LEGO has been crushing it with its video game sets. I honestly can’t think of a single miss. The LEGO NES set, the LEGO Pac-Man arcade cabinet, and even the recent SEGA Genesis controller (which was only available as a Gift With Purchase) all paid loving homage to the source material and managed to squeeze in clever surprises and Easter eggs. I’m happy to say the LEGO Game Boy, in spite of its smaller size, still managed to sneak in a few surprises, but if you’re hoping for something as elaborate as the NES Easter Egg, or the hand-crank movement and hidden ’80s arcade scene of the Pac-Man set, definitely temper your expectations.
How Big Is the LEGO Game Boy?
At 421 pieces, the LEGO Game Boy is the smallest of the available video game console sets LEGO has issued over the years, but in spite of a relatively small brick count, its efficiency of parts still makes for an exceptional whole. When it’s fully assembled, it looks everything the part of the original, although it’s just a touch smaller.
It also comes with bricks to build a small display stand, and a second, smaller display stand that shows off a cartridge and also serves as a place to store the extra lenticular game screens.
Its efficiency of parts still makes for an exceptional whole.
There are three game screens in all: one for Super Mario Land that has Mario hitting a block to reveal a star, one for Link’s Awakening that shows Link and Zelda gazing to the sea as gulls fly over head, and one that’s just the Nintendo logo scroll when you power on the Game Boy.
Swapping screens is no factor at all, you just pop off the back panel and drop it in place. It’s held secure with a little lever that’s easy to move and has just the right amount of give to keep it from moving without pressing so hard as to deform the thin lenticular sheets.
Since this model is based on the original Game Boy and not its later revisions, the graphics are in the sickly greens of that original 160 x 144 display. They’re sharp, too, and look exactly like how you remember them. They’re lovely. I hope they make more.
How Long Does it Take to Build the LEGO Game Boy?
In order to get the most appropriate timing on the LEGO Game Boy as I could, I popped in my Blu-ray copy of the 1989 Nintendo feature-length commercial “The Wizard.” My goal was to see if I could complete the build before Fred Savage, Jenny Lewis, and the titular Wizard made it to California.
I’m happy to say, in spite of having to get up to let my dogs out and then back in, I snapped the final piece into place just as Jenny Lewis stepped onto the dry soil of California on the way to the world Nintendo championships, so just about an hour after I pushed play. Not a bad build time, and again, the final results are so much better than it feels like should be possible with a set this size.
The parts on the inside evoke the look of the inside of a real Game Boy
Since it’s a 421-piece build, there are only five bags of parts inside the box, and they’re small bags. I have a little organizer basket from Walmart, the sort of thing you put on a shelf to store buttons and doo-dads for crafts, and I use it to organize parts bags when I build sets. For this build, it was overkill. I still used it, but really, there was no need to. I’m just a creature of habit.
I was surprised at the color selection of the bricks: lots of greens, browns, gold, and copper-colored pieces. Then it occurred to me the colors for the interior mimic the colors of a printed circuit board. That’s one of the first Easter eggs. As you’re putting it together, the parts on the inside you’ll never see again evoke the look of the inside of a real Game Boy, or any electronic gizmo of the era. It’s obviously not a 1:1 representation of the circuitry, but it’s a close enough approximation that I was suitably impressed.
The cartridges also follow this circuit board aesthetic on their insides, and the coolest Easter Egg in the set is in the Link’s Awakening cartridge. Now, LEGO didn’t need to do this at all, because again, once you put it together, you never see it again, but inside of the Link’s Awakening cart is a “back up battery” piece.
If you don’t know, in order to keep save files on those old carts, there had to be a small coin-cell battery providing a trickle of power to keep the electrons dancing soldered onto the board. Link’s Awakening was one such cart, and they went ahead and added that detail into the LEGO version, for no reason other than to please people like me. The Super Mario Land cart had no such battery back up and so the LEGO version doesn’t either.
The stickers for the carts are exact replicas of the ones on the originals, and I went into a state of hyper concentration to make sure I placed them exactly where they needed to be. Usually I put on LEGO decals with the same tweezers I use for scale models, but this time I just went raw dog on them and did pretty well.
LEGO Game Boy Controls
The power switch, D-pad, A and B buttons, contrast, and volume knobs, and start and select buttons are all functional. Well, “functional” meaning “they move.” The power switch in particular feels exactly like the one on the original Game Boy. When you switch it on, it’s so accurate to how you remember it feeling, you can’t help but expect to hear that familiar chime. Obviously it doesn’t, but your brain will fill in the details.
When you switch it on, you can’t help but expect to hear that familiar chime.
The rest of the buttons don’t feel exactly like they did on the original unit, but they still provide enough tactile feedback to get the job done. After the power switch, the A and B buttons probably feel the most accurate, with a little rubber band system rigged up to give them a little resistance and travel when you press them.
No LEGO Game Boy Tetris
If you’re going into the LEGO Game Boy hoping for a Tetris Easter egg, or any Tetris content at all, you’re going to be disappointed. While Tetris was the original pack-in game for the Game Boy, and no doubt helped to popularize both the console and the game itself, it’s nowhere to be seen here. My guess is it has to do with licensing, as Tetris wasn’t a Nintendo game but was merely licensed to Nintendo back in 1989 and it was almost certainly easier to include two first-party Nintendo titles with the kit.
So if you were hoping for a little Tetris homage hiding inside, I’m sorry to say there just isn’t one. Take it up with The Tetris Company Inc.
The LEGO Game Boy is scheduled for an October 1 release date, but Amazon and other retailers have gone ahead and broken street date. That means a lot of people spent their weekend putting together this delightful little LEGO Game Boy kit, and between its short build time and excellent final result, I recommend picking one up if you have any nostalgia for the good old days of the 4-battery OG Game Boy. The kit is also pretty reasonably priced at $59.99, and you can go ahead and pick it up right now and get it on, or even before, its October 1 release date.
