Shotgun King developers Punkcake Délicieux have quietly rolled out another ticklish oddity in the shape of Build The Sun, a work-in-progress 2D god sim. In Build The Sun you preside over a tribe of alarming yet cute inkblot creatures, who sometimes remind me of Pikmin and sometimes, of that awful ‘roided-up panther monster from the opening stretch of Another World. Your objective is, indeed, to build the sun, because there isn’t one: the game’s pastoral pixelart world is engulfed in darkness.
NCSoft, the South Korean MMO specialist behind the likes of Throne and Liberty, Guild Wars 2, and Lineage, has confirmed a significant restructure of the company amid a sweeping round of layoffs.
South Korean news agency Yonhap reported on comments from NCSoft co-CEOs Taek-Jin Kim and Byung-Moo Park, who blamed the incoming layoffs and reorganization on the company’s ongoing financial troubles. “We feel a deep sense of responsibility and offer an apology to all employees,” they said.
The co-CEOs added that “as a result of operating in a way that most of the manpower and functions are concentrated at the headquarters, financial performance has continued to deteriorate and we are at risk of becoming a chronically loss-making company,” and that this situation “is seriously damaging the creativity and challenging spirit that NCSoft originally possessed.”
NCSoft, established in 1997 and headquartered in Seoul, now plans to develop new video games in the form of independent studios, each with their own culture and process, it said. Throne and Liberty, recently published globally by Amazon Games to huge player numbers on Steam, is now its own game studio.
NCSoft is now split into four divisions: NCAI, Studio X, Studio Y, and Studio G. (Studio X is the studio behind Throne and Liberty.) It’s unclear at this stage what NCSoft’s troubles mean for ArenaNet, the Bellevue, Washington-based studio behind Guild Wars. Earlier this year, Guild Wars 3 was said to have been in development, although work continues on Guild Wars 2.
Some video games will be canceled, howoever, alongside layoffs via a voluntary retirement program, the co-CEOs confirmed. “Major changes are inevitable for the survival and future of the company, and we promise active support and compensation to those affected,” they said.
Earlier this month, Amazon Games announced that Throne and Liberty had seen more than three million players in just a week following its global launch. Originally billed as a Lineage sequel, Throne and Liberty is an MMO with PvE and PvP set in a dynamic and seamless world. It suffered numerous delays over the course of a development cycle spanning several years.
Throne and Liberty finally launched on October 1 across PC, PlayStation 5, and Xbox Series X and S, and soon proved a hit on Steam with an impressive player concurrent peak of 336,300. Throne and Liberty remains one of the most-played games on Valve’s platform. Neither Sony nor Microsoft make player numbers public.
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.
Netflix have shut down one of their more trumpeted video game initiatives – a Californian studio known as team “Blue” and stocked with former Halo, God Of War and Overwatch developers. It was a major plank in Netflix’s on-going efforts to extend their film and TV streaming empire to what Nic insists on calling the “greasy screen”.
The mobile version of HAL Laboratory’s Part Time UFO has been delisted from storefronts as of today, the game’s official Twitter has announced. But don’t worry, the Switch version isn’t going anywhere.
Shared on Bluesky by AK, Part Time UFO’s original mobile release is no longer available to download on mobile devices. The game originally launched on phones in 2017 in Japan, before getting a worldwide release in 2018, and an expanded Switch version in 2020.
Immerse Yourself in the Game: The Next Evolution of the Xbox Wireless Headset
Mekias Bekalu, Product Marketing Manager, Xbox Accessories
Sound shapes the way we experience games, adding dimension and depth to every action, interaction, and atmosphere. From the epic swell of a battle soundtrack to the quiet tension of a stealth mission, audio plays a crucial role in creating unforgettable gaming moments. That’s why we’ve refreshed the Xbox Wireless Headset, introducing key enhancements to elevate your audio experience to new heights.
