The Nintendo Switch 2 console only has two high-profile original games that you can get right now: Mario Kart World and Donkey Kong Bananza, with Kirby Air Riders coming later in November. Mario Kart World is great, but Donkey Kong Bananza has entrenched itself as one of the best games of the year and an absolute must-buy for anyone with a Switch 2.
It’s unlikely that we will see any first party Nintendo Switch 2 games discounted at domestic retailers during Black Friday, but AliExpress is offering a great deal on an imported copy. Lucky Tech Store has it right now for $52.49 after $12 off coupon code “AEUS12“. Delivery is free and the game is shipped from a local US warehouse. That means it arrives within a week and you don’t have to worry about tariffs. All physical Switch 2 games are region unlocked, so you’ll be able to play this game without any problems on a US-based Switch 2 console.
Donkey Kong Bananza for $52.49
Not only did we rate Donkey Kong a 10/10, it’s the only game we’ve given a Masterpiece rating so far this year. Although there hasn’t been much competition in the way of Switch 2 exclusive games for 2025, this has been a fantastic year so far for console gaming in general. We’ve seen some of the best games released in recent history, including Clair Obscur: Expedition 33, Kingdom Come Deliverance 2, Death Stranding 2, Doom: The Dark Ages, and Hollow Knight: Silksong, all of which got close to a Masterpiece rating but didn’t quite hit the mark. That’s not to say that Donkey Kong Bananza is necessarily better than those other games since, after all, different people have reviewed each of these games, but it’s a testament to just how outstanding Donkey Kong Bananza is to have achieved that score.
If you don’t yet own a Switch 2, now might be a good time to get one. It’s now in stock everywhere, including Amazon, without any invitation required. Nintendo also recently raised prices on Switch 2 accessories and warned that the console itself might see a price hike in the near future. Check out our Nintendo Switch 2 review, in which Tom Mark aptly describes the new console as “a vital but unexciting upgrade to a console I already love.”
Eric Song is the IGN commerce manager in charge of finding the best gaming and tech deals every day. When Eric isn’t hunting for deals for other people at work, he’s hunting for deals for himself during his free time.
Star Wars fans, don’t miss out on this rare Star Wars Ultimate Collector Series bundle. Right now Walmart is offering the LEGO Star Wars AT-ST Walker (75417) and LEGO Star Wars Darth Vader Helmet (75304) together for just $210. Purchased separately you would have to pay $280, so you’re saving about 25% off. This is sold and shipped exclusively from Walmart directly with free delivery. I posted this deal last week and it sold out in a few hours.
LEGO Star Wars Darth Vader and AT-ST Walker Bundle for $210
The LEGO AT-ST Walker is part of the Star Wars exclusive Ultimate Collector Series – or UCS – collection. The UCS models are the largest and most detailed Star Wars sets that LEGO produces and an obvious pick for collectors. They are also technically challenging build that are aimed at adult (18+) builders. The AT-ST measures 14.5″ high, 8.5″ long, and 8.5″ wide and is comprised of 1,513 bricks. It has plenty of moveable elements for poseability, like a rotating turret head, working shutters over the viewports, and adjustable laser cannons. A unique AT-ST driver minifigure is also included.
The LEGO Darth Vader Helmet is part of LEGO’s build-to-display Star Wars helmet collection that also includes Boba Fett, The Mandalorian, Stormtropper, and Luke Skywaker (Red Five). It measures 8″ high, 5.5″ wide, and 5.5″ deep and is comprised of 834 brick pieces. The build is challenging yet enjoyable as you put together details like the internal life support system and breathing apparatus. The finished piece can be mounted on an included stand with placard. As a display piece, it is well worth a spot on your shelf.
LEGO announced a new Death Star set
LEGO recently unveiled its most expensive set yet. The new LEGO Star Wars Death Star (75419) comes in at a eye-watering sticker price of $1,000. It’s comprised of 9,023 pieces and includes a whopping 38 minifigures. Unlike the original LEGO Death Star, the new set will be a more of a diorama-style cross section build that sits nicely on a shelf when completed. Not surprisingly it is part of LEGO’s Ultimate Collector Series.
Eric Song is the IGN commerce manager in charge of finding the best gaming and tech deals every day. When Eric isn’t hunting for deals for other people at work, he’s hunting for deals for himself during his free time.
The tech experts at Digital Foundry have completed their analysis of Borderlands 4 on console, and confirmed a gradual worsening of framerate with continuous playtime, even on PlayStation 5 Pro and Xbox Series X.
