They’re back! Sort of…
Eagle-eyed Donkey Kong Bananza fans have spotted an advertisement for the game’s next event, and it sounds like the rewards will be quite familiar to those who played Donkey Kong 64 back in the day.
Yes, as spotted by X user @upachan64 (thanks, Gaming Reinvented), both Lanky Kong and Chunky Kong appear to be entering the fray as unlockable figures. This comes via the Japanese version of the Switch 2 news app, which states:
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Metal Gear Solid and Death Stranding developer Hideo Kojima says he was “surprised” to read that the creators of The Matrix wanted him to develop a game based on the franchise, insisting: “no one ever told me such a conversation had taken place.”
Yesterday, IGN reported that The Wachowskis, the writers and directors behind the Matrix movies, once asked Metal Gear creator Hideo Kojima to design a Matrix video game, but publisher Konami reportedly turned it down. “The Wachowskis were big fans of Kojima,” Konami Digital Entertainment VP of licensing, Christopher Bergstresser, said. “So Kazumi Kitaue, Kojima, Aki Saito (who still works with Kojima), and I were at the Konami HQ, and we got a call from the Wachowskis, who wanted to come in and meet with Kojima. So they did!
“The two of them came in with their concept artist, and effectively they said to Kojima, ‘We really want you to do the Matrix game. Can you do that?’ Aki translated this into Japanese for Mr. Kitaue, and Kitaue just looked at them and told them plainly, ‘No.’ We did still get to enjoy the Matrix Japanese premiere and afterparty, though.”
However, in a message posted to social media in English, Kojima said that while he and The Wachowskis were “mutual fans and exchanged emails,” he didn’t know they were hoping he’d take on a game adaptation of the movie, and “there could’ve been a way to make it work” despite his commitment to Metal Gear Solid 2: Sons of Liberty.
I was surprised to see on social media that the Wachowski sisters had “offered me a Matrix game project!” back in 1999. In all these 26 years, no one ever told me such a conversation had taken place. At the time, we were mutual fans and exchanged emails. The Matrix hadn’t been… pic.twitter.com/4P10P9eEfT
— HIDEO_KOJIMA (@HIDEO_KOJIMA_EN) October 29, 2025
“I was surprised to see on social media that the Wachowski sisters had ‘offered me a Matrix game project!’ back in 1999,” he wrote. “In all these 26 years, no one ever told me such a conversation had taken place. At the time, we were mutual fans and exchanged emails. The Matrix hadn’t been released in Japan yet, but I had already seen it in theaters in the U.S. and at a preview screening.
“When the Wachowskis came to Japan for promotion, I believe I met them three times. In the morning, we had a Famitsu interview in Shinjuku — that time, Geof Darrow joined us for the talk session. In the afternoon, they were invited to the headquarters of Konami’s CS Division. Back then, I was vice-president of KCE Japan, a wholly-owned subsidiary. When I arrived at the headquarters, their meeting with Mr. Kitaue, the head of the CS Division, had just ended.
“I joined them afterward, and we chatted for about an hour without an interpreter (Aki wasn’t even there),” he added. “I think John Gaeta, the visual effects supervisor, was also present. That evening, I attended the premiere screening and party, where I also met Joel Silver. Even then, there was no mention of an offer.
“At that time, I was already extremely busy with [Metal Gear Solid 2] and probably couldn’t have accepted the offer right away. But if someone had told me, maybe there could’ve been a way to make it work.”
Kojima is working on a number of new projects, including horror game OD for Xbox Game Studios. He revealed the first trailer for it last month, sparking speculation that it is connected to P.T. in some way. The mysterious game will star Dungeons & Dragons: Honor Among Thieves’ Sophia Lillis, Hunters’ Udo Kier, and Euphoria’s Hunter Schafer, with the trailer showcasing Lillis’ character in a spooky house, lighting candles before meeting a malevolent figure.
The Matrix franchise was eventually adapted into a series of games, of course, starting with Shiny Entertainment’s Enter the Matrix in 2003, follow up The Matrix: Path of Neo in 2005, and Monolith Production’s The Matrix Online in the same year. We were also treated to a Matrix-themed tech demo in 2021, The Matrix Awakens: An Unreal Engine 5 Experience, in which Epic Games showed us what Unreal Engine 5 was capable of.
Photo by Phillip Faraone/Getty Images for Kojima Productions.
Vikki Blake is a reporter for IGN, as well as a critic, columnist, and consultant with 15+ years experience working with some of the world’s biggest gaming sites and publications. She’s also a Guardian, Spartan, Silent Hillian, Legend, and perpetually High Chaos. Find her at BlueSky.
