Overwatch 2’s Stadium was announced earlier this year, a new round-based mode that lets you buy upgrade items through its rounds to get different buffs, gear, etc. as you try to win the best of seven rounds. Honestly one of the most notable things about it is that it’ll have a third-person perspective, a series first for the shooter, one that I’ve never understood not being in the game given how much of an emphasis on skins there is. But, interestingly enough, it’s not launching with every character in the roster, and weirdly that includes box character Tracer.
The Mario Kart World Direct has been and gone, and we learnt… not all that much actually. What we did get out of it, mind you, is a fresh batch of screenshots from Nintendo, showcasing the majority of our new racers with some stunning close-ups.
World appears to have the series’ biggest roster yet, with an almighty line-up of characters at your disposal and even more options if you include all the unlockable costumes. We’re already breaking down every confirmed character in our guide, but if you want to feast your eyes on some of the newbies, we’ve got the following gallery for you to see ’em at a glance.
Master the Art of Combat in Mandragora: Whispers of the Witch Tree
Nathan WhincupContent Lead, Global Player Communications, Knights Peak
Summary
Whether you favor brute strength or devastating magic, learn how to best slay monsters in Mandragora: Whispers of the Witch Tree, coming to Xbox Series X|S and PC today.
This epic dark fantasy action-RPG comes with many combat options – learn about all the systems at your disposal below.
The type of damage your Inquisitor inflicts can give you an edge in battle, or inflict special Status Effects on foes. You can also craft, obtain new Gear, and progress through Talent Trees to power your quest.
Mandragora: Whispers of the Witch Tree is an epic dark fantasy action-RPG coming to Xbox Series X|S today. It features brutal Soulslike combat, a sprawling, interconnected world, and a sinister story campaign coming in at over 40 hours.
To survive in this world, your approach to combat is everything – and thankfully you have a lot of options at your disposal. Your combat strategy in Mandragora: Whispers of the Witch Tree can be shaped by everything from the Class you choose, to the type of damage you inflict, the Status Effects that ensue, and your approach to Talent Tree progression and crafting.
Battles can be brutal, Inquisitor. It would serve you well to brush up on the various systems at play before you descend into the darkness of Faelduum. Are you ready?
Class Is Now In Session
There are six classes to master in Mandragora: Whispers of the Witch Tree. Starting your journey, you’ll choose from the Vanguard, Flameweaver, Spellbinder, Nightshade, Wyldwarden, and Vindicator. Each comes with its own pros and cons, while your choice of weapon, special abilities, and active skills can also influence your playstyle. Let’s take a closer look at each of them:
The Vanguard is a melee specialist and the perfect choice for those who want to wield mighty swords to face the unspeakable horrors of the night.
If you rely more on cunning and wiles, the Spellbinder is the Class for you. Wield power over pure chaotic energies to vanquish your enemies.
Fancy taking on the power of the elements? Become a Flameweaver, renowned for their mastery over fire and their skill in wielding one-handed weapons.
If dark and mysterious is more your bag, choose the Nightshade Class, and become a stealthy assassin, specializing in swift eliminations with poison and dual-wield daggers.
You can also choose the Wyldwarden Class, the ideal choice for those who feel a unique bond to natural forces and want to wield them to defeat their foes.
Finally, the Vindicator Class is a perfect pick for those who wish to command celestial energies to deliver swift judgment upon their enemies.
Status Symbols
Your Weapons, Active Skills, and Talents can deal different types of damage that may also inflict corresponding Status Effects.
Physical damage is the meat and potatoes of a melee build like the Vanguard. A surgical strike can inflict the Bleed Status on foes, making them more susceptible to damage. If you’ve laced your blade, Poison Status will ruthlessly drain an enemy’s health over time.
This world is also brimming with elemental forces, and there are six types of Magic at play. Astral saps the power of light to attack enemies, and you can inflict the Lightbrand Status to take enemies’ strength to fuel your fury. Chaos can cause enemies to sustain the Weakness Status, slowing them down and leaving them open to more pain. Predictably, Fire can inflict the Burn Status to damage foes over time.
And it’s not all about damage. Tap into the raw power of nature to deal Wyld damage and lock enemies in place with the Root Status. If you want to send shivers down monsters’ spines, use Frost to inflict the Chill Status, freezing them solid for a short while. Certain enemies might even attack with Void magic, a power drawn from the parallel realm of Entropy.
Climb the Talent Trees
The Talent Tree is your roadmap to power. While gear like swords and armor offer an immediate boon to strength, the Talent Tree gives you long-term, customizable power through carefully chosen abilities. Earn Talent Points by leveling up or visiting Offering Shrines. Each Class in Mandragora has its own unique Tree—will you master them all?