Seth Macy is Senior Social Commerce Producer, and just wants to be your friend. You can find him online.
Shirley Curry, known to fans as Skyrim Grandma, has announced her retirement from uploading The Elder Scrolls videos ahead of her upcoming 90th birthday.
In a YouTube video published today entitled “My Goodbye to Skyrim,” Curry said that her time trying to find more The Elder Scrolls V: Skyrim content for her followers was finally over, after a decade of uploads.
“This has come to this because I’ll soon be 90 years old,” Curry explained. “Every time I come up with a new idea for how to play a story in Skyrim… I may make one or two or three with a new character and then I’m bored again. So that’s why I’m going to stop uploading anything to do with Skyrim.
“I’m tired, I’m not having any fun with it anymore, probably because of all the little kids on there,” Curry continued, saying that she was no longer “getting any feedback” from her viewers in the same way that she used to. “All I get is ‘Hi Grandma, I love you Grandma’ — that isn’t what I’m spending my time making and uploading videos for.”
In her video today, Curry repeatedly told anyone still wanting Skyrim content from her to download the fan-made mod which adds her as an in-game follower (it’s available from Nexus Mods). Alternatively, Curry said she had a bible study YouTube channel she would continue to post videos to, and encouraged any fans who were interested to follow her there.
Curry made no mention of waiting for her planned appearance in The Elder Scrolls 6, whenever that finally arrives. Bethesda has previously said it will add Curry to its upcoming project in some capacity, though there’s no sign of the game materialising any time soon, despite its teaser trailer being released more than seven years ago.
“The regulars that have been with me a long time – because I’ve been playing Skyrim and uploading it for about 15 years – those I will still appreciate hearing from,” Curry said. You usually have my email and I will be leaving a vlog once in a while when I have something to talk to you guys about.” In the description box for the video, Curry has also left her postal address, in case anyone wanted to get in touch via physical mail.
“I think that’s about all I have to say,” Curry concluded. “I hope my older viewers will stay with me and keep talking with me as you have been.”
Image credit: Shirley Curry.
Tom Phillips is IGN’s News Editor. You can reach Tom at tom_phillips@ign.com or find him on Bluesky @tomphillipseg.bsky.social
There are loads of great deals to check out in the UK today. Our headline is on brand new EA Sports FC 26 for just £51.99, £18 off the RRP of £69.99, at Argos. It’s listed for just £56.99 right now, which is still a good deal, but if you sign up for Argos’ newsletter, you’ll score an instant £5 voucher to use on any order over £40.
Looking to pick up the latest FIFA, I mean, EA Sports FC game? Here’s the best deal.
EA Sports FC 26 is listed for just £56.99 at Argos right now, which is still a good offer post-launch, but if you sign up for Argos’ newsletter, you’ll score an instant £5 voucher to use on any order over £40.
That’s applicable to use on both the PS5 and Xbox versions, so go nuts! It’s the very best discount we’ve seen on the game since the Currys promo code expired, and well worth checking out ASAP while stock lasts.
PlayStation 30th Anniversary DualSense and PS5 Back in Stock
Remember when these were selling like hotcakes? The stress of it was too much to take, and many of us just gave up entirely. But now, as a special treat, PlayStation has got both the DualSense and PS5 Slim Digital 30th Anniversary Edition back in stock and available to buy right now. What a feeling!
The DualSense gamepad is listed for £69.99, while the console is £469.99, reflective of their recent price hikes. Still, if you missed out the first time, this is a great opportunity to score one or two of the coolest gaming items available this generation.
It’s worth mentioning that the PS5 also features those outrageously nostalgic accessories, such as the USB C cable that harkens back to the original PlayStation console from 1994-1995 (depending on your territory).
The Witcher: Crossroads of Ravens
Nearly a year after its debut in Poland, Andrzej Sapkowski’s latest Witcher novel, Crossroads of Ravens, finally arrives in English on September 30. Amazon is currently selling it for £19.99 in the UK (20% off the £20 RRP). If you preorder now, it’ll still arrive in time for release day as well.
There’s still plenty to be excited about in 2025 for Magic: The Gathering (Avatar’s coming up soon!), but preorders have begun for the first set of 2026, Lorwyn Eclipsed.
The highly anticipated set, which will take players back to Lorwyn and Shadowmoor, debuts on January 23, 2026, and marks the first Commander precons of the year, as well as new Theme Decks for Standard.
It’s currently available to preorder at both Amazon and HMV, but with how excited fans seem to be about this one, I’m now expecting stock to sell out fast.
Where to Buy MTG Spider-Man
Marvel’s Spider-Man also recently launched, and it’s been tough to find online, at least from the typically reliable retailers like Amazon and HMV.
For now, these four booster sets are what’s still available to buy, otherwise you might be better off hunting down some packs in your local game stores.
UGREEN Steam Deck Dock (6-in-1)
This is an excellent deal for any Steam Deck owners, and well worth picking up if you indulged in that Steam Deck LCD deal I shared last week.
Normally £40, this UGREEN Steam Deck dock is down to just £28.49 for Amazon Prime members. It’s listed for £29.99, but there’s a handy 5% extra saving at checkout to redeem as well.
I own this dock, and it works like a dream. It’s well worth considering if you’re looking to use your Steam Deck like a mini console or just for hooking it up to the TV like the Switch. Game on!
INIU 20000mAh 65W Power Bank
Your phone running out of charge all the time? This is the way to keep you going on long trips, communtes, or general days out. This INIU 20,000mAh 65W Power Bank will serve you through thick and thin, and it’s the best price going for a decent power bank of this size ANYWHERE right now.
