Indiana Jones and the Great Circle Review

It’s been over 30 years since I wore out my VHS copy of Indiana Jones and the Last Crusade. Since then the film franchise has been in a state of escalation. Where do you go after uncovering the literal Holy Grail? Aliens, then time machines, apparently. Indiana Jones and the Great Circle is the perfect antidote to all of this; one that uses its own figurative Dial of Destiny to propel us back in time to Indy’s prime. The result is easily one of the best Indy stories across both the games and the movies, with painstakingly detailed environments, wonderfully atmospheric tomb raiding and puzzle solving, a pitch-perfect score, and quite possibly the greatest punch sound effect in the business. While it does stumble occasionally as a stealth-focused sneak ’em up, The Great Circle is an otherwise grand and gorgeous globe-trotting adventure that left me giddy as a schoolboy. Yes, it’s true that bringing Indiana Jones back to the big screen (twice) after he literally rode off into the sunset was probably a poor choice. But having MachineGames craft an Indy experience inspired by all the best games in that development team’s past?

Bethesda chose wisely.

MachineGames’ most immediate legacy is the modern Wolfenstein series, and there’s certainly some of that on show in The Great Circle. Like The New Order and its excellent prequel and sequel, The Great Circle is first-person and highly story-driven, and I’d wager if there’s anyone who hates Nazis as much as Indy, it’s the Gestapo-gutting, SS-slaying BJ Blazkowicz. The Great Circle is not, however, a bloodthirsty exercise in double-fisted, lead-flinging fury. Unlike Wolfenstein, The Great Circle’s focus is patient and slower-paced exploration and stealth – where guns are rarely (and barely) a viable option.

That said, with the founding members of MachineGames all hailing from fellow Swedish studio Starbreeze, MachineGames’ DNA admittedly runs much deeper than Wolfenstein. For many of the team, it dates back to 2004’s outstanding and highly acclaimed The Chronicles of Riddick: Escape from Butcher Bay. Riddick’s first-person fisticuffs and adventure elements appear to have been a huge inspiration on The Great Circle, and it’s refreshing to be playing a game like Butcher Bay again – particularly when it’s done with this much verve and commitment to a storied franchise.

For clarity, I doubt anybody would’ve been shocked to see an Indiana Jones game in 2024 arrive as a clone of the blockbuster Uncharted series. It certainly wouldn’t have been unprecedented. After all, both 1999’s Indiana Jones and the Infernal Machine and 2003’s Indiana Jones and the Emperor’s Tomb both followed a fairly strict Tomb Raider template. Pivoting to pay tribute to the man who usurped Lara as the premier grave-robbing vagabond of modern video games would hardly have been surprising – particularly as games today have become increasingly homogenised overall.

The Great Circle isn’t an Uncharted clone, and it’s all the better for it.

But The Great Circle isn’t an Uncharted clone, and it’s all the better for it. It’s an Indiana Jones game I didn’t even know I wanted, and sometimes that’s the best surprise. I like highly cinematic, quality third-person shooters as much as the next man, but not every game needs to be one. And besides, you can do a lot worse than taking notes from Butcher Bay – another licensed tie-in with the extremely rare distinction of being even better than the film upon which it was based.

Genius of the Restoration

The first-person perspective blesses The Great Circle with a fantastic sense of scale. Looking up in awe of the Great Pyramid – or staring out at a giant Nazi battleship perched atop a mountain in the Himalayas – simply has a more pronounced effect at eye-level. It also does wonders for immediacy, with puzzle solving in particular benefitting greatly. Picking up and poring over documents and clues, directly manipulating and placing objects, and watching the results unfold in front of your eyes makes it feel like you’re personally inside some of the world’s most expensive escape rooms. Puzzles come regularly, and they’re mostly light lifting, but I’ve encountered at least a couple of slightly curlier ones that left me smugly satisfied that I wasn’t stumped. If you do hit a roadblock, there’s a baked-in hint system that will only interject if you take an extra photo of the offending puzzle with your in-game camera. It’s a smart and courteous way of offering aid only when asked that will keep players off their phones and in the game.

On top of this, it’s really the best showcase for the incredible amount of granular detail MachineGames has stuffed into seemingly every surface in The Great Circle. From streak marks on freshly wiped glass to the slow trickle of wax from a candle lighting your way down an ancient stairwell, these are things that wouldn’t be noticed from any other viewpoint. Are they entirely necessary to make The Great Circle a great game? Maybe not, but they do paint a picture of a project where no flourish is too small if they make the world look and feel even a fraction more authentic.

After beginning with a short flashback to Raiders of the Lost Ark as a tutorial – one that might’ve been a tad indulgent had it not been so utterly well done – The Great Circle’s second level is a wonderful (and equally nostalgic) trip through Connecticut’s Marshall College. It’s a magnificent rendition and draped in layers upon layers of bespoke details that distracted me constantly on my way to the objective. Busts and other paraphernalia related to the history of the school. Cabinets full of exotic items. Notice boards cluttered with handmade signs. If you’d shown this version of Indy’s famous school to the eight-year-old version of me who cut his teeth aimlessly point-and-clicking his way around Marshall College in 1989’s Indiana Jones and the Last Crusade: The Graphic Adventure, I might have had you burnt at the stake. Or at least lowered into a sacrificial lava pit without a heart.

The eye-catching environments keep coming: The ornate Italian architecture and crusty catacombs of Vatican City; An ancient town and multiple Nazi dig sites in the shadow of the Egyptian pyramids and the Great Sphinx; Sukhothai’s winding waterways and flooded temples, which are being reclaimed by the jungle. It’s all excellent stuff, and bolstered by exemplary ray-traced lighting to boot. I love the huge contrasts between the levels, and “the great circle” as a fanciful archaeological concept is an admirably effective premise to justify Indy hopping all over the globe during a single story.

David Shaughnessy’s unerring version of Marcus Brody may go criminally unnoticed in Baker’s shadow.

