GDC have released their 2026 State of the Game Industry report, comprising survey results from thousands of quizzed developers on the craft and business of gamesmaking. As in the 2025 report, this year’s responses signal a growing discontent with generative AI tools, with opposing sentiments tipping into simple majority status for the first time: 52% now say GenAI is having a negative impact on the industry, up from 30% in 2025 and 18% in 2024.
Before we start celebrating the moral arc of the universe, this opinion-hardening appears to correlate with neither an overall decrease not increase in the adoption of GenAI tech. Asked if they or someone in their company used these tools, 52% said yes and 35% said no, both unchanged from their 2025 survey levels. However, optimistic views are becoming harder to come by, with the percentage of respondents who thought GenAI is having a positive impact dropping from 13% in 2025 to a mere 7% in 2026. Presumably that’s made up of Tim Sweeney, Larian’s Swen Vincke, half the people on my LinkedIn feed, and that one dentist out of ten who doubts toothpaste.
The Legend of Zelda. The Witcher. Dragon’s Dogma. Monster Hunter. Street Fighter. And now, GTA 5? Every time South Korean studio Pearl Abyss shows off a new slice of its upcoming open-world, action-adventure Crimson Desert, I feel like I see a new line of influence. Over the six years since its reveal, we’ve seen a fantasy land akin to one Geralt would explore, puzzle shrines in the sky that could easily hover above Hyrule, and a complex combat system rooted in Capcom classics. But in the developer’s latest lengthy video detailing the world of Pywel, a new surprise awaited us: the addition of two new playable characters to join Scottish Jon Snow-alike main protagonist, Kliff Macduff. With whole skillsets of their own for us to now anticipate getting our heads around, I can’t help but be excited, but also cautiously wary. By trying to do so much, does Crimson Desert risk achieving nothing?
I say this as someone who has had the benefit of seeing and playing Crimson Desert more than pretty much anyone outside of Pearl Abyss’ walls, having visited the studio a few months back for our IGN First. Despite playing a good few hours of it, and having quite a lot of fun with its dynamic systems and satisfyingly flexible action, I still left feeling like I’d only scratched the surface of what Crimson Desert has in store. And I don’t mean that entirely positively – while it’s good to leave a preview knowing there’s plenty more to see, it’s not often you conclude a studio visit still unsure of a game’s big picture. If all those hours of hands-on haven’t successfully communicated what the game is, is something off?
We now know that Crimson Desert’s open world is twice the size of Skyrim’s and larger than Red Dead Redemption 2’s. I’ve put over 200 hours into Rockstar’s Western masterpiece and feel like I still haven’t seen everything, so it’s anyone’s guess how much awaits in this world. Crimson Desert’s Pywel is a gorgeous piece of geography, too, with streets filled with life and rivers running with glistening water. That water is also systemically linked to the gameplay options, conducting lightning magic to electrocute those who stand in it, and is transformed into blocks of ice when struck by freezing spells.
It’s all very impressive on a technical level, but leaves me wondering if this is all part of a “we can put it in the game, so why shouldn’t we?” mentality. From what I played, and from talking to the team, the ability to manipulate the elements won’t necessarily have puzzles or challenges built around them to make it a system you’d legitimately find worthwhile. In Breath of the Wild or Tears of the Kingdom, for example, you know that if you’re taught how to make giant ice cubes, a puzzle shrine will likely follow asking you to put that lesson into action. Nintendo is a developer that has been making games like this for decades now, though, whereas Pearl Abyss is a studio in its relative infancy, having only released MMORPG Black Desert Online so far. By trying to fit everything it can think a player would like to do in a fantasy open world into Crimson Desert, I fear it may be shooting straight for the moon without learning how to get into orbit first.
The power trip is there; I just worry about the rest of the journey.
It all loops back to this latest revelation that not only will we be playing through Kliff’s story, but stepping into the shoes of two new protagonists along the way. The as-yet-unnamed characters with their own (presumably) complex fighting systems look very fun to play as, don’t get me wrong — I’m particularly drawn to the quick dodging, magic-shifting, pistol-wielding woman who appears at first glance to better fit my more rogue-ish tendencies — but it’s yet another layer added on top of an already ambitious cake. I like cake, you can probably tell from a quick look at my face that that would be the case, but when it’s stacked so high that even Bruce Bogtrotter would take a pass on it, I worry it’s a sign that Crimson Desert should not be trying to have and eat it.
