Author: Game Infliction

Death Stranding 2: On the Beach is widely regarded as another masterpiece from Kojima Productions, with all the sweeping scope, drama, and weirdness fans have come to expect. Now those fans can delve even deeper into this unique world with the release of Titan Books’ The Art of Death Stranding 2: On the Beach.

IGN can exclusively reveal a new preview of The Art of Death Stranding 2 ahead of the book’s release. Check it out in the slideshow gallery below:

The Art of Death Stranding 2: On the Beach is a 240-page hardcover book featuring concept art from the game. The book offers a closer look at character designs, equipment, locations, and creatures from the game, with plenty of pieces from acclaimed artist Yoji Shinkawa.

Here’s the official summary for the book:

The official art book for the action video game DEATH STRANDING 2: ON THE BEACH, from legendary game creator Hideo Kojima, including artwork by acclaimed artist Yoji Shinkawa.

With DEATH STRANDING 2: ON THE BEACH, step by step, legendary game creator Hideo Kojima changes the world once again. Embark on an inspiring mission of human connection beyond the UCA. Sam—with companions by his side—sets out on a new journey to save humanity from extinction. Join them as they traverse a world beset by otherworldly enemies and obstacles.

The Art of Death Stranding 2: On the Beach is packed with hundreds of pieces of concept art for the characters, equipment, locations and creatures featured in the game, as well as early and unused concepts, including artwork by character and mechanical design director, acclaimed artist Yoji Shinkawa.

The Art of Death Stranding 2: On the Beach is priced at $50 and will be released on February 17, 2026. You can preorder a copy on Amazon.

In other Death Stranding 2, we learned at Sony’s State of Play event that the game will be hitting the PC in March 2026. Check out everything announced at State of Play.

Jesse is a mild-mannered staff writer for IGN. Allow him to lend a machete to your intellectual thicket by following @jschedeen on BlueSky.

God of War creator David Jaffe has slammed the series’ new side-scrolling spinoff Sons of Sparta for being “boring” and “an insult” both to fans of the series and its original creative team.

God of War Sons of Sparta was announced and then shadow-dropped on PlayStation 5 last week at the end of Sony’s big State of Play broadcast. A Metroidvania-inspired action platformer from indie retro developer Mega Cat Studios, Sons of Sparta is designed as a prequel to the original God of War trilogy, featuring a young version of Kratos and his brother as they train together.

In an initial YouTube video posted after playing an hour of the game, Jaffe made his frustrations with the project’s concept clear: essentially, that it was too different in tone from the original trilogy, despite his initial excitment to see a side-scrolling take on the series.

“This is the kind of game I’ve always wanted in terms of 2.5D God of War, super into it — but this, to me, is not what I was talking about. I bought this game, it’s a $30 game, I don’t like it, I don’t recommend it,” Jaffe began, before turning his attention to the executives at Sony who decided to greenlight the project.

“I wanted to make a video more about what are they thinking, like what the f*** were they thinking? It’s not a bad game by any means, it’s fine, it controls decently… but to me the more fascinating part of this is, why is this in existence? I don’t understand.”

After an hour’s worth of play, Jaffe said he couldn’t continue with the game as its characters kept “stopping over and over [to] talk and talk.” He added: “This is not God of War.”

“Let’s just make him some generic f***ing kid, like we’re watching a Kids WB TV show or something,” Jaffe continued on. “It’s probably some bulls*** writer going, ‘Oh people want to know why, how did people become this way?’ No one cares. It’s a dumb idea… [Fans] wanted something like Blasphemous, in terms of it’s violent, it’s bloody, it’s serious, it has the tone of the early God of the War games.

“If you pulled God of War out of it, and you just said, ‘hey, we’re making a game about this kid,’ most people would say ‘that doesn’t sound like a very compelling idea for a video game character,’ because it’s not.”

Final Fantasy Remake Part 3 director Naoki Hamaguchi has discussed the impact of expanding the platforms on which the Final Fantasy 7 Remake series is available, insisting that going multiplatform “will not in any way lower the quality of the third instalment.”

In an interview with Automaton, via Eurogamer, Hamaguchi said both the Nintendo Switch 2 and Xbox versions of the game’s prior instalments “have been incredibly well received and generated a lot of buzz online,” but did note some community concerns.

“Both the Nintendo Switch 2 and Xbox versions have been incredibly well received and generated a lot of buzz online,” Hamaguchi said. “That attention has also made me realize how many people are worried about this issue. However, our decision to go multiplatform with the FF7 Remake series will not in any way lower the quality of the third installment.

“Our development structure simply doesn’t work that way to begin with… I suppose I’ll just have to keep saying it,” he said, laughing. He also stressed that because of the growing popularity of gaming on PC both in Japan and beyond, the game has been built with PC “as the foundation.”

“While PC gaming is gradually expanding in Japan, overseas growth has been even more rapid,” Hamaguchi added. “The market has broadened tremendously across both consoles and PC. The FF7 Remake series has sold very well on platforms like Steam and the Epic Games Store, so we develop assets with the broad PC market in mind. In fact, our 3D assets are created at the highest quality level based on PC as the foundation.

“When FFVII Rebirth launched, there was talk about how the PC version looked better than the PS5 version, and our philosophy will not change for the third instalment,” he concluded. “As our fundamental principle, we do not design assets to meet the lowest baseline. Instead, we create them for high-end environments first.”

Last month, Hamaguchi teased that the “core game experience is almost complete,” and while he “really want[s] everyone to play it as soon as possible,” the team has now moved on to “refining and polishing.”

Meanwhile, Final Fantasy 7 Rebirth‘s Queen’s Blood card game is making a “powered-up” comeback for the final chapter in Square Enix’s remake trilogy. Hamaguchi said he plans to double down on the card game when its next installment finally launches, promising to “expand” what was seen with its Rebirth launch.

We also recently learned that the Final Fantasy 7 Remake team actually considered resizing Cloud’s iconic Buster Sword to make it more realistic before deciding to stick with the original design, admitting “it was just too iconic” to change.

Vikki Blake is a reporter for IGN, as well as a critic, columnist, and consultant with 15+ years experience working with some of the world’s biggest gaming sites and publications. She’s also a Guardian, Spartan, Silent Hillian, Legend, and perpetually High Chaos. Find her at BlueSky.

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