The strength of that story here is one of The Great Circle’s true assets, and it’s been brought to life with some very impressive performances. For the most part, Troy Baker’s Harrison Ford impersonation is close to spot-on, and Baker’s otherwise distinct voice disappears in the role. Credit too must go to voice actor David Shaughnessy, whose unerring version of Denholm Elliot’s Marcus Brody may go criminally unnoticed in Baker’s shadow. This could have very much felt like a gimmick considering Elliot passed away back in 1992, but Brody’s small role feels meaningful and respectful, and not like a stunt. Marios Gavrilis also kills it as the slimy and sinister Nazi archaeologist Emmerich Voss; he spits his dialogue with such venom I imagine his microphone may have required a tiny umbrella. Most of the meaningful conversations occur in well-directed cutscenes, which are on par with those in modern Wolfenstein, albeit punctuated with an appropriate amount of slightly slapstick Indiana Jones humour when the fists start flying. There are basically two movies worth of cutscenes here, but it never felt like too much. This is Indy in his prime, and I’m on board for every extra minute of it.

As a rule, the Indiana Jones series is always at its best when it involves a desperate race to track down an artifact before the Nazis can nab it for what they believe will be an unbeatable, world-conquering advantage. Those movies were video game fetch quests before video game fetch quests, and The Great Circle naturally embraces it, immediately beginning on the right foot by setting its action in 1937 – directly between the events of Raiders and The Last Crusade, as the world simmers towards the Second World War.

It’s honestly quite remarkable how convincingly The Great Circle fits into the hole between those two impeccable films, successfully exploiting the odd chronology of the original Indy trilogy. That goes far beyond just providing a little extra context on Indy’s separation from Marion Ravenwood, too. In fact, one of the greatest compliments I can pay The Great Circle is that it may well be the best Indiana Jones movie you’ve never seen. The music, too, is a victory on all fronts, and I love how in sync it feels with Raiders and The Last Crusade. I was especially thrilled to see The Great Circle crescendo to a showdown that follows tightly in the footsteps of both of those films – yet still managed to knock me out with a brilliantly unexpected twist.

Aid our own resuscitation

On the topic of knockouts, combat in The Great Circle is satisfyingly brutal without being gratuitously violent, which is in keeping with its family-friendly, swashbuckling adventure serial roots. I love the deeply impressive sound design, which makes every strike sound like a golf club being slammed into a huge bunch of celery, and I love how visceral the fighting is in first-person. You block and parry blows with the correct timing, and deliver quick jabs and loaded up power punches. On top of that, Indy’s bullwhip can be used to quickly disarm enemies, and stun them long enough to either wade in and whack them or scoop up their dropped weapon and bludgeon them with it.

I enjoy how Butcher Bay-adjacent the fighting is but I’m a little unconvinced by the stamina system that rules over it, which depletes as Indy exerts himself climbing, sprinting, and throwing hands. It just creates pauses throughout the action where you’ll be compelled to wait for a beat, or jog backwards as a gaggle of goose-stepping morons march towards you with their dukes up. I can’t really detect what it adds other than something to be arbitrarily upgraded to the point where it’s no longer an inconvenience.

Combat escalates with your actions so, if you do grab a gun and start blasting, expect all armed enemies in your vicinity to respond with hot lead of their own. Indy can’t survive this kind of barrage so, for the most part, the best thing to do is forget the firearms. This does, admittedly, create a bit of silliness if you stir up a large enemy response and park yourself anywhere your attackers need to climb to reach. You can, for instance, stand at the top of a ladder and clobber the crap out of everyone who climbs it for some time, and no one will figure out that they have guns and can simply shoot at you (on regular difficulty, at least). But you’d be colouring outside the lines here, playing like this. Indy doesn’t mind leaving bodies in his wake when necessary, but he’s not some moustache-twirling mass murderer. You can always fire up Wolfenstein if you need to get some of that out of your system.

Indy doesn’t mind leaving bodies in his wake, but he’s not some mass murderer.

On the topic of guns, though, Indy’s personal revolver is sadly a big disappointment. I used it all of twice, but both were still total anticlimaxes. The first was an early boss battle where Indy’s pistol really should’ve been written out of the fight before the showdown began. After placing several bullets into a man’s unarmored head, it became clear that shooting this bloke wasn’t the way MachineGames intended me to clear this encounter. The second was late in the story, where I thought, ‘There’s no point rolling credits with revolver rounds in the cylinder!’ and figured I’d quickly plug two Nazis that suddenly appeared ahead of me in an open elevator. They simply took too many shots to go down. It seems like a weird fumble, when the scene of Indy actually using his pistol and taking out the Raiders swordsman in a single shot is one of the most memorable moments in the whole film franchise. Revolver rounds should absolutely remain exceedingly rare, but the pistol itself really should have shipped with the consistent stopping power of its cinematic counterpart.

It also rarely feels logical that high-ranking enemies within the levels can automatically see through disguises, particularly in Vatican City. It is a mechanic I’m accustomed to thanks to the likes of Hitman, which I’ll be clear is another game I love, but it’s definitely a little sillier here. It really is total nonsense that a random Italian officer would physically attack a stranger who is, for all intents and purposes, a visiting priest.

This is only a mild annoyance though and, to be fair, The Great Circle actually has a very smart approach to difficulty overall. There’s a lot more fiddling you can do than just adjust a single setting from easy to very hard. Enemy attributes are split into several categories, meaning you can tweak it so that there are tougher enemies, but fewer of them. Maybe you want to pump up their awareness, but make them weaker than wet newspapers. (This is something I think I may try for a second run.) It’s good that these options are here because, on regular difficulty, the stealth is quite basic; enemies have pretty limited vision and they’re easier to sneak past than I first assumed. I definitely became progressively less cautious once I realised I could sneak across seemingly dangerously open places as long as I did it fast enough.

That said, The Great Circle does allow us to return to previously visited locations to complete all the extra side missions, even after the main adventure is complete, so I may focus on that instead of starting over. I suspect I have many more hours of auxiliary objectives to keep me busy; I only got around to ticking off a handful of them on my first run through the story, which took me about 17 hours.