As revealed in a new video published to YouTube, Digital Foundry found performance starts dipping after around 30 minutes to an hour, which it called “too intrusive on the overall experience, too regular an interruption.” Even after a completely fresh boot, the game is still prone to framerate drops.
Gearbox development chief Randy Pitchford has acknowledged the problem on social media, promising incoming improvements. As a workaround, Pitchford suggested console players quit Borderlands 4 and restart. Digital Foundry’s Tom Morgan confirmed this does restore performance, but criticized the situation, saying “resetting the game every hour should really not be an expected solution for players.”
“Each console is prone to sizeable, sub-60fps lurches given enough time on the clock, and it’s just a matter of how long you’re willing to keep playing before deciding to reset,” Morgan added.
“Borderlands 4 justifies the six-year wait since the last entry with some big technical upgrades via Unreal Engine 5,” Morgan said. “Despite the team’s huge ambition here, though, the game’s performance at launch is struggling on console if 60fps is the goal, and a patch cannot come soon enough. The gradually worsening framerates on PS5, Pro, and Series X lead to some dire mid-30fps passages of play after a while. And resetting the game every hour should really not be an expected solution for players.
“This lack in polish at launch also shows in its bugs where broken NPC pathfinding and flickering lighting are just a couple of issues I’ve experienced. The promise of Borderlands 4 is compelling, but following on from MGS Delta and Oblivion Remastered, we’re once again looking at a major UE5 release with framerate issues on every format. And once again, we’re having to hang tight for an update to save the day.”
So, what’s causing the problem? As Morgan points out, the situation with Borderlands 4 rekindles memories of The Elder Scrolls IV: Oblivion Remastered, another Unreal Engine 5 title where performance degraded over time on console and also improved with a fresh boot. It’s unconfirmed for now, but the leading theory for Borderlands 4, as with Oblivion, is there’s some form of memory leak at play, or, as Morgan put it, “a cache of data not being flushed from system memory that eventually catches up on the player.”
Gearbox has said addressing PC performance is a “top priority” for the studio. In the meantime, the studio pointed to a Borderlands 4 Nvidia Optimization guide on Steam, advising players how to optimize their graphics settings for “better performance and framerates” on PC with the Nvidia app, although users report mixed results.
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.
The main leaked Battlefield 6 gameplay making its way around social media is relatively straightforward and not unlike what we’ve seen in other, similar battle royale experiences like Warzone. The player can be seen running around a warehouse, dodging bullets from enemy players as they collect weapons, armor plates, and other tools from nearby loot chests.
Other clips have also spilled onto platforms like X, including footage of how things like upgrade kits and custom weapon drops work. It’s important to note that none of what we’ve seen so far is final.
Battlefield 6 itself still has a few weeks to go before its October 10 release date for PC, PlayStation 5, and Xbox Series X and S arrives. BF Studios hasn’t officially announced when exactly the Battlefield 6 battle royale mode will launch, though ModernWarzone reported earlier this week that its sources expect its release date to be October 28, 2025.
EA and BF Studios are no strangers to leaks, especially when it comes to Battlefield 6. That’s mostly thanks to BF Labs, which has allowed a large number of players to experience in-development content as the developers look for fan feedback.
“I remember, at one point, making a big presentation that said, ‘What will leak? Everything.’ Like, we just started with that assumption that things would leak,” technical director Christian Buhl told us. “Now, to be clear, we didn’t want things to leak. We weren’t seeking leaks, but we knew that the most important thing was to get the game in front of players, get real feedback from players, get real telemetry, real data, and that had to come at any cost, including the fact that things would leak.”
Michael Cripe is a freelance writer with IGN. He’s best known for his work at sites like The Pitch, The Escapist, and OnlySP. Be sure to give him a follow on Bluesky (@mikecripe.bsky.social) and Twitter (@MikeCripe).
Over the last few decades, soccer (or football, if you’re not from the US like me) hasn’t changed much. Sure, there are new rules, improved tactics, and so much more money involved in the modern game – but at its heart, it’s still all about kicking a ball into a goal more than the other team. So how does a series like EA Sports FC improve each year when the sport it’s emulating isn’t introducing massive changes? For me, it’s about quality-of-life updates, and FC 26 has those in spades. You’ve heard the phrase “death by a thousand cuts,” but this is more like “fixed by a thousand pieces of tape.” It’s not that every problem has been solved, and many of the micro issues like confusing player-switching and weird tackle animations have returned from FC 25 – but at least in my early time with it, FC 26 is inching in the right direction in nearly every aspect.