The catch? These deals go faster than I can say The Lord of the Rings: The Battle for Middle-earth II: The Rise of the Witch-King. Pick up one of these ASAP while the deal is still on! Save 49% at checkout, and you’re looking at just £30.08 on a powerful portable charger that’ll work with your phone, Steam Deck and Switch 2. Or, opt for the more affordable 22.5W version for £14.53 instead, while stock lasts!
Borderlands 4 SHiFT Codes – 3 Golden Keys
JH6BB-6RST3-5FB35-JT3BB-R3WCB
JZRTJ-SR9BB-W6T35-BJBTT-36FZR
BSFTB-TZ9BB-KRJBK-TTJB3-6S3KS
Three golden keys available for Borderlands 4 players. Expires at the end of today, September 29, 2025.
Lipton Ice Tea Lemon 500ml (Pack of 12)
At 50p per bottle, this is one hell of a deal, so stock up ASAP. Only catch? Delivery is currently delayed to 1-2 months. So as long as you have the patience of a saint, and don’t need a hit of Lipton any time soon, this is a deal to savour, and take advantage of while you still can.
Switch 2 + Pokémon Legends: Z-A Champion’s Choice Bundle
Nintendo has just launched a brand new version of its Switch 2 + Pokémon Legends: Z-A bundle, now packing in a whole bunch of extra free goodies alongside.
For £449.99, you’re getting the Switch 2 console, Pokémon Legends: Z-A (Switch 2 edition, download code), Mega Charizard X and Y figurines, alongside a Pokémon-themed pin set, umbrella, mug, and cap.
If you’re after the perfect gift for Christmas, this is it! If you want the Switch 2 + Pokémon Legends: Z-A bundle without the extra tat, then it’s £429.99 at Amazon as well.
If you’re looking for just the new game and the bonus items, you can pick those up direct from Nintendo’s online store as well right now.
Looking to save even more? Sign up to their newsletter and you can score an instant £5 voucher to use on any order over £40.
Robert Anderson is Senior Commerce Editor and IGN’s resident deals expert on games, collectibles, trading card games, and more. You can follow him @robertliam21 on Twitter/X or Bluesky.
EA has confirmed it has agreed to be acquired by an investor group composed of PIF, Silver Lake, and Affinity Partners in a transaction valued at approximately $55 billion. It’s the largest all-cash sponsor take-private investment in history.
Under the terms of the agreement, the group will acquire 100% of EA, with Saudi Arabia’s Public Investment Fund (PIF) rolling over its existing 9.9% stake in the company. EA stockholders will receive $210 per share in cash. The per share purchase price represents a 25% premium to EA’s unaffected share price of $168.32 at market close on September 25, 2025, and a premium to EA’s unaffected all-time high of $179.01 at market close on August 14, 2025.
Following the close of the transaction, EA’s common stock will no longer be listed on any public market.
Andrew Wilson, EA Chairman and CEO, commented:
“Our creative and passionate teams at EA have delivered extraordinary experiences for hundreds of millions of fans, built some of the world’s most iconic IP, and created significant value for our business. This moment is a powerful recognition of their remarkable work.
“Looking ahead, we will continue to push the boundaries of entertainment, sports, and technology, unlocking new opportunities. Together with our partners, we will create transformative experiences to inspire generations to come. I am more energized than ever about the future we are building.”
EA will continue to be led by Wilson and will remain headquartered in Redwood City, California. The transaction is expected to close in Q1 FY27, subject to regulatory and stockholder approvals.
The transaction will be funded by a combination of cash from each of PIF, Silver Lake, and Affinity Partners, the latter of which is an American investment firm based in Miami, Florida, and formed in 2021 by Jared Kushner, Donald Trump’s son-in-law.
Combined, the deal is for an equity investment of approximately $36 billion, and $20 billion of debt financing fully and solely committed by JPMorgan Chase Bank, N.A., $18 billion of which is expected to be funded at close. Each of PIF, Silver Lake, and Affinity Partners plan to fund the equity component of the financing entirely from capital under their respective control, the companies said.
The enormous sale comes just days before EA releases Battlefield 6, a crucial launch for the company, and hot on the heels of FC 26 and Skate. EA games in development include Mass Effect at BioWare, Star Wars Jedi 3 at Respawn, and Iron Man at Motive.
Photo by Patrick T. Fallon/Bloomberg via Getty Images.
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.
Nearly a year after its debut in Poland, Andrzej Sapkowski’s latest Witcher novel, Crossroads of Ravens, finally arrives in English this week. Amazon is currently selling it for $24.50 in the US (18% off the $30 MSRP) and £19.99 in the UK (20% off the £20 RRP).
According to Amazon’s description, the prequel finds Geralt “stumbling through a world that neither understands nor welcomes his kind.” Fresh from Kaer Morhen, a rash attempt at heroism nearly ends with his execution, but he is saved at the last moment by Preston Holt, “a grizzled witcher with a buried past and an agenda of his own.”
Under Holt’s mentorship, Geralt begins to learn what it really means to walk the Path, not just in battling monsters but in surviving the prejudice and politics of the Continent. Sapkowski frames this as the story of “how legends are made, and what they cost.”
It makes sense for this new tale to look back rather than push forward. Geralt’s arc already reaches a definitive conclusion in the main saga, and the CD Projekt games have effectively carried the timeline on in their own way, set just a few years after the books.
Still, while Sapkowski’s novels remain the bedrock of the series, The Witcher has long since grown into something much bigger. Alongside the games and their upcoming sequels and spin-offs, there’s now a Netflix adaptation, comics, a tabletop RPG, manga, and even a cookbook keeping the Continent alive in new and unexpected forms.