Indiana Jones and the Great Circle: Starting Tips and Tricks for Your Adventure

Indiana Jones and the Great Circle: Starting Tips and Tricks for Your Adventure

Indiana Jones Hero Image

It’s time to pack your whip, don your hat and embark on a journey in Indiana Jones and the Great Circle, available in early access today for Xbox Series X|S consoles and Game Pass. While life’s greatest adventures rarely come with a manual, a little guidance here and there is often welcomed. As such, the Wire team has assembled some handy, spoiler-free tips, tricks and pointers to get you started on your escapades.

Indiana Jones Indy image

Sights, Camera, Action

The greatest mysteries and perplexing puzzles require documentation, and that rings true throughout Indiana Jones and the Great Circle, in which snapping photos is key. Once you’ve arrived in the Vatican, you’re given the opportunity to purchase a camera, a tool that comes in extremely handy during Indy’s escapades, not just to progress the story, but to gain experience that’ll unlock new perks and skills.

Virtual Tourism

When you’re in an area that contains a historical artefact or point of interest, a camera prompt will appear on the screen. Take that as a sign to stop and absorb your surroundings, and look for notable design, artefacts or items to get a quick snap of. Doing this contributes to your Adventure Points, which – when combined with the various knowledge books that you’ll find or purchase throughout the world, can be spent on upgrading your skills, everything from melee abilities to stamina capacity. These will come in super handy if you’re enjoying being creative with the vast range of melee options on display.

Helping The Locals

As you navigate through lively streets in several locations, you’ll hear the mumblings of NPCs discussing notable landmarks, or people that they’d like a visual reminder of. Pay close attention, as capturing photos of those places and characters and handing them back to the characters who mentioned wanting that visual can rack up those Adventure Points.

Never Be Empty-Handed

While Indy can and will use just about anything he can get his hands on as a weapon- shovels, dustpans, wooden spoons, flyswatters, hammers… sometimes you’ll find yourself… empty handed. Not really though! While your trusty revolver doesn’t have a silencer, it does have a quiet mode, by pressing X while your handgun is drawn, Indy will flip the grip, allowing for an effective pistol whip. A word of warning, he can only thwack a fascist a handful of times before the gun will get bent out of shape. Fortunately, you can fix it right up with those Repair Kits you’ll be finding all over the place.

It’s Ok To Walk Away (for now)

Indiana Jones and the Great Circle’s levels are densely packed with secrets, puzzles, and treasure, and it’s well worth your time to chase down all the Mysteries, Discoveries, and Fieldwork you encounter, both for the rewards they yield, and the fact that they’re just plain fun to do. While players will usually find everything they need to open containers such as locked chests close at hand, along the way, intrepid explorers are likely to run into locked doors, dead ends, or other mechanisms they just can’t figure out in the moment. In those cases, our counterintuitive advice: keep moving.

Often times, following the main thread of a story will result in new areas becoming accessible, doors opening, etc. Additionally, areas teeming with enemies become much more welcoming as Indy collects disguises allowing him to fit in where his trademark fedora makes him stand out. Even better, characters will let you know when you should tidy up loose ends in an area, so until that point, just go with the flow without fear of missing out.

Brawn Over Brains

While Indy’s (and therefore your) brain is certainly his strongest weapon, sometimes direct application of force is the best bet. In your travels, you may find little padlocked wooden boxes scattered. Don’t bother looking for a key when a hammer will do; if the reticle turns red, try smashing instead! Likewise, a sledgehammer is not only an effective weapon, it can also take down a fragile wall – so keep an eye out for crumbling masonry whenever you happen upon one.

We hope our guidance proves helpful as you begin your own adventure in Indiana Jones and the Great Circle, available in early access today.

Indiana Jones and the Great Circle™: Digital Premium Edition

Bethesda Softworks

$99.99

Pre-order now or Play on Game Pass* to receive The Last Crusade™ Pack with the Traveling Suit Outfit and Lion Tamer Whip, as seen in The Last Crusade™.

***
Live the adventure with the Premium Edition of Indiana Jones and the Great Circle™!

INCLUDES:
• Base Game (digital code)
• Up to 3-Day Early Access**
• Indiana Jones and the Great Circle: The Order of Giants Story DLC†
• Digital Artbook
• Temple of Doom™ Outfit

***
Uncover one of history’s greatest mysteries in Indiana Jones and the Great Circle, a first-person, single-player adventure set between the events of Raiders of the Lost Ark™ and The Last Crusade. The year is 1937, sinister forces are scouring the globe for the secret to an ancient power connected to the Great Circle, and only one person can stop them – Indiana Jones™. You’ll become the legendary archaeologist in this cinematic action-adventure game from MachineGames, the award-winning studio behind the recent Wolfenstein series, and executive produced by Hall of Fame game designer Todd Howard.

YOU ARE INDIANA JONES
Live the adventure as Indy in a thrilling story full of exploration, immersive action, and intriguing puzzles. As the brilliant archaeologist – famed for his keen intellect, cunning resourcefulness, and trademark humor – you will travel the world in a race against enemy forces to discover the secrets to one of the greatest mysteries of all time.

A WORLD OF MYSTERY AWAITS
Travel from the halls of Marshall College to the heart of the Vatican, the pyramids of Egypt, the sunken temples of Sukhothai, and beyond. When a break-in in the dead of night ends in a confrontation with a mysterious colossal man, you must set out to discover the world-shattering secret behind the theft of a seemingly unimportant artifact. Forging new alliances and facing familiar enemies, you’ll engage with intriguing characters, use guile and wits to solve ancient riddles, and survive intense set-pieces.

WHIP-CRACKING ACTION
Indiana’s trademark whip remains at the heart of his gear and can be used to distract, disarm, and attack enemies. But the whip isn’t just a weapon, it’s Indy’s most valuable tool for navigating the environment. Swing over unsuspecting patrols and scale walls as you make your way through a striking world. Combine stealth infiltration, melee combat, and gunplay to combat the enemy threat and unravel the mystery.

THE SPIRIT OF DISCOVERY
Venture through a dynamic mix of linear, narrative-driven gameplay and open-area maps. Indulge your inner explorer and unearth a world of fascinating secrets, deadly traps and fiendish puzzles, where anything could potentially hide the next piece of the mystery – or snakes. Why did it have to be snakes?

*Game Pass members get access to all pre-order content as long as Game Pass subscription is active.
**Actual play time depends on purchase date and applicable time zone differences, subject to possible outages.
†DLC availability to be provided at a later date.