An epic RPG adventure awaits, Hero.
It’s an incredibly exciting week for old school RPG fans, with Square Enix releasing Dragon Quest I & II HD-2D Remake on the Switch, Switch 2 and multiple other platforms. This reimagined package comes loaded with not only the trademark HD-2D visuals, but also new features, new locations and new story content.
Ahead of our own review going live later today, the very first critic review has now been shared online. As usual, it comes from the famous Japanese publication Famitsu. So, what is the final verdict?
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Here’s a teaser…
There was recently news about the upcoming release SpongeBob SquarePants: Titans of the Tide getting a demo on select platforms, and ahead of Halloween, it’s now officially available on the Switch 2 eShop.
You’ll apparently be able to access the first levels of the game as SpongeBob and Patrick, and also some new abilities (thanks, Nintendo Everything). In general, you’ll also be able to get an idea of what to expect before the full release next month on 18th November 2025.
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Download it now.
Nintendo has been updating all sorts of first-party titles since the release of the Switch 2 in June, and today it’s rolled out an update for its limited-time release, Super Mario 3D All-Stars.
According to the official patch notes on Nintendo’s support page, Version 1.1.4 addresses “several issues” to improve gameplay on the new hybrid hardware. Nintendo doesn’t go into the specifics, but if we hear anything, we’ll let you know.
Read the full article on nintendolife.com
Poker face.
Remember how much time you have sunk into Vampire Survivors? How about all the hours you’ve put into Balatro? What if they were… in the same game?
Yep, you guessed it, Vampire Survivors is crossing over with Balatro in the new ‘Ante Chamber’ free expansion. This one arrives on most platforms today, but we’ll have to wait a little longer until it lands on Switch on 31st October.
Read the full article on nintendolife.com
It’s hard to imagine what first-person shooters would be like today, if they were to exist at all, without the original DOOM, released back on December 10, 1993, for MS-DOS. A lone super soldier, the legendary Doom Guy, fending off the hordes of demons from hell is one of the defining images of PC gaming, and the series continues to shock and amaze fans to this day with every new gory entry. Now, Modiphius Entertainment is bringing DOOM to the tabletop with the upcoming Doom Arena Board Game, now on Kickstarter, and I had a chance to get some time with a prototype to see just how well I could rip and tear in my dining room.
While Doom Arena isn’t the first cardboard adaptation of the series, this latest rendition is a bloodbath contest between one player controlling Doom Guy and the other controlling the demons. Taking place in – you guessed it, an arena – the two players maneuver their plastic forces around the hexagon grid-based warzone, competing to see who can dish out the most pain.
Each point of damage done to an opponent earns you blood, which serves as a victory point. The winner is whoever comes out ahead in two out of the three rounds by earning the most blood, with each round consisting of six turns each for both sides. Between rounds, both Doom Guy and the Demons can upgrade their arsenals. Doom Guy gets new weapons and armor, while the Demons swap out weaker enemies for hartier ones like Pinky, Cacodemons, or the mighty Cyberdemon.
Doom Arena is one of those games that fits great as a filler between some heavier ones during a game day, or when you just want to have some fun while sipping a cold one and munching on some snacks. The gameplay is a slick dice-chucker where the strategy takes a back seat to running in guns blazing and seeing how much pain you unleash, which is very reminiscent of its source material. The only real “strategy” I found myself thinking about is what upgrades I was going to spend my resources on between rounds.
I appreciate the simpler ruleset behind Doom Arena, because you can explain the rules to friends pretty quickly and be rolling dice shortly after. That being said, I wouldn’t complain if there were a smidgen more depth to be found. To be fair, the prototype I had access to and a work-in-progress ruleset included only two-player game modes, whereas the final game will be playable with 2-4 players, so it’s possible the additional depth I am hoping for will be found in the final rules and other game modes. On the topic of game modes, I will say that having official rules for starting with more upgrades is smart, and makes for a ton of chaotic fun, and I could see some great matches happen by adopting a pick/counter-pick approach.
The version of Doom Arena that I played featured miniatures showcasing the classic looks of Doom Guy and demons that players of the original game from the ’90s will recognize. But those who jumped on the chainsaw wagon in more recent decades will have a version for them, too. Modiphius is producing a mechanically identical version that instead has arenas, models, and weapons pulled from the most recent Doom: The Dark Ages, with Doom Guy replaced by the menacing Doom Slayer and demons including the Mancubus, Imps, Imp Stalkers, Hell and Battle Knights, Pinky Rider, Arachnotron, and Soldiers. And for folks who may be lacking in storage space, Modiphius will also offer a version that replaces the plastic miniatures with acrylic standees, shrinking the box size and lowering the cost.
