In December, following the release of the Season 1 Reloaded update, fans noticed a number of telltale signs in Black Ops 6 loading screens, calling cards, and art used to explain how Zombies community events work.
At the centre of the backlash was a loading screen image of Zombie Santa, aka ‘Necroclaus,’ which some said showed the undead Father Christmas with six fingers. Generative AI often struggles with hands, adding extra fingers where they shouldn’t be.
Another image of a gloved hand was used to show off a new Zombies community event. It contained what looked like six fingers with no thumb on-screen, suggesting up to seven digits on this hand.
The release of the Zombie Santa image sparked a closer look at other images in Black Ops 6, which some in the Call of Duty community subsequently called into question. Redditor Shaun_LaDee highlighted three images included in paid bundles that have irregularities that could suggest the use of generative AI.
Fans then called on Activision to disclose the use of generative AI for art that is included in bundles that are sold, and following new AI disclosure rules for Steam, it has now added a vague disclosure that covers the entirety of Black Ops 6 on Valve’s platform.
Black Ops 6’s Steam AI Generated Content Disclosure reads: “Our team uses generative AI tools to help develop some in game assets.”
This bundle cost 1,500 COD Points, the premium virtual currency sold for real-world money that generates hundreds of millions of dollars for Activision each year. 1,500 COD Points is approximately valued at $15.
Wired pointed out that Microsoft, which owns Activision Blizzard after its $69 billion acquisition of the company last year, cut 1,900 staff from its gaming business just months after Activision sold this skin. The report alleged that 2D artists’ jobs were being replaced by AI at the company.
“A lot of 2D artists were laid off,” one anonymous Activision artist told the site. “Remaining concept artists were then forced to use AI to aid in their work.” Activision employees were allegedly “made” to sign up for AI training, with its use promoted throughout the business.
Generative AI is one of the hottest topics within the video game and entertainment industries, which have both suffered massive layoffs in recent years. Generative AI thus far has drawn criticism from players and creators due to a mix of ethical issues, rights issues, and AI’s struggles to produce content audiences actually enjoy. For instance, Keywords Studios attempted to create an experimental game internally using entirely AI. The game failed, with Keywords citing to investors that AI was “unable to replace talent.”
Wesley is the UK News Editor for IGN. Find him on Twitter at @wyp100. You can reach Wesley at wesley_yinpoole@ign.com or confidentially at wyp100@proton.me.
In typical shinobi style, Assassin’s Creed Shadows has slipped through the cracks of physical and digital retail and sneakishly released itself a month ahead of schedule. The game is due to launch on 20th March, but people are already posting photographs of boxed copies, while others say they’ve managed to lift a code from the crevices of the PlayStation store.
Videos of the game have been popping up on Youtube like Ninja Whac-a-Moles, no sooner seen than shurikened by Ubisoft’s lawyers. Quite how all this has happened remains to be explained, but Ubisoft are naturally rather annoyed. They’ve put out statements asking people to avoid sharing spoilers, plus the boilerplate cautionary note that any footage you encounter isn’t representative of the quality of the final game.
It’s been a bloomin’ long time coming, but Level-5’s Fantasy Life i: The Girl Who Steals Time is finally making its way to the Switch on 22nd May 2025 following multiple delays.
To really drive the message that this date is likely final, two new commercials have been released (thanks, Go Nintendo) that highlight some tasty gameplay before reconfirming the game’s upcoming launch. They’re not particularly lengthy, but we get a good glimpse at what you’ll be getting up to during the time with the game, including the various farming mechanics, mining, crafting, and, of course, a sprinkling of combat.
Another fan-favorite indie, Buckshot Roulette, is also making the jump to Xbox. Within a year of its release back in December 2023, the tabletop horror game was a hit, taking over four million of us through a fiendish – and terrifying – game of Russian roulette with a pump-action shotgun.
But those aren’t the only games jumping onto Microsoft’s subscription service. We’ve rounded up all the new indie games confirmed at last night’s show as coming to Xbox Game Pass later in 2025.