The post Indiana Jones and the Great Circle: Starting Tips and Tricks for Your Adventure appeared first on Xbox Wire.

Wanderstop, a cozy game about change and tea, coming to PS5 March 11, 2025

My name is Jenny, and I’m the Communications Director for Ivy Road, the indie studio currently developing Wanderstop. Our team is proud to announce that Wanderstop will be released on PlayStation 5 on March 11, 2025. We are eager for the chance for players to step into Alta’s shoes and contribute to PlayStation’s tradition of representing impactful, emotional storytelling in games.  

A Mysterious Tea Shop

In Wanderstop, you’ll play as a former tournament fighter named Alta who has to put her troubled past aside to tend a charming shop and brew tea for its various customers. One would anticipate that after a lifetime of dedication, determination, and constant competition, Alta would welcome the opportunity to slow down. But Alta isn’t quite like everyone else, and this golden opportunity for rest is something she wishes she could escape. Instead of fighting, Alta must spend time growing and harvesting the ingredients needed for tea and mixing them in an unusual tea-making contraption, speaking with the many travelers who pass through the shop, learning their stories, and making tea to match their unique requests. 

In your downtime, you might tidy up around the clearing, decorate the shop in your style, or just sit on a bench with a cup of tea and listen to your own thoughts. Maybe doing nothing at all is okay. The shop demands patience and rejects those who have come only in the pursuit of growth unchecked. 

Inspired by Personal Experience

Creative Director Davey Wreden’s experience with burnout initially inspired the concept of Wanderstop, and as the team and project grew, each member brought their perspectives to the table. We also drew from the groundwork of many narrative and cozy games that have also explored challenging topics.

In our release date announcement video, we had the opportunity to share a bit of Davey’s journey. Years ago, he wrote and directed two games – The Stanley Parable and The Beginner’s Guide – and after finishing those games, he felt incredibly burnt out. In the hopes of bringing some balance to his life, and to inspire a healthier work/life balance, he started to explore making a cozy game. As he progressed, he discovered that playing cozy games can provide lots of relaxation – making them still contain the stresses and challenges that all game development holds.


Wanderstop, a cozy game about change and tea, coming to PS5 March 11, 2025

After collaborating with other members of the team, like co-founder and writer, Karla Zimonja, art director Temi Olujobi, and lead designer, Steve Margolin, the game’s central themes and questions evolved. Rather than simply creating a cozy experience, there was a tension that they began to explore. What happens when you have a protagonist who isn’t excited about or willing to engage with a cozy world? The coziness, rather than simply being the solution to her inner turmoil, became a point of contention for our protagonist, Alta, and it also became an interesting design element for us as a team.

We looked towards many of the games already out that’ve explored these intersections of burnout, grief, fatigue, and healing, as well as previous research articles on topics like player motivation and the work on coziness from Project Horseshoe. Our hope was to continue expanding on the ways that these types of games provide spaces for players to reflect and address potentially challenging issues.

Let Your Mind Wander

In Wanderstop, there are ample activities a player can do to pass the time. Let your interests guide you to the tasks that bring you the most fulfillment. Players who enjoy decorating can take their time arranging plants in the garden and around the shop, petting adorable pluffins, and finding trinkets scattered about the glade. Periodically, visitors will arrive, providing an opportunity for conversation. Talk with them, see what’s on their minds, and perhaps take on a request to brew their favorite tea. Need a moment to yourself? Create your own cuppa, find a spot to sit, and take in the sights and sounds of the clearing. The music – composed by C418 — shifts dynamically based on your actions in-game and provides a relaxing soundtrack to reflect on.

These verbs of Wanderstop – brew, decorate, talk, sit, drink tea – all support our goal for you: that you find your own sense of meaning and connection to this world and Alta’s journey when it comes to PS5 March 11, 2025. 

Microsoft Flight Simulator 2024 Review

I’m at a loss for how to start this review, because I’m not sure I even believe what Microsoft Flight Simulator 2024 actually is. An absolutely disastrous launch made it literally unplayable for the first 24 hours, and the next several days saw bugs and glitches popping up thanks to an unexpectedly high server load. And in spite of all that, now soaring through smooth skies after 58 hours of exploring the planet, working on building my career, taking photos of famous landmarks, and just messing around in free-flight, I sat back in my chair this week and said to myself “I can’t believe it… they did it again.” No one was there to hear me, but all the impressive new features and improvements that Microsoft has built upon its predecessor’s already masterful groundwork made it worth saying out loud just the same.

Graphically, Flight Simulator 2024 is a step-up in a lot of ways. Perhaps the most noticeable is the change in the seasons. Since I live in Maine, I tend to explore it in-sim more than most other places, just because it’s cool to see how one-to-one the digital twin is compared to the Earth we’re living on now. This makes me an expert on what Maine looks like, which isn’t a very desirable trait to have in most situations, but for this review, perhaps no one is more qualified. We’re in late autumn now, and the trees in both the sim and in real life are devoid of foliage, wooden skeletons sat on the rolling hills and small mountains of this Northeastern state. The pattern of greyish-brown is broken by populations of dark green evergreen trees, like spruce and pines. And that sparse hibernatory period is reflected perfectly in Flight Simulator 2024.

In fact, all the seasons and weather are. Want to enjoy the famous fall foliage of Vermont? Turn the weather and date settings to October to see the vibrant hues of autumn there. Turn it back a little more and the trees settle into a nice leafy green. Or, if you’d rather go back to the winter, you can adjust the snow depth – and just like with mud and tall grass, if you taxi your plane through the snow, it leaves tracks.

Hey, remember that total solar eclipse that happened over the United States last April? I was fortunate enough to live a couple hours away from the path of totality and witnessed it firsthand, but if you missed it, just set the date to April 8, 2024 and adjust the time to wherever the totality was at your location, and suddenly you can fly through that astronomical event yourself. I saw this tip going around online and I expected it would just get dark and then bright again, but nope: the sun became an ever-smaller sliver until it finally vanished behind the moon. The lighting even had a similar eeriness to the real thing. Just unbelievable, and I think I’m going to revisit it again from a jetliner flying at 35,000 feet.