Robert Anderson is Senior Commerce Editor and IGN’s resident deals expert on games, collectibles, trading card games, and more. You can follow him @robertliam21 on Twitter/X or Bluesky.
The highly anticipated set, which will take players back to Lorwyn and Shadowmoor, debuts on January 23, 2026, and marks the first Commander precons of the year, as well as new Theme Decks for Standard.
Here’s everything on offer, and where you can find it if you’re looking to lock your preorder in ASAP.
The preorder price guarantee means you may pay less, too, and each pack has a guaranteed foil.
Bundle
As is the case with pretty much any Magic set, a Bundle is available, too. This one includes 9 Play Boosters, a deck box, 30 lands and a spindown life counter.
After no Commander Decks for Marvel’s Spider-Man or Avatar: The Last Airbender, they’re back with Lorwyn Eclipsed.
Blight Curse is a Jund (Black, Red, Green) deck which promises -1/-1 drain and creature combos, while Dance of the Elements is a rare five-color precon with a gameplan of summoning huge elementals and sacrifice.
They’re both up for $49.99 on Amazon, but there’s every chance one (or both) spike in the coming weeks.
Up next, Collector Boosters are where you’re likely to find the more sought-after variants of Lorwyn Eclipsed cards, with these packs full of foils, full-arts, and special treatments.
They’re not going to come cheap, however, so you’ll want to lock in a preorder price if you’re particularly keen. Amazon has them listed, but there’s no pricing yet.
Draft Night Box
To my knowledge, this is a debut for the Lorwyn Eclipsed set, and this Draft Night box is still without a price on Amazon.
It contains 12 Play Boosters, 1 Collector Booster, and 90 basic lands so that players can draft a 40-card deck with friends and pit them against each other, and the winner gets the Collector Booster.
Theme Decks
Finally, Lorwyn Eclipsed is bringing back Theme Decks for Standard play, and I’m pretty excited to have an easy way to jump into the format since Commander can be overwhelming to newcomers.
Lloyd Coombes is an experienced freelancer in tech, gaming and fitness seen at Polygon, Eurogamer, Macworld, TechRadar and many more. He’s a big fan of Magic: The Gathering and other collectible card games, much to his wife’s dismay.
Fortnite has swiftly disabled the game’s Peaceful Hips emote, a collaboration with James Gunn and John Cena’s DCU Peacemaker TV series, following a bombshell twist at the end of the show’s most recent episode.
Warning! Spoilers for Peacemaker Season 2 Episode 6 follow.
Fans were left stunned when Peacemaker’s latest episode revealed that the show’s alternate “Earth-2” setting was in fact “Earth-X,” a fascist, Nazi world where the U.S. flag features a swastika.
Many fans now say Peacemaker had subtly pointed to this twist the whole season, as Cena’s dance in the show’s opening credits includes arm movements suggestive of a swastika — the same dance moves seen in the Peaceful Hips emote.
But none of this seemed likely before the last episode aired — and judging by a statement released by Fortnite maker Epic Games over the weekend, the developer was just as surprised to discover what looks to be the true meaning of the emote it now had in the game.
DC Peacemaker ‘Peaceful Hips’ Emote will be disabled
“As we inquire into our partner’s creative intentions in this collab emote. Assuming it’s not coming back, we’ll issue refunds in the next few days. Sorry folks.” pic.twitter.com/gQ4oARbf6f
“We’re disabling the Peaceful Hips Emote in Fortnite as we inquire into our partner’s creative intentions in this collab emote,” Epic Games wrote on its Fortnite Status social media account. “Assuming it’s not coming back, we’ll issue refunds in the next few days. Sorry folks.”
Epic Games’ statement doesn’t sound positive for the emote remaining in Fortnite, but what’s even more extraordinary is the suggestion that developer — who worked closely with DC Studios on the collaboration — was left to discover the dance’s true nature alongside audiences, and was now scrambling to get an explanation.
Fans have already begun to fret over what any potential schism might mean for the future of DC’s popular collaborations within Fortnite, and whether the two companies would continue to work together. IGN has contacted Epic Games for comment.
In general, fan response to the emote being pulled has been mixed, with some acknowledging the potential for the “Nazi emote,” as it’s been dubbed, to subsequently be misused by players to grief others. Others, however, have questioned why Epic Games has acted here but not in other similar situations.
For example, Fortnite recently raised eyebrows by adding the Tylil Dance, an emote collaboration with rapper Kai Cenat which features music by Kanye West. West, who now refers to himself as Ye, previously made numerous comments deemed to be anti-semitic and in 2022 said he identified as “a Nazi.”
In another example, Fortnite has notably shied away from reselling an in-game skin, Rue, whose costume players widely likened to the design of a Nazi uniform. The skin remains within the game, though is now one of Fortnite’s rarest — as Epic Games has chosen not to sell it in over five years.
EA is ramping up its Battlefield 6 marketing, this time taking a direct jab at first-person shooter rival Call of Duty.
Battlefield 6’s official live-action trailer dropped over the weekend, and it begins with what looks like a send up of Activision’s star-studded live-action Call of Duty trailers. The classic example here is the ‘There’s a Soldier in All of Us’ video for 2010’s Black Ops, which features the late Kobe Bryant, and talkshow host Jimmy Kimmel firing weapons in a live-action battlefield.
The Battlefield 6 advert sees actor Zac Efron, basketball star Jimmy Butler, country singer Morgan Wallen, and UFC star Paddy Pimblett assume the classes available to play in the game, complete with outlandish gun skins. It looks like the trailer will continue on in the Call of Duty style, but Zac Efron’s rousing speech is cut short by a missile that blows the squad to smithereens.