This is of course on top of Watch Dogs: Legion (Cloud, Console, and PC), which launches into Game Pass Ultimate, PC Game Pass, and Game Pass Standard today, February 25.
Vikki Blake is a reporter, critic, columnist, and consultant. She’s also a Guardian, Spartan, Silent Hillian, Legend, and perpetually High Chaos. Find her at BlueSky.
Sorcerous cardgame Balatro and slot machine RPGLuck Be A Landlord have been reclassified as fit for people aged 12 years and over by the Pan European Games Information board, after they were initially slapped with an 18 rating for “glamorising… the simulation of gambling”.
PEGI have made the change following a successful appeal against the 18 rating by Balatro’s European publisher Sold Out and Luck Be A Landlord’s Switch publisher Fangamer. They’re also going to develop “a more granular set of classification criteria” for games that reference gambling, to distinguish jingling parodies of rentier capitalism from the one arm bandits found in actual casinos.
I like to think that, having been supplanted by autoshooters and twig-picking survival games as the Steam Next Fest genre du jour, 2D puzzle-platformers can circle back from ubiquity to becoming cool and clever again. In any event, I’ve definitely enjoyed As I Began To Dream, a charmingly hand-drawn side-scroller that delivers its puzzles with a tactile clickiness straight out of your childhood toolbox. The demo is out now.
Get The Band Back Together in Rockbeasts, a Management RPG Coming to Xbox
Elise Ashwood, PR Manager, Team17 Digital
Get ready to add Rockbeasts, the narrative band-management RPG, to your most anticipated albums of 2025. Welcome to a world that puts you in the shoes of a manager in the age of MTV, rock anthems, and bad haircuts.
Featuring the iconic Iggy Pop and with a story written by Jakub Szamałek (Senior writer of The Witcher 3, Principal Writer of Cyberpunk 2077 and the upcoming The Blood of Dawnwalker), prepare for a tragicomic tale of the highs and lows of an up-and-coming band in the 90s.
As the manager of “one of the most controversial bands” of the era, you’ll help a group of rising stars as they navigate the highs and lows of the music industry in pursuit of fame and fortune. Along the way, you’ll meet a colorful cast of anthropomorphic animals, some inspired by real world rock legends.
Pick the venue, prep the set and make sure it all goes according to plan. Pull it off and the band might just finally take those first steps to fame and glory. Sure, this one was in a grimy basement, but even the rock legends had to start somewhere, right?
The characters that bring this world to life all come with their own motivations, and personal demons. You have a choice – will you be the manager who helps those around you, or uses others as the stepping stone to success?
Bringing the Godfather of Punk himself, Iggy Pop, to your television screens once again, has drawn on decades of musical insider knowledge for his performance to give you an authentic window into the world of early ’90s rock mayhem.
His musical performances live in the annals of rock music history and now he’s jumping over to your Xbox. Iggy Pop plays a fictionalised version of himself, the aptly named “Iggy Pup” and lends his vocal talents to bringing the story’s narrator to life, as a radio host charting the rise of the band to fame. Relive the story first-hand as the notorious manager that leads the band to fame and fortune.
The branching narratives, twists and tales of the story will lead you down a path for you and your band to either rock, or ruin, and only by making the hardest choices can you help this band reach their true potential. Manage their practice sessions, sculpt their image, and do everything a good manager will do and maybe you’ll find a diamond in the rough with this misfit bunch of anthropomorphic animals. Or, simply use their hopes and dreams to line your own pockets, at the end of the day – the choices really are yours.
Ladies and Gentlemen: Rock & Roll. Wishlist Rockbeasts now on the Xbox Store today.
Pokémon Trading Card sets like Prismatic Evolutions are in high demand at the moment and it doesn’t look like things will be slowing down any time soon.
In response to the TCG’s latest spike in popularity, GameStop has announced it has discontinued pre-orders. This includes implementing purchase limits in-store on select SKUs. Here’s the official notice, along with the reasoning behind this decision:
Hey, everyone! At Annapurna Interactive, we’re fortunate to work with some of the world’s best development teams around the world, supporting them to help bring unique game experiences to PlayStation. Today, we premiere a new Annapurna Showcase, highlighting some of these teams, sharing exciting news and updates about previously announced games that are coming very soon.