The lighting in the cockpit just hits in a way it didn’t before.

These seasonal differences are most noticeable when you’re on or near to the ground. However, that’s also where the GPU puts in the most amount of work. On the ground, my Radeon RX 7900XT GPU is running at 99%, and turning the graphical settings down a notch only takes the load down to 95%. When you’re flying, and the requirements to render all those trees is smaller, the load on my GPU dropped down to 80%, which is still crazy high, but obviously a significant improvement. I’m hoping this is something developer Asobo Studio is working to optimize as the sim matures, because one of the biggest new features of Flight Simulator 2024 is the ability to land your aircraft anywhere, get out, and walk around. It’s a bummer this awesome new option places such a burden on your hardware.

Shadows and lighting have also been improved, something that’s most noticeable inside the cockpit. The light just hits in a way it didn’t before, with each knob and soft key casting its own shadow realistically. The imperfections and scratches in the windows of your aircraft react exactly how you’d expect them to, even to the point where they can obscure your vision if you’re flying with the sun in your eyes. It’s another unexpected touch that adds so much more realism.

Career Path

Flight Simulator 2024 has a few new modes, including on-foot photo challenges and time trial races with leaderboards, but the one I found the most compelling was the Career mode. Whereas I primarily used the power of imagination to add tasks to my free-flights in 2020’s Flight Simulator, in Career mode you have actual missions to complete once you unlock the requirements to do so.

Your career starts simply enough: you choose an airport as your home base, and from there you go through training to get your Private Pilot License, or PPL. The PPL training is, unfortunately, the exact same training from 2020, but in the new engine and with updated instruction voiceover. It’s a little disappointing to have gone through the same training I did before, but then again, I didn’t mind it as a refresher. And if you feel confident in your piloting skills, you don’t even need to go through the lessons as you can just jump right into the exam.

You earn credits by taking on jobs, and the types of jobs available are dependent on your experience level, reputation, and which certifications you’ve earned. For example, when you have your PPL, you’re limited to “first flights,” where you take a passenger or two on a quick trip around a specified flight path. You need to have a few of them under your belt to get the necessary “hours” of experience needed to move onto your Commercial Pilot License, or CPL.

Once you get that, the experience and earning potential dramatically opens up, and only continues to become more lucrative as you unlock specializations for your CPL, like Instrument Flight Rules (IFR) certification, tail-wheel endorsement, and turboprop engine rating, to name a few. Right off the bat, you can start taking on missions delivering aircraft from one airport to another, and some jobs, like Search and Rescue, won’t open up until you’ve earned quite a few hours in the air and a slew of certs and endorsements.

It all plays out like a normal, old-fashioned video game skill tree. For example, you can’t get your turboprop engine rating without your high performance endorsement, which you can’t get without your CPL. If you want to specialize, you can focus your efforts on one path in the tree, or you can fill them out in whatever way feels right to you. And there’s a completely separate tree for helicopters that largely plays out the same way, just with different requirements and, you know, helicopters instead of fixed-wing aircraft.

Career mode was the first moment in Flight Simulator 2024 where I said, “Okay, this rules, actually.”

The exams are no joke: I failed my IFR exam the first time because I wasn’t giving it my all, but was able to swing it the second time. My final grade left something to be desired, but the gamer in me is glad to know I can revisit it at any time and try to improve. My one wish for retaking exams would be to make the introductory text skippable so I could just get right into the test and not have to listen to the NPC instructor give me the rundown on what I’m supposed to do.

Progress through career mode is slow. You don’t earn much as a new pilot, and you have to take on quite a lot of work before you have enough to do the later exams. It’s almost like grinding in an RPG, which, if you know me, is something I love doing anyway. And if you’re impatient, you can skip a lot of the parts of the mission. For example, you could jump from the ramp to the runway, take off, then skip directly to the final approach. To counteract this, there are bonuses for completing missions without skipping any of the parts and pieces – and if you’re wondering if I ever skipped a section, the answer is “no.” Bro, I go through the checklists from a cold and dark cockpit. I am here to simulate, not mess around.

Career mode was the first moment in my Flight Simulator 2024 experience where I said to myself “Okay, this rules, actually.” I mean, free flight is excellent, but I’ve been doing that since the last Flight Sim’s 2019 alpha. But Career mode? Requiring me to have a method to my madness? I love it. And eventually, once I’ve gotten enough experience, saved up enough Flight Sim Bucks, and earned the requisite certifications, I can start my own aviation business with my own fleet of aircraft. Needless to say, I find the prospect absolutely thrilling. But for now, I’m still grinding it out, delivering planes, taking skydivers to new heights, and becoming a better pilot with each successful landing.

Challenge League

Another one of Flight Simulator 2024’s new features is Challenge League, a competitive mode where you’re presented with a set of three challenges that are updated weekly. Launch week had a Grand Canyon rally race, a low-altitude F/A-18 challenge, and a landing challenge. I initially took on the Grand Canyon rally and really enjoyed it. I felt compelled to keep racing, to better my time, and to beat the next-best person on the leaderboard.

Challenge League is about as close to an “arcade” experience you’ll find in Flight Simulator 2024, and even though its all about fun, the flight model remains the same. In other words, the planes all act and fly exactly as they do in the wider sim. You’re completing fanciful challenges using meticulously simulated aircraft and conditions, so you can’t suddenly pretend like you’re playing Ace Combat.

While I did spend a fair amount of effort trying to better my time on the Grand Canyon rally, I wasn’t compelled enough to find this a stand-out mode overall. I’m going to revisit it each week and at least try one, perhaps two of the challenges out, but it’s not really why I play Flight Simulator. It’s a good inclusion for those who are interested, and the competitive part of me was riled up trying to climb the leaderboard, but it’s not going to be my go-to.

Slow walking aside, it’s really cool to be able to visit landmarks on foot.

World Photographer is another challenge-type mode, but it’s much more low-key and shows off just how detailed Asobo was able to make the Earth’s digital twin. You’re tasked with taking photos of various landmarks around the world, and to get the best possible score, you need to fulfill certain requirements.

