Games Workshop has announced plans to build a new Warhammer World in the United States with a late 2027 target for opening its doors.
Warhammer World, in Nottingham, England, is the focal point for Games Workshop’s various tabletop games and a social hub for the hobby. It includes an exhibition centre with dramatic, large-scale dioramas featuring everything from famous battles in the grimdark sci-fi setting Warhammer 40,000 to the fantasy world of Age of Sigmar.
For competitors, a sizeable castle-themed gaming hall lets fans play matches, often in scheduled tournaments. There’s a themed bar and restaurant, areas to paint miniatures, and an in-house store with exclusive products.
In a post on Warhammer Community, Games Workshop confirmed its plans to start work on the new Warhammer World, to be built just outside Washington DC.
“This new Warhammer World will be a flagship venue that celebrates Warhammer in all its forms: gaming, painting, modelling, storytelling, events, and community,” Games Workshop said.
“The original Warhammer World in Nottingham, UK sets a very high bar. We’re not going to replicate it brick-for-brick, but instead build something equally uncompromising on quality and experience, something worthy of Warhammer’s rich settings and of course the title ‘Warhammer World.’ And of course, at the heart of all this is creating something extraordinary for all of you — the Warhammer fans!
“Now, there’s a lot to do – but with a fair wind, and the might of the Emperor and his inexhaustible armies, we hope to open the doors late in 2027.”
With this new Warhammer World, Games Workshop is clearly hoping to reinforce its explosive success and the ever-increasing popularity of Warhammer 40,000 in particular, which in recent years has grown far beyond the confines of a tabletop game. Its loyal fandom fusses over lore, analyzes new novels for fresh insight into the setting, and speculates about future development. The smash hit video game Space Marine 2 boosted interest in all things Warhammer 40,000 — so much so that playable character Titus is now the poster boy of the tabletop game and is even at the heart of its next narrative expansion. And former Superman actor Henry Cavill’s upcoming Warhammer 40,000 Cinematic Universe for Amazon will undoubtedly take it to new heights. It makes a lot of sense to have a Warhammer World in place to capitalize on the army of newcomers Cavill’s Prime Video work will surely rally together. (Cavill once visited Warhammer World in the UK and posted a video of his tour on Instagram.)
In the shorter term, Warhammer 40,000 fans are bracing themselves for an announcement and release of the 11th Edition of the game, accompanying lore developments, and new model releases. And we’re arguably in the golden age of Warhammer 40,000 video games, with Space Marine 2 still receiving updates, Space Marine 3 in the works, and Dawn of War 4 and Total War: Warhammer 40,000 waiting in the wings.
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.
Last month, Larian Studios presented console players of Divinity: Original Sin 2 with a special treat: an upgraded version of the game for PS5, Xbox Series, and delightfully, Nintendo Switch 2. But while Original Sin 2 has been on Nintendo’s system since 2019, Larian’s next game, Baldur’s Gate 3, never made it to any Nintendo console. Why not? Well, Larian at least says it wasn’t its decision.
In a Reddit AMA today conducted by various members of Larian, CEO Swen Vincke took a moment to answer a question about whether or not Baldur’s Gate 3 for Nintendo Switch 2 was “even possible”. Sadly, his answer wasn’t a happy one: “We would have loved to but it’s wasn’t our decision to make.”
Vincke is speaking in the past tense because officially, Larian is done with Baldur’s Gate 3. It’s still supporting the game with minor bug fixes, but there’s no reason to expect the studio to do a whole new release on a new platform now, especially since it’s moved on to a new Divinity game. That leaves Wizards of the Coast in charge of the future of Baldur’s Gate 3, meaning a port isn’t happening without its blessing.
Which seems to be what Vincke is implying here – that Larian would have done one, but Wizards for whatever reason decided not to. We’ve reached out to Wizards of the Coast for comment on this.
Which is a shame for Switch owners, because Baldur’s Gate is a fantastic game. We gave it a 10/10 at launch, saying that “with crunchy, tactical RPG combat, a memorable story with complex characters, highly polished cinematic presentation, and a world that always rewards exploration and creativity, Baldur’s Gate 3 is the new high-water mark for CRPGs.”