Now featuring Dolby Atmos at no additional cost, this updated headset delivers immersive, spatial audio that brings games to life in vivid detail. We’ve also improved battery life, offering up to 20 hours of playtime*, upgraded the microphone with enhanced auto-mute and voice isolation for crystal-clear communication, and now feature Bluetooth 5.3. Combined with its sleek, all-black design, the new Xbox Wireless Headset remains an essential addition to any gaming setup.
The new Xbox Wireless Headset delivers an exceptional sound experience, powered by advanced spatial audio technology. With built-in support for Dolby Atmos, Windows Sonic, and DTS Headphone:X*, you can experience sound with stunning precision, allowing you to pinpoint every footstep, explosion, or whisper. Dolby Atmos, now included at no extra cost, transforms your audio experience by revealing depth, clarity, and details like never before, creating a sound experience you can feel all around you.
Clear communication is essential, whether you’re strategizing with your squad or catching up with friends. The upgraded Xbox Wireless Headset includes advanced auto-mute and voice isolation, ensuring your voice comes through loud and clear while minimizing background noise. Direct pairing with Xbox consoles, along with Bluetooth 5.3 connectivity for PC and mobile devices, allows you to seamlessly switch between platforms without the need for dongles or extra setups (see xbox.com/headset-compatibility for more details). Plus, with Qualcomm S5 Gen 2 technology, you’ll enjoy ultra-low latency wireless connectivity for smooth, uninterrupted gameplay.
Long gaming sessions require maximum comfort, and the new Xbox Wireless Headset is designed with that in mind. Its adjustable headband and plush earcups provide a snug, comfortable fit, while the sleek, all-black design effortlessly complements any gaming setup. With up to 20 hours of battery life* on a single charge, you can focus on gaming without the hassle of frequent recharges. The extended mic boom ensures your voice is heard clearly, even during the most intense moments. Need to adjust your audio mid-game? The intuitive on-ear controls make it easy to fine-tune your game/chat balance without interrupting the action. And for players who want even more control, the Xbox Accessories app offers deeper customization, allowing you to tailor the headset to your personal preferences.
The new Xbox Wireless Headset is available now in select Xbox markets worldwide for $109.99 USD ERP, visit Xbox.com or your local retailer, including the Microsoft Store, for more information.
*Audio customization available via the Xbox Accessories app for Xbox Series X|S, Xbox One, and Windows 10/11 devices. DTS Headphone:X may require additional purchases, app downloads, and supported hardware. Windows Sonic, Dolby Atmos, and DTS Headphone:X require supported content. Battery life varies significantly with distance from console, additional accessories, usage and other factors. Testing conducted by Microsoft using pre-production units.
The wait is almost over and we’re beyond excited for PlayStation VR2 players to seize their Sense controllers and dive into the explosive world of Vendetta Forever on October 24. The debut game from visionary indie developer Meatspace Interactive, published by nDreams, this frenetic puzzle-shooter pays bombastic homage to classic action cinema, set to a pulsing synthetic soundtrack. Alongside what makes Vendetta Forever so special, today we want to show off some new PS VR2 gameplay and reveal the features players can enjoy when the title launches this Thursday on PS5.
Come on baby, do the Lo-Kill-Motion
Shoot to kill. Kill to move. Lo-Kill-Motion is the new mechanic that propels players acrobatically through Vendetta Forever’s maze-like arenas. Take down enemies, seize their weapons in mid-air, and take their place. Rinse, repeat, and reload. Each scene is loaded with iconic weaponry, spanning the all-time classics to the deviously improvised. Whether you’re scoped in with a sniper rifle or flinging a humble pencil (seriously), you’ll always have an outrageous arsenal at your disposal.
Harnessing the immersion of PS VR2
We loved digging into the possibilities of the PS VR2 hardware and Vendetta Forever is full of features to maximise your stylish shooting immersion. Feel subtle differences between some of the least subtle weapons in the business. Every weapon in the game – from agile silenced pistols to hefty rocket launchers – will handle differently thanks to the Sense controller’s adaptive triggers. Immersion is maximized through the Sense controller haptics and headset feedback, allowing you to feel incoming damage and death-defying explosions. PS VR2 players can enjoy a few visual perks as well. Your view is mirrored on the TV at 4K, with a stabilized camera for optimal spectating and streaming your wildest moments. In-game you can enjoy real-time shadows, dialed-up lighting, and post-processing.