Surprise! Realistic-looking mil-sim soldiers emerge from the smoke. “Who was that?” one soldier asks. “Doesn’t matter. Let’s move.” We’re then treated to a live-action trailer packed with the kind of explosive action and environmental destruction the Battlefield series is famous for. The trailer ends with the tagline “Only in Battlefield.”
The message is loud and clear: Battlefield 6 isn’t like Call of Duty, it’s a serious first-person shooter.
It didn’t take long for fans to take note of what EA’s trying to do here. “Wait. Game company dissing other game company in their trailer in 2025??? We’re so back on 2010,” said one YouTube user. “They’re literally just roasting call of duty at this point,” said another. “Oh my god they had us in the first half not gonna lie,” added another fan. “I think we know who they’re mocking, S+ marketing team,” said a redditor.
In a recent interview with DBLTAP, Battlefield 6 design director Shashank Uchil doubled down on EA’s commitment to grounded realism, and even pointed to Call of Duty’s infamous Nicki Minaj skin as something Battlefield 6 doesn’t need.
“It has to be grounded,” he said. “That is what BF3 and BF4 was — it was all soldiers, on the ground. It’s going to be like this,” Uchil said, pointing at the key art featuring soldiers in soldier gear looking out over a wartorn New York City.
He added: “I don’t think it needs Nicki Minaj. Let’s keep it real, keep it grounded.”
Call of Duty’s foray into goofy skins territory is well-documented, although recent releases have certainly amped up the conversation around them. With the likes of Beavis and Butt-Head and American Dad hitting the game this year shortly after weed-obsessed bundles starring Seth Rogen, some fans have said they’ve had enough of what they call the ‘Fortnite-ification’ of their beloved Call of Duty, and pleaded with publisher Activision to return to its mil-sim roots.
Then, last month, Activision shocked the Call of Duty community when it confirmed that Operators, Operator Skins, and Weapons from Black Ops 6 would no longer carry forward into Black Ops 7. This came as a big surprise to players who had expected content they’d bought for Black Ops 6 to carry forward, as it has done with previous entries, and given Black Ops 7 directly follows last year’s Black Ops 6. Explaining the decision, Activision said Black Ops 7 “needs to feel authentic to Call of Duty and its setting.”
It means that at launch, at least, you won’t see all those goofy skins running around Multiplayer. It sounds like Multiplayer will look like Black Ops 7, at least at the start of things. Activision went on to say that Black Ops 7 bundles and items “will be crafted to fit the Black Ops identity.” “We hear the feedback,” Activision added. “We need to deliver a better balance toward the immersive, core Call of Duty experience.”
Battlefield 6 is a crucial release for EA, and based on this live-action trailer, it’s putting its weight behind the marketing of the game. Battlefield 6 leads the charge, releasing October 10 before Call of Duty: Black Ops 7 counter-attacks on November 14. It will be interesting to see which of the two mega publishers is happiest when the dust settles.
It’s been an interesting month for video game companies mocking their rivals with adverts. Earlier this month, Sega reignited its old rivalry against Nintendo with a spicy trailer for Sonic Racing: CrossWorlds that went hard on Switch 2 launch title Mario Kart World.
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.
We’ve rounded up the best deals for Sunday, September 28, below, so don’t miss out on these limited-time offers.
PAC-MAN World Re-PAC for $10
Amazon has PlayStation 5 copies of PAC-MAN World Re-PAC on sale for just $10 today. This is the lowest we’ve ever seen the game, and this isn’t a deal that will last for long. If you’re unfamiliar, Re-PAC is a remake of Pac-Man World, originally released in 1999. This is a great opportunity to pick up and play a brand new 3D platformer at a low price.
Apple Watch Ultra 3 for $734.99
The Apple Watch Ultra 3 just released, bringing a slightly bigger screen, better battery life, satellite connectivity, and more to Apple’s premium watch line. Right now, Best Buy has Open Box Excellent units available for $734.99, which saves you $65 off the MSRP. If you’re looking to upgrade but want to save some cash, this is a great deal to look at.
Death Stranding 2: On The Beach for $59.49
For the first time since launch, Death Stranding 2: On The Beach is on sale. You can score a digital copy of the game for $59.49 at the PlayStation Store, so you can instantly download and dive into the game. DS2 is still my favorite game of the year, especially as someone who loved Death Stranding. I’m still working on the Platinum trophy, even 130 hours later.
ROG Xbox Ally Up for Pre-Order
Xbox and Asus finally opened up pre-orders for the ROG Xbox Ally and ROG Xbox Ally X this week, with both units set to release on October 16. These two portable handheld systems are set to allow players to play their Xbox and PC games wherever they are, with a dedicated Xbox button for quick access.
Avowed Deluxe Edition Steelbook for $41.45
Amazon has the Avowed Premium Edition Steelbook available for $41.15, which is a huge discount over the MSRP of $94.99. This package includes a Steelbook containing key art for Avowed, with a digital download code inside that gets you the game on both Xbox Series X|S and PC via Windows Store.
Raidou Remastered for $31.99
Raidou Remastered: The Mystery of the Soulless Army launched in mid June, and you can save almost 50% off a PS5 copy for this weekend at Woot. This action RPG is a remaster of the 2006 PS2 game, and there are many improvements and new features to discover. For one, UI, visuals, and voice acting have all been tweaked to refine the experience, but you can also discover more than 120 different demons.
Sonic X Shadow Generations for $39.99
Amazon has Sonic X Shadow Generations for Nintendo Switch 2 on sale for $39.99 today. While this is a Game-Key Card, this is the lowest we’ve seen this game yet for Switch 2. If you haven’t picked up the latest Sonic adventure, now is a great time to do so.
