Category: IGN

2K has reaffirmed its support for 3rd-person action roguelike shooter Project Ethos, and has appointed the former executive producer for Apex Legends as the new studio head of developer 31st Union.

This news was shared with employees today in a town hall followed by an internal memo, the latter of which was shared with IGN by 2K. The memo, written by 2K president David Ismailer, states that Ben Brinkman will take over as studio head of 31st Union beginning Monday, October 20. Brinkman will oversee Project Ethos development as the game is “reimagined” “with a renewed vision” after the game’s 2024 playtests revealed a need for “a more distinct identity.”

Here’s an excerpt from the memo:

The community feedback from last fall’s Project ETHOS playtest was enlightening. It affirmed the promise of a roguelike shooter but told us we still had work to do. It uncovered the need for a more distinct identity.

It’s been inspiring to see how far you’ve come. You took the feedback to heart and reimagined Project ETHOS with a renewed vision – one that’s poised to deliver on its promise to our players

Our confidence in Project ETHOS grows every day. To further the incredible progress you’ve made, I’m excited to welcome Ben Brinkman as the new Studio Head of 31st Union. After several months of conversations, Ben officially joins us on Monday, October 20.

Brinkman joins 31st Union directly from EA, where he had previously been working as executive producer on Apex Legends since 2020, following six years at Treyarch on Call of Duty. IGN has reached out to EA for comment on what this means for Apex Legends, and who will be taking over Brinkman’s former role.

Project Ethos was first announced in October of last year as a free-to-play, third-person, hero extraction shooter with some roguelike elements. It’s being developed by 31st Union, a studio founded in 2019 by ex-Sledgehammer Games co-founder Michael Condrey and originally referred to as 2K Silicon Valley. We previewed Project Ethos at the time, and liked it fine, but said it “fails at being a new experience that players will crave over and over again.” Other outlets shared similar feedback, that the game was fun enough but didn’t do anything significant to stand out in a crowded genre.

31st Union has been quiet on the Project Ethos front since then, but in February this year, Kotaku reported that Condrey was fired by 2K Games due to the lukewarm reception of the game. At the time, 2K reassured employees it would continue to support the project.

This news indicates that 2K is indeed making good on its promise to continue to support Project Ethos, even amidst ongoing concerns that the audience for online, multiplayer shooters – especially extraction shooters – is worn out. But it may be a while before we get another update given the wording of the email.

Rebekah Valentine is a senior reporter for IGN. You can find her posting on BlueSky @duckvalentine.bsky.social. Got a story tip? Send it to rvalentine@ign.com.

Dovetail Games, perhaps best known as the developer and publisher of the Train Sim World series of video games, announced a brand-new title at IGN Fan Fest 2025: Fall Edition– and it’s unlike anything they’ve released before.

Metro Rivals: New York is “an innovative and genre-defying subway simcade game” set to release in early 2026.

In the game, “players step into a near-future New York City where the subway system has been carved into 10 fiercely contested districts.” In addition to its single-player campaign, Metro Rivals: New York includes a PvP mode where up to four players can compete online or with friends. Drivers can “race to stop at designated platforms,” and are “scored on their ability to handle their train with precision and control under pressure.”

Metro Rivals: New York’s first trailer was revealed as part of IGN Fan Fest and, as you can see in the player at the top of the page, gives a brief glimpse into train racing mechanics.

According to Dovetail, the game’s narrative sees “players begin their journey with nothing but a hand-me-down train and a determination to rise. To succeed, they must take on a variety of missions, earn cash fares, upgrade their train’s performance, build a loyal following, and earn respect.”

While there will be in-game purchases, Dovetail says those are “entirely cosmetic” and that the game is not “pay-to-win.” Instead, players “can express themselves with extensive options to upgrade their train’s performance, apply unique skins and liveries in signature colours, and personalise their character’s appearance to stand out on the tracks.”

And if neither the single player campaign nor the PvP mode is your cup of tea, you also have the option to partake in a “more relaxed experience” where “players can set their own paths, hop into their train, and enjoy the sights of the city.”

Publisher Reef Entertainment and developer Bitmap Bureau have published a new Terminator 2D: No Fate trailer, showing off how next month’s arcade-inspired action game reimagines the events of Terminator 2: Judgment Day.

It’s a two-and-a-half-minute look at a modern take on retro gaming that debuted as part of IGN Fall Fan Fest 2025. Director James Cameron’s original ‘90s sequel has been picked apart by movie fans for decades, and Terminator 2D: No Fate aims to let players experience fan-favorite moments – and new scenarios, too.