I wouldn’t be doing what I’m lucky enough to do for a living without Mario games. Heck, I’m not sure I’d even be playing video games if not for Mario. And so, when I reviewed Super Mario Odyssey for IGN in 2017, it checked off a career bucket list item for me. And oh how lucky I was that Odyssey turned out to be – and still very much is – one of the greatest 3D platformers ever made.
It was worth the long wait, as in case you’re too young to remember (which would be perfectly understandable at this point), the last mainline 3D Mario game before Odyssey was Super Mario Galaxy 2…all the way back in 2010. Yes, it was seven long years between headlining 3D entries in Nintendo’s biggest franchise, but fast-forward to 2026 and we’ve already surpassed eight years as we continue to wait for Odyssey’s 3D Mario successor. I thought for sure last Fall was going to be when it finally happened, as what better way for Nintendo to have celebrated the 40th anniversary of the original Super Mario Bros. than with the next mainline 3D Mario game, cementing the Switch 2 as the must-have device for its first Christmas, just as Odyssey did for the Switch 1’s first holiday on the market back in 2017? But that big anniversary came and went with nothing but a questionably priced 4K remaster of Super Mario Galaxy 1 and 2.
However, I think the wait for the true next-gen mainline 3D Mario game is finally almost over. Let’s run through the reasons:
First and foremost – and this is 90% of my argument – is that Nintendo has essentially fired every other bullet (Bill) in its chamber in recent years! What big megafranchise moves do they have left for this year? A mainline 2D Mario game? We just got that in Fall 2023 in the form of the (sensational) Super Mario Bros. Wonder. Mario Kart? After its own incredibly long hiatus, it was the Switch 2’s big day-one launch title. How about 3D Zelda? Tears of the Kingdom was just two-and-a-half short years ago, after we waited six years for it following Breath of the Wild. That means we won’t see Aonuma’s next effort for at least a few more years. What about 2D Zelda? Echoes of Wisdom was in Fall 2024, and though this year is the 40th anniversary of Zelda, last year’s 40th anniversary of Mario suggests you should set your expectation to, at best, a 4K remaster of Twilight Princess or Wind Waker.
Donkey Kong Bananza dropped in the Switch 2’s launch window and is arguably the system’s best game so far. Super Mario Party Jamboree just released in 2024. Animal Crossing is getting a Switch 2 update in just a few days, making it unlikely we see an all-new game anytime soon. Super Smash Bros., barring a miracle, is retired due its director leaving it all on the field with Ultimate. Is Splatoon big enough to really move the needle? Maybe, maybe not. Pokemon is really Nintendo’s best non-Mario bet, but we just had Legends: Z-A last Fall.
Nintendo has essentially fired every other bullet (Bill) in its chamber in recent years.
Shall I keep going? The last of Nintendo’s “Big Three,” Metroid, has shipped a 2D (Dread, 2021) and 3D (Prime 4, barely a month ago) entry in recent years. And anyway, Nintendo itself admits that Prime 4 wasn’t it. An unnamed senior source revealed to The Game Business that Switch 2 sales fell behind the pace of the Switch 1 in key markets this past holiday in large part due to the “absence of a major Western game.” Ouch – that is some serious Metroid Prime 4 slander!
But back on topic: what would fit the definition of a “major Western game” for Nintendo that hasn’t already shipped in recent years? How about the next major 3D Mario game, which isn’t just a major Western game but a major global game? Odyssey sold nearly 30 million copies – an absolutely staggering amount that could easily be replicated over the life of the Switch 2 if Nintendo delivers it this Fall…or perhaps even sooner?
That brings me to reason number two: The Super Mario Bros. Movie is the highest-grossing video game movie ever, raking in over $1.3 billion dollars at the box office. Its sequel, The Super Mario Bros. Galaxy Movie, is set to debut in theaters on April 3. What better way to capitalize on what’s likely to be another massive Hollywood hit for Nintendo than to feed those moviegoers’ enthusiasm with the next big 3D Mario entry – one that, as we’ve already established, can easily sell another 25 million copies (which, given the likely $80 price point for the next 3D Mario game, would mean $2 billion in revenue, besting the box office take of the first film – and likely the second) – not to mention a whole bunch of Switch 2’s?