A behind-the-scenes peek at some early scene compositions
Vendetta Forever comes from the idiosyncratic game design brain of MeatSpace Interactive’s founder and solo indie developer, Zander Dejah. Zander’s well familiar with the power of PlayStation hardware. Having worked on Star Wars: Tales from the Galaxy’s Edge and Vader Immortal: A Star Wars VR Series, he’s experienced at crafting immersive VR worlds. For Vendetta Forever, this is a labour of love that goes all-in on gunplay purity. It’s unapologetically the game this VR fanatic dreamt of making – focused entirely on making the player feel really damn good.
“From day one, the goal with Vendetta Forever was to craft all-action scenes that put player power at the centre of everything, rather than lengthy cinematics or dialogue scenes. This game is about fulfilling that ultimate player fantasy of starring in their own action movie show-stopping vignettes. It’s fast-paced, rewards strategic thinking on the fly, and achieves that sense of shooter flow state in VR.
After working on some narrative heavy hitters in the past, this game has really been the opportunity to make the hyperactive shooter experience I’ve always wanted to play. It’s VR-first and when it comes to immersion, ‘feel’ beats ‘real’ for me. I think it’s an experience frenetic shooter fans have been craving and I can’t wait for PS VR2 players to dive in.”
– Zander Dejah, MeatSpace Interactive
10% off pre-orders with PlayStation Plus
Get prepped for cult action paradise with a 10% pre-order discount, exclusively for PlayStation Plus members! Come launch acrobatically blast your way through 60 unique scenes with 20 modifiers, 50+ iconic weapons, and 50+ achievements to shoot for. Vendetta Forever launches on October 24 on PS VR2.
If you’ve ever wondered what the arcade classic Rampage would be like if you had to play as a puny human rather than one of the skyscraper-smashing goliaths, then Kong: Survivor Instinct might be your answer. This 2.5D Metroidvania platformer takes place amidst a crumbling coastal cityscape while Kong and his kaiju combatants duke it out in the background, making it seem at first glance a bit like a Shadow Complex situated within Shadow of the Colossus. It’s a novel enough concept, but basic environmental puzzle design and uninspired combat mean that Survivor Instinct is unable to reach the towering heights of its ideas, and as I begrudgingly pushed crates and collected keys to make my way through each ruined urban rabbit hole I could never really shake the impression that Kong seemed to be having considerably more fun than I was.
Not that actually playing as Kong would be a guaranteed good time, of course – 2023’s Skull Island: Rise of Kong was such an unmitigated disaster that the aftermath of its self-destruction is probably still being studied by scientists from the Monarch organization. Kong: Survivor Instinct is a notably better game than that, but once the novelty of having the iconic angry ape messing about in the middle distance fades it just doesn’t have the level of creativity or player freedom that other superior games of this ilk released in recent years – such as Prince of Persia: The Lost Crown or Blasphemous 2 – have so expertly displayed.
It also doesn’t have much of a story beyond “Don’t get smashed by the monkey.” We play as David Martin, a single dad in search of his daughter who’s gone missing in the midst of the spectacular, city-ravaging royal rumble that’s currently sweeping along the west coast of the United States. The elevator pitch of David’s personality is basically a sort of middle-aged Nathan Drake who’s apparently forgotten how to be funny (almost every time he kills a labrador-sized spider he deadpans “I was never fond of spiders”), and the handful of survivors he meets along the way don’t even pretend to be real characters. There are also a couple of appearances from the villainous Alan Jonah, who was last seen in 2019’s Godzilla: King of the Monsters – there he was played by a typically cold and ruthless Charles Dance (AKA Tywin Lannister in Game of Thrones), but here he’s voiced by a somewhat subdued soundalike. None of these details really matter, though, since Kong: Survivor Instinct’s slight amount of story is stretched thin over its six-hour frame until it suddenly snaps apart during its jarringly abrupt and underwhelming conclusion.