The other new playable hero is a hulking, giant axe-wielding brute with a machine gun attached to his wrist. If you’ve been keeping up with Crimson Desert, you’ll know that this isn’t your typical fantasy world, but one where dragons, steam trains, and mechs also roam around. It’s all very exciting in isolation, and genuinely fun to play as your giant metal monsters come face-to-face with helpless medieval soldiers holding only a shield. The power trip is there; I just worry about the rest of the journey.
Story and questing are incredibly important to me when it comes to open-world games. The Witcher’s twisting tales and many memorable side stories are what make The Wild Hunt an all-timer in my eyes. The cast of characters in Red Dead Redemption 2 and the way they weave seamlessly in and out of its world are what make it my favourite game ever. Crimson Desert has a lot going for it — the combat is exciting, the world is diverse and beautiful, and its systems are impressively reactive — but I can’t help but feel wary. Most of the missions I’ve played so far, at several different events, have been castle sieges, often ending in admittedly impressive boss battles. But, they’ve all been relatively thin narrative-wise, aside from an interesting detour to a mad inventor’s lair where he’d built a golden mechanical dragon, as you do. I’ve seen little of what’s going to be the thrust story-wise in Crimson Desert as a whole to get me hyped in that regard, nor met any characters that I feel will get close to my heart. And I can’t help but worry that there’s a reason we’ve seen so little of this world’s story.
Now, with the surprise addition of two extra playable protagonists to get to know on this adventure that is less than two months away, I worry that Kliff and his friends may well be fun to play as stylistically, but contain little substance within them. I’d be very happy to be wrong, though. I’ve been looking forward to Crimson Desert for a long time now, and have had a genuinely fun time whenever I’ve managed to get hands-on with it. I just wonder how all of these well-constructed building blocks will, in turn, create a greater whole. Will its gameplay systems overlap in interesting ways and be built into mission design? Will authorial intent come to the fore, or will I ultimately feel like a kid being dropped into a sandbox of possibilities with direction? I’m excited, just also a little afraid that by trying to be everything, it may end up achieving nothing.
Simon Cardy is a Senior Editor at IGN who can mainly be found skulking around open world games, indulging in Korean cinema, or despairing at the state of Tottenham Hotspur and the New York Jets. Follow him on Bluesky at @cardy.bsky.social.
Well, World of Warcraft developers Blizzard have decided to have a bit of extra fun with all the junk that’ll fill up the new player houses rolling out in full with March’s Midnight expansion. The MMO’s getting a prop hunt mode dubbed Decor Duel, designed to act as a “small diversion” from the whole Xal’atath-led void invasion business.
Well, folks, the day is finally upon us. Today is the last day that you can buy Switch Game Vouchers before Nintendo consigns them to the ‘Discontinued’ pile.
The Big N initially made the announcement way back in July 2025, but time has flown by since then, so we thought it was only right to give you one last nudge now that the day of reckoning is upon us.
If you’ve seen Crimson Desert’s impressive 15-minute gameplay video, you might be wincing at the thought of it running smoothly on your console or PC. Well, right now, the developers at Pearl Abyss are focusing on optimization to help ensure a “smooth” experience when the game comes out in March.
Crimson Desert is set in a huge and seamless open world packed with enemies, NPCs, and all sorts of things to do. It’s dense with detail, and you can zip around quickly on the back of a dragon. Based on the video, below, Crimson Desert will be a demanding beast — it will be interesting in particular to see how it runs on the Xbox Series S.
According to Will Powers, director of public relations at Pearl Abyss America, the developers are doubling down on the “optimization phase” as we speak, telling former IGN video extraordinaire Destin Legarie in a new interview that this is the focus ahead of Crimson Desert’s March 19 release date.
“We have gone gold. Now comes further, further optimization to make the game run as good as it possibly can,” Powers said. “And that’s as important of a part. So that’s the phase we’re currently in between now and launch to make sure that the experience when players eventually get their hands on the game, is as smooth as possible.”
Powers wouldn’t go into specifics on the graphics settings that will be available on consoles, but did confirm Crimson Desert has PS5 Pro enhancement. You can also turn off the particle effects in settings, although Powers said they do convey important information during fights.