Sayonara Wild Hearts
The critically-acclaimed rhythm game Sayonara Wild Hearts is coming to PlayStation 5 today. Experience a brand-new PS5 exclusive Remix Arcade game mode chasing high scores in endlessly replayable levels set to a selection of songs from the game’s iconic soundtrack.
Sayonara Wild Hearts also features upgraded 4K visuals, runs at up to 120 FPS, and supports haptic feedback on PS5. Those who own the game on PlayStation 4 can upgrade their copy to the PlayStation 5 version for free as long as both platforms are linked to the same account.
Lushfoil Photography Sim
Explore diverse landscapes, play with camera settings, and capture the perfect shot in Lushfoil Photography Sim.
Featuring breathtaking locations, from the picturesque Italian countryside to the saltwater beaches of West Australia, Lushfoil Photography Sim delivers the premier digital photography experience, ramping up your favorite in-game photo modes to 11.
We’re excited for PlayStation players to experience the delight of travel photography when the game launches April 15, 2025 on PlayStation 5.
To a T
Led by esteemed Katamari Damancy creator Keita Takahashi, to a T is a charming, colorful adventure game about a teen navigating life in a small town with their cute dog companion.
Play as a teenager (Teen), with a unique posture just trying to live a normal life in a small coastal town. Explore the town along with the help of Teen’s loyal dog and loving mother. While going to school and contending with bullies, Teen discovers a new ability granted to them by their extraordinary posture, as they start to uncover more about their mysterious lineage.
PlayStation players can be charmed and delighted on May 28 when To a T launches on PlayStation 5. The latest trailer for the game features an original track, “The Giraffe Song,” performed by Rebecca Sugar (Steven Universe, Adventure Time).
Wheel World
Wheel World is a single-player bicycle racing adventure where you’re tasked with preventing the world from collapsing.
You are Kat, a young cyclist with one mission: save Wheel World from total collapse. Explore a stunning world filled with impressive vistas, hidden secrets, and races that will test your skills. Customize your bike with an endless array of parts, from sleek speedsters to off-road beasts—there’s no limit to how you can ride.
Customize your ride, explore, and compete in this cycling journey with original music from the electronic music label Italians Do It Better when it launches this summer on PlayStation 5.
That’s all for the Annapurna Interactive Showcase 2025. We hope you are just as excited about the upcoming releases as we are. We can’t wait to get these games in your hands but for now make sure to follow and wishlist the games on the PlayStation Store to be among the first to receive the latest updates. From all of us at Annapurna, as well as our developer partners – thank you so much for joining us.
Originally released as a PlayStation 2 game in 2005, Yakuza (Ryu ga Gotoku in Japan) spawned a lengthy and beloved video game series that follows the many conflicts and schemes of yakuza families in the game’s fictional neighborhood of Kamurocho, Tokyo. (The series was renamed to Like a Dragon, the English translation of Ryu ga Gotoku, in 2022.)
The games are notably action packed, melodramatic, cinematic, and super goofy all at once. (If you skip the side quests, you’re missing out on an key part of the games’ sense of humor.) It took years for the franchise to start receiving the renown it’s finally achieved outside of Japan, and its reputation only grows thanks to a scarily consistent output of localized re-releases, spinoffs, and new games – including the most recent of the bunch, the Majima-led spin-off Like a Dragon: Pirate Yakuza in Hawaii.
Which Yakuza Game Should You Play First?
With such a sprawling saga available to play, where should a curious newcomer jump in? We’d recommend starting chronologically with Yakuza 0 or jumping ahead to the clean slate of a new generation with Yakuza: Like a Dragon.
Yakuza/Like a Dragon Games in Chronological Order:
Beware: Mild spoilers for the plots, characters, and some major events of each game follow.
1. Yakuza 0 (2014)
The sixth game released is actually the first chronological Yakuza game. In Yakuza 0, we play as a two protagonists during the economic boom in the late 1980s. The first: a young Kazuma Kiryu, member of the Dojima family, who is being framed for a murder that took place at the Empty Lot, an undeveloped piece of land that will be a crucial asset for whoever owns it.