Starting Nodes unlock a core ability for each class, like the Vanguard’s ability to wield Tower Shields. Focus on aggressive builds to get powerful Bleed effects, develop new defensive strategies with your shield, or find ways to restore your Health and Adrenaline with every enemy you dispatch.
If you want to push your build even further, you can combine Talents from different Classes. For example, blend the Vanguard’s raw strength with the Flameweaver’s speed to yield a hybrid build that shreds enemies with Bleed and lightning-fast strikes.
Crafty Caravans
Your journey is dangerous, but you don’t have to face it alone. Skilled Artisans who travel with your Caravan can craft powerful gear, consumables, and enchantments to aid you in battle. There are seven Artisan Vendors throughout Faelduum, each a master of their craft. Whether it’s weapons, armor, potions, or runes, everything you need to survive can be forged, brewed, or prepared at your Caravan.
Some Artisans may cultivate their own resources, such as rare herbs that you can use to make potions and weapon oils. You might even be lucky enough to enjoy a stat-boosting meal with the Cook. And for all the lore fans out there, be sure to visit the brave Explorer to piece together map fragments and read detailed Bestiary entries on the creatures you’ve slain.
Crafting with Artisans will level them up and help you unlock stronger gear. Always check out your Artisans’ wares before setting out on a quest!
Gear Up, Inquisitor
Your Inquisitor is yours to develop and customize as you see fit. Power them up with Talents, Active Skills, and Gear. And speaking of Gear, there are over 350 items to find, earn, and craft in Mandragora: Whispers of the Witch Tree.
Equip Weapons, Armor, Rings, and Consumables, and switch between two Weapon sets to find your ideal loadout. Whether you wield a Greatsword or Dual Daggers, your approach can shape your playstyle and journey through Faelduum.
Your Armor is a crucial piece of the puzzle, too. It not only reduces incoming physical damage, but can grant additional attribute bonuses to health, defense, resistance, and more. Every piece also has a unique Weight and Poise, with more Poise making it harder to stagger you in combat, and Weight contributing to your overall carry capacity.
Whether you craft it, loot it from enemies, or find it lying around on your travels, keep an eye out for new Gear to fuel your quest. You can also enchant and enhance your weapons and armor with one of your Artisans—Rhys the Occultist.
This just scratches the surface of how deep combat can be tailored to your whims – start your journey with Mandragora: Whispers of the Witch Tree or play the demo and prepare to face the horrors of Entropy!
Slay your way in Mandragora: Whispers of the Witch Tree, a dark fantasy action RPG. Battle monsters across an expansive story featuring 40+ hours of gameplay, craft powerful upgrades for your weapons and gear, and explore the secrets of this vast, ruined world.
DEFY YOUR FATE
You are an Inquisitor. As evil seeps into Faelduum through tears in reality, defy your purpose and embark on a path that leads to this world’s unraveling fate. From the towering majesty of Crimson City, through festering darkness, and into the horrors of Entropy… what will you become at journey’s end?
MASTER SOULSLIKE COMBAT
Choose from six unique Classes and wield blades and magic to master your craft in brutal battles. Dodge, parry, and strike with perfect timing to hunt vicious creatures and nightmarish bosses.
SUCCUMB TO A DARK FANTASY WORLD
Fall into a sinister, branching tale written by Brian Mitsoda and hauntingly soundtracked by Christos Antoniou (Septicflesh) and the FILMharmonic Orchestra Prague. 75 unique locations await your discovery across this vast, interconnected world.
SLAY YOUR WAY
Create your Inquisitor and develop them through six Talent Trees. Hundreds of skill and combat upgrades are available, and you can also craft powerful weapons and gear to define your playstyle, die less, and deal death faster.
New to action RPG or Soulslike games? Tune the difficulty to your skill level in the settings. For Soulslike experts, more challenges await in New Game Plus!
The Nintendo Switch 2 is set to get special enhanced versions of several Switch 1 games, including The Legend of Zelda: Tears of the Kingdom. A newly spotted disclaimer has fans worrying some games, or at least one game, won’t support Nintendo’s cloud save functionality as they’d hope.
Over the last day or so, users have been noticing that Nintendo’s pages for Tears of the Kingdom‘s Switch 2 edition carries the following disclaimer: “Please note: this software does not support the Nintendo Switch Online paid membership’s Save Data Cloud backup feature.”
Though it’s since disappeared from those pages, the Tears of the Kingdom still has the disclaimer as of this writing. The Japanese page though, per Eurogamer via machine translation, does not carry the same disclaimer; only the US and EU pages seem to be showing it.
IGN has reached out to Nintendo for clarification on the matter.