Kong: Survivor Instinct’s slight amount of story is stretched thin over its six-hour frame until it suddenly snaps apart.
Surface Tension
The story may be weak, but the look and feel of its crumbling 2.5D environments is undoubtedly its strength. David’s quest leads him from smoldering suburban outskirts to devastated downtown areas and the mysterious subterranean facilities below, and each dilapidated diorama is rich with precise detail and convincing depth. Kong: Survivor Instinct does perhaps try a bit too hard to convince you that every structure you explore is an unstable one with the repetitive routine with which it collapses the floor beneath your feet or drops chunks of the ceiling onto your skull, and that does get old pretty fast. However, it also allows you to scamper along the roofs of cars suspended by the webs of a towering arachnid, and navigate your way through the slanted corridors of an apartment building that’s been violently upended by Kong, so there are some more interesting platforming sections among them.
It’s just a shame that so much of the exploration is built around the same pushing of crates and shooting of padlocked gates. The very best Metroidvanias – like Hollow Knight or Metroid Dread – gradually empower you with new tools and abilities that incentivise you to backtrack through the world and unlock previously unreachable areas, but Kong: Survivor Instinct is comparatively light-on when it comes to evolving the ways in which you interact with your surroundings. Here, by contrast, David is given a sledgehammer to smash through weakened walls and eventually a grappling hook to scale up to specific anchor points, but otherwise his progression is always painfully obvious and consists of the same rehashed circuit boxes to shoot or generators to repair, copied and pasted along the winding path towards each mission objective.
This general absence of ingenuity also drains the enjoyment out of its combat, which is primarily geared towards melee attacks since ammunition for David’s pistol is so scarce. There is some nuance to each scrap with Jonah’s soldiers – you can block or parry their blows to open them up for a counter attack or grab them to use them as a human shield when their more heavily armed comrades open fire, and I was pleased to discover that you can even shoot them in the leg to drop them to their knees so that you can deliver a series of finishing blows a la Resident Evil 4. At the same time, there’s a stiffness to each scrap, particularly when David finds himself surrounded, and since he’s unable to jump or climb while he’s locked in a combat stance there were times where I’d knock an enemy off a ledge, only to find myself unable to drop down and continue the fight. Annoyingly, the only way forward was to reload my save.
Furthermore, rather than introduce any interesting new enemy types that require you to adapt your methods of attack, Kong: Survivor Instinct just gradually ups the numbers of foes in each encounter while keeping your combat abilities exactly the same. David’s pistol can be upgraded to carry more rounds per magazine to help counter the swelling hordes, but there are no other firearms to find despite the fact that every other goon you come across in the story’s second half seems to be toting a pump-action shotgun. When you consider that outside of the human soldier types there are only a couple of small spider-like enemies to contend with – and absolutely no boss fights whatsoever – Kong: Survivor Instinct’s combat feels flatter than a kaiju’s couch cushion overall.
Raze the Roof
While there might not be any traditional boss fights, Kong: Survivor Instinct does feature a handful of sequences that could best be described as boss flights. At specific points during the story, Kong or one of his rival titans will spot you through the window of a structure and you’ll be suddenly forced to flee, with the monster punching wrecking ball-sized holes in your path that require some pinpoint platforming to evade. (Sadly, none of these titans is Godzilla.) These sections certainly inject a burst of excitement and urgency into the adventure, although they also involve a fair amount of trial and error to get around instant deaths, which did lead to some frustrating repeated checkpoint restarts at times. Still, watching one of these monolithic beasts unwrap the building you’re trapped inside of like a kaiju kid on Christmas morning is undoubtedly one of the most spectacular tricks that Kong: Survivor Instinct has up its sleeves – even despite the seismic impact these high-intensity moments seem to inflict on the frame rate while playing on PlayStation 5.