When I first heard the announcement that Modiphius was designing a new Doom board game, my mind immediately went to images of playing as Doom Guy, exploring corridors, finding keys to unlock doors, that eventually would lead to a fight with a big scary demon. Something more akin to say a Betrayal at House on the Hill, Cthulu: Death May Die, or Zombicide. I still would love a Doom game like that, but I can’t deny that Doom Arena captures the spirit of these games splendidly.
This is a series about killing as many things as fast as possible, and Arena delivers on that premise in an exciting and digestible package. Even playing dice with this WIP build led to tense moments where I had to hold my breath as I rolled my dice, or giant sighs of relief as my demons avoided being brutally dismembered by a chainsaw. I eagerly look forward to seeing what sort of additional elements or add-ons will be available to play around with and what sort of other game modes will ship in the final release that use three and four players. With the Doom Arena Board Game, Modphius looks to deliver a box that fans of both the video games and board games in general can enjoy, and I am counting down the days until I can rev up my chainsaw again and take it to some demons again.
Doom the Arena Board Game’s campaign runs until November 21, 2025 with an expected delivery date of October 2026.
Scott White is a freelance contributor to IGN, assisting with tabletop games and guide coverage. Follow him on X/Twitter or Bluesky.
Combining classic 1930s “rubber-hose” animation, retro gunplay, modern mechanics and exploration, and a deeply bizarre setting, Mouse: P.I. For Hire is shaping up to be a truly unusual treat – but there’s more to this game than you might have realized from earlier trailers.
After announcing a March 19, 2026 release date during today’s ID@Xbox Showcase, we were treated to a deep-dive on the game, directly from the developers at Fumi Studios in Warsaw, Poland.
You can watch the full deep-dive above, or read on to find out the big new details we learned along the way:
If there’s one thing to take away from today’s introduction, it’s that Mouse is far more than a retro shooter in even more retro clothing. While your core interaction is with the game’s gunplay (more on that later), this is a far more modern game than you might think.
For a start, your character – war veteran-turned-private investigator, Jack Pepper – doesn’t have just a single case to solve. From the very beginning, Jack’s presented with three separate cases to solve, each of which will take him across the city of Mouseburg to unravel their secrets.
Each case can be taken on in any order, asking you not just to take down the enemies in your way, but to find clues – whether those are physical objects, information learned by talking to NPCs, or photographs you might take. Clues can then be taken to your office’s classic string-adorned corkboard, and put in place to unlock new revelations and destinations.
With 10 biomes to explore, each containing multiple levels, this is very different to a Point A-to-Point B shooter.
At the core of all that exploration is the game’s hub world – set at the centre of Mouseburg, the hub contains Jack’s office, his local pub, and a workshop where he can upgrade his weaponry before heading to the next case. But there’s far more here than a series of menus. NPCs might offer conversations, and a range of minigames are on offer to provide different gameplay experiences, and even rewards of new clues, or upgrades.
The biggest of these minigames will take you across the entire game – a classic collectible card game, themed around baseball, will see cards dropped across many of the levels you’ll be fighting through, letting you build a deck and take on increasingly difficult matches.
And once you’re ready to leave, you can jump in your car and take a trip across the beautiful overworld map to your next firefight.
Mouse’s combat draws on classic shooters like DOOM, but with added touches that bring it right up to date. With a philosophy of “challenging but fair”, you’ll be pitted against hordes of enemies, collecting weaponry that ranges from the expected (Tommy guns, shotguns) to the gleefully insane (a brain in a jar that fires psychic waves).
Every gun comes with an alt-fire mode, and can be upgraded over the course of the game, helping things stay fresh. But beware – enemies themselves will see upgrades, too. As you progress, familiar enemy types will start to get their own modifications – a tank-like enemy you may have mastered can start coming equipped with a forcefield, for example, forcing you to change you tried-and-true approach.
Bosses might even throw in whole new mechanics, too – we saw a ghost-like boss named the Third Wife, which seems to require you to weaken her with a flashlight before you can start pumping lead.
And, of course, we need to talk about how this game looks. While enivronments are rendered in 3D, every single character, enemy, and weapon has been painstakingly hand-drawn and animated to resemble classic 1930s “rubber hose” animation. The way everything in the world bounces, stretches, and bends is a tribute to that distinctive style (even shotgun shells seem to dance in their chambers during a reload), and took an enormous amount of work from Fumi.
