ENTERTAINMENT

Days Gone Remastered was one of the standout announcements during Sony’s recent State of Play showcase, but some PlayStation Plus subscribers aren’t happy about its $10 upgrade.

Sony has confirmed that the $10 upgrade to the remastered version on PlayStation 5 is only available to those who own the PlayStation 4 disc or a digital copy of Days Gone. Game redemptions via subscription service PS Plus, therefore, are not eligible for the $10 upgrade to the PS5 remaster.

(Days Gone was available on the now defunct PS Plus Collection and was an Essential monthly game in April 2021.)

This means those who own Days Gone via PS Plus will have to pay the full $49.99 to play this new PS5 version of the game.

The detail of the $10 upgrade has caused some PS Plus subscribers to venture online to complain. A post on the PlayStation Plus subreddit, for example, is packed with comments from subscribers who say they would have paid $10 to upgrade to the PS5 remaster, but now will skip the game entirely.

“They would actually have made a decent chunk of change if PS Plus players were eligible, even if most didn’t want to play it they’d at least be interested in paying 10 bucks to try it out for an hour or two,” suggested squarejellyfish_.

“They should let Essentials upgrade cause I would pay the $10, but I will not buy it any other way,” added “teckn9ne79. “I will stick with the one I got.”

“Yeah this seems pretty stupid,” said dredizzle99. “There’s no way I’m paying full price for this, but I’d happily pay for the upgrade at least just to check it out. Surely the majority of people that have it on PS plus are thinking the same thing, so they’re basically losing all the potential sales from them.”

“They gave away the game for free so every copy is an extra £10/$10 they wouldn’t have had but they decided to be awkward instead and cut out half the owner base,” jackanyon95 said. “I’m not paying full price, it didn’t even need a remaster.”

Marvel Rivals was, from the moment it was revealed, compared to Overwatch. Taken at face value, Marvel Rivals is remarkably similar to Blizzard’s game; while Marvel Rivals uses Marvel heroes and villains for its playable characters, it is, like Overwatch, a competitive multiplayer hero shooter with some remarkably similar mechanics and gameplay systems. Both Marvel Heroes and Overwatch 2 are free-to-play, monetized as live services, and lean on the addition of new characters to keep things feeling fresh.

Marