Category: Video Games

Ereban: Shadow Legacy’s blend of Splatoon and Assassin’s Creed releases in April

Stealth games in which you can become “one with the shadows” cover a wide range, though I guess spectrum is the more appropriate word here. You’ve got sober infiltration games like Thief, which metes out gradations of light and dark with the care of somebody calculating their tax expenses, and stylised affairs such as Mark Of The Ninja, in which stepping into shadow desaturates you and sort of makes your character far too fancy for enemies to notice.

There are games such as Splinter Cell, in which hiding in shadows rests on a gentleman’s agreement with NPCs not to perceive the big green torches attached to Sam Fisher’s head. And then you have games like Ereban: Shadow Legacy, which has just been given a release date – 10th April. In this mystical third-person stealth-platformer, your character can literally disintegrate and travel through shadows as a ripple of dark energy – a transformation that puts me in mind less of Thief than of squid-mode in Nintendo’s Splatoon.

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Cyberpunk 2077 Player Discovers Easter Egg Hidden in the Main Menu

A Cyberpunk 2077 player has discovered an Easter egg hidden by CD Projekt Red in the main menu.

While the role-playing game features layers upon layers of open-world exploration with all manner of references hidden throughout, fans were perhaps overlooking this one, which was available from the moment they booted up the game.

Shared by @crushovitz_b on X/Twitter, below, players can discover the Easter egg for themselves by clicking on the version number, which is currently 2.12, in the top right corner. The number flicks between several different symbols and numbers before unfolding into 2.0.77.

“Good find, I started to doubt you chooms will ever find it!” game director Paweł Sasko tweeted in response. “Was hidden way too well.”

It’s unclear when CD Projekt Red added this reference to Cyberpunk 2077, but it wouldn’t be too surprising if it had sneaked in alongside the latest patch. Update 2.11 added an unexplained “munch munch” sound when consuming food in the menus, for example, which turned out to be the result of one developer’s hard fought mission.

This isn’t the only hidden reference to be found in March 2024 either, as one player recently discovered a wild Easter egg that involved finding a random diner, climbing to its roof, and looking through a pair of binoculars at a red bird (akin to CD Projekt Red’s logo) to see a photo of the development team flash across the screen.

Cyberpunk 2077 also had myriad Easter eggs added alongside the Phantom Liberty expansion, including a clever nod to the original The Witcher game, a very on-brand secret message, and even a studio history lesson from CD Projekt Red founders Marcin Iwiński and Michał Kiciński.

Phantom Liberty arrived alongside the game-changing Update 2.0, which completely revamped Cyberpunk 2077 with features such as a new perk system and improved AI. It also brought closure to an Elon Musk fan theory, a reference to the late racing legend Ken Block, and bizarre additions to the game’s biggest mystery. Update 2.1 later added a full metro system, romantic partner hangouts, new vehicles, and more.

In our 9/10 review of the game, IGN said: “Cyberpunk 2077 throws you into a beautiful, dense cityscape and offers a staggering amount of flexibility in how you choose to take it from there.”

Ryan Dinsdale is an IGN freelance reporter. He’ll talk about The Witcher all day.

New Palworld mod adds three unreleased Pals, including that Pokemon Mewto rip-off

There are 137 Pals in Pocketpair’s monster-catching simulator Palworld, which might sound like plenty, but the serial Palworld player is an insatiable creature, always clamouring for new beasties to capture, pet and exploit, even as the developers encourage fans to play other games while they wait for the next Palworld update. If you’ve already bagged all the available Pals and are hungry for more, you might be interested in Palworld mod Breed Unreleased Pals, created by ShameIHaveNoFriends, which grants access to three animals who exist in the game’s files but are not, strictly speaking, available to players.

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Nintendo Switch Gets a New Discount Alongside Free $25 Credit at Amazon

Are you searching high and low for the best Nintendo Switch deal going in 2024? Well, we’ve found what should be considered a pretty excellent offering for this time of year, as we usually don’t see such generous deals before the summer. You can currently secure a Nintendo Switch console for $276 at Amazon, down from $299.99, alongside an additional free $25 in Amazon credit when using promo code NSWNEON25.

Now considering how rare deals like this are, we wouldn’t be surprised if this sells out before the end of the day — you have been warned. If you are unlucky this time, you’re best off checking Best Buy, Walmart, and Dell for their respective deals on the Switch right now as well. Otherwise, ensure you’re following @IGNDeals on Twitter/X and Instagram as well for even more updates on the best gaming deals right now.

There are plenty of other great Switch deals right now as well, including over $20 off games in the Mario Day sale that extends through to March 16. This is a pretty standard deal price for Nintendo Switch games in 2024, but still notable for any new Switch owners or those who have missed a couple of titles over the past few years. This includes popular entries like Mario Kart 8 Deluxe, Luigi’s Mansion, Mario Party Superstars, and more all for $39.99.

Also as part of MAR10 Day, Nintendo is offering a Nintendo Switch Online 14-Day Free Trial Membership (typically 7 days), available now through until March 17. This is available even for those who have used a free trial before, so there’s plenty of opportunity to take advantage of this offer while it is still live. Great news for anyone picking up a Switch right now as well.

Robert Anderson is a deals expert and Commerce Editor for IGN. You can follow him @robertliam21 on Twitter.

Capcom Shares Results Of The Monster Hunter 20th Anniversary ‘Top Monster’ Poll

And the winner is…

Hot off the back of revealing that Monster Hunter Stories will be coming to Switch this June, Capcom was keeping up with the Monster Hunter 20th anniversary celebrations as it finally shared the results of the fan-favourite ‘Top Monster’ poll which we first heard about last year.

This one put all 229 monsters in the series against each other to see which one came out on top. The above video runs down the top 20 so you can see where the likes of Shagaru Magala and Primordial Malzeno land in the rankings, but come on, it’s the top three that we all really want to know.

Read the full article on nintendolife.com

PS5 System Update 9.00 Rolling Out, Lets You Adjust the Brightness of the Console’s Power Indicator

Sony has released the PlayStation 5 system software update 9.00 after a period in beta, and published the patch notes on its website.

This update for Sony’s console lets you adjust the brightness of your PS5’s power indicator, improves DualSense mic noise cancellation, lets you interact with the Share Screen using pointers and emojis, and enhances DualSense speaker audio.

To adjust the brightness of your PS5’s power indicator, go to Settings > System > Beep and Light, and then select Brightness.

As for the DualSense, the controller speakers can now produce higher volume sound, letting you hear in-game sounds and voice chat audio more clearly. Sony said the mic input quality on the DualSense has been improved with a new AI machine-learning model. This means background noise from button presses and game audio are “suppressed”, which, hopefully, makes for a better voice chat experience.

Elsewhere, Sony has added new features in Parties and Share Screen. As mentioned, players watching Share Screen can use pointers and emoji reactions to interact with the host’s gameplay. Viewers can use a pointer or indicate a specific location on the gameplay screen with ping, and send emoji reactions. To make this feature available, turn on Viewer Interactions in the Share Screen settings. Unicode 15.1 emoji is supported, which means you can now use them in messages.

And finally, Sony has updated the device software of the DualSense and DualSense Edge controllers, the PlayStation VR2 headset, PlayStation VR2 Sense controllers, and Access controller to “improve stability.” Yep, it’s the classic “we’ve improved system software performance and stability” patch note from Sony.

The PS5 launched November 2020 during the height of the pandemic, and has now sold 54.7 million in just over three years. This November the console turns four years old, with rumors that a PS5 Pro model is waiting in the wings.

PS5 9.00 update patch notes:

  • We’ve updated the device software of the DualSense and DualSense Edge wireless controllers to improve their sound features.
    • The controller speakers can now produce higher volume sound, allowing you to hear in-game sounds and voice chat audio more clearly.
    • The mic input quality on these controllers has been improved with a new AI machine-learning model. Background noise from button presses and game audio are suppressed, resulting in a better voice chat experience.
  • You can now adjust the brightness of your PS5’s power indicator.
    • Go to Settings > System > Beep and Light, and then select Brightness.
  • We’ve added new features in Parties and Share Screen.
    • Players watching Share Screen can use pointers and emoji reactions to interact with the host’s gameplay.
      • Viewers can use a pointer or indicate a specific location on the gameplay screen with ping.
      • Viewers can also send emoji reactions.
      • This feature is available when the host turns on Viewer Interactions in the Share Screen settings.
  • Unicode 15.1 emoji is supported. You can now use them in messages.
  • We’ve updated the device software of the DualSense and DualSense Edge wireless controllers, PlayStation VR2 headset, PlayStation VR2 Sense controllers, and Access controller to improve stability.
  • We’ve improved system software performance and stability.
  • We’ve improved the messages and usability on some screens.

Wesley is the UK News Editor for IGN. Find him on Twitter at @wyp100. You can reach Wesley at wesley_yinpoole@ign.com or confidentially at wyp100@proton.me.

Penny’s Big Breakaway On Switch Is Getting A Frame Rate Update

At launch it was capped at 30FPS.

Evening Star’s new 3D platformer Penny’s Big Breakaway got off to a solid start when it arrived last month, but notably was capped at 30FPS. Fortunately, this is set to change in the next update, with developer Christian Whitehead confirming the upcoming console update will unlock the Switch frame rate.

This will allow players to choose between 30FPS and a 60FPS option. Similar to Bomb Rush Cyberfunk, it may not necessarily maintain silky-smooth performance at this frame rate, but it will at least be an option. This update will also add anti-aliasing to 30FPS.

Read the full article on nintendolife.com

Why did Digital Eclipse make Llamasoft: The Jeff Minter Story? It’s a tale of centipedes, psychedelia, and tea

Who is Jeff Minter? Unless you’re a long-term fan of his work, you might have asked that upon hearing about Llamasoft: The Jeff Minter Story, the latest interactive documentary from Digital Eclipse (following on from The Making Of Karateka and Atari 50: The Anniversary Celebration). You might have heard Minter’s name in connection with the remake of the unreleased Atari arcade game Akka Arrh in 2023. Maybe you played his mind-warping shooter Polybius in VR. You might remember as far back as the Atari Jaguar and Minter’s phenomenal Tempest 2000, the unexpected highlight of the console’s library. Or perhaps you recall his work from the 8-bit glory days. You could just know him from the daily videos of him feeding his sheep on YouTube.

The point is that Jeff Minter has been making games for a phenomenally long time – more than 40 years, in fact. And in all that time, he has stayed true to what he believes in. “One of the things we say in the game itself is the idea of him being the last indie developer,” says Chris Kohler, editorial director at Digital Eclipse in California. “The last of the people from the early 80s who very consciously never sold out, never took the money, never looked to expand or do anything other than [be] just Jeff at his computer, making the sorts of video games that he wants to make.”

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Monster Hunter Stories Physical Collection Includes A Download Code (US)

The first game is on the card, the second game is digital.

Alongside the release date announcement for Monster Hunter Stories, Capcom revealed a “special set” containing the original game and sequel. Its official website also confirmed this “collection” would be getting a physical release in the US.

Now, in a new update, a GameStop listing featuring the official box art has revealed there’s a bit of a catch. While there will be a game card including Monster Hunter Stories, the second game will be a download voucher. Here’s exactly what the fine print says:

Read the full article on nintendolife.com