If you think more games should be about giving cursed skulls to weird strangers, then I’m here to tell you that you’re fine, you’re normal, you’re right, and you should play Strange Antiquities.
You may have already played Bad Viking’s first game in the ‘Strange’ series, Strange Horticulture, a gothically-tinged tale of running a plant shop, but with more than a touch of Lovecraftian business lurking in the shadows. As someone who’s a little bored of the more toothless cosy games on the market, I’m always delighted to find something with sinister undercurrents and supernatural goings-on. Also, ritual murder! Not enough cosy games feature ritual murder.
Ninjas and samurai have always been a staple of video games, but even with their perennial popularity, 2025 has been an exceptionally good year for titles about deadly Japanese warriors. A bunch of ninja- and samurai-themed games hit PlayStation 5 this year, offering a huge variety of takes on the idea of becoming a sneaky, sword-wielding fighter in dark clothes.
From fast-paced combo-ridden action games, to slower and stealthier assassin-themed takes, no matter how you like your ninjas, 2025 has had something for you.
Assassin’s Creed Shadows
Sure, the Assassin’s Creed series is about two ancient orders of ridiculously influential warriors battling one another throughout history, and also there are godlike aliens. But what the games sometimes lack in narrative realism, they make up for in nailing historical settings. Assassin’s Creed Shadows’ depiction of feudal Japan is unmatched, and the series’ focus on stealthy takedowns is right in line with the ninja sensibilities of its protagonist, Naoe — after all, “assassin” is right there in the name. But if you’re looking for some variety, good news: Assassin’s Creed Shadows has two protagonists, so you can get the ninja experience and a taste of the samurai life throughout the course of its lengthy story.
Like Ghost of Tsushima before it, Ghost of Yōtei sports a “Kurosawa mode,” named after the famed Japanese filmmaker, and that’s a pretty good indication of the cinematic experiences that await you. Yōtei is a lot like playing through a samurai film, but with a whole lot of shinobi elements thrown in along the way. Its protagonist, Atsu, isn’t a ninja or a samurai, per se — she’s a mercenary, and she uses every advantage she can to win battles on her quest for revenge. What Ghost of Yōtei channels from the ninja experience is the idea of stealth and silent takedowns. For example, Atsu’s upgraded kusarigama can snare enemies from a distance. She can also unleash kunai for chained assassinations and disappear with smoke bombs. Each enemy encounter demands clever improvisation to match the threat, and that’s Atsu all over.
Publisher: Sony Interactive Entertainment | Developer: Sucker Punch Productions | PS5
Ninja Gaiden 4
Team Ninja’s and PlatinumGames’ titles are often all about speed — overwhelming your foes through ridiculously fast reactions and unrelenting combos. With Ninja Gaiden 4, it’s all slashing, dodging, and obliterating enemies. While there are a lot of classically ninja-esque elements at play, as you might expect from all the uses of the word “ninja” in this paragraph already, what Ninja Gaiden 4 really grabs onto is an over-the-top mobility and agility in its ninja experience. You’re incredibly fast as you run along walls, grapple over gaps, and dodge past enemies, and once you start laying into opponents, you’re able to combo them so fast they can’t even react. If you’ve got a need for ninja speed, this is the game for you.
Publisher: Microsoft Corporation | Developer: Team Ninja, PlatinumGames | PS5
Ninja Gaiden: Ragebound
Side-scroller Ninja Gaiden: Ragebound channels the early entries in the Ninja Gaiden series, mixing modern game design ideas with an old-school charm. You fight through hordes of enemies, including a whole lot of demons, with weapons that kill most enemies in a single hit. The ninja fantasy isn’t so much in the blades, speed, or abilities — although those elements are all there — as it is in mastering the battlefield. You’ll need to size up your foes, and the order in which you need to defeat them, so you can make the most of power-ups to take down tougher foes, or avoid potentially devastating attacks.
Publisher: Dotemu | Developer: The Game Kitchen| PS5, PS4
Onimusha 2: Samurai’s Destiny Remastered
Onimusha 2: Samurai’s Destiny, as the name suggests, falls on the samurai side of the spectrum, but it shares a lot with 2025’s crop of ninja games, like powerful fighting abilities and a focus on battling demonic enemies. Capcom’s remaster of this 2002 classic sends you on a quest of revenge against an army of fiends, encouraging you to engage in smart swordplay as you balance slashing, blocking, and nailing powerful Issen counters. Onimusha 2 also gives the samurai experience a slightly different spin, drawing on elements of Capcom’s contemporary games of the time, like the Resident Evil series, to channel a bit of a survival-horror vibe.
Publisher: Capcom | Developer: Capcom Production Studio 2 | PS5, PS4
Shinobi: Art of Vengeance
Similar to Ragebound, Shinobi: Art of Vengeance also reinvigorates a famed ninja series by reaching back into its 2D side-scrolling past. Shinobi plays up the ludicrous power and skill of its ninja, Joe Musashi, with an emphasis on weakening enemies so that you can perform a blazing fast assassination on several of them at once. Strategically whittling down the life of every enemy on the screen without outright defeating them, just so you can watch Musashi zip around at lightning speed to finish them off, is always satisfying. With a katana, kunai, and powerful, magical Ninpo and Ninjutsu abilities, you have all sorts of ninja-themed options at your disposal to take on anything the game throws at you.