To add to the challenge, the game is entirely black-and-white, which changed how Fumi approached traditional level design. Where most games use colour to subtly guide the player, Fumi needed to take that approach with light, giving the entire game a unique look from a player’s perspective. Even here, we’re seeing a tribute to classic cartoons – interactable objects dance in place, waiting for you to find them.
And to complete that tribute to the past, we even learned that Fumi has added customizable audio filters to the game – you can choose to play with crisp, modern sound effects and music, or add degradation to help it everything sound as if it’s being played off of old-school vinyl. The attention to detail – and to how players might want to experience it – is clear across everything Fumi has touched.
Mouse: P.I for Hire comes to Xbox Series X|S on March 19, 2026.
PlaySide
DEADLY INVESTIGATIONS
Meet Private Investigator Jack Pepper, a former war hero-turned-detective in a world where danger lurks even in the smallest mouse hole. Uncover the truth when a simple missing persons case quickly escalates into a complex web of intrigue, with corruption, kidnapping and murder all on the docket. Investigate the seedy underbelly of Mouseburg, battle heavily armed gangs and crooked cops, and discover clues to reveal the conspiracy buried underneath the surface.
LOCK, LOAD & LAUGH
From crackling machine guns to explosive firepower, each weapon in Pepper’s arsenal is designed to deploy non-stop cartoon chaos. Arm yourself with an array of classic, creatively twisted and experimental firearms, and consume powerful upgrades when you need that extra spinach-loaded punch! Lethal encounters and manic boss battles await in this boomer shooter-inspired, retro-vibed adventure – and the denizens of Mouseburg never go down without a fight.
A CITY OF SECRETS
Explore a diverse city playground, from dark streets to classic film studios, opulent opera buildings, poisonous swamps and underground sewers. With a myriad of cases to solve and collectibles to find, Mouseburg is truly a detective’s delight! Use every tool at your disposal to wall-run, grapple-hook and double-jump through this unrelenting cartoon world.
FEATURES
– Black and white, hand-drawn rubber hose animation, inspired by cartoons of the 1930s
– Fast-paced FPS combat, where constant movement is key
– A thrilling single-player campaign that unravels a complex web of crime and corruption
– Over 20 noir-infused levels, teeming with mice, rats and shrews
– Fully-loaded arsenal of over a dozen unique weapons and equipment – with a cartoon twist
– Devastating consumable power-ups, capable of turning the tide of any battle
– Unlockable movement abilities and Metroidvania-inspired level traversal
– Original jazz soundtrack, featuring a big band orchestral ensemble
The post Mouse: P.I. for Hire Is Much More Than It Appears appeared first on Xbox Wire.
The classic 1995 first-person shooter Star Wars: Dark Forces is finally getting its due, in action figure form. Kyle Katarn, the hero of the video game, is getting a Star Wars The Black Series action figure. It costs $27.99 and will be available on April 1. You can preorder it now at Amazon.
The Kyle Katarn figure is six inches tall, with a good amount of articulation. It comes with a blaster and a blue-bladed Lightsaber, with a standard blade and one that mimics the blurred swinging effect. It’s a figure that looks good enough for adults to enjoy as a collectible, but it works equally well for play, with a suggest age range of 4+.
The video game Star Wars: Dark Forces hit PC in 1995, with a port to PS1 the following year. It’s one of the early “Doom clones,” but it had strong enough story and gameplay elements to stand up on its own. Gameplay-wise, it included novel ideas like the ability to jump and duck, as well as to look up and down, all of which Doom and Doom 2 lacked.
Dark Forces is set in the (no-longer-canon) extended universe, around the time of the first Star Wars movie. It follows Kyle Katarn, a mercenary working for the Rebel Alliance, as he uncovers the Dark Troopers Project and goes about trying to stop it. This mission brings him all over the galaxy to locations like Jabba’s yacht, the Imperial mines on Gromas, inside a Star Destroyer, and more.
Star Wars: Dark Forces got the remaster treatment last year, making it accessible on modern platforms and tweaking its graphics and adding various quality-of-life improvements.
Chris Reed is a commerce editor and deals expert for IGN. He also runs IGN’s board game and LEGO coverage. You can follow him on Bluesky.
My review of The Outer Worlds 2 begins with a retelling of the first unexpected curveball the RPG threw my way. Barely out of the intro and having made exactly two vending machine purchases, I was offered the consumerism flaw. This puzzled me. As it turns out, this event had good reason to puzzle me.