As Bitmap Bureau lead programmer and designer Mike Tucker explains in today’s trailer, a Terminator 2D: No Fate playthrough begins simply enough, with players tasked with revisiting the events of the Terminator 2 movie through the lens of a 2D, retro side-scroller. That No Fate title then takes over on repeat playthroughs, as fans are given the option to make choices that alter the story they’ve known for years.

Secret levels and remixed weapon loadouts are just the tip of the iceberg for Terminator 2D: No Fate. The example we see in today’s IGN Fall Fan Fest 2025 trailer revisits Sarah Connor’s trek through Cyberdyne HQ. Players will first fight through waves of SWAT officers by using little more than Sarah’s pistol and a few well-timed punches. A follow-up playthrough, coupled with different choices, however, could see her use an assault rifle to go in guns blazing while Arnold Schwarzenegger’s T-800 tears through enemies with his minigun.

“Adding in this pivotal decision the player must make gave us a way of staying accurate to the movie,” Tucker explained, “while also opening up the possibility of new scenarios and gameplay ideas that could make repeat playthroughs both rewarding and entertaining, allowing fans of the franchise to experience battles they have only ever dreamed of before.”

Following a recent delay, Terminator 2D: No Fate has a release date of November 26, 2025, for PC, Nintendo Switch, PlayStation 4, PlayStation 5, Xbox One, and Xbox Series X | S. For more while we wait to see the multiple new endings it can give longtime Terminator 2 enjoyers, you can read up on why Bitmap tracked down one of the film’s original actors. You can also check out why we think the game needed to be made in 2025.

Michael Cripe is a freelance writer with IGN. He’s best known for his work at sites like The Pitch, The Escapist, and OnlySP. Be sure to give him a follow on Bluesky (@mikecripe.bsky.social) and Twitter (@MikeCripe).

Love them or, more likely, hate them, Minecraft’s Creepers are now an iconic part of Mojang’s beloved sandbox game. But the explosive creatures probably wouldn’t be included today, the developer has said, if it were to design them from scratch now.

Speaking in a new developer video discussing game balance and fairness, chief creative officer Jens Bergensten said that Mojang now followed a strong principle when adding any new item, biome or enemy to Minecraft that could cause players grief. In a nutshell, if anything causes the player to suffer, it should be because players brought it on themselves.

“We want to avoid treating players in a way that feels unfair,” Bergensten said. “So we have this guiding principle that bad things [can] happen, but they’re technically the players’ fault. What we mean by that is either the player caused it, or the player had a chance to prevent it.”

That means enemies have to feel fair — so players can choose to take them on if they want or have a decent chance of mitigating the danger if not. Situations that negatively impact a player should also never feel too random.

Bergensten listed various examples of things that have been added in the past that haven’t felt as fair as intended — such as Iron Golems protecting villages by attacking Creepers (and getting said villages blown up), or Endermen randomly stealing blocks that could have some pivotal signifiance (such as a painstakingly-built Redstone circuits).

This doesn’t mean that Mojang won’t add in tougher challenges, though the developer said it was now careful to make difficult content feel like something players were opting into — such as when actively making the choice to enter The End and take on the game’s climactic Ender Dragon.

The new Disney Lorcana expansion, Whispers in The Well, is now available to preorder. Amazon has preorders up at the moment for a booster box, the Illumineer’s Trove box, a single booster pack, and two single-player decks: Amber & Emerald and Sapphire & Steel. All of these are set to be released on November 14 this year as well, so thankfully you only have about a month to wait before you can get your hands on them. Get your preorders in at the links below before they sell out.

Preorder Disney Lorcana Whispers in The Well Expansion

On top of the expansion, there’s also two new Disney Lorcana playmats that are releasing on the same day. One of these is a delightful playmat featuring a design of Mickey Mouse while the other features Jasmine from Aladdin. At the moment, they are both available to preorder for $19.99 a piece.

If the big booster box has caught your eye, it comes with 24 booster packs that each contain 12 randomized cards. Illumineer’s Trove, on the other hand, comes with 8 booster packs alongside six damage-counter dice, six card dividers, one lore counter, and a card storage box. If you’re not looking to splash out on these big sets, though, the single booster pack will just set you up with 12 cards. As for the single-player decks, these come with 60 cards (including two foil cards of the characters featured on the front of the package), 11 damage tokens, a bonus booster pack, and a rulebook.

If you’re looking for even more card deals and preorders to drop some cash on, check out our breakdown of the best deals of the day. Yesterday’s write-up featured some great Pokémon TCG discounts and information on where you can preorder the new Magic: The Gathering’s Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles set.