For example, the first mission in the World Landmarks collection requires you to meet three conditions: take a photo of the Great Sphinx in Cairo on the September equinox with the sun setting over its right shoulder. Oh, and you need to capture that photo while on foot. To accomplish this mission, I picked an ultralight as my aircraft and landed in the empty area just south of the Great Pyramid complex. Then I hopped out and walked to a spot where I could fulfill all the requirements. The default aircraft is a helicopter, but since I turned off all the assists, I am still completely unable to land a helicopter without it falling apart, and I’m too stubborn to turn them back on, but using one would have allowed me to get even closer.

Graphically, it is pretty impressive. The sand looks exactly how you’d imagine it to look, with rocks and desert shrubs scattered about. That said, the renderings of the structures themselves vary widely. The pyramids and the Sphinx looked, appropriately enough, almost photorealistic. But the other ruins around them looked like they were from GoldenEye in some spots. To be fair, I did this mission pretty early on, when the streaming servers were still slammed, so that might have been a part of it. Regardless, I didn’t find it too distracting and actually thought it was really cool to be able to visit a place like this on foot.

The biggest problem I have with World Photography mode, and walking around in the sim-world in general, is that it simulates a real-world walking speed. If you’re used to first-person shooters, walking around at an actual, human pace inside a video game is painfully slow. I landed as close to the Sphinx as I could and it was still a long walk. This is one area where I wouldn’t mind an option to just toggle the realism off.

There are literally hundreds of different World Photography challenges, and I’ve only just scratched the surface. Since I’ve always loved the “sightseeing” aspects of Flight Simulator, this is a mode I will definitely be returning to time and time again. Being able to walk around changes it up quite a bit from the old photography challenges, and the addition of seasonal foliage and improved models also improves it greatly. I didn’t care for the challenges in 2020, but this edition, I’m actually pretty fired up about them.

Flight Planner

Probably the most incredible, interesting, and ultimately nerdy addition to Flight Simulator 2024 is the Flight Planner. It’s a web-based tool that does an excellent job of replicating the flight planning software and resources actual pilots use while planning their real-world flights. The concept itself isn’t new: there have been apps doing this for Flight Simulator for a while. But this one is free and completely integrated with Microsoft Flight Simulator 2024, developed by one of Asobo’s partners, Working Title.

Since it’s web-based rather than an iOS or Android app, you can fiddle with it on any device with a web browser. And friends, I have done just that. Logging into the site, there’s no fluff or extra welcome screens to get in the way. It’s essentially the same Electronic Flight Bag, or EFB, that’s already in-game, but you can use it anywhere and at any time and with even more features. It’s not without a few annoyances: the altitude always defaults to 35,000 feet regardless of which plane I’m planning to fly, and fuel doesn’t seem to load in properly.

However, I have to come clean here, as I’m not sure if this is my fault or just a bug that hasn’t yet been ironed out. This flight planner is so gigantic, so complex, and so full-featured that I’m not even sure what every option actually does. But while I can easily make and then upload a flight plan, it’s all the other features I don’t understand yet that excite me the most. I found myself happily Googling flight charts and 100 other things because I wanted to learn it all. I suddenly I find myself with an excuse to learn all this complex technical piloting stuff real pilots need to know before they can take to the skies.

The Flight Planner doesn’t feel like a gimmick. It feels essential.

I did find the process of loading the flight plan into my EFB in the simulator a bit frustrating at first, but I eventually sussed it out and immediately wrote a guide on how to do it, so you don’t need to suffer like I did. And holy cow – when I finally got everything sorted, I loaded the plan I’d made on my iPad into Flight Simulator 2024, sent the route to air traffic control, then sent it to my virtual plane’s avionics, and boom. My route was all there, ready for me to use to navigate either manually or in my plane’s autopilot system. That frees me up to tinker around and learn the ins and outs of flight planning and reading charts anytime I feel like on any device, but then also makes what’s already the most realistic simulation out there feel that much more real once I jump back in. I am a complete sucker for this kind of thing, and it doesn’t feel like a gimmick. It feels essential to the experience. It’s thrilling to me and takes my Dad Energy to new heights.

And there are finally airport charts you can use now, just like in real life! Gone are the days of 2020, when I’d land at an airport and just have the AI copilot take me to the gate. Now I can open up the kneeboard in Flight Planner and view the charts and facility maps as I would were I actually there. This is exactly the type of granular simulation stuff my body craves. And while it unfortunately doesn’t have a lesson plan to follow or any sort of tutorials, if you’re like me, you’re already Googling the difference between VOR DME and VOR DTAC (VOR DTAC is the military equivalent of VOR DME, obviously).

Save 30% Off the Xbox Elite Series 2 Pro-Grade Controller With Component Pack

We’re past Cyber Monday, but Walmart is still pushing out brand new gaming deals for December. Right now, you can pick up the professional-grade Xbox Series X Elite Series 2 Wireless Controller for only $124.00 after a 30% off instant discount. That’s a great deal for the original Elite Series 2 controller that includes the component pack. The newer Elite Series 2 Core controllers in White, Blue, and Red do not include the component pack and they normally retail for $140. The component pack itself retails for $59.99.

Xbox Elite Wireless Controller Series 2 for $124

Includes component pack

The Xbox Elite Series 2 Core controller features better build quality and lots more customizability than the stock controller that comes with the Xbox Series X console. Some of the more significant pro gaming features include adjustable-tension thumbsticks, wrap-around rubberized grip, and shorter hair trigger locks. The component pack, which is bundled with this controller, includes an extra sets of paddles, thumbsticks, D-pad, and case.

I rarely see this version of the Elite Series controller for sale. The versions without the component packs are commonly sold for a lesser price, but one of the biggest advantages of getting this controller over the standard controller is the customizability. Without those extra accessories to modify the controller to your liking, there’s less of a reason to spend so much more when a regular Xbox controller can be often be found for under $50.

Eric Song is the IGN commerce manager in charge of finding the best gaming and tech deals every day. When Eric isn’t hunting for deals for other people at work, he’s hunting for deals for himself during his free time.

Total Chaos is a grimy horror FPS from the Turbo Overkill devs

I think It’s safe to say that Trigger Happy Interactive’s upcoming survival horror Total Chaos is a bit of a palette change from their last offering – the frenetic, neon-drenched, chainsaw-legged Turbo Overkill. Still, it’s not often we see psychological horror combined with ultraviolence, and anything that gives off even a whiff of Condemned: Criminal Origins has my attention.

Total Chaos started life as a popular Doom 2 mod, and while I dare the say the limitations of that game sell the atmosphere a little better than this much sleeker update, I certainly trust Trigger Happy enough to make the most of the new engine. The game is set in New Oasis, a “once bustling haven for coal miners” that is now most definitely not bustling, nor haven-like.

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Pre-Order the Far Cry 20th Anniversary Soundtrack Collection Vinyl Now at IGN Store!

Far Cry is one of the most beloved series from Ubisoft, and for good reason. Over the last 20 years, Far Cry has challenged and twisted the shooter formula with all sorts of settings through 13 different games. This includes places like America, Cuba, the Himalayas, the dystopian future, and even a trip to 10,000 BCE. To celebrate the 20th anniversary of the series, you can pre-order the all-new Far Cry 20th Anniversary Soundtrack Collection on vinyl at IGN Store!

Pre-Order the Far Cry 20th Anniversary Soundtrack Collection on Vinyl!

This soundtrack collection includes 48 tracks from across three LPs. The music was selected from some of the biggest games in the series, including Far Cry 2, 3, 4, 5 and 6, Blood Dragon, Primal and New Dawn. This includes music from composers like Tyler Bates, Pedro Bromfman, Marc Canham, Jason Graves, and more.

The front cover of this collection features five iconic villains from the Far Cry series, with unique 20th anniversary iconography placed on the back. Each LP comes in a spined and printed inner sleeve that slips into a widespined outer sleeve with spot gloss UV. It’s perfect for any Far Cry fan, with a vibrant cover that’s sure to strike up a conversation.

The Far Cry 20th Anniversary Soundtrack Collection Vinyl will ship out starting May 2025. Pre-orders are now open on IGN Store, so don’t miss your chance to grab this unique collector’s item!

About IGN Store

IGN Store sells high-quality merch, collectibles, and shirts for everything you’re into. It’s a shop built with fans in mind: for all the geek culture and fandom you love most. Whether you’re into comics, movies, anime, games, retro gaming or just want some cute plushies (who doesn’t?), this store is for you!

Probably-magnificent mystery house puzzler Blue Prince will release in spring 2025

Dogubomb’s Blue Prince boasts my favourite shapeshifting house in a video game, which admittedly isn’t setting a very high bar. Perhaps surprisingly, most video game houses do not shapeshift. Despite being made out of pure imagination and carbon emissions, they remain nostalgically shackled to the limitations of brick, mortar and Euclidean geometry. Blue Prince’s abode is different. It is a house made of house. You’ll actually design the layout yourself every time you wander through it, picking from a selection of mismatched room types whenever you open a door.

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How The Thing: Remastered Remains Faithful To 2002’s Adaptation

How The Thing: Remastered Remains Faithful To 2002’s Adaptation

John Carpenter’s iconic 1982 horror classic “The Thing” has inspired countless creators over the years, including Computer Artworks, the studio behind 2002’s The Thing, a video game adaptation that takes place after the events of the film.

In the game, Captain J.F. Blake leads a team of U.S. Special Forces in an investigation of Outpost 31. There, Blake and his crew must defend themselves from hostile alien life, and each other, as infections arise.

Despite being released 20 years after the 1982 film, The Thing has become more of a challenge to revisit than its original source of inspiration. While you can easily purchase or stream the film, 2002’s The Thing often requires nostalgic gamers to track down a physical copy along with the necessary hardware to play it on.

This is where Nightdive comes in with The Thing: Remastered, available on Xbox Series X|S and Xbox One today. It’s a revitalization of the almost-lost game that stays true to the creators’ original vision.

Understanding The Source Material

Nightdive’s goal is to bring lost and forgotten games like The Thing back from the depths. Not only so people can revisit their favorites on modern platforms like Xbox Series X|S, but also to preserve these games for future generations.

Game preservation is something I recently stressed the importance of while writing about Killing Time: Resurrected, and the same remains true for The Thing: Remastered. All games deserve to be preserved, but preservation isn’t as simple as applying a fresh coat of paint. One of the challenges in using remasters as a form of preservation is keeping the remaster as faithful to the original as possible.

With this in mind, Nightdive worked closely with members of the original Computer Artworks staff, including art director Ron Ashtiani and technical director Mark Atkinson, both of whom are well-versed in the game they helped create and the 1982 film.

“I‘d seen the film before the project, but re-watched it multiple times when we started the game,” explains Computer Artworks technical director, Mark Atkinson. “We wanted to preserve the feel of the movie and what made it scary in terms of a survival horror.”

For Ron Ashtiani, the movie “scared the hell out of me, but also sparked my interest in sci-fi horror.” He went on to reflect how ahead of its time the film was. “It was made before the days of studios relying on an abundance of CG effects to wow the viewer.”

In addition to being ahead of its time visually, “The Thing” benefited from the captivating performance of actors like Kurt Russel and Keith David, and well-written screenplay courtesy of Bill Lancaster.

“I think one of the reasons ‘The Thing’ still holds up is due to the lingering mystery at the end — who was the Thing? It’s a smart movie, a masterclass in cinema,” remarks Joel Welsh, art lead on The Thing: Remastered at Nightdive Studios.

While it’s not required to watch “The Thing” before playing The Thing: Remastered, it does help broaden your knowledge of the peril Captain J.F. Blake and his team face as they explore Outpost 31. Both from alien creatures, and each other.

“Every scene was carefully detailed to make you wonder and be suspicious about everyone the whole time,” says Grover Wimberly IV, Nightdive’s project manager and producer on The Thing: Remastered. “For fans of Nightdive games who haven’t had a chance to watch ‘The Thing,’ I’d suggest watching before diving into the game.”

Remastering With The Masters

Mark Atkinson oversaw many technical aspects with 2002’s The Thing in addition to contributing to the game’s original design and coding alongside Computer Artworks’ talented team of engineers. Working on The Thing: Remastered with Nightdive, Atkinson took on a similar role.