If this holds true, this could create some confusing scenarios for players. Nintendo’s cloud save option for NSO members is handy, for one. It makes carrying games across systems, or juggling storage space for games without losing your saved progress, a little less stres-inducing.
Actually importing a save file from the original Switch to the Switch 2 Edition of Tears of the Kingdom does seem to still work. The Nintendo page noted an additional save slot for the Switch 2 Edition, where one can start a brand-new journey or “continue a previous one with your existing save data.” Nintendo does note that save data created in the second save data slot cannot be trasnferred to the Nintendo Switch 1 version of Tears of the Kingdom.
It’s a confusing situation that can possibly lead to some stress, as players would likely not want to lose a save file they’ve dumped many, many hours into when upgrading versions. Hopefully, this gets cleared up soon.
The Switch 2 Edition does have a few reasons for prospective Switch 2 owners to upgrade, including the Zelda Notes app, which comes packed with helpful guiding content, lore, and even some potential equipment repair options.
Colours! They exist, right? They’re all around us, everywhere you go, and as of yesterday, Marvel Rivals did something revolutionary: it made them customizable. Taking my sarcasm hat off for a moment, that means developer NetEase added in the ability to choose different colour palette options for your costumes. It’s just a small little way to add some amount of uniqueness to your version of the game’s extremely pre-established characters, really. Except, the catch is that you have to pay actual money for them.
Nintendo just wrapped up its April 2025 Mario Kart World Direct, revealing details about new items, modes, and more about those strange snacks players can chomp into when the Nintendo Switch 2 launches this June.
Nintendo’s latest entry into its long-running kart racing spinoff series looks like the next big step for Mario and co. That’s thanks in part to a smorgasbord of both new and returning items, while other familiar features have either been given small tweaks or total facelifts. Mario Kart World dived into a solid slice of everything players can expect in its 15-minute presentation, so we made sure to gather the highlights.
Items
The biggest question block hanging over everyone’s heads has had players questioning which wacky items they’ll be able to toss at their friends come June. Nintendo’s got a fittingly wacky answer that includes spins on items and abilities that may be able to be paired with some of Mario Kart World’s new features.
Items like the Bullet Bill and Lightning appear to function just as you remember. The former sends players flying forward at breakneck speeds, while the latter stops and shrinks opponents, though now it also causes it to start raining in the game now that Mario Kart has introduced weather effects. Meanwhile, classic items like the Feather also remain largely unchanged, but now, players can use them to not only hop over some of the many new track hazards but also reach new areas, high-up rails, and even shortcuts.
New items have plenty to bring to the table, too. The Coin Shell is a golden shell variant that leaves a trail of coins for you – and your enemies – as it moves forward through the track ahead of its thrower. Kamek is an especially wild addition, as the Koopa wizard can be spawned to transform each of your opponents into something completely new. Other highlights include Hammers that now stick in the ground for a short time and a slightly tweaked Ice Flower that can seen multiple opponents spinning at a time.
One of Mario Kart World’s more mysterious items are those new food-related abilities. These are called Dash Foods and come in the form of tasty burgers, plates of sushi, kebabs, and more. These are collectibles that can be acquired around Mario Kart World’s giant map and, once gobbled up, unlock new outfits to use elsewhere. In case you were wondering, yes, the Moo Moo Meadows Cow can, in fact, eat burgers.
New Tricks
Tricks have been an important part of Mario Kart since 2008’s Mario Kart Wii, and in Mario Kart World, they’ve been given added importance. You can charge jump straight from the track this time around, allowing you to not only short hop over items but fully clear hazards like other vehicles, too. It should help reach those out-of-reach rails to grind on as well, with additional tricks in the air giving players the ability to gain a bit of extra air.
Tricks will also help players leap toward and latch onto walls, which can be hopped between to find new portions of a track and even some hidden item blocks. Chaining tricks together can be tricky, so if you find yourself missing a particular jump to a high-up ledge, a new Rewind feature will help you turn back the clock for a few moments to hone your skills.
Modes
While modes like Grand Prix and Time Trials are back, Mario Kart World comes with loads of new modes, too. Knockout Tour is one of the more substantial additions, as it allows players to compete to stay ahead of the pack across extended races. Those who fall behind are in danger of being, well, knocked out.
Time Trials are one returning mode that have been beefed up to accommodate Mario Kart World’s improved multiplayer functionality. When hopping online, players will have the option to download data from other racers from around the world. Longtime Mario Kart fans will also be happy to know that fan-favorite modes like VS Race, Balloon Battle, and Coin Runners are back and feature some of those new tracks to fight off friends with. There’s also a full-on photo mode, which can be used to capture iconic moments when cruising around the world.