Pearl Abyss built a new engine for Crimson Desert, and Powers explained that it’s capable of providing a 4K60 native presentation, complete with ray tracing, without the aid of graphics technology such as DLSS or FSR. But of course you’ll need powerful hardware to enable it.
“Yeah, we’ll show 4K 60 native, sure, with ray tracing on, that’s not done through DLSS or FSR, that’s done natively in-engine,” Powers said. “And then if you want to further optimize then you can tweak all the settings and do all the things, but we want to show that you don’t have to… like the game itself should be able to stand on its own.”
And on that decision to go with a proprietary engine:
“I’m not going to say that the game is absolutely perfectly optimized, but within the engine it’s using every single thing. So it’s as optimized as it can be within that space. That’s not possible otherwise. And so rendering thousands of trees within draw distance, it does those things better than an off-the-shelf engine could because of that.
“Off-the-shelf engines weren’t able to deliver the uncompromised vision that the developers set forth to create with this game. So, they needed to create their own engine in order to deliver on that vision.”
Crimson Desert’s huge open world has been a topic of debate recently. Pywel is divided into five distinct regions: Hernand; Pailune; Demeniss; Delesyia; and the Crimson Desert itself. The main quest revolves around protagonist Kliff’s journey, but you’re free to explore the world in any order, taking faction-driven quests, large-scale battles, fortress sieges and smaller, character-focused missions.
Pearl Abyss confirmed that as the story progresses, two additional playable characters become available, each with unique combat styles, skills and weapons. Exploration is a big part of the game — you travel on horseback, climb terrain, glide across distances, and later access advanced traversal options such as a missile-firing mech and a dragon. Pearl Abyss said the world is filled with hidden treasures, ancient mechanisms, puzzles and points of interest “designed to reward curiosity and discovery.” As for combat, expect to face enemy soldiers, sorcerers, beasts and machines.
Speaking on the Gaming Interviews YouTube channel, Powers said that describing the size of Crimson Desert’s world in terms of numbers doesn’t do it justice, because doing so fails to capture the scope and scale of the game. But he did go as far as to compare it to two of the biggest open-world games around.
“I don’t think numbers really do it justice because, how big is that in terms of scope and scale?” he said. “But what we can say is that the world’s at least twice as big as the open world, the playable area, of Skyrim. It’s larger than the map of Red Dead Redemption 2.”
Powers went on to insist that the size of Crimson Desert’s open world wouldn’t determine its quality. Rather, what you actually do in it is the key factor.
“The continent of Pywel is absolutely massive, but size doesn’t really matter if there’s nothing to do,” he said. “Open-world games are about doing things, having activities, having distractions. So we wanted to create a world that’s not only massive, but is also incredibly interactive.”
Image credit: Pearl Abyss.
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.
If you’ve ever intrepidly looked up a Paradox game, seen a million DLC expansions on the Steam page, and fled screaming into the woods, rest assured that Paradox have you in their eye. It’s doubtful they’re going to change anything about their broad DLC strategy, mind, but they’re aware that some players may feel reluctant to purchase older Paradox games that have dozens of add-ons.
Inevitably, the New California Republic Power Armor that made such a dramatic appearance in the latest episode of the Fallout TV show is now in Fallout 76. But rather than sell it via the in-game shop and thus allow players to buy it with Atoms, Fallout 76’s virtual currency, it is only available as part of a standalone DLC bundle priced $30.
In lieu of a brand new Fallout video game, Bethesda has leaned heavily on Fallout 76 to capitalize on boosted interest in all things Fallout following the breakout success of the Prime Video TV show. Fallout 76 has Walton Goggins’ character The Ghoul dishing out quests, for example. There is a New Vegas-style expansion (Season 2 is set in New Vegas — or what’s left of it). And now Fallout 76 has the NCR Power Armor that Maximus uses to fight a pack of Deathclaws in Episode 7.
That NCR Power Armor is a big talking point among Fallout fans for a number of reasons. It’s brand new — we’ve not seen its type in the video games before — and it sparks all sorts of questions about the Fallout lore and what we thought the NCR was capable of. Setting aside the fact that an NCR Power Armor appearance in Fallout 76, which is set before all the other Fallout video games, makes little sense lore wise because the NCR didn’t exist yet, its price has become the big talking point.
