe).
I’m not entirely sure of the cultural relevancy of Chicken Run, even if it did get one of those trendy legacy sequels back in 2023, and yet here we are with the reveal of an entire video game. The name of said game is Chicken Run: Eggstraction, and quite fittingly it is an action stealth game, one that might even look quite good?
Whether you’re opening boosters, sorting through prerelease pulls, or keeping tabs on the market for trade value, it’s clear this set is drawing serious attention.
If you’re curious which cards are in highest demand right now, either to cash in or just to see what the hype is all about, we’ve broken down the top 12 best-selling Final Fantasy cards based on data from trusted marketplace TCGPlayer.
We’ve simplified the list for clarity, grouping some variants, like Borderless and Surge Foils, with their base versions, while also noting the specific card number that’s proving most popular (i.e, Aerith Gainsborough – 519). Not every slot is a Mythic Rare either. This list includes a bit of variety to reflect what’s actually trending, while still focusing on the standout cards from the set. Let’s dive in.
12. Aerith Gainsborough – 519
Aerith Gainsborough is a deceptively powerful engine for life gain and +1/+1 counter strategies. With lifelink built in, she can start growing immediately,every time you gain life, Aerith picks up a +1/+1 counter.
And when she dies, she passes that strength on, putting X +1/+1 counters on each legendary creature you control, where X is the number of counters she had. In the right deck, that can be a game-ending swing.
The card’s popularity is reflected in its pricing. The standard print is just $1.83, while the foil version goes for $16.81. For collectors or premium deckbuilders, the borderless version is around $39, but the rare borderless surge foil sits at a much steeper $140+.
11. Starting Town – 289
Starting Town is an early-game powerhouse, especially in multicolor decks. If you can play it on turn one, two, or three, it enters untapped, giving you immediate access to mana without slowing your tempo. Beyond that, it taps for colorless, or you can pay 1 life to generate one mana of any color, making it a flexible piece in almost any deck.
That versatility comes at a price. The regular version is currently going for around $14, while the foil will set you back just under $17. Still, for decks that care about fast, reliable mana across multiple colors, it’s proving to be well worth the cost.
10. Summon: Knights of Round – 359
Summon: Knights of the Round is one of the hottest cards from the Final Fantasy crossover right now, and it’s not hard to see why. For just five mana, you create three 2/2 white Knight creature tokens, instantly building a board.
But it gets even better with its [V] ability, Ultimate End, which gives all your other creatures +2/+2 until end of turn and puts an indestructible counter on each of them. Combined with the card’s own indestructible keyword, it turns even a modest board into a nearly unstoppable force.
The borderless version is currently going for $35.99, which marks a 25% drop in market price this month. The standard print is more budget-friendly at $21.88. Either way, it’s a powerful pickup for Knight, token, or white-based Commander decks, and one that’s likely to remain popular.
9. Traveling Chocobo – 210
The chase card of all chase cards, there are just 77 gold foil Traveling Chocobos out there, available. There are other versions, including Neon Ink versions going for well over $1000, but if you manage to find the gold foil, it is the one you’ll want to find when you’re cracking open Collector Boosters.
Considering how much the ink versions are already going for, I can’t imagine how much the Gold Foil variant would actually be valued at, maybe you just win at money and never have to pay for Magic cards again, now that would be nice. But, that being said, one did recently sell for around $30K on eBay.
8. Summon: Bahamut – 1
I love a big ol’ dragon in my Magic collection, and Bahamut certainly fits that bill.
Not only does this Summon create a 9/9, but it can remove permanents, trigger card draw, and use Mega Flare to essentially finish a game of Commander.
How many card variants do you NEED? Apparently, Final Fantasy 13’s protagonist, Lightning, needs at least five. To be fair, that makes sense considering how many spin off games she got.
Army of One is all about the Stagger mechanic, teeing your foes up for double damage while also offering lifelink, first strike, and trample in a three-cost card.
Market price is already up to around $256.50 for the most popular Borderless Surge Foil version, while my personal favorite is seemingly the cheapest (but still just as popular), normal print for $20.58.
6. Yuna, Hope of Spira – 549
Yuna’s an interesting one, as it’s just her 549 Borderless Surge Foil that have drawn the most interest from eager buyers in the secondary market.
Yet, her standard variant is also going through much more of geniune surge in value over the past couple of weeks, rising +143.65% in value, jumping from a low of $5.68 to around $20.15 most recently. It’s a big jump in such a short space of time.
5. Tifa Lockhart – 536
Tifa Lockhart continues to be a main stay of the best selling Final Fantasy cards, and even featured as one of the most popular during the presale period just before the Universes Beyond set launched.