A phenomenal example of this is the new gameplay presets. In the past, everyone was using the same gameplay style, whether diving into competitive games in Ultimate Team or trying to win the league against CPU opponents in Manager Mode. This year, EA has split things between two different presets: Competitive and Authentic. With the Competitive preset, you can expect the fast-paced action and smarter AI teammates that you might be used to from previous FC/FIFA games. Meanwhile, Authentic will feel more realistic to what you see on the real-life pitch every weekend. Players are slower, and you need to use your tactical intelligence to get into scoring position.
The most important part of this change is that these two options do not impact each other. That means EA can tune Competitive mode however is needed without changing the balance of Authentic mode, something they couldn’t do in previous versions of FC. I’ve only played about a dozen games with each preset so far, but they already feel distinct in a way that is valuable. Players come to FC 26’s various modes for different reasons: Career Mode players want a game that plays as close to real-life a possible, while Ultimate Team and Clubs players want fair and balanced online competition. Those two ideals have sometimes worked against each other in the past, so giving us two totally separate gameplay styles lets EA serve both communities.
What’s strange about the implementation is that the Authentic preset is restricted to offline modes only. That means you can’t even use it in your Squad Battles matches despite them being the only single-player content in Ultimate Team. It’s something I hope is added in the future, as it feels strange not to include all of the single-player content by default, especially when it does exactly that with the new version of the Season Pass.
This might be the worst version of a Season Pass in a sports game yet.
Before diving into some of the other positive changes, let’s go over that Season Pass, as it’s one of the biggest points of contention for me. Last year, EA introduced a paid Season Pass into FC 25 toward the end of the cycle, so we knew this was coming, but seeing it drop on day one does sting. You can ignore it and stick with the free version of the pass, or even earn enough in-game currency to buy it without spending real-world money, but I would argue that this might be the worst version of a Season Pass we’ve seen in a sports game yet.
The issue with FC 26’s Season Pass is that you’re not just earning rewards for Ultimate Team, where people are already (unfortunately) conditioned to spend money. You’re also earning a ton of rewards for Clubs, Player Career, and Manager Career. The latter is where things really get icky, because one of the big draws for FC 26 is that Icons and Heroes are finally available in Manager Mode. For the first time ever, you can take classic players like Luis Figo, Toni Kroos, and Julie Foudy and put them into your Manager Mode saves. It should be a revelation, but instead, EA made the strange decision to lock many of these players behind the Season Pass.
There are several reasons this is frustrating. The first is that you probably won’t be able to acquire enough XP for them by playing Manager Mode alone. EA might implement more ways for non-Ultimate Team players to earn XP, but with how things are currently constructed, you’ll need to dive into that lootbox opening simulator if you want to finish enough of the pass to claim all of the Career Mode rewards. Even as someone who primarily plays Ultimate Team, this change sucks. I already know how bad FC’s monetization can get, and I hate seeing it expanded to more of the playerbase in a way that feels scummy.
As if that weren’t frustrating enough, Career Mode players aren’t likely to earn enough Ultimate Team-specific currency to purchase the Season Pass in that mode alone. That means you’ll need to spend real money to unlock players like Gianfranco Zola, Miroslav Klose, and Park Ji-Sung. Keep in mind, this is only the first Season Pass. If FC 26 continues to lock Icons and Heroes behind future passes, we’ll likely see desirable players like Ronaldinho, Ruud Gullit, and Johan Cruyff tucked behind a paywall as well.
It’s an unfortunate situation that reeks of EA trying to get even more money out of its playerbase than usual. It’s bad enough that Ultimate Team players are being milked dry, but now you can’t even enjoy your offline Career Mode without feeling the pull to spend money.
Most of the modes feature fun updates to their tried and true formulas.
What makes this even more painful is that most of the modes feature fun updates to their tried and true formulas this year. For example, the new Manager Live Hub lets you dive into specific challenges and earn new jerseys for your club. These feel like the next step toward a historical mode like the Negro Leagues option in MLB The Show, as you’ll be challenged to recreate moments like Jamal Musiala’s double with Bayern Munich or take a mid-level club like SK Rapid or Strasbourg to European glory. The classic version of Career Mode is still there, but Manager Live gives you a rotating list of challenges that will test your skill on and off the pitch.