The second is former Shimano family member Goro Majima, who is working in a cabaret as a punishment for being part of an assassination years ago. He’s tasked by his ex-patriarch, Futoshi Shimano, to kill a blind woman named Makoto for unknown reasons. (It’s later revealed that she’s the legitimate owner of the Empty Lot.)
By the end of the game, Kiryu gets back to the Dojima family after defeating all the lieutenants, Majima leaves Makoto to live her life, and the Empty Lot is destroyed; the Millennium Tower, a key location in the series, is built on the land.
2. Yakuza (2005) / Yakuza Kiwami (2016)
The first Yakuza game stars Kazuma Kiryu after he goes to prison for taking the blame for a murder he didn’t commit in 1995. The victim was Sohei Dojima, Kiryu’s boss, who was murdered by Akira Nishikiyama, Kiryu’s best friend. The reason behind this crime was that Sohei tried to rape Yumi Sawamura, a friend of both Kiryu and Nishikiyama.
When Kiryu is released from jail after a 10-year sentence, he’s expelled from the Tojo Clan, someone has stolen ¥10 billion from the clan’s account, and Yumi is nowhere to be found. In the middle of this, Kiryu meets Haruka, the daughter of a woman named Mizuki. Haruka has a pendant that seems to be a key element related to the lost money. Also, Nishikiyama shoots Kiryu’s former captain and adoptive father, becoming an antagonistic force.
During the climax, Kiryu finds Yumi and the lost money, and fights Nishikiyama. Kiryu is asked to be the Fourth Chairman of the Tojo Clan, which he accepts. Moments later, however, he names Yukio Terada, a former Omi Alliance yakuza, as the new chairman, and he quits the yakuza to raise Haruka as his adopted daughter.
3. Yakuza 2 (2006) / Yakuza Kiwami 2 (2017)
Yakuza 2 starts with Terada, the Fifth Chairman of the Tojo Clan, asking Kiryu to help him prevent a war between his clan and the Omi Alliance, their eternal rivals. After being shot in an ambush, Terada seems to be dead and Kiryu looks for Daigo Dojima, son of Sohei Dojima, to appoint him as the new chairman of the clan.
While helping Daigo, Kiryu meets Ryuji Goda, the son of the Omi chairman, and they become enemies because Ryuji refuses a truce with the Tojo Clan. Another character, detective Kaoru Sayama, comes into play and tries to help Kiryu while learning about her parents, who disappeared when she was young.
4. Yakuza 3 (2009)
The first game in the series released on PlayStation 3, Yakuza 3 starts with Kiryu far away from the yakuza lifestyle. Instead, in 2007, he’s taking care of the Morning Glory Orphanage in Okinawa. He’s assisted by Haruka, and he looks after many new kids living there.
Unfortunately, peace doesn’t last for long. Our protagonist has to face multiple troubles with different characters, involving new yakuza families, multiple assassinations, shootings, betrayals, an arms smuggling group, and even the CIA.
5. Yakuza 4 (2010)
One year after the events of the previous game, Yakuza 4 raises the stakes in a tale of families, betrayals, and crime from the eyes of four protagonists.
Apart from Kiryu, three other new faces join the streets of Kamurocho. The first one, Shun Akiyama, is a loan shark who runs his own firm, Sky Finance, and finds himself in the middle of a conflict between the Tojo Clan and the Ueno Seiwa Clan. He’s also asked for a ¥100 million loan from a mysterious woman named Lily.
Taiga Saejima, Goro Majima’s blood brother, went to prison after performing a hit against the Ueno Seiwa Clan in 1985. Twenty years later, after successfully escaping, he looks for Majima, who abandoned him when they had to perform the hit.
Detective Masayoshi Tanimura, another new protagonist, is investigating one of the recent murders in the Tojo Clan. While doing so, he meets Lily, who is actually Saejima’s sister, and she’s being attacked by the Shibata family. Tanimura later finds out that the patriarch of that family was related to the hit Saejima participated all those years ago.