Pre-Order Super Mario Galaxy + Super Mario Galaxy 2 on Switch
The latest Nintendo Direct featured the reveal of Super Mario Galaxy + Super Mario Galaxy 2, a collection that’s part of the 40th anniversary of Super Mario Bros. These games are set to receive enhancements to resolution, UI, and even new storybook content. If you haven’t ever played either game, the Nintendo Switch is going to be the ultimate platform to do so. The best part? This collection is out this week, so be sure to get your pre-order in!
Lenovo Legion Go for $549.99
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The Silent Hill series has been at the forefront of feel-bad survival horror storytelling for close to three decades now, and with the success of 2024’s Silent Hill 2 remake and the recent release of Silent Hill f, it felt like the right time to take a look back through Konami’s catalogue of psychological horrors to see how each scarefest stacks up.
Now, admittedly the series hasn’t been immune to the odd misstep here and there, and there have certainly been periods of time where things have gone more downhill than Silent Hill. Thus you won’t find the likes of forgettable mainline entries like Silent Hill: Homecoming and Silent Hill: Downpour here, or the inappropriately aggressive shoot ‘em up action of Silent Hill: The Arcade, or indeed the co-operative dungeon crawling of Silent Hill: Book of Memories that absolutely nobody asked for.
With all that in mind, here’s IGN’s picks for the very best entries in the Silent Hill series, from portable terrors to playable teasers.
9. Silent Hill: Origins
A Silent Hill adventure that can fit into your jeans pocket and still scare your pants off? That’s Silent Hill: Origins, the 2007 prequel originally developed for the PlayStation Portable and later ported to the PlayStation 2.
With its story taking place several years before that of the original Silent Hill, Silent Hill: Origins puts you into the shoes of Travis Grady, a truck driver who takes a wrong turn into North America’s freakiest fog-shrouded town, and things get appropriately hair-raising from there.
What makes Silent Hill: Origins stand out from other instalments in the series is how it handles the exploration of the sleepy small town’s nightmarish otherworld. Unlike most other Silent Hill games that drag you kicking and screaming towards the jagged edges of the industrial nightmare realm when you least expect it, Silent Hill: Origins gives you full control in determining when and where you want to shift between realities via the use of special mirrors scattered around the town.
On the one hand, this does diminish Silent Hill: Origins’ ability to surprise you with scares, but on the other hand it creates some uniquely creepy scenarios for puzzle-solving, such as examining the plastic organs of an anatomy mannequin in one reality, only to find that it’s an actual corpse in the other.
Combined with a dread-inducing atmosphere on par with the foreboding feel of the original game, Silent Hill: Origins on PSP made for some truly terrifying train trips.
8. Silent Hill 4: The Room
Although it sounds like some sort of bizarre crossover between the much-loved survival horror series and director Tommy Wiseau’s infamous best worst movie ever made, Silent Hill 4: The Room isn’t quite as wild a departure as that – although it does shake up the formula pretty significantly. Shifting the terror out of the foggy streets of Silent Hill and into the new setting of Ashfield – specifically the locked-down apartment of protagonist Henry Townshend – Silent Hill 4: The Room alternates between claustrophobic, first-person exploration of Townshend’s home and more traditional third-person combat in the nightmarish otherworlds he can reach by stepping through the ominous holes in his apartment walls.
These otherworlds serve as small pocket dimensions, each visually distinct and with its own story to tell, from the filthy, tiled circular hallways of the water prison to the abandoned hospital packed with a variety of disturbing dioramas. As the story progresses, the apartment you return to gradually evolves from safe haven to haunted house, as Townshend’s tracking of an undead serial killer gradually consumes his reality and the game’s skin-crawling atmosphere grows all the more oppressive.
While the sudden switch in the story’s second half to an annoyingly dragged out escort mission proved to be divisive amongst fans, there’s no question that its cast of genuinely disturbing creatures, haunting original soundtrack from Akira Yamaoka, and the uniqueness of its decaying apartment hub made for arguably one of the most spectacularly tense Silent Hill adventures in the entire canon.
Silent Hill 4: The Room would also mark the fourth and final instalment in the series to come from Japanese developer Team Silent. That team would then disband, with its members going on to work on various other horror games like Forbidden Siren and The Evil Within, and it also saw the development of subsequent Silent Hill games shift into the hands of western developers with fairly mixed results… We’re looking at you, Homecoming and Downpour.
7. Silent Hill: Shattered Memories
Not all of the western-made Silent Hills have been bad, though. The only entry in the series to ever make it onto the Nintendo Wii, Silent Hill: Shattered Memories from British developer Climax Studios reimagines the original Silent Hill and features the same premise: Harry Mason is the survivor of a car crash searching for his missing daughter in the fictional American town of Silent Hill. However, its plot unravels in an entirely new way and the gameplay is dramatically restructured, shifting between first-person psychotherapy sessions to the more typical over-the-shoulder explorations of Harry’s harrowing journey through Silent Hill.
Shattered Memories is a tricky instalment to rank in the Silent Hill series, because it’s so unlike any other entry to date. It completely ditches combat, instead forcing Harry to flee in regular chase sequences inspired by the unstoppable antagonists of slasher movies. It swaps out the fog of previous adventures for ice and falling snow to limit player visibility and build an atmosphere of dread in interesting new ways. It also makes quite brilliant use of the Wiimote, using its motion controls to give players full command over the beam of Harry’s flashlight, and its built-in speaker for the hiss of the series’ signature radio static among several other unsettling bits of sound design.