Ultimately, though Nintendo is tough to reliably predict (honestly, I would’ve bet money – and lost – on the next big 3D Mario game arriving last Fall for Switch 2’s first holiday and Mario’s 40th anniversary), the planets do seem to be aligning for Mario’s next major 3D platformer to arrive sometime this year. If I’m wrong and Odyssey’s successor debuts in 2027 (or, gulp, later!), it means we’ll be going at least a full decade since the last mainline Mario, which basically means Nintendo is just torturing us.
I would’ve bet money – and lost – on the next big 3D Mario game arriving last Fall for Switch 2’s first holiday and Mario’s 40th anniversary.
Whenever it’s finally confirmed, the next question is, of course, what is it? Is it Super Mario Odyssey 2, or an entirely new adventure? Based on Mario’s history, I’d hope for and expect the latter – in Mario’s 3D era, Nintendo has only ever done one sequel in the form of Galaxy 2 (or two if you want to count 3D World as a sequel to 3D Land). But we’ll cross that bridge when we come to it. For now, beggars can’t be choosers. We can only hope that 2026 is finally going to be the year. I think it is. Now if you’ll excuse me, I’m going to start replaying Odyssey again, just to experience the sheer joy of New Donk City one more time.
Ryan McCaffrey is IGN’s executive editor of previews and host of both IGN’s weekly Xbox show, Podcast Unlocked, as well as our old interview show, IGN Unfiltered. Super Mario Bros. 3 is his favorite video game of all time. Debate it with him on Twitter at @DMC_Ryan.
The Sims developer Maxis is kicking off the new year with an update on what its whole deal is, after plenty of rumors and concerns about the future of the franchise. Ans as a part of that, it seems to be teasing the “next evolution” of single-player PC and console The Sims games…even as its long-touted “next generation” of The Sims, Project Rene, is relegated to a mobile-only social spin-off.
This comes from a lengthy blog post on the EA website, in which Maxis speaks at length about its philosophy around The Sims in the coming year. Most of it is pretty mission statement-y, but in the middle, we get a glimpse of what’s planned for the future of The Sims.
For three years now, Maxis has been teasing something called Project Rene. Initially billed as the future of The Sims that would exist across PC and mobile, EA nevertheless refused to call it The Sims 5. Since 2022, there have been multiple closed playtests, and the feedback has gradually soured as Project Rene increasingly started to look like a pretty basic mobile game. Meanwhile, while The Sims 4 community remains robust, there hasn’t been much discussion on what The Sims 5 might look like, or if the console and PC base should even expect anything new at all. As recently as last August, EA Entertainment president Laura Miele insisted that it wouldn’t be “player-friendly” to release one when the community had already invested so much time and money into The Sims 4.
Which is why the wording in this blog post is both exciting and nerve-wracking as a The Sims fan. The post separates out its plans for “The Sims” on PC and console, and Project Rene. For PC and console, Maxis reaffirms its commitment to new content for The Sims 4, and adds that “Single-player PC and console experiences will always be a part of our future, with more than half of our global development team dedicated to The Sims 4 and the next evolution. More news in the coming months!”
That wording, “the next evolution,” is huge. While it’s not exactly “The Sims 5,” it’s the first crumb we’ve gotten in years that we might see something like one eventually. What’s even more promising is that EA is designating Project Rene as a social, multiplayer game that’s mobile-first. That’s disappointing for those who were hoping Project Rene would be an exciting new future, but it sounds like that’s still going to exist in some fashion alongside whatever the actual new evolution is.
Still, Maxis has a rough road ahead. Miele is correct that one of the biggest issues with a new The Sims game is that players have spent tons of money already on expansion packs for The Sims 4, and historically brand new The Sims games have felt woefully feature incomplete when they launch with no such packs. That was the case with The Sims 4, which launched to relatively weak reviews as players adjusted to the shock of features they’d come to get used to – pets, interactive children, weather – suddenly gone, until a new paid expansion pack was released.
It would behoove Maxis to figure all this out, because The Sims 4 is over a decade old now, and starting to show its age. What’s more, a number of potential competitors have come out of the woodwork in recent years, including Krafton’s inZOI and the indie Paralives, both in early access.
The most recent The Sims 4 expansion pack was Adventure Awaits, which launched in October of last year.
Rebekah Valentine is a senior reporter for IGN. Got a story tip? Send it to rvalentine@ign.com.