Ultimately, Kiryu meets his new partners and finds out what happened to all the characters involved in the ongoing conflicts.
6. Yakuza 5 (2012)
If Yakuza 4’s story got complicated with multiple protagonists’ points of view, Yakuza 5 went even further. This time, you play as five protagonists in different scenarios in 2012, making this one of the biggest and most ambitious games in the series.
First you follow Kiryu, who left Kamurocho and moved to Fukuoka without Haruka, leaving his orphanage behind. As usual, he won’t enjoy calm for long before he learns that Daigo is missing, and the peace between the Tojo Clan and the Omi Alliance is about to break.
Saejima is in prison once again, but he’s looking to escape with his cellmate Shigeki Baba when he hears that Majima is dead. (After they escape, they learn Majima had actually faked his death.) In the meantime, Haruka is already a teenager and she’s following her dream of becoming a J-pop idol. Things get complicated when the president of her talent agency, Mirei Park, is found dead in what seems like a staged suicide. Returning protagonist Akiyama appears to help Haruka learn who was really behind Park’s death.
The last piece of the puzzle is the brand-new character Tatsuo Shinada, a former professional baseball player who was banned after being framed for fixing an important match. A mysterious man, who’s actually Daigo, will meet Shinada and ask him to find out the truth of what happened.
7. Yakuza 6: The Song of Life (2016)
Yakuza 6: The Song of Life is presented as the final beat in Kazuma Kiryu’s spotlight in the Yakuza series. Our protagonist spends three years in prison, but this time it’s for his past crimes he actually did. At the end of the previous game, Haruka revealed in a concert broadcast that Kiryu was her father and that he was an ex-yakuza member.
After getting out of prison in 2016, Kiryu returns to Kamurocho, but only for a little while. He learns that Haruka is in a coma after a car accident, and she has a child named Haruto. Haruka was in Onomichi, Hiroshima for a long time before the accident, so Kiryu goes there to investigate what happened and who Haruto’s father is.
While finding clues, important characters like Daigo, Saejima, and Majima are imprisoned, and rival groups, the Chinese Saio Triad and the Korean Jingweon Mafia, are looking to make their moves in Kamurocho.
8. Yakuza: Like a Dragon (2020)
A major turning point for the series, Yakuza: Like a Dragon begins the transition away from the Yakuza name. It also introduces a new turn-based combat system and a brand-new main character: Ichiban Kasuga, another Tojo Clan member who, like Kiryu, starts his journey by agreeing to take the hit on a criminal charge for his yakuza family and go to prison for a murder he did not commit. On his release 18 years later, Kasuga quickly learns that major changes have happened while he was away, chiefly that the Omi Alliance defeated the Tojo Clan.
Kasuga goes to confront Masumi Arakawa, his former patriarch and father-like figure who seemingly sold out the Tojo Clan, about what happened and is greeted by his former compatriats with hostility. Arakawa shoots Kasuga and dumps his body near a homeless encampment in Yohokama’s Isezaki Ijincho. (New city unlocked!)
Ichiban wakes up and finds himself in the care of Yu Nanba, a former nurse who treated his gunshot wound. This is the starting point for Kasuga, who will meet multiple new faces for the Yakuza series to round out his fighting party, including members from area criminal groups the Yokohama Liumang, the Geomijul Mafia, and the Seiryu Clan. Together, they dig around Yokohama, Sotenbori in Osaka, and Kamurocho to uncover the bigger picture behind Arakawa’s play.
9. Like a Dragon: Infinite Wealth (2024)
The biggest Like a Dragon game to-date teams up the old and new guard – Kiryu and Kasuga – in a true two-protagonist saga that takes the crew from Japan to Hawaii and back. Jumping ahead to 2024 after the events of Yakuza: Like a Dragon (if you were curious, the pandemic also exists in the Like a Dragon universe), Kasuga and friends are trying to live above-board lives in Ijincho until a popular VTuber posts a viral video that upends their normalcy. Soon after, Kasuga learns that his mother, who he thought was dead, is alive and hops on a plane to Honolulu to find her.