Tifa has a Landfall trigger that doubles her power alongside her existing Trample keyword. As TCGPlayer points out, you can grow her attack power with something like Titanic Growth and then use Fabled Passage to double it again.
What’s Cloud without the Buster Sword? Thankfully, this iconic weapon gets the treatment it deserves in Magic’s Final Fantasy set, with a stunning borderless version illustrated by Karuta Shiki. It’s more than just a collector’s piece too, it’s a powerful piece of equipment in its own right.
Buster Sword gives the equipped creature +3/+2, making it a serious threat in combat. But the real payoff comes when that creature connects with a player. Not only do you draw a card, but you can immediately cast a spell from your hand with mana value equal to or less than the damage dealt, without paying its cost.
If you’re a fan of Cloud or just love flashy, high-impact equipment, this is one to watch, and anything under triple digits is looking like a bargain right now.
3. Vivi Ornitier – 248
Final Fantasy 9 spellcaster Vivi Ornitier, by Toshiyuki Itahana (character designer on the game), might just be one of the best cards in the game right now. So, it’s hardly surprising that it’s standard card is up there as the third most popular in the set currently. Market price isn’t too bad either (at least compared to the rest of this list), if you’re looking to buy one standalone.
The Borderless version is also the absolute definition of a collector’s item if I’ve ever seen one, and proving to have plenty of interest as well. Both of these can also be considered a top 10 card for collectors, also demanding a rather mighty price at around $72.13 for the former, and $232.71 for the later in the market right now.
2. Cloud, Midgar Mercenary – 520
Cloud, Midgar Mercenary is, unsurprisingly, by far one of the most popular cards from the Final Fantasy x MTG Universes Beyond set. Low mana cost and double equipment triggers make Cloud very close to Stoneforge Mystic, but with some striking new anime art from Kazto Furuya.
Not only is the Borderless Surge Foil variant one of the priciest cards from the new set (sitting at around $466 market), the Borderless, Extended Art, and Normal print all also fetch a pretty penny right now.
In terms of popularity, the Borderless Surge Foil is shoulders above the rest, but the Normal print is also exceedingly popular right now according to TCGPlayer, and still one of the top 20 cards players have been chasing since the new set released. Finding any of these, or deciding to buy them out right standalone, are good reasons to get excited.
But it’s not the only version that’s proving popular either, with the 382 and 317 Borderless, alongside the 115 Normal print also proving to increasingly sought after right now, which is unsurprisingly reflected in the market prices right now as well.
Where to Buy Magic: The Gathering – Final Fantasy Cards
I’m going to give it to you straight right from the off. It’s painfully hard to get hold of any of these sets from major retailers right now. While we saw some big restocks over the past month, pretty much everywhere is sold out of Final Fantasy MTG at the time of writing.
There are a trio of Final Fantasy Secret Lair sets, Weapons, Grimoire, and Game Over, each offering unique art and names for Magic: The Gathering cards. Everything is available in standard and foil, alongside the Japanese variants as well.
But, since they’ve sold out, you won’t find Secret Lair drops at the same price as you’d find them directly from Wizards of the Coast (standard $30 nonfoil, $40 rainbow foil), with most being listed anywhere between $80-$150 or above.
This is a huge markup, so if you’re looking to buy, be sure you’re 100% informed of what you’re paying for. You can buy them from eBay, but we’ve always found TCGPlayer, while still eBay-owned, to be the most secure and trustworthy way to nab Secret Lair drops post-release.
Lloyd Coombes is Gaming Editor @ Daily Star. He’s a big fan of Magic: The Gathering and other collectible card games, much to his wife’s dismay. He’s also a tech, gaming, and fitness freelancer seen at Polygon, Eurogamer, Macworld, TechRadar, Tom’s Guide, IGN, and more.
This article also includes contributions from Lloyd Coombes. Thanks to TCGPlayer for the data and information that informed this article.
How does one come up with, and subsequently make, Peak? Well, it sounds like you just kind of have to do it in weird ways. If you’ve missed it, Peak isn’t just slang you’ve heard your teen use to denote something being really good, it’s a co-op video game about climbing mountains with your friends and having a very good/ bad time while doing so. The bulk of work was also done in a single month as part of a collaborative game jam between Another Crab’s Treasure developer Aggro Crab and Content Warning developer Landfall. And in an interview with PC Gamer, a couple of the devs that worked on Peak have shared a little insight into how it got made.
The N64 controller has its fair share of fans, but I am not one of them.
I should clarify that I don’t dislike it, as such, but as someone who owned a PS1 back in the ‘90s and only had limited access to the N64 through my friends, the three-pronged design definitely felt, well… weird by comparison. I’ve come to appreciate it much more since owning a wireless N64 pad for the Switch, but I still wouldn’t rank it as one of my favourites.