Unfortunately, those are the only times that Kong and company have a measurable impact on the action. Elsewhere, these goliaths are only ever glimpsed – either having an incidental tussle in the distant background, or when you summon one by collecting the requisite number of biowaves scattered around each level to clear a blocked path towards a level’s exit in a game of supersized simian Simon Says. It’s certainly a treat to watch Kong casually pick up a connected row of train carriages like they’re steel sausage links and violently wrench them apart, but the operative word here is “watch.” Once these path-clearing actions have been performed, it’s straight back to the same plodding puzzle-platforming and uninspired combat.
I forgot about just-launched horror game Tormenture when ravelling together this week’s round-up of potent PC releases, but thankfully, Maw disciple Fachewachewa was on my case in the comments. It’s one of your ‘cursed video game’ videogames in the spirit of Inscryption and Pony Island, and based on a quick blast with the demo, it seems lush.
It’s set in the 1980s, a premise I now automatically find horrible because I was born in the 1980s and that was, like, a million years ago. You’re a kid who’s playing a legendary 8-bit game that’s said to be possessed by evil spirits. The experience sees you alternating between the surprisingly labyrinthine space of the game, and the increasingly threatening environment of your bedroom, where terrible toys abound. Did you have one of those phones on wheels with eyes as a kid? Whoever invented that deserves a spell in Arkham Asylum.
Call of Duty: Black Ops is often more overtly gung-ho and violent than Modern Warfare and other Call of Duty series. But for every Michael Bay-style blockbuster moment there are flashes of betrayal, psychological warfare, and plenty of undercover operations that skirt the grey zones of morality. But, of the 50-plus campaign missions across the Black Ops series, which is the best?
IGN sat down with senior Call of Duty Black Ops developers to ask them what their favorite campaigns are from across the entire Call of Duty: Black Ops franchise. Have your favorite missions made the cut?
Vorkuta (Call of Duty: Black Ops)
One of the most popular Call of Duty: Black Ops campaigns among the development team is Vorkuta. Three separate, senior Call of Duty devs named Vorkuta as their favorite campaign in the whole series, and for good reason.
A key mission in the very first Call of Duty: Black Ops, Vorkuta sees hero Mason attempt a daring escape from the Soviet labor camp of Vorkuta in 1963. The ensuing great escape sees Mason fleeing through the mines while fellow prisoners are dying alongside him and it culminates in an explosive motorcycle chase. As a single mission, it’s packed with action and heartbreak.
“It’s the great escape from the mine and the motorcycle chase,” says expert level designer and Nuketown creator Adam Hoggatt on why Vorkuta sticks with him after all these years.
“Vorkuta is an obvious choice,” says Raven Software lead audio designer Jake Harley. “It’s just an incredibly memorable map. Reznov leading you out from the mine, the sacrifices of the other Russian prisoners pushing the mine carts as you’re taking cover behind them. It was just an epic map that was full of a lot of action and big moments.”
“It had a lot of strong narrative and gameplay beat changes from beginning to end, especially the escape on the motorcycle. But I’m a big motorcycle guy…” adds Raven Software lead designer Damon Shubhastari.
Rebirth (Call of Duty: Black Ops)
Another popular campaign mission cited by multiple Call of Duty developers is Rebirth, also from the first Black Ops game. This mission, where a big plot twist reveals the character Reznov was actually a figment of your mind the entire time, highlighted Black Ops’ psychological thriller themes. The mission set the whole tone for the twisty, grimy world of the Black Ops in the years to come.
“That moment when you realize that Mason and Reznov are one and that Reznov was actually dead and in Mason’s mind is such an ‘Oh my god,’ moment,” says Treyarch associate creative director Miles Leslie. “It really cemented what Blacks Ops is internally, and you could feel that in the studio when we were developing it… I’d walk over to the team making it and we would talk [about Rebirth and I would just go], ‘you’re blowing my mind.’”