After immediately getting into some trouble after landing (classic), Kasuga runs into Kiryu, who is also in Hawaii to find Kasuga’s mother on behalf of the Daidoji faction that agreed to give him sanctuary and keep him in hiding (play Like a Dragon: The Man Who Erased His Name for the full backstory there). Kiryu also reveals that he’s been diagnosed with cancer from exposure to nuclear waste (which is connected to the Big Bad of the game). That’s just the very tip of the setup to the massive story that embarks on new Hawaiian adventures, sentimentally reflects on Kiryu’s past, and builds a dramatic arc that involves multiple international mob groups, a religious cult, live streamers, a national conglomerate, and world governments, just to name a few players in this soap opera.
How to Play the Yakuza/Like a Dragon Games by Release Date
Yakuza (2005) / Yakuza Kiwami (2016)
Yakuza 2 (2006) / Yakuza Kiwami 2 (2017)
Yakuza 3 (2009)
Yakuza 4 (2010)
Yakuza 5 (2012)
Yakuza 0 (2015)
Yakuza 6: The Song of Life (2016)
Yakuza: Like a Dragon (2020)
Like a Dragon: Infinite Wealth (2024)
How Many Yakuza/Like a Dragon Games Are There?
Sega and Ryu Ga Gotoku studio have released nine main Yakuza/Like a Dragon games, two remakes – Yakuza Kiwami (2016) and Yakuza Kiwami 2 (2017), with a third promised down the road – and 11 spin-offs since the series’ debut in 2005. They were originally PlayStation exclusives, but later ported to Xbox and PC, with every new game since Yakuza: Like a Dragon releasing simultaneously for every system with the exception of Nintendo Switch. However, as announced in the Nintendo Direct from August 2024, Yakuza Kiwami was the first of the Like a Dragon games to get a Switch port in October 2024.
In addition to the mainline games, Like a Dragon has tons of wildly different spinoffs. Kurohyō: Ryu ga Gotoku Shinsho (2010) and its sequel Kurohyō 2: Ryu ga Gotoku Ashura Hen (2012) are two games exclusive to the PlayStation Portable featuring Tatsuya Ukyo, a completely new character. Judgment (2018) and Lost Judgment (2021) star another new face, lawyer-turned-detective Takayuki Yagami, who’s investigating strange murders in Kamurocho, and has a peripheral crossover with Kiryu and the others in that he brushes up against Tojo Clan subsidiary families.
Then there’s the zombie-infested spinoff Yakuza: Dead Souls (2011), which features the classic cast of characters in a dystopian setting. Yakuza Online (2018) is a free-to-play TCG available on mobile and PC which soft-launched Ichiban Kasuga, the protagonist of Yakuza: Like a Dragon. The popular Japanese series Fist of the North Star received the Yakuza treatment with Fist of the North Star: Lost Paradise (2018), which shares Kiryu’s games’ structure and gameplay elements.
Two spinoff games are set in older Japanese eras and feature historic figures as their main protagonists: Ryu ga Gotoku Kenzan! (2008) and Ryu ga Gotoku Ishin! (2014). The latter has been released in the west as Like a Dragon: Ishin! in 2023.
In 2023, RGG released Like a Dragon: The Man Who Erased His Name, which takes place at the same time as Yakuza: Like a Dragon and explains what happened to Kiryu following the dramatic ending of Yakuza 6: The Song of Life. The most recent spin-off is Like a Dragon: Pirate Yakuza in Hawaii starring fan-favorite Goro Majima as an amnesiatic protagonist in and around Honolulu six months after the events of Infinite Wealth.
What’s Next for Yakuza/Like a Dragon?
The Like a Dragon story is far from over. Though Infinite Wealth, which quickly became the fastest-selling game in the franchise, closed the loop on its own story, it still ended on what felt like a big cliffhanger that leaves the door wide open for the next installment. Just TBD when that might happen: At the 2024 Game Awards in December, RGG revealed it was reviving Virtua Fighter but dropped nothing about what we can expect from the next Like a Dragon mainline or spin-off game.
Leanne Butkovic is an Editorial Project Manager at IGN who wishes they could befriend Seonhee.