Hannah Hoolihan is a freelancer who writes with the guides and commerce teams here at IGN.

The Battlefield 6 team at EA and Battlefield Studios is shrinking ticket sizes for their large-scale Conquest multiplayer game mode, but players aren’t sold that these changes will improve the pace of matches.

An update to the structure of Conquest matches arrived in an official post from the Battlefield Comms X/Twitter account. It details blanket changes across every Conquest map in Battlefield 6, as the developers aim to ensure matches “finish at a more natural pace.”

To achieve this, BF Studios says it has reduced ticket sizes from 1000 tickets to a unique ticket goal for each map. These range from 900 tickets on maps like Siege of Cairo and Empire State to 700 tickets on maps like Mirak Valley and Operation Firestorm. You can see the full breakdown below.

• Siege of Cairo from 1000 to 900
• Empire State from 1000 to 900
• Iberian Offensive from 1000 to 900
• Liberation Peak From 1000 to 800
• Manhattan Bridge From 1000 to 800
• Operation Firestorm From 1000 to 700
• New Sobek City from 1000 to 900
• Mirak Valley from 1000 to 700

BF Studios says its goal is to keep matches moving at a more natural pace, but players aren’t convinced that reduced ticket requirements are what Battlefield 6 needs.

Meanwhile, BF Studios added in a separate tweet that the Out of Bounds timer for vehicles on Battlefield 6’s Manhattan Bridge map in Conquest and Escalation have been increased from five to 10 seconds.

Developing…

Michael Cripe is a freelance writer with IGN. He’s best known for his work at sites like The Pitch, The Escapist, and OnlySP. Be sure to give him a follow on Bluesky (@mikecripe.bsky.social) and Twitter (@MikeCripe).

Destiny 2’s recent Edge of Fate expansion marked the game’s seventh mainline annual expansion, and if there’s one thing that’s never been clearer, it’s that Bungie’s MMO/loot-shooter is tough for new players to get into.

Sure, the game isn’t in its best state right now ahead of the Star Wars-themed Renegades in December, but it’s still one of the best-feeling shooters.

If you’ve ever wanted to become a Titan, Hunter, or Warlock but felt you missed your chance, there’s good news: Green Man Gaming has bundled together every expansion for charity.

The Outer Worlds 2 is almost here, aiming to not just be bigger than its predecessor but a better RPG in every respect when it releases on October 29 on PC, PlayStation 5, and Xbox Series X and S.

We think Obsidian’s sci-fi sequel is one of this fall’s most slept-on games, possibly due to a bumpy start after The Outer Worlds 2 was initially touted as Microsoft’s first $80 game. The publisher U-turned on the decision just a month later, however, saying it was keeping the price at $69.99 “in line with current market conditions.”

We had a great time with The Outer Worlds 2 when we previewed it back in August, writing: “If it’s not clear by now, I’m really into what Obsidian is doing with The Outer Worlds 2. While I appreciated Obsidian’s prior attempt at this universe, I never totally fell for it, but what the studio has achieved here in this prologue is exactly what I’d hoped for the first time around. And that’s exactly why I’m willing to bet that The Outer Worlds 2 will be one of those sequels. The ones that finally take an idea all the way to greatness.”

The Outer Worlds 2’s official release date is October 29, but if you’ve bought the $99.99 Premium Edition, you can jump in five days early from October 23-24, depending upon where you are in the world. Xbox Game Pass subscribers can also jump in early if they have a valid subscription and upgrade to the premium edition for $29.99. The Outer Worlds 2 is available for pre-download now.

The Outer Worlds 2 Early Access Launch Times

Thursday, October 23, 2025

PDT (San Francisco):

• 9pm

Friday, October 24, 2025

EDT (New York):

• 12am midnight

BST (London):

• 5am

CEST (Paris, Rome, Berlin):

• 6am

EEST (Turkey):

• 7am

HKT (Hong Kong):

• 12pm noon

CST (Beijing):

• 12pm noon

JST (Tokyo):

• 1pm

AEST (Sydney):

• 3pm

The Outer Worlds 2 Global Launch Times

Wednesday, October 29, 2025

PDT (San Francisco):

• 10am

EDT (New York):

• 1pm

BST (London):

• 5pm

CEST (Paris, Rome, Berlin):

• 6pm

EEST (Turkey):

• 8pm

Thursday, October 30, 2025

HKT (Hong Kong):

• 1am

CST (Beijing):

• 1am

JST (Tokyo):

• 2am

AEST (Sydney):

• 4am

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

Ghost of Yotei sales are in-line with Ghost of Tsushima’s in Europe, new data shows.