Shattered Memories also profiles the player while they play, taking the answers chosen during the psychotherapy sessions to make subsequent changes to level and enemy designs, as well as altering how the story progresses and eventually determining which of the multiple endings you will arrive at. While this mechanic is yet to resurface in subsequent Silent Hill stories, Supermassive Games’ Until Dawn seemingly took a great deal of inspiration from it given its similar mix of psychotherapy sessions and slasher-style horror.
Meanwhile, Shattered Memories’ writer/designer Sam Barlow (who also worked on Silent Hill: Origins) has since gone on to find considerable success as an independent developer with his critically acclaimed works of interactive fiction: Her Story, Telling Lies, and Immortality. All three involve solving a mystery by sifting through assortments of out-of-sequence video clips, which in a way are their own form of shattered memories.
6. Silent Hill f
It took 13 long years for a new mainline Silent Hill game to emerge from the fog, but Silent Hill f finally arrived in 2025 with a brand new Japanese setting, a twisted and compelling story that continues to unfold and satisfy in subsequent playthroughs, and a strict focus on melee-based combat to further distinguish itself from the more gun-centric assaults of the previous year’s Silent Hill 2 remake.
To be fair, the deliberately sluggish feel of Silent Hill f’s fighting system might not be to everyone’s taste. With its mix of light and heavy attacks, dodges and counters, and a reliance on the careful management of health, stamina, and sanity bars, its monster-mashing seems inspired by the slow and weighty combat of the Dark Souls series, though thankfully minus the punishing difficulty. Yet even though your controller might not be in any danger of being smashed to bits after repeatedly dying to the same boss, your lead pipe or crowbar certainly is due to the irritatingly brittle nature of Silent Hill f’s destructible weapons.
However, if you can embrace the clunky combat clashes – or simply force yourself to endure them – there are huge rewards for persevering because Silent Hill f’s story is simply one of the most captivating tales in the entire series. The psychological effects of high schooler Hinako Shimizu’s domestic abuse and bullying is truly gut-wrenching to examine, the monsters she encounters provide a full-fat dose of nightmare fuel, and the world around her is an absorbing place to pore over, whether it’s the misty streets of her mountainside village or the mysterious shrine realm she enters in her dreams.
You would think that a Silent Hill game that doesn’t actually feature the town of Silent Hill would be like a Resident Evil game without some sort of resident evil in it, but Silent Hill f successfully proves that you can take the series out of Smalltown, USA, but you can’t take the spinechilling psychological horror out of the Silent Hill game.
5. P.T.
While ultimately a proof of concept rather than a fully fledged Silent Hill game – the P.T. stands for Playable Teaser – this standalone slice of psychological torment got fans’ appetites whet for a Silent Hills game that sadly never saw the light of day. Quietly shadow-dropped as a free download on PlayStation 4 amidst a number of more headline-grabbing announcements at Gamescom 2014, P.T. quickly took social media and Reddit threads by storm as more than a million players discovered it and collectively set about unravelling its most enigmatic puzzles.
Set in a single, looping, L-shaped corridor inside a suburban family home, P.T. was capable of delivering scares in ways both micro and macro; subtly rearranging the decor to unsettle you in one loop, before ensuring you’d never sleep with the lights off again by surprising you with a murderous ghost named Lisa the moment you dared to look over your shoulder. Much like the apartment sections of Silent Hill 4: The Room, P.T. also broke from the Silent Hill series’ typical third-person perspective, presenting its horrors in a more claustrophobic first-person view that made them all the more immediate. It was compact, cryptic, and completely terrifying.
What further adds to P.T.’s mystique is that it’s extremely hard to actually play at this point. After the cancellation of Silent Hills and Kojima Productions’ seemingly acrimonious split with Konami in 2015, P.T. was removed from the PlayStation Store for good, making it impossible to reinstall even if it was attached to your PSN account. There are some questionable PC-based workarounds to regain access to it, but otherwise the only way to play P.T. today is by somehow tracking down a PlayStation 4 console with it already installed, or playing a fanmade remake such as the impressively faithful recreation in Media Molecule’s Dreams. Or perhaps by breaking into that same warehouse that the Ark of the Covenant was stashed in at the end of Raiders of the Lost Ark.
As for its legacy, though, P.T. has gone on to be one of the most influential horror games released in recent memory. Layers of Fear ran with P.T.’s looping environments to unsettle players exploring its artist’s mansion setting, while Resident Evil: Village terrified fans with the P.T.-esque tight hallways, combat-free puzzle-solving, and nightmare-inducing deformed fetus found in its House Beneviento section. That’s not to say anything of the countless P.T. pretenders that continue to flood Steam to this day. Not bad for a playable teaser for a Silent Hill game that never was.
4. Silent Hill 3
The storytelling brilliance of Silent Hill 2 made it a hard act to follow – and we’ll get to exactly why in a moment – but Silent Hill 3 distanced itself slightly from its landmark predecessor by positioning itself as a direct sequel to the original Silent Hill instead. The third game in the Silent Hill saga digs into compelling new details about the doomsday cult from the original game, as well as introducing an almost entirely new line-up of nightmarish creatures, brought to bowel-loosening life by visuals that pushed the PlayStation 2 hardware to its limits.
Its biggest departure from its two predecessors, though, is the fact that its protagonist is a plucky teenage girl instead of a miserable, 30-something year old man. Heather, who’s surname we’ll keep vague for story spoiler reasons, came as a breath of fresh air through the fog and proved to be one of the best written and most relatable leads in the series’ history. Not to mention that up until the release of Silent Hill f, she was the only playable female lead in the mainline entries (unless you count Maria in the Director’s Cut of Silent Hill 2).
Upon its release, Silent Hill 3 was criticised for lacking gameplay innovation and being a bit too similar to the first two games, but given the string of subpar Silent Hill games released in the aftermath of Silent Hill 4: The Room, perhaps in retrospect staying true to the look and feel of the two most respected entries in the Silent Hill series wasn’t such a bad thing.