Even Ultimate Team is home to several small yet meaningful changes. Everything from the return of tournaments to the ability to choose the cosmetics on your Evolutions feels carefully crafted to deliver the improvements fans have been asking after for years. We’ll have to wait a month or two to see the impact of the slower Ultimate Team power curve, and I’m hesitant to judge the stability of the servers until they are live for everyone, but my early experience is positive.
While I’m not much of a Clubs player, the new Archetypes have certainly piqued my interest. Without a dedicated group, it’s unlikely I will spend too much time in Clubs, but the Archteype system seems like an improved way to handle progression to my untrained eye. While a meta will surely settle over the mode in the coming weeks, having this clear sense of forward momentum makes me wish I had a group of 10 friends to play with.
I have more to play this weekend, but so far FC 26 seems to provide enough quality-of-life changes that I feel more positive about the on-pitch product after a few years of stagnation. However, I can’t help but be annoyed by how heavily monetized every mode is becoming. I’ve always felt it was relatively easy to ignore the pull to spend extra money unless you wanted to compete at the very top of Ultimate Team, but that’s much less true this year. Now, not even the Career Mode players are safe. FC 26 is EA at its most money-hungry yet, and I can’t help but worry where we’re going next.
CD Projekt looks set to include multiplayer features in Cyberpunk 2, years after similar plans were scrapped for Cyberpunk 2077.
A posting for the role of Cyberpunk 2’s lead network engineer lists the job’s responsibilities as including the need to “develop and optimize multiplayer systems, including matchmaking” with an aim to “address challenges related to latency, bandwidth usage and server performance.”
Applicants will also need to work “closely with game designers, gameplay programmers, and other departments to integrate network features seamlessly,” the job description continued, to “play a pivotal role in designing and implementing the network architecture and online systems.”
As expected, the role is primarily based out of CD Projekt’s Boston studio, where work on Cyberpunk 2 is now underway, while the company’s Polish teams focus on The Witcher 4.
The prospect of Cyberpunk 2 finally achieving the studio’s multiplayer ambitions therefore should not be surprising — though until CD Projekt confirms the features officially, there’s always the possibility these could fall by the wayside once again.
“We really needed to look at what were the priorities for Cyberpunk [after it launched],” Cyberpunk 2077 senior quest designer Philipp Weber said back in 2022. “The priority was that the main experience will run for the people in a really good state, and essentially, the switch of priorities meant that other R&D projects had to go away. With Cyberpunk, we wanted to do many things at the same time, and we just needed to really focus and say, ‘Okay, what’s the important part? Yeah, we will make that part really good.’”
Last week’s Apple Event provided a first look at mobile gameplay from upcoming 3D RPG and strategy game Arknights: Endfield, alongside confirmation of the title’s early 2026 release.
The GRYPHLINE game, set in the same world as the studio’s tower defence hitArknights, featured in a segment showcasing the iPhone 17 Pro. The gameplay demo was shown running on the next-generation A19 Pro chip, which enabled the combat sequences to play out super-smoothly, while the hardware-accelerated ray tracing and 16-core Neural Engine helped the vibrant visuals of the AAA title to shine.
Apple’s post-event press release also exclusively revealed an early 2026 release window for Arknights: Endfield. Following its appearance in the showcase, the game has since featured on multiple Apple channels, from the official website and Apple Newsroom, to other promotional materials for new products.
This high-visibility, pre-launch inclusion indicates Apple’s confidence in the game’s quality and its strong performance on mobile devices – a significant step as previous demos for the exploration, real-time combat and base-building centred game had focussed solely on the PC version. This included a technical test running back in 2024, and a closed beta that took place earlier this year, allowing players to have hands-on experience of the updated combat and AIC factory system.
Arknights: Endfield has enjoyed a major presence at headline gaming events and conventions throughout 2025, including Japan Expo, Anime Expo andgamescom. GRYPHLINE has confirmed that this run of high-profile appearances will continue with a showcase at the Tokyo Game Show (September 25-28).
The Chinese developer is gearing up for a busy Q4, as its 2-4 player co-op puzzle shooter POPUCOM lands on Nintendo Switch. Originally launched on Steam and the Epic Games Store in June, the candy-coloured title – in which you are summoned to an unknown planet to embark on a playful enemy-slaying and puzzle-solving adventure with your friends – featured in the September 12 Nintendo Direct, which revealed a Holiday 2025 release date.
User-made mods should not be considered prior art, Nintendo has argued, as part of the company’s lawsuit against Palworld developer Pocketpair.
Nintendo’s claim appears to be an attempt at blocking Pocketpair from using popular Pokémon mods as evidence that the franchise’s patented gameplay was already being featured in other games elsewhere.
The argument put forth by Nintendo — essentially, that mods require a separate base game to function, so therefore are not art by themselves — has raised eyebrows across the games industry and among Pokémon fans alike, with many suggesting it could have far-reaching consequences if accepted by a judge.
Writing in Games Fray, which first reported the development, games industry reporter and legal analyst Florian Mueller described the suggestion that gameplay ideas or innovations featured in mods were not viable as prior art as something that showed “utter disregard for the enormous creativity” of many mod makers.
Additionally, and perhaps more concerning from a legal perspective if accepted, the ruling could potentially open the door to mods being considered “fair game” for patent thieves, who could swoop in and incorporate the same ideas into full game releases — which would then be protected.
“Patents are a special monopoly granted by the governments of the world to encourage creative invention,” business lawyer and creator of the Virtual Legality podcast Richard Hoeg told IGN today. “If something already exists in the world, some new person is not allowed to claim they invented it and get that protection.
“We call everything that already exists ‘prior art,’ and it would be ludicrous to exempt any piece of game design from that category simply because of how it’s stood up in the software. The mechanism for access shouldn’t really matter. It exists. It makes things like it in the world non-novel and thus not subject to protection. We don’t give out monopolies to second place.”
Will Nintendo succeed with its claim? Mueller suggests it is unlikely, as courts typically reject any attempt to narrow what can be considered prior art — with Nintendo taking an “extreme position” here. But time will tell, as the lawsuit shows no sign of winding down.
While Nintendo’s legal threats continue, Pocketpair is busy putting together Palworld’s big 1.0 release, due at some point in 2026. In the meantime, development will focus on removing “jank” from the game, communications director and publishing manager John “Bucky” Buckley said earlier this week, though a smaller winter update is still planned.
Tom Phillips is IGN’s News Editor. You can reach Tom at tom_phillips@ign.com or find him on Bluesky @tomphillipseg.bsky.social
On January 20, 2026, students at the University of Tennessee will attend the world’s first Grand Theft Auto college history class. That’s right: we got a GTA college history class before GTA 6.
‘Grand Theft America: U.S. History Since 1980 through the GTA Video Games’ was devised and will be taught by history professor Tore Olsson, who eagle-eyed IGN fans might remember from our coverage of his Red Dead Redemption American history class — another world first. Accompanying that course was Professor Olsson’s book, Red Dead’s History, and its audiobook narration by none other than Arthur Morgan actor Roger Clark.
It turns out, Professor Olsson had planned to launch his class with GTA 6 firmly under his belt, but Rockstar’s high-profile delay to May 2026 dashed those plans — just as they did those of so many video game publishers. So, with what will no doubt be the biggest entertainment launch of all time waiting in the wings, Professor Olsson will soldier ahead.
In this wide-ranging interview with IGN, Professor Olsson discusses why Grand Theft Auto was the right choice for a history class after Red Dead, what the GTA games get right and wrong in their portrayal of contemporary America, and the place of GTA 6 in the class. But perhaps most important of all, we ask the question: will playing the Grand Theft Auto games count as ‘studying?’
IGN: What’s the basic idea behind this class?
Tore Olsson: Video games are great at conjuring fictional worlds, but they also impact players’ thinking about real-world times and places. And just as Red Dead Redemption 2 has shaped folks’ perception of the nineteenth-century American West or Ghost of Tsushimahas informedtheir vision of feudal Japan, millions of people around the globe imagine contemporary America through the lens of the Grand Theft Auto franchise. Just think of how many GTA veterans have recognized landmarks in Los Angeles and New York thanks to their hours in Los Santos and Liberty City!
In my class, I take seriously GTA’s fictional representation of the United States: its characters, its urban and rural landscapes, and its storylines. And I use that world as the framing device for a serious history class that examines what’s actually taken place in the United States over the last half-century. The class is much more about American history than the games themselves, but GTA provides the framework that structures our exploration of the past. My hope is that after the class, students will never look at these games, or modern America, the same again.
IGN: The Red Dead Redemption series, which you’ve worked with in the past, is obviously historical in its framing. Few people think of the Grand Theft Auto games in the same way. How can the GTA games’ contemporary setting serve as the backbone of a college history class?