Of course, Mario Kart World’s biggest new mode is its open-world-inspired free roam feature, which allows players to explore its vast map and all of the tracks it houses. We explained everything you need to know about this major addition to the Mario Kart universe and how you can play it with your friends here.
Mario Kart World launches alongside the Switch 2 June 5. We’re still waiting for Nintendo to set a new date for pre-order options in the US and Canada following their delay earlier this month. Meanwhile, the topic of the console’s price remains one detail that continues to take over Nintendo comment sections. Today’s Mario Kart World Direct was no exception, as players made sure its chat sections were filled with comments like “drop the price.”
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).
Harken to the tolling of the village bell! See the blazing of the watchfires on the parapet! CD Projekt have issued a warning about Witcher 4 beta scams. Apparently, people have been receiving invites to playtest the new Witcher, even though CD Projekt have previously said that their RPG sequel won’t release before 2027. If you sign up to anything right now, the only thing you’ll be beta-testing is how fast you can change all your usernames and passwords.
As detailed during Nintendo’s Mario Kart World Direct, the Switch 2-exclusive racer will allow its players to unlock a literal smorgasbord of costumes inspired by a menu made up of “dash foods” from around the world.
During the show, we got a look at some Free-Roam-style portions of Mario Kart World, which are populated by Yoshi restaurants. The restaurants serve food themed on the region you are currently visiting and, by gobbling some up, you’ll give yourself the chance to unlock a costume to suit the food style – as well as giving yourself a handy speed boost!
Nintendo hosted a Mario Kart World Direct this morning, showing off all the features of the upcoming launch game for the Nintendo Switch 2. Amid all the new tricks and modes, Nintendo also confirmed a slew of new and returning tracks and racers for Mario Kart World.
On the course side, there were several new courses shown off as part of the roamable world. From the streets of Crown City to the water of Salty Salty Speedway, there are plenty of places to explore and shortcuts to discover. Mechanics like wall-riding and grinding seem like they’ll add quite a bit for players to uncover. Here’s what we spotted in today’s Direct.
Mario Kart World Confirmed Courses Shown in Today’s Direct
Mario Bros. Circuit
Crown City
Salty Salty Speedway
Starview Peak
Boo Cinema
Toad’s Factory
Peach Beach
Wario Shipyard
Whistletop Summit
DK Spaceport
Desert Hills
Shy Guy Bazaar
Wario Stadium
Airship Fortress
DK Pass
Sky-High Sundae
Koopa Troopa Beach
Faraway Oasis
Crown City
Peach Stadium
Dino Dino Jungle
Great ? Block Ruins
Rainbow Road
But what’s a world full of courses without a universe’s worth of racers to speed across them? Mario Kart World looks to be making some deep pulls from Mario’s history. The usual suspects of Mario, Peach, Luigi, and Yoshi are joined by the likes of Spike, Conkdor, Penguin, and more. Here’s everyone we spotted in a kart during today’s Mario Kart World Direct.
Mario Kart World Confirmed Racers From Today’s Direct
Mario
Luigi
Peach
Daisy
Rosalina
Pauline
Yoshi
Toad
Koopa Troopa
Baby Mario
Baby Luigi
Baby Peach
Baby Daisy
Baby Rosalina
Wario
Waluigi
Bowser
Goomba
Spike
Cow
Lakitu
Toadette
Bowser Jr.
Birdo
King Boo
Shy Guy
Donkey Kong
Nabbit
Pirahna Plant
Hammer Bro
Monty Mole
Sidestepper
Cheep Cheep
Dry Bones
Wiggler
Cataquack
Pianta
Rocky Wrench
Conkdor
Chargin’ Chuck
Penguin
Stingby
Swoop
Dolphin
Para-Biddybud
Pokey
Coin Coffer
Peepa
Snowman
Fish Bone
It’s quite a line-up so far, and will probably only expand as we learn more about this game. Today’s Mario Kart World Direct went over everything from Grand Prix and Knockout Mode to the camera-fueled social options.
Mario Kart World is set to arrive on the Nintendo Switch 2’s launch day, June 5, as an exclusive for the newest Switch console. There certainly seems to be quite a bit to do here, which will hopefully measure up to its $80 price tag. The newest Kart is being sold both standalone and as part of a hardware bundle though, and given Mario Kart 8 Deluxe’s massive popularity, World is likely to find a home on many Switch 2 consoles.
You don’t need to drop two grand to play in the big leagues. Right now, Dell is offering its Tower Plus Gaming PC with an RTX 4070 Ti Super for $1,649.99, and it’s quietly one of the smartest buys in the prebuilt space. Free shipping included, no hoops, no rebates, just solid specs at a better price than any RTX 5070 Ti system out there. If you’ve been waiting for a high-performance gaming rig without paying a “new GPU tax,” this is it.