In the years since Baldur’s Gate 3’s release, Larian has put a lot of time and energy into updating the game with tons of new content, including new content for some beloved character who got the short end of the wizard staff the first time around, like Karlach. But one character is still coming up short for fans: Wyll. And at least one writer at Larian is just as frustrated by it as you.
This comes from a Reddit AMA today conducted by a number of Larian employees, during which one person asked why Wyll wasn’t developed further in post-launch patches, even as other companions got storyline and even personality updates. We’ve known for a while that the “Blade of Frontiers” warlock Wyll was rewritten significantly from his early access version to final version.
The question was answered by Larian senior writer Kevin VanOrd, who explained that he also wished Wyll had gotten more attention, and that the lack of content compared to other companions was mostly the result of a series of unfortunate timing coincidences. Here’s how VanOrd puts it:
I wish Wyll had gotten more content and a more fulfilling arc too.
As you probably know, we weren’t connecting with Wyll’s Early Access recruitment and initial questing, so we started over at a point when most of the other companion stories were fairly solid. A lot of decisions came later in development than was ideal – and there was a key situation near Baldur’s Gate that I intended to heavily involve Wyll in (the Red War College) that got cut. That meant back to the drawing board again. We eventually tied him to Duke Ravengard and started to work on that element of his arc just in time for me to get unexpectedly ill. I was out of the office for quite a while, and again after the epilogue’s release.
I think that Ansur’s lair was Swen’s idea – we did have the resources for a standalone dungeon, so we got to work on tying Wyll to the Wyrmway, but I couldn’t get more than a dungeon boss out of it. Once the situations were in place, that was that – I had to start writing them.
Wyll’s content is sparser than I’d have liked as a result. He’s also split into two stories, really – the Mizora story and the Ravengard story, and that might have been a mistake in hindsight. I also wish I could given him a stronger endpoint – it always bugged me that he can end up just as he started, as the Blade of Frontiers, without any meaningful difference. All that said, I love the Blade and I am really proud of him, his sincerity, his good nature, and his eager heroism. I’m truly sorry I didn’t give you more quality time with him.
It’s worth pointing out that it’s not that Wyll received no updates post-launch. Patch 7 made some light tweaks to Wyll’s dialogue that helped those pursuing him romantically have a more interesting time, though it didn’t really give him any new story content. But that’s nothing compared to Karlach, who got an entirely new ending in the same patch. Karlach, like Wyll, was considered to be one of the character who had been given the least love in terms of story content in the 1.0 release, and has consistently been a popular favorite. Recently, one fan broke down how many minutes of dialogue every character in Baldur’s Gate 3 had, and Wyll’s down below most of the other companions with just under 9 hours speaking. Still, it’s not as bad as Halsin, Minthara, Jaheira, and Minsc, though admittedly those four companions are a little more complex to recruit and you can’t even get them until Acts 2 or 3.
So, perhaps cold comfort to Wyll fans, but it’s comforting to know that he wasn’t intentionally sidelined. We’re proud of him too.
Red Dead Redemption 2 fans have made progress towards solving the game’s newly-discovered spiderweb mystery, and now believe they’ve reached its final clue.
An intricately-placed breadcrumb trail of spiderwebs was found and plotted, leading to a further set of marked telegraph poles. These then pointed to a collection of guitars within the game’s Fort Wallace location, where the trail temporarily went cold. Now, however, fans have pushed forwards — to what seems like a final clue beyond the edge of Red Dead Redemption 2’s map, and a sense of what this whole mystery might actually be about.
Once again, progress on the discovery has been brilliantly chronicled by YouTube channel Strange Man, who picks up the trail back at Fort Wallace by showing that these guitars acted as signposts, guiding players to the roof of the location’s tower.
On this roof, two tiny engravings of flying birds were then spotted, pointing in the direction of Giant’s Birds, right at the very north of the game’s map within Calumet Ravine. Heading here and using binoculars allows you to see a tiny, faint, but unmistakable “?” symbol on a mountain in the distance. The design of the question mark across the far hillside is such that it is only visible from this particular location.