Tore Olsson: Of course, most folks wouldn’t put GTA in the same category as games set in distant eras, like Red Dead, Assassin’s Creed, or Kingdom Come: Deliverance. But because the franchise is now nearly 30 years old, and because some of the early titles were set a decade or two before their release date, the games capture a particular historical epoch: the United States from 1980 to the present. Vice City Stories (set in 1984) and Vice City (1986) cover the 1980s. San Andreas (1992) and Liberty City Stories (1998) speak to the ‘90s, and then 3, 4, 5, and soon 6 provide different snapshots of the twenty-first century.
I really believe that the years between 1980 and today mark a distinct and cohesive era in American history. If we want to understand the divided and unequal U.S. of today, we have to grapple with what’s happened in that time. 45 years ago, the political fires that burn so hot today were much cooler. Most Americans got their news from the three TV networks – ABC, NBC, and CBS – which presented a very centrist spin on controversial topics. In 1980, the average CEO earned about 25 times the salary of their rank-and-file employees; today it’s nearly 400 times as much. 45 years ago, just over 5% of Americans were immigrants; today the number surpasses 15%. And the U.S. prison population quadrupled between 1980 and 2005.
In many ways, the America of today is unrecognizable from its 1980 version. In my class, we’ll explore how all of this came to change – and we’ll use the fictional world of the GTAgames as the window for this exploration.
IGN: What do the GTA games get right in their portrayal of contemporary America? What do they get wrong?
Tore Olsson: Unlike Red Dead Redemption and other historical games, the GTA franchise is a satirical parody of the past (and present), rather than an attempt at faithful recreation, which means it’s almost a waste of time to list what it gets wrong. But just for fun… here’s a few. Every GTA game depicts an America plagued by violence and criminality. This is rather ironic given that homicide and car theft, as two examples, plunged dramatically from the early ‘90s until the pandemic. The games imagine an America largely without suburbs or traffic. (Have you ever actually visited L.A.?) They present a society where most women seem to find their primary employment in sex work, and where people of color are often gang members. It’s not hard to see the flaws (and ugliness) in such a portrayal. Or what about the fact that no vehicle seems to have door locks?
But I find the games much more interesting – and useful in the class – when their parody rings true. For example, Los Santos, Liberty City, and Vice City are each home to bustling container ports – what 5 calls “the orifice of American capitalism” – that often sit near rusting manufacturing districts. This is spot-on: arguably no technology was more transformative of post-1980 America than the shipping container, which facilitated the global outsourcing of U.S. industry. Or there’s GTA’s radio stations, where much of the games’ sharpest social commentary takes place. In 4 (set in 2008) and 5 (2013), we encounter a highly polarized media landscape where rival political commentators spit acid at each other from separate stations. But the talk radio of the Vice City and San Andreas era are very different: here, an assortment of weirdos debate each other on a single station. It’s an interesting (and perhaps unintentional!) reference to how in 1987 Ronald Reagan began the deregulation of television and radio with the repeal of 1949’s “fairness doctrine,” which paved the way to overtly partisan networks like Fox News and MSNBC.
IGN: Can you give an example how you plan to use the games’ storylines to teach historical content?
Tore Olsson: I’ve invested more hours than I care to admit in playing these games, and I’m eager to use their plots and characters to teach big historical topics. I’m perhaps most excited to use San Andreas, set primarily in a fictional Los Angeles of 1992. As many know, the game follows Carl “C.J.” Johnson as he returns to the West Coast, seeking to evict drug dealers from his neighborhood and then free his brother from prison, while crooked cops seek to derail his plans. The narrative climax of the game comes when these police officers are found innocent of their crimes, which triggers a vast urban rebellion against the miscarriage of justice. “Los Santos will burn tonight,” declares an in-game news anchor ominously.
It’s probably obvious to many that this drama is an allusion to the L.A. Riots of April and May 1992, one of the most significant turning points in contemporary U.S. history, but also one that is widely misunderstood. Explaining the origins and meaning of this violent convulsion is a key goal of my class. Most folks understand the 1992 riots as a knee-jerk reaction to the videotaped police beating of Black motorist Rodney King and the near-total acquittal of the officers charged. But that explanation lacks backstory and context, some of which San Andreas hints at, but much of which is absent from the game.