Publisher: Sega | Developer: LizardCube | PS5, PS4
Honorable Mention: Ninja Five-O
Another side-scrolling ninja title returning from the past, Ninja Five-0 was previously a super hard-to-find game that was only available for portable systems way back in the early 2000s. But with Ninja Five-0 making its way to the PS5 this year, you’re finally free to answer the age-old question: What would happen if a cop was also a ninja? You’ve asked that question, right? Ninja Five-O gives you a pretty in-depth answer as you use ninja skills and abilities to save hostages and take down bank robbers and other criminals. Firearms are no match for your speed, skills, or the arsenal of classic weapons at your disposal, including a katana, a grappling hook, and shuriken.
While 2025 might be drawing to a close, don’t worry — it seems we won’t be short on ninjas and samurai on PS5 in the New Year, either. Sucker Punch is gearing up to deliver cooperative multiplayer action with the release of Ghost of Yōtei Legends next year.* Ghost of Yōtei Legends will be free DLC for all Ghost of Yōtei owners.* Nioh 3 is already preparing to strike on February 6, and brings a whole set of ninja skills and abilities to complement its deep samurai gameplay. Ninja Gaiden 4 is arming itself with a major expansion in early 2026 that adds new story content and weapons for its ninja protagonists. And Onimusha: Way of the Sword, the first new mainline entry in Capcom’s series in two decades, will launch a sneak attack sometime next year.
*Available via patch update. Internet connection and account for PlayStation Network required. PlayStation Plus subscription (sold separately) required for online play or multiplayer. PS Plus is subject to recurring subscription fee taken automatically until cancellation. Age restrictions apply. Terms apply: play.st/psplus-usageterms.
CD Projekt has sold its DRM-free PC storefront GOG to its original co-founder, Michał Kiciński, for 90.7 million Polish złoty (approx. $25.2 million). Kiciński is also co-founder of CD Projekt itself, and currently holds 10% of share capital in the business.
Kiciński co-founded GOG in 2008, and it has operated within the CD Projekt Group for over 17 years. Selling GOG “fits” CD Projekt’s long-term strategy, according to a FAQ posted online. CD Projekt, the Polish company behind smash hits The Witcher 3 and Cyberpunk 2077, wants to focus on video game development and other projects, it said. CD Projekt is currently developing The Witcher 4 and Cyberpunk 2.
“Selling GOG fits CD Projekt’s long-term strategy,” reads the statement. “CD Projekt wants to focus its full attention on creating top-quality RPGs and providing our fans with other forms of entertainment based on our brands. This deal lets CD Projekt keep that focus, while GOG gets stronger backing to pursue its own mission.”
Kiciński commented: “From the very beginning, GOG has always been built on strong values and clear principles. When Marcin Iwiński and I came up with the idea for GOG, the vision was simple: bring classic games back to players and ensure that once you buy a game, it truly belongs to you — forever.”
GOG will operate independently, it said, and continue with its DRM-free philosophy. Following the sale, CD Projekt and GOG signed a distribution agreement that specifies the terms of future cooperation, including a plan to release CD Projekt Red’s upcoming games on GOG.
“CD Projekt and GOG share the same roots and values: freedom, independence, and a genuine sense of ownership,” Kiciński continued. “I believe that CD Projekt, with its exceptional AAA games, will stand, as always, behind the GOG offering — making GOG the best place on the planet to purchase The Witcher and Cyberpunk games, both existing titles and the new ones we all anticipate so much.
“As a mature gamer, I often play classic games myself and deeply admire the creativity behind many of them. I truly believe that well-crafted classics can deliver as much joy as new releases. When it comes to pure playability, timeless games often prove to be really the safe choice, especially in a market flooded with gazillions of low-quality smaller games. Beyond preserving classics, GOG has always sought out new games with a retro spirit. I am personally involved in the development of a few games like that and they will certainly make their strong appearance on GOG in 2026.”
Michał Nowakowski, joint CEO of CD Projekt, added: “with our focus now fully on an ambitious development roadmap and expanding our franchises with new high-quality products, we felt this was the right time for this move.
“For a long time now, GOG has been operating independently. Now it’s going into very good hands — we are convinced that with the support of Michał Kiciński, one of GOG’s co-founders, its future will be full of great projects and successes. We would like to thank the GOG team for years of fruitful cooperation and wish them all the best. And to the GOG community, I say ‘see you around,’ because our upcoming releases will naturally be available on GOG as well.”
GOG has long competed with Steam for the hearts and minds of PC gamers by leaning on its no-DRM policy, although Valve’s platform remains the overwhelming market leader. In the FAQ, the question ‘is GOG financially unstable?’ is asked. The answer, officially, is no. “GOG is stable and has had a really encouraging year,” reads the statement. “In fact, we’ve seen more enthusiasm from gamers towards our mission than ever before.” GOG hit the headlines recently for getting behind indie game Horses after Valve banned it from Steam.