Once again, it’s a smart set of clues — which is perhaps why this mystery has taken over seven years to be discovered — and once again, progress has stalled. But there’s a sense now, with this latest clue way beyond the boundary of the map, that the trail has reached its final stage. As Strange Man suggests, it now seems likely that the mystery’s denoument is right here, though the trigger remains elusive.
“Let’s solve this before GTA 6 arrives!” Strange Man wrote, asking for further ideas from fellow fans.
While the wait for an answer continues, there is at least a growing sense of what this whole breadcrumb trail might be about. With the hunt for clues leading to Calumet Ravine, it’s been noted that this is in the Wapiti reserve, amplifying previous suggestions that earlier steps in the mystery were an obtuse reference to Wapiti tribe member Eagle Flies. (Feathers could be shot out of spiderwebs, with five colored black and three colored red. Eagle Flies appears in five story missions, before three more which chart his capture and eventual death.)
Could it all lead nowhere? Possibly, but earlier this week IGN’s previous story on the mystery was shared by former Rockstar developer Adam Butterworth, who provided the first official acknowledgement that the game had included this trail of clues. “Absolutely wild people have found this,” he wrote on social media. “I remember hearing about this and thinking it would never be discovered.”
As things stand, this complex and multi-stage mystery has left fans on the edge of Wapiti territory, and has hinted at its tribe member Eagle Flies. What will be discovered next? Here’s hoping we aren’t waiting until GTA 6 to find out.
Tom Phillips is IGN’s News Editor. You can reach Tom at tom_phillips@ign.com or find him on Bluesky @tomphillipseg.bsky.social
Baboo! Are you looking for Heartopia codes? You’ve come to the right place. Here you’ll find all the codes that we’ve collected for the cozy sim. Redeeming these will give you currency, resources, and extra Gold to help you settle into your new home.
Working Codes for Heartopia (January 2026)
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Expired Codes for Heartopia
There are currently no expired codes for Heartopia, so you’ve got lots of goodies to redeem above!
How to Use Heartopia Codes
Looking to play Heartopia and want to know how to redeem codes? Follow these steps:
Press Tab on PC or tap the watch in the top-right corner
Click Setting
On the General Tab, look for the Redeem Code bubble button in the bottom right
Copy the code from this article and paste it into the bar that reads “Case Insensitive”
Click Redeem and if the code has been successful, it will say “Redeemed! Please check the mailbox for rewards.”
FAQs for Heartopia
Have a particular question about Heartopia and codes? See our answers to frequently asked questions below.
How to Collect Heartopia Rewards
Rewards are automatically sent to your Mailbox once you’ve redeemed codes. To find your Mailbox, press Tab or tap the watch in the top-right corner. Click Mailbox. All of the gifts you’ve received can be then be claimed. You can do this individually by opening each mail, or by pressing Claim All in the bottom left corner.
Why Isn’t My Code for Heartopia Working?
When a code doesn’t work for Heartopia it’s usually because of two reasons:
The code for Heartopia has expired
There’s a spelling mistake or an additional space in the code
Codes for Heartopia are not case-sensitive, but sometimes, a series of letters and numbers. The best way to ensure you’ve got a working code is to directly copy it from this article. We check all codes before we upload them, so you can guarantee they’re working. Just double-check that you haven’t copied over an extra space!
How Do I Get More Codes for Heartopia?
We regularly check and test new codes, so the best way to get more codes for Heartopia is to visit this article. But if you want to mine for codes yourself, then the Discord server for Heartopia is the best place to go.
Lauren Harper is an Associate Guides Editor. She loves a variety of games but is especially fond of puzzles, horrors, and point-and-click adventures.
Larian’s Reddit AMA on Divinity has concluded, and with it comes a number of new details on the Baldur’s Gate 3 developer’s next game.
We’ve rounded up all the new information revealed during the Reddit AMA from the various Larian members of staff who took part.
First up, Larian confirmed Divinity’s looting system will include handcrafted items, as Baldur’s Gate 3 did, as opposed to random and level dependent loot seen in the Divinity: Original Sin games.
As you’d expect, Divinity will have mod support via modding tools, but it’s unclear if they will be available for launch. Larian confirmed Divinity will have co-op at launch, and that modders will be able to up the player count. “Yes, coop will be available for release!” technical director Bert van Semmertier said. “The amount of players playing together will be depending on the final party size. But since modding is planned for this project as well, player will be essentially free to extend this. There is no hard limit to the amount of coop players.”