Immigration, policing, capitalism, drugs, government policies – these are all towering dilemmas of contemporary America. And it’s my plan to use GTA’s allusion to them as the entry point for a history that I hope will be fresh and timely to many students.
IGN: How can a less-than-serious video game be the foundation for a serious college class?
Tore Olsson: It might surprise or even shock some folks to learn of a college class built around the fiction of a video game, and especially this franchise. But video games have by now moved from the margins to the mainstream. Other forms of pop culture have made the same journey before. 50 years ago, it would have been unthinkable to find a “history of rock’n’roll” class at a college or university, thanks to the music’s edgy and risqué reputation. Today, that exact course is one of the most popular at my institution. Perhaps a generation from now we’ll see many more courses built around the digital fiction of games.
When it comes to GTA’s unique brand of unseriousness, I’ve certainly played enough to become familiar with its cynical, irreverent, and crude sense of humor. Sometimes this is amusing; often it’s not. In my class, I’m steering clear of the games’ most distasteful satire. Instead, I’ll be emphasizing the elements that are most evocative of big social, cultural, and political paradoxes – of which there’s plenty.
And from day one, I’ll take great pains to establish that this is a serious college class that will handle weighty and difficult topics, which we’ll always approach with sensitivity and respect. I’ll make clear that my classroom is a professional environment for students, nothing like their friend’s basement where they may have played GTA for the first time. I’m confident that my 20 years of experience teaching challenging subjects – and my four years of working through such material via the Red Dead games – have prepared me to navigate the unique demands of teaching through a complex piece of pop culture like GTA.
There’s also the question of GTA’s nihilistic violence, which has been the subject of controversy many times during its career. In no way do I celebrate or endorse that digital bloodshed. Indeed, the core message of my course is profoundly anti-violent, revealing the common humanity and strivings of all Americans. My hope is that students will walk away from this class with the understanding that Americans are divided today because powerful forces profit from that division, and that a more harmonious future is possible.
IGN: Has there ever been a class like this before?
Tore Olsson: Not really! Certainly there have been other college classes built around pop culture, whether Taylor Swift or HBO’s The Wire, and there are other historians who teach using video games – though it’s fairly rare to see instructors frame a class around one particular game franchise. There’s been a game design course at a Canadian university on GTA, but its goals are very different from what I’ll do as a historian. I’ve searched far and wide but have come across no previous examples of instructors in traditional disciplines who’ve made these games central to a class – which is rather surprising, given how astoundingly popular GTA has become in the last two decades.
IGN: Are students required to buy or play any of the games? Will playing the games count as ‘studying?’
Tore Olsson: I bet many students would embrace that kind of studying! But no, I’m afraid they will be disappointed on that count. As with my previous courses on Red Dead Redemption, I don’t require students to own or play the games during our semester. I’d be anxious asking cash-strapped students to buy a pricy console or gaming PC plus the games themselves. And I never examine students on the fictional content of the games; there’ll never be an exam question about Trevor Philips or Niko Bellic.
However, that’s not to say that the games will be absent from the class – far from it. I begin each lecture by showing game footage or screenshots on our topic of the day. Sometimes I’ll pull out a controller and briefly play on my laptop and projector – perhaps loading shipping containers in the Port of Los Santos – before proceeding to the core historical content. I expect many students will be familiar with the GTA franchise, though ultimately their knowledge of game lore won’t do much to earn them an A. Yet I do hope that their passion for the games’ fictional world will inspire a similar dedication for learning the history that informs the games in the first place.
IGN: What is the place of GTA 6 in the class?
Tore Olsson: I had originally hoped that it would be a major part! I first began planning this class more than a year ago, when GTA 6 was scheduled for release in late Fall of 2025 – well-timed for the start of our semester in January 2026. Of course, the recent delay to May 2026 made that impossible. So yes, that’s why we got a GTA college history class before we got GTA 6! (I really hope 6’s release date doesn’t fall during Spring final exams week, because I’d be very worried about my students’ ability to concentrate…) I certainly plan to integrate the new game into future versions of the course, but for now I’ll have to rely on the older games. Thankfully that’s a ton of material.
IGN: Is it a coincidence that you’re turning to another Rockstar game after RDR, or is there something unique about that developer’s game formula that allows a historian to base a course around?
Tore Olsson: I don’t think it’s a coincidence. Few developers rival Rockstar in terms of the granular detail that goes into their games. But I also think Rockstar is rather rare in their eagerness to comment on the social fabric of American life. Their games – from L.A. Noire through Red Dead through GTA – are all interested in saying something about the unique strangeness of the American experiment. What they say is sometimes thoughtful, sometimes not – but that they’re trying is fascinating.