The NCR Power Armor is available in Fallout 76 via the Mojave Bundle, which includes the following:
Ranger Power Armor Paint
NCR Flag
New Vegas Neon Sign
Ad Victoriam (Super Sledge)
Legion Legate Outfit
Player Title Prefix – “Advictoriam”
Player Title Prefix & Suffix – “Tribune”
The long and the short of it is that if you want the NCR Power Armor, you need to hand over $30 for this entire bundle — a standard practice these days really, where DLC bundles often cost more than entire video games, and items you might not necessarily want are thrown in to improve “value.”
Some fans have said the bundle is overpriced at $30, and accused Bethesda of “cashing in” on the show by not making it available to buy for Atoms, which most players will have stashed away for DLC like this.
“Yeah, the price of the Mojave bundle is ridiculous,” one fan said. “It’s exhausting to watch a studio that once had credibility reduce everything to cash grabs. I guess a lot of people will pay for it anyway. Good luck.”
It’s a sentiment shared by many across the various Fallout subreddits, Steam’s own forum, and social media. “Yeah this is a hard pass for me. Put it in the Atom shop,” said a disgruntled fan. “£26.99 for eight items, two of which are just words!!!” added another. “Then you’ve got two C.A.M.P items, a Power Armor paint, a weapon, plus an outfit with a helmet…. Not even a cheeky few hundred Atoms thrown in! That’s actually peak lmao, but whilst people keep buying it, Bethesda are going to keep selling it!”
“This DLC includes a set of armor that I’m never going to wear because the Legate armor doesn’t fit in thematically with anything, it also includes a flag and a neon sign, none of which are of particular value to me,” reads one negative Steam review. “And with the Burning Sands starter bundle you at least get a free bullet machine. This bundle gives you nothing of value. For me the only reason to pick this up is the NCR Power Armor, which I can understand cashing in on the show, but they clearly didn’t want to put it on the Atom shop for the people who have saved atoms. I would have paid $10 for this item no problem.”
However, not all players agree. Many are pointing to the $30 price point being standard for bundles of this type in Fallout 76 (and in other games), and others are saying you can simply choose not to but it if you don’t like it.
“Is it overpriced? Yes. Is it undervalued? Yes,” countered one fan. “It’s still not predatory, because you can simply NOT BUY IT. You lose out on zero actual gameplay by not buying it. You also don’t gain any gameplay from buying it. If having this bundle gave me some type of advantage in-game, that might be predatory, but this is just another bundle. I’ve skipped plenty of those over the years. This bundle replaced the Atomic Angler bundle, which I believe was also $30. There’s ALWAYS going to be a cash bundle out there. Just don’t buy it. It’s that simple.”
“You know as weird as it is I just don’t mind,” said another. “There’s no gameplay content or quests / locations locked behind the purchase, so far every expansion has been released for free, there’s plenty to do in the game and loads of other cosmetics and camp stuff to get for free or buy with atoms from challenges, the game (imo) doles out tons of Atoms anyway, and from my understanding these bundles typically go on more than 50% off sale pretty regularly.
“So I mean like, whatever, you don’t need to day one buy every single piece of content, if Bethesda releasing these lil whale drops occasionally means the vast majority of the game can stay free for the vast majority of players that’s a good thing. Just be glad we’re not a gacha or a lootbox game or something with actual predatory pricing.”
Bethesda will of course be hoping that as many fans as possible decide that $30 is a reasonable price to pay to patrol the desert of Burning Springs like you’re straight out of the Fallout TV show. Data shows that the show has fueled an increase in player numbers for all Fallout games, with some newcomers dipping into the likes of Fallout 76 for the first time. I imagine in that context, this NCR Power Armor will prove quite popular.
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.
Ahead of Yakuza Kiwami 3 & Dark Ties‘ release on February 11th, devs RGG Studio have announced plans to put out a day one patch to fix visual issues spotted the remade beat-em-up’s demo. Specifically, there’s a section of the game’s version of downtown Okinawa by a river which players have pointed out to be garishly oversaturated compared to the original Yakuza 3 and its previous remaster.
One aspect of Pokémon Legends: Z-A we thought was “excellent” was the music. With this in mind, it’s been announced the game’s soundtrack will be getting a physical release in Japan on 17th April 2026.
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