3. Silent Hill 2 Remake
Unlike Shattered Memories which completely overhauled the structure and dramatically altered the plot of the original Silent Hill, the 2024 remake of Silent Hill 2 preserves the story, characters, and vibe of the PlayStation 2 original, but updates it all for modern audiences with superb visuals, anxiety-inducing audio design, and controls that allow for far more fluid player movement and inventory juggling.
Developer Bloober Team wasn’t exactly new to the horror genre nor the process of remaking of horror games, having previously both made and remade its own spooky stories in the form of Layers of Fear and Observer. This experience evidently served the team well since the Silent Hill 2 remake is by far and away its biggest triumph to date, dramatically enhancing the unsettling and claustrophobic atmosphere of the original, and expanding the small town setting to make it utterly absorbing to pore over for returning fans.
Crucially, almost every modernisation made here has resulted in Silent Hill 2’s overwhelmingly shuddersome setting seeming all the more immersive and alarming. The volumetric fog feels thicker and more oppressive than ever. The new level of detail applied to the dwellings you shuffle through make them seem infinitely more dank and depressing, if not completely disgusting at times. The use of light is particularly brilliant, and being forced to explore every inch of the Toluca Prison area in limited bursts of illumination thanks to failing circuit breakers makes for one of the most frantic and frightening sequences the series has ever seen. Or indeed, not seen, since so many of its horrors are quickly plunged into blackness.
Add in some superior voice acting and a terrifying soundscape from Akira Yamaoka that will have you doubting your own sanity, and there’s no question that the Silent Hill 2 remake is the best way to visit – or revisit – one of the most dread-inducing destinations in the history of survival horror.
2. Silent Hill
Take a splash of Stephen King, a dash of David Lynch, a flash of Francis Bacon, and filter it all through the Japanese cultural lens of developer Team Silent, and you have the twisted and truly terrifying journey through the original Silent Hill. Stepping away from the typically campy, B-movie style popular in ‘90s survival horror, Silent Hill plunged you into previously unseen depths of psychological torment, putting the emphasis on properly disturbing atmosphere in favour of cheap jump scares, and establishing the tone for a series that, at its best, is somehow incredibly uncomfortable yet utterly enthralling.
Unlike prior survival horror games like Resident Evil and Parasite Eve that relied on pre-rendered backgrounds, Silent Hill bucked the trend by putting you into an environment rendered entirely in 3D. Remarkably, this meant that the series’ signature darkness and oppressive fog were actually borne out of a need to mask the meagre draw distance and ugly graphical pop-ins that plagued the original PlayStation, turning the system’s hardware limitations into a powerful tool for terror that has remained a constant in the series to date.
From your first steps as Harry Mason entering the eerie small town searching for his lost daughter, Silent Hill assaults you from all sides with its genuinely unsettling nothingness, and the fear of not knowing what’s waiting for you in the fog is arguably more petrifying than the actual beasts that lie in wait. This unending sense of unease was only intensified further by ingenious atmospheric flourishes, like the screeching static from Harry’s radio that hissed with more urgency as you arrived in the vicinity of some unseen mess of pissed-off polygons.
Silent Hill ushered in a chilling new standard for slow-burn survival horror, and its influence can still be felt decades later in the likes of The Medium and Alan Wake 2. Yet it only took Team Silent a couple of years to drag players into new depths of depravity and despair…
1. Silent Hill 2
The original Silent Hill may have established the series’ combination of overwhelmingly bleak atmosphere and disturbing adult themes, but 2001’s Silent Hill 2 perfected it. A thoroughly absorbing and emotionally-draining examination of grief and guilt, Silent Hill 2 put us into the role of the recently widowed James Sunderland and set us on a tortured tour through his own private hell, one crawling with awful apparitions that symbolised his increasingly decaying mental state and the suffering of the people around him.
Whereas the original Silent Hill focused primarily on the corrupt religious practices of a local cult and how it permanently altered the town’s reality, Silent Hill 2 deals with themes that were more nuanced and extremely taboo at the time, at least in the world of gaming. Sexual abuse, suicide, and self-harm are all explored as Sunderland encounters other survivors trapped within the foggy lakeside town, with each form of trauma made all the more confronting by the twisted creatures they manifest as. 2001’s Grand Theft Auto 3 might be widely regarded as the first proper video game for grown ups, but Silent Hill 2 arguably beat Rockstar’s opus to the punch just one month prior.
Silent Hill 2 also introduced one of the most iconic antagonists in the series’ history, if not survival horror in general. There are few enemies as shit-your-pants scary as Pyramid Head, an intimidating and unstoppable tormenter who stalks Sunderland at several stages through the story, and who also does unspeakable things to mannequins. Ominously dragging one half of a giant pair of scissors and with an angular skull so rusty you need a tetanus shot just from looking at it, this pointy-headed predator’s potency was diluted somewhat by subsequent appearances in weaker instalments such as Silent Hill: Homecoming and Silent Hill: Book of Memories, but his importance to Silent Hill 2’s sustained sense of dread cannot be understated.
From its tragic story to its provocative symbolism and no shortage of genuine scares, Silent Hill 2 remains the bone-chilling benchmark for the series, and is therefore the obvious choice for the number one slot on this list.
And there we have it: the nine best games in the Silent Hill series. Did your favourite make our list? Let us know what we forgot in the comments.
Tristan Ogilvie is a video producer on the IGN reviews team, based in Sydney, Australia. He has over 18 years of experience covering video games. When he doesn’t have a controller in his hand, Tristan is happiest playing guitar, taking photos, or watching cricket.