IGN: What advice do you have for folks who are curious about your class but are not students at the University of Tennessee and can’t enroll in it?
Tore Olsson: First off, follow me on social media – on X/Twitter, Instagram, and TikTok – where I’ll be sharing regular updates about what we’re doing in the class, and my thoughts on GTA 6. I loved the work of adapting my college class on Red Dead Redemption into a book for wider audiences, and it was a dream to work with Roger Clark as the book’s narrator. So I’m very much considering the possibility of doing the same with ‘Grand Theft America’ – perhaps with an equally perfect audiobook narrator? Stay tuned!
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.
Fortnite maker Epic Games will allow creators to sell in-game items through its platform — and earn a better cut of sales than via Roblox.
The announcement comes at an interesting time for Fortnite as a whole, which has seen lower than average player numbers for its core battle royale modes over the summer. At the same time, Roblox’s player count has spiked thanks to trending hits like Grow a Garden and Steal a Brainrot.
Now, Epic Games is doubling down on encouraging creators to its platform, after several weekends where a Fortnite version of Steal a Brainrot soared in popularity. Next up for Fortnite’s third-party offerings will be the ability to sell items directly, with a better cut of the sales than in Roblox handed over to creators.
In a blog post on the announcement, Epic Games highlighted that it will hand over 50% of the V-Bucks value of purchases made in third-party experiences after store/platform fees, raised to 100% through the program’s first year (until December 31, 2026). Taking those store/platform fees into account, that translates to creators earning 37% of in-game sales, doubled to 74% for the first year. In comparison, as Epic Games itself points out, Roblox offers 25%.
The message here is clear: come launch your game on Fortnite’s platform and you’ll earn more money per dollar spent — and considerably more to start off with. It’s a similar tactic to one Epic Games has used before, to encourage developers onto its Epic Game Store rather than Steam. But it’s worth remembering that, while a better percentage, Fortnite’s player numbers are far below those of Roblox — meaning that while creators might earn less per dollar spent, they may still see far more money made.
Alongside this announcement, Epic Games has also announced a tweak to its creator payouts for engagement in third-party experiences, with better rewards for those who are detected as bringing in new or lapsed players. Here, it feels like Epic Games is clearly pushing creator content as a way to widen its audience further, rather than something that simply offers current players new things to do (another challenge it has faced over the past few months, with new additions in various battle royale offerings feeling like they’re just shuffling existing players around modes).
The push to highlight creator-made content will continue with the introduction of a “sponsored” block on Fortnite’s main screen, Discover, where creators will be able to pay Epic Games for placement. Long-term, Epic says it will use 50% of this revenue for its creator engagment payouts, though this will be boosted to 100% of the revenue for the first year. After that, Epic Games will keep the other 50%, for use covering server costs, safety and moderation tools, and R&D. “In recent years, Epic has been investing and operating the business at a loss,” the company noted.
Another change that better angles Fortnite towards its creator-made experiences will be the long-awaited launch of the game’s “thin client”. Beginning on mobile and PC, players will be able to download a smaller version of Fortnite with just its popular Blitz Royale mode included, along with the ability to play creator-made games. Other modes — even including Fortnite’s main battle royale — will then require additional downloads, if desired. It’s a smart way to get people playing trending hits like Steal a Brainrot without requiring a larger download than necessary. But it’s also feels like an eye-opening shift in priority for the company, and an acknowledgement Fortnite’s core Epic-made modes may no longer be the game’s hottest draw.
Fortnite has changed repeatedly over the years, from PVE zombie experience to battle royale, to a metaverse-y platform full of other genres. And while Fortnite’s next transformation isn’t wholly unexpected — the percentage of players in creator-made modes has been rising for years — it feels like it may be its most dramatic yet. There’s no suggestion that Fortnite battle royale is going away, of course, and there’s good reason to think its lucrative battle passes and live events will stick around for a long time yet as a differentiator to other platforms, as well as a way to introduce more IP crossovers. But with the growing focus on creator-made content — and the sheer number of players now engaged with it across Fortnite and Roblox — the game’s next era looks clear.
Tom Phillips is IGN’s News Editor. You can reach Tom at tom_phillips@ign.com or find him on Bluesky @tomphillipseg.bsky.social