It sounds like from a user point of view, nothing changes here. As for CD Projekt, it can now strip out GOG from its business, which at latest count employed 1,335 staff. In The Witcher franchise it has the aforementioned The Witcher 4 as part of a new Witcher trilogy with Ciri as protagonist, The Witcher Remake, and Project Sirius. Cyberpunk 2 is also in development, as is Project Hadar, a new IP.
Wesley is Director, News at IGN. Find him on Twitter at @wyp100. You can reach Wesley at wesley_yinpoole@ign.com or confidentially at wyp100@proton.me.
The debut trailer for Sword and Fairy 4 Remake is out in the wild — and it looks a lot like Clair Obscur: Expedition 33.
Developed by Chinese studio Up Software and published by Cube Game, Sword and Fairy 4 Remake is a single-player turn-based role-playing game made in Unreal Engine 5 due out on PC and consoles at some point.
The official trailer, dubbed “Unpredictable Divine Will,” has already drawn comparisons to Clair Obscur: Expedition 33’s eye-catching battle system, from the dynamic user interface to the action heavy parry system. Even the camera perspective and the way the camera moves during battle rekindles memories of Sandfall Interactive’s hugely popular RPG.
Sword and Fairy 4 Remake – Official Trailer “Unpredictable Divine Will” is here! Developed by Up Software and published by Cube Game, this single-player turn-based RPG is reborn in Unreal Engine 5 with the latest technology. Set off on a journey to find the immortals with Tianhe… pic.twitter.com/dKlfnDJsta
“Set off on a journey to find the immortals with Tianhe Yun’s team,” reads the official blurb. “In the meantime, a hidden truth that has been sealed for a long time is revealing itself.”
The Legend of Sword and Fairy is a Chinese video game franchise that encompasses nine mainline Chinese mythology/xianxia-themed role-playing computer games. The first game launched in 1995 for PC and enjoyed critical and commercial success across China. Many sequels and spinoffs have followed in the years since.
The Legend of Sword and Fairy 4 is in fact the fifth installment in the mainline video game franchise, and acts as a prequel to the third game. The latest game, The Legend of Sword and Fairy 7, came out in 2021 as the ninth mainline entry on PC, with an English version released for PlayStation 4, PlayStation 5, Xbox One, and Xbox Series X and S in 2022 under the name Sword and Fairy: Together Forever. It was seen as an alternative to the recent mainline Final Fantasy games, which of course inspired Clair Obscur: Expedition 33’s development.
Fans are drawing a line from Clair Obscur: Expedition 33 to Sword and Fairy 4 Remake, and some are accusing its developer of copying Sandfall’s game. “Totally not copy and paste combat, style, parry, from Clair Obscur Expedition 33,” said one commenter. “Is this DLC of Expedition 33?” said another. “We got Expedition-like genre now,” added another fan. Others, however, are saying Sword and Fairy 4 Remake just looks like a modern turn-based RPG in the Persona style, and are pointing to previous entries in the series as evidence of its credentials.
The first E33-like is already on its way from China and it’s through the announcement of the remake of “Legend of Sword and Fairy 4”. pic.twitter.com/jfiVnNn42X
Cube Game has said an English version of the trailer will be revealed in the coming days by a “regional publisher.” We’ll hopefully learn more about Sword and Fairy 4 Remake then.
Wesley is Director, News at IGN. Find him on Twitter at @wyp100. You can reach Wesley at wesley_yinpoole@ign.com or confidentially at wyp100@proton.me.
The last full week of 2025 UK charts data is in, and for the most part, it’s a minor reshuffle of the usual suspects, with EA SPORTS FC 26 sitting pretty at #1 and Mario Kart cleaning up twice over and first-party Nintendo (published) games taking up more than a quarter of entries in the all-formats chart.
A recap: of the seven hopefuls I slipped into our bulk 2025 list of “Oh, that looks alright” games, only three actually released in 2025, and one of them wasn’t very good. If it’s the hope that kills you, I am therefore dead four, arguably five times over. Real Necron shit, honestly.
Over the holiday season, we’re republishing some of the best articles from Nintendo Life writers and contributors from2025. This article was originally published in May. Enjoy!
While I would go so far as to say that I have an affection for the team here at RPS, they certainly tried my patience when it came to the Advent Calendar voting. How dare they not have played and loved the same games as me through the year? Here I was, new head honcho, and I couldn’t find a single one in the bunch who had put the necessary hours into Chip ‘n Clawz vs. The Brainoids. Shameful.
Thank goodness I can put that right with my Selection Box.
Since the Switch 2 generation got underway, many Nintendo fans have been calling for the Pikmin titles to receive an upgrade from Nintendo. Now, in an interesting development, a Switch 2 rating has surfaced on the European age rating board ‘PEGI’ for Pikmin 3 Deluxe.