“On the remaster, Ron and I were involved from the start, resurrecting the old code and master quality art assets, and helping guide the Nightdive team, e.g. what was intentional vs. where we just ran out of time to polish,” notes Atkinson.

“The remaster adds many significant upgrades in terms of gameplay, level design, UI, HUD etc., which go beyond a simple 4K reskin. Ron and I gave the green light to all of that, as well as consulting Andrew Curtis, the original game designer. In practical terms, I did a significant amount of C++ work as we wanted to really take the opportunity to make the remaster as good as possible.”

When asked about his experience working on 2002’s The Thing, Ashtiani recalls, “I joined the art team at Computer Artworks just after the game was fully signed after a successful prototype. Back then, art teams weren’t siloed into specific fields, but I mainly worked on the environments and built around half of the levels in the game.”

Again, Ashtiani reprised this hands-on role with The Thing: Remastered: “My role with Nightdive has been to co-lead the art team as the vision holder for the look of the game. I worked on setting the art direction for the remaster and ensuring that while we remaster the graphics and art assets, we don’t lose the essence of the original game.”

And this is important, because the essence of the original is inherently special. For the entire team, not just the artists, 2002’s The Thing needed to align with the 1982 film, and that took making the most of the technology and tools that were available at the time.

“We did the best we could with what we had,” Ashtiani explains. “We put a lot of work into capturing the isolation of the Antarctic and created a host of new and interesting creatures. However, lighting was an area we couldn’t match until the remaster.”

As well as the technical limitations, time constraints also contributed to some of the quirks players encountered in 2002’s The Thing, which Atkinson says has been addressed in the remaster.

”People loved the original game, but had some legitimate complaints, e.g. the scripted burst-outs, the difficulty is uneven, the combat was a little janky, the boss fights weren’t great,” admits Atkinson. “We went hard on fixing all that.”

The Thing: Remastered also benefits from the addition of modern gameplay elements such as third-person aiming, quick select wheels, the ability to use a controller on PC, and more. In terms of difficulty, Atkinson notes, “the game is still fairly hard, but not in such an uneven and sometimes frustrating way as the original.” There’s also the option now for players to select an easier difficulty setting, further expanding the game’s approachability.

Seconding this, Ashtiani says the remaster is true to 2002’s The Thing, but with improved gameplay balancing, control systems, UI improvements, among other quality-of-life adjustments.

“Graphically, it’s a big leap forward,” Ashiani adds. “We’ve been able to use all the lighting technology of today, plus higher resolution models and textures. We even managed to add some assets that were cut from the original game, creature variations in particular.”

A Team Effort

Having a team you can trust is important, not only when attempting to survive in the world of The Thing, but also in developing a quality remaster. Trust, communication, and teamwork between the original developers and the developers at Nightdive Studios were integral in resurrecting 2002’s The Thing.

“We made it a point to make sure Ron and Mark’s input were taken throughout the development process by consulting and having them at our team meetings when discussing adjustments, enhancements, and fixes to make sure it fit the spirit of the original 2002 release,” explains Wimblerly IV.

“Ron and Mark certainly left their mark, along with the rest of the team,” praises Welsh. “This is Nightdive/Atari’s most ambitious remaster to date, and we hope Xbox players have a blast with it. Just remember: No One Survives Alone!”

You don’t have to take our word for it, though. Whether you’re a fan of 2002’s The Thing, or simply want to check out a classic game you previously missed out on, you’ll be able to pay an eventful visit to Outpost 31 when The Thing: Remastered releases on Xbox One and Xbox Series X|S today.

The Thing: Remastered

Nightdive Studios

No One Survives Alone.

The 2002 third-person survival horror shooter that serves as a sequel to the genre-defining 1982 film is back, remastered by Nightdive Studios to bring this innovative blend of fast paced squad action meets survival horror to the modern era. Including Antialiasing, Per Pixel Lighting, 4K Resolution and up to 120 FPS.

Where the movie ended, the true terror begins.

You are Cpt J.F. Blake, leader of a U.S. Special Forces rescue team sent to investigate the blood-curdling events and enigmatic deaths of the American scientific team that transpired at the Outpost 31 research facility located in the frozen wastelands of Antarctica. Within these inhospitable surroundings your team encounters a strange shape-shifting alien life-form that assumes the appearance of people that it kills. Trapped by the elements and infected by this horrific entity, using all your team members is critical if you hope to accomplish your objectives, let alone survive. If you only knew which ones were still human…

The post How The Thing: Remastered Remains Faithful To 2002’s Adaptation appeared first on Xbox Wire.

Infinity Nikki Interactive Map is Now Available

IGN’s Infinity Nikki map is here! Our interactive map tracks collectibles across the world of Miraland including Whimstars, Dew of Inspiration, and Treasure Chests for those who like to farm collectibles. It also displays the locations of Styling Challenges and Mini Games so you know where to go to spend time.

Our team of Stylists is hard at work filling out our Infinity Nikki interactive map, so make sure to check back often and track your progress across Miraland.

Infinity Nikki Interactive Map

The available Infinity Nikki interactive map filters include:

  • Collectibles, including Whimstars and Dew of Inspiration. You’ll need the latter to get rewards from Kilo the Cadenceborn!
  • Locations, such as Warp Spires, which allow you to fast travel once activated. There’s also Caverns, Catapult Seals, and more.
  • Activities, including Box Games, Mini Games, and Styling Challenges.
  • Items, such as Treasure Chests. Opening them can net you Clothing and even Diamonds, which you can spend on the Resonance Banners.
  • Quests, including Main Quests and Side Quests, so you always know where to go to start your next mission.

Infinity Nikki Codes

While you’re using IGN’s Infinity Nikki interactive map to find loot across Miraland, make sure you check out the latest Infinity Nikki codes to get even more free rewards.

Infinity Nikki codes lead to rewards like free Diamonds and Revelation Crystals, and materials such as Threads of Purity and Shiny Bubbles to help you craft new clothes, accessories, and outfits. Combine those with what you can earn by exploring the map alone and you’ve got a ton of rewards!