However, Divinity will not support native keyboard movement controls such as WASD right out of the box, which means modders will have to do their thing again, as they did for Baldur’s Gate 3.
Meanwhile, Divinity will run on Larian’s proprietary engine, which includes “significant changes.” “For each game, we are bringing significant changes to our engine,” head of gameplay Artem Titov said. “Since Divinity Engine is fully our own creation, it makes it easier to alter it to serve a new game rather than write a new engine from scratch.”
Divinity finally adds swimming to a Larian RPG?
As for new mechanics, head of design, Nick Pechenin, teased: “There was something that bothered me when I explored the starting areas of DOS1, DOS2 and BG3. It stares you right in the face if you think about it. In Divinity I can finally do the thing I wanted to do in every previous game.” Most believe this is about swimming.
As for the camera perspective, Divinity’s camera will work “very similar” to Baldur’s Gate 3’s, so expect a hybrid of top down and third-person camera.
Larian CEO Swen Vincke couldn’t say when we’ll see Divinity gameplay. “We’ll see,” he commented. “We’re in full production mode now but still have truckloads of work.” Larian wouldn’t be drawn on the playable races and classes, either, but did say there are clues as to Divinity’s races in the much-discussed announcement trailer.
Divinity tone, lore, and story
Writing director Adam Smith discussed the tonal difference between Divinity and Divinity: Original Sin 2, saying: “it’s more grounded and you might have picked up on some folk horror vibes in our trailer. But with games the size of DOS 2 and Divinity, there are lots of tonal variations as you move through the world and meet new characters. I hope it’ll make you laugh, frighten you, shock you and delight you.”
Smith also commented on Divinity’s place in the overall Divinity series lore. “It’s in the same continuity, but it’s a standalone story,” Smith said. “Long-term Divinity fans will find lots of familiar things but it’s never just fanservice – it has to serve the story we’re telling. The Divinity universe is full of weird and wonderful characters, and I’m really excited to be part of that legacy.”
Bert van Semmertier also touched on this, saying: “Divinity is a different universe than Baldur’s Gate. While you do not need to play the previous Divinity games, it would certainly improve your enjoyment if you do! You’ll perhaps recognize certain characters or situations or learn to explore the large universe the was already built for Divinity!”
Nick Pechenin confirmed Divinity Divinity will not keep the magic armor system from DOS2. “There will be ways to protect your characters from harm, but you will not have to wait before you can use your fun skill on enemies,” he said. “We are still cooking a system that makes sure that you have to work harder to stunlock solo bosses with.”
Divinity’s character customization will be “even better” than Baldur’s Gate 3’s, art director Alena Dubrovina said, “more colors, more options, more control!”
Size and scope of Divinity compared to Baldur’s Gate 3
Vincke touched on the size and scope of Divinity compared to Baldur’s Gate 3, saying: “Divinity takes everything we learned from BG3 & D:OS 2 and improves from there. In regards to BG3 – I think the main thing will be more agency and a rulesystem that was made for videogaming in addition to higher production values. Oh – and some really cool new friends to meet.”
Then: “more agency, more consequences. We don’t know ourselves yet how big it will be. We’re still making it.”
Larian will do its best to make Divinity playable on Steam Deck, given how popular Baldur’s Gate 3 proved on Valve’s portable game machine.
Here’s a fun one: will the new engine render moving ropes correctly and will we be able to look up in to the sky?
“There is no real engine limitation to allow looking at the sky,” technical director Bert van Semmertier replied. “How the camera works is entirely a design choice. Alternative camera angles are always considered. If they benefit the game, we will for sure add it. As for the ropes: you can expect substantial changes to our physics engine in the future games!”
Divinity’s combat and character progression systems
Head of design, Nick Pechenin, said Divinity will have a brand new combat system. “We went through our original ideas for DOS1 and DOS2, looked again at how they worked out in practice, picked up some inspirations from our BG3 EA and post-release journey, consulted the star charts to see what we need to do to stay competitive – and cooked a new action economy and character progression system,” he said.
“Feedback from BG3 players trying DOS2 for the first time has been especially interesting to us, seeing the two worlds colliding. We hope that both fans of BG3 and fans of DOS2 will find the new system intuitive but deep.”