Judgment Day (Call of Duty: Black Ops 2)
Another of Leslie’s favorite missions is Judgment Day from Call of Duty: Black Ops 2. A tense assault on a secret Haitian facility led by Mason, this operation eventually culminates in a player choice on whether to kill the game’s primary antagonist — Menendez — or capture him alive. The player’s choice determines which ending the player gets.
“I have fond memories of people [asking me],’ Oh, you killed Menendez? How could you do that? That’s not the way,’” recalls Leslie who’d respond by adamantly explaining that Menendez “had to die.”
“It was really cool that even internally we would have these debates on the branching story,” Leslie adds.
Break on Through (Call of Duty: Black Ops Cold War)
The branching paths would become a staple of the Black Ops series, with player choices leading to different scenarios. Take Break on Through, a mission from the recent Call of Duty: Black Ops Cold War, as an example. Unable to get the location of a nuclear bomb, Russell Adler drugs the player in the hope psychoactive chemicals will uncover the hidden location. The drug trip that ensues forces Bell to either obey or disobey Adler through a series of drug-fueled scenarios.
While the drug-fuelled interrogation was an exhilarating experience, Treyarch lead game designer Joanna Leung says that the level’s repeated use of the red doors to teleport the player through different vision quests was a personal highlight, having worked on a similar mechanic for the multiplayer map, ‘Deprogram’.
In Darkness (Call of Duty: Black Ops 3)
Treyarch senior level designer Matt Coutras fondly remembers the first campaign he worked on when he joined the Call of Duty: Black Ops 3 development team.
“It was called ‘In Darkness’ and it takes place in Singapore during a bad storm. Singapore is partially destroyed and it was a cool location to go through,” he says. But as a designer, the real challenge with In Darkness for Coutras was how the map integrated the four-player co-op and how the large map allowed multiple players to explore different parts of Singapore. “You have a bunch of cool locations — from docs to a flooded subway to a downtown space.”
Brick in the Wall (Call of Duty: Black Ops Cold War)
One of the first missions developed for Call of Duty: Black Ops Cold War, and a favorite mission of audio designer Jake Harley, is Brick in the Wall, a spy-thriller stealth mission where Bell and his associates hunt down one of Perseus’ men in East Berlin, meeting with informants and sneaking past Stasi guards in the process.
“I love stealth missions to begin with and I really liked seeing how the team brought East Berlin to life and just sneaking through the ghost tunnels. It was a really cool experience.”
Karma (Call of Duty: Black Ops 2)
One mission in Call of Duty: Black Ops 2 called Karma sees the player entering an opulent club and fighting on the dance floor with dubstep blaring in the background.
“As an audio person, that was so cool to me and memorable,” says Harley, who says Karma is his second favorite campaign mission behind only the crowd favorite, Vorkuta.
Those are the favorite Call of Duty Black Ops campaigns according to the developers. Let us know what your favorite Call of Duty Black Ops campaigns are in the comments and keep an eye out for all the latest updates on Call of Duty Black Ops 6 right here on IGN.
Matt Kim is IGN’s Senior Features Editor. You can reach him @lawoftd.
Not many people hit the refund button on Sonar Shock, the indie immersive sim that’s rated Very Positive on Steam. But those that do tend to complain they couldn’t get the hang of the controls. You can understand why. Try to strafe left to dodge an attack from a blubber monster, and you’ll instead rotate on the spot. Attempt to turn the camera with a flick of the mouse, and you’ll discover that your view remains fixed in place – the cursor moving across the screen as if searching for an icon on your desktop.
“The controls are actually one of the biggest points that make people bounce off the game,” developer Raphael Bossniak admits.
And yet they’re also a unique selling point. Where last year’s extraordinary System Shock remake embraced the interface and keyboard conventions of modern gaming, Sonar Shock leans into the experimentation of pre-Quake control schemes – long before WASD and mouselook became standardised for the sake of ease and sanity.