As reported by The Game Business, Ghost of Yotei debuted at No.2 in the GSD European charts behind EA’s FC 26.

Sony has yet to announce a sales figure for Ghost of Yotei, which launched exclusively on PlayStation 5 on October 2, 2025. But we now know that in Europe it’s doing about as well as its predecessor, which launched in 2020 exclusively on PlayStation 4. That is, for its first few days on sale, as the GSD European chart runs to October 5.

There are a number of things worth noting here. Not only did Ghost of Tsushima launch on a console with a bigger install base at that point than PS5 has now, it launched during the pandemic, which saw record video game sales and player numbers as people were forced to stay at home during lockdowns.

The Game Business noted that Ghost of Yotei is the biggest first-party PlayStation launch since Spider-Man 2 in October 2023. Helldivers 2, which launched February 2024, remains the fastest selling PlayStation Studios game of all time, with an incredible 12 million sold in 12 weeks. The question is whether Ghost of Yotei will end up meeting Sony’s sales expectations over time; Ghost of Tsushima ended up a hugely successful release, with over 13 million sold as of September 2024.

But it shines a light on just how few new games Sony’s first-party studios have released over the last few years. Since Insomniac’s Spider-Man 2 came out in October 2023, we’ve had the aforementioned Helldivers 2, the disastrous Concord, Team Asobi’s wonderful Astro Bot, Lego Horizon Adventures, MLB The Show 25, and a bunch of remasters. Naughty Dog has seemingly skipped the PS5 generation entirely in terms of brand new games.

First-party Sony games we know to be in the works include Bungie’s Marathon, Housemarque’s Saros, Insomniac’s Marvel’s Wolverine, Naughty Dog’s Intergalactic: The Heretic Prophet, Haven’s Fairgames, and a multiplayer Horizon game from Guerrilla. A whole bunch of Sony first-party games were canceled as the company’s live-service push faltered, including a multiplayer The Last of Us game, a live-service God of War game, and another live-service title from Bend Studio. Bend’s last brand new game was 2019’s Days Gone on PlayStation 4, which launched on PC in 2021.

But how has Ghost of Yotei done in the U.S.? According to Mat Piscatella, senior director at Circana, Ghost of Yotei ranked 12th on its Top 15 Titles by Total Weekly Active Users chart for the week ending October 4, with 4.4% of active PlayStation players giving it a go. Coincidentally, Ghost of Tsushima also ranked 12th in its launch week back in 2020 with 4.4% of active PlayStation players engaging.

So it sounds like Ghost of Yotei has done about as well as Ghost of Tsushima did, at least at launch. It will be interesting to see if Sony says anything about its performance in upcoming financial reports, and how sales hold up in the coming weeks as we head into the crucial holiday season.

As for what’s next from developer Sucker Punch, in an interview with VGC, co-founder and studio head, Brian Fleming, said the studio will decide its next project once the multiplayer add-on Ghost of Yotei: Legends comes out in 2026. But, he suggested, don’t expect a flurry of games from the relatively lean developer — it’s one project at a time.

While we wait to find out, check out IGN’s Ghost of Yotei review. We’ve also got a cool story about Atsu’s sword-drawing technique, which Japanese martial arts experts have said is kind of doable in real life.

Ready to master Ghost of Yotei? Check out our comprehensive guides, which cover everything from things to do first, best skills to unlock, advanced combat tips, getting the best early-game armor set, and uncovering every Altar of Reflection location. Our Walkthrough also provides essential tips and strategies for defeating every boss, and our secrets and easter eggs guide ensures you never miss another hidden reference again.

Wesley is Director, News at IGN. Find him on Twitter at @wyp100. You can reach Wesley at wesley_yinpoole@ign.com or confidentially at wyp100@proton.me.

Fans across the world are paying tribute to “titan of soul” D’Angelo, who died yesterday aged 51 after an undisclosed battle with cancer.

D’Angelo was behind the hugely popular Red Dead Redemption 2 track, Unshaken, and fans of the game as well as developer Rockstar paid tribute following the news.

In a statement posted to social media, Rockstar Games called D’Angelo a “true titan of soul,” writing: “We are eternally grateful for his track Unshaken which will forever be an enduring part of the legacy of Red Dead Redemption 2.”

The Grammy-award winning musician released three albums over his career. 2014’s Black Messiah was his last album, which makes the iconic track included on 2018 Red Dead Redemption 2’s soundtrack one of his final pieces. The entire track can be heard in the mission Dear Uncle Tacitus, in an impactful segment when you’re riding a horse back to camp. It boasts over 55 million streams on Spotify alone.