It sounds like Divinity may indeed come to Nintendo Switch 2, eventually. “We have just released Divinity Original Sin 2 for Switch 2! We love the platform and we will certainly consider Switch 2 for the next Divinity game,” technical director Bert van Semmertier said.
Lizard romance?
As a Larian RPG, romance will of course be in Divinity. And it sounds like the developer expects lizards to get on well with each other. Vincke said he was particularly excited for players to experience a spot of lizard romance: “there’s a lot [he’s excited for players to experience] but we prefer to show and not tell. That said – Lizard romance seems like it’s going to be popular.”
And will the orcs have a special twist in Divinity? “Without saying which species are in the game, all of them have something unique,” is all Vincke would say.
What about Divinity’s gruesome announcement trailer? Vincke responded to one fan who said they were put off playing the game because the trailer is “so nihilistic and viscerally depressing.” Is the trailer an accurate depiction of what fans should expect from the game itself?
“We’re creating a dark world so you can be the light in the darkness. It’s a story about hope,” Vincke insisted. “But of course – we do want you to experience agency – so there’s also plenty of ways to take away that hope and be the darkness that snuffs out the light.”
Larian, Divinity, and generative AI
As expected, Vincke addressed the generative AI controversy that emerged following Divinity’s announcement. He insisted Divinity would not include any generative AI art, and confirmed it has ditched genAI tools during concept art development. However, Vincke confirmed Larian is using genAI across other areas of development.
Here’s Vincke’s full statement from the Reddit AMA:
“So first off – there is not going to be any GenAI art in Divinity. I know there’s been a lot of discussion about us using AI tools as part of concept art exploration. We already said this doesn’t mean the actual concept art is generated by AI but we understand it created confusion. So, to ensure there is no room for doubt, we’ve decided to refrain from using genAI tools during concept art development. That way there can be no discussion about the origin of the art.
“Having said that, we continuously try to improve the speed with which we can try things out. The more iterations we can do, the better in general the gameplay is. We think GenAI can help with this and so we’re trying things out across departments. Our hope is that it can aid us to refine ideas faster, leading to a more focused development cycle, less waste, and ultimately, a higher-quality game.
“The important bit to note is that we will not generate ‘creative assets’ that end up in a game without being 100% sure about the origins of the training data and the consent of those who created the data. If we use a GenAI model to create in-game assets, then it’ll be trained on data we own.”
Machine Learning Director Gabriel Bosque expanded on this last point in a bit more detail:
“This is all new technology, so I totally understand why it’s difficult to see where the positive uses are. We believe Machine Learning is a powerful tool to accelerate and make game development more efficient and streamlined. This means that our creatives have more time doing the work that makes their jobs more rewarding and the game a richer experience.
“The important bit to note is that we do not generate ‘creative assets’ that end up in a game without being 100% sure about the origins of the training data and the consent of those who created the data.
“With over 100,000 voice lines scheduled to be in the game, recorded by hundreds of actors, and even hundred thousands more to be recorded that will not end up in the game, there are useful tools for us to reduce the ‘mechanical legwork’ and free up time for teams that would be bogged down doing tasks that kept them away from what they really want to be doing. Additionally, our ML R&D team monitors and experiments with anything that is state of the art and that might influence game development pipelines of the future. This is important to us because we make our own engine.
“But we draw lines in the sand too. We explicitly committed in our actor agreements to not using the recordings to train or build AI voice modelers, because we are aware of how sensitive it can be to artificially generate an actor’s voice. Even if an actor were willing to agree to this if we’d compensate them, we don’t currently feel comfortable with including an AI-generated voice in our games.”
Writing director Adam Smith confirmed this stance on generative AI applies to writing, too. “We don’t have any text generation touching our dialogues, journal entries or other writing in Divinity,” he said.
“We had a limited group experimenting with tools to generate text, but the results hit a 3/10 at best and those tools are for research purposes, not for use in Divinity. Even my worst first drafts – and there are a LOT of them – are at least a 4/10 (although Swen might disagree :p), and the amount of iteration required to get even individual lines to the quality we want is enormous. From the initial stub to the line we record and ship, there are a great many eyes and hands involved in getting a dialogue right.”
So what areas do Larian use genAI on and what does it mean by a “creative asset”? “There is currently one example of ML generated assets that end up in the game and that is within our cinematics and animation pipeline,” Bosque explained. “In this pipeline we try to capture the actor’s performances as best as we can, so we use ML models to clean, retarget and even add motion when it’s not motion captured. These models are trained exclusively with Larian data.”
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.
Crimson Desert is an open-world action-adventure game set on the continent of Pywel. But how big is the open world, exactly? It’s “absolutely massive,” its developer has said, bigger even than that of Bethesda’s Skyrim and Rockstar’s Red Dead Redemption 2.
Speaking on the Gaming Interviews YouTube channel, Pear Abyss’ Will Powers said that describing the size of Crimson Desert’s world in terms of numbers doesn’t do it justice, because doing so fails to capture the scope and scale of the game. But he did go as far as to compare it to two of the biggest open world games around.
“I don’t think numbers really do it justice because, how big is that in terms of scope and scale?” he said. “But what we can say is that the world’s at least twice as big as the open world, the playable area, of Skyrim. It’s larger than the map of Red Dead Redemption 2.”
Powers went on to insist that the size of Crimson Desert’s open world won’t determine its quality. Rather, what you actually do in it is the key factor.
“The continent of Pywel is absolutely massive, but size doesn’t really matter if there’s nothing to do,” he said. “Open-world games are about doing things, having activities, having distractions. So we wanted to create a world that’s not only massive, but is also incredibly interactive.”
Unlike Skyrim and Red Dead Redemption 2, in Crimson Desert you can fly around on a dragon, so despite the size of its world, you’ll be able to get about quickly. And don’t expect RPG elements in terms of decision-making and choice and consequence as it relates to your character, either. The sheer amount of things to do in the world will facilitate the role-playing part of Crimson Desert, which players will form through “head canon.”
“You choose the type of character you want to play as in terms of your progression within the systems in the game,” Powers explained. “And then through head canon you’re having this very different experience than other players because of the scope and scale of the game. You’ll be distracted by something, you’ll go on this quest line, you’ll have an experience that’ll be radically different than someone else, even though they’re playing the same game and the same canonical storyline that you both are going through.”
Indeed, the part of Crimson Desert shown off to the media in previews is just “a tiny corner of the map,” Powers added. Crimson Desert is due out March 19, 2026.
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.
Over two years after it was announced, Ubisoft is still working on The Division 3. And while it has yet to show off the game, its chief developer has said he thinks it will have as big an impact as The Division 1.
The Division 1 was announced at E3 2013 with a trailer that went down as one of the most talked about of the show. After a series of delays, The Division released on March 8, 2016, breaking sales records for Ubisoft. The Division 2 followed in 2019, although it failed to make as big a splash at launch as its predecessor.
While there’s no release date for The Division 3, the hope is Ubisoft will show it off at some point this year. Now, Julian Gerighty, executive producer of The Division franchise at Ubisoft’s Massive Entertainment, has provided a brief but tantalizing update.
Speaking during the New Game+ Showcase 2026, Gerighty said: “So, The Division 3 is in production, right? This is not a secret. It’s been announced. It’s shaping up to be a monster. I can’t really say anything more than that. But this is, within these walls in Massive, we are working extremely hard on something that I think will be as big an impact as Division 1 was.”
That’s not much to go on, but clearly Ubisoft is hoping that The Division 3 will rekindle memories of The Division 1, which was certainly a hot topic when it was announced and enjoyed huge sales when it eventually came out. The pressure is on to deliver, especially with Ubisoft’s recent high-profile struggles.
Meanwhile, support for The Division 2 continues with various updates, and a team in Paris is putting the final touches of a The Division mobile game. The Division Heartland, a free-to-play spin-off, entered development in 2020 but was canceled in 2024.
Two months ago, Massive Entertainment introduced what it called a ‘voluntary career transition program,’ (the studio asked its staff to volunteer to be laid off) as part of a move to focus on The Division franchise and its Snowdrop game engine. It came as part of significant restructuring at Ubisoft that has seen multiple studio closures and rounds of layoffs. Massive Entertainment’s Star Wars Outlaws, released in 2024, was a big sales disappointment for Ubisoft, despite significant development and marketing costs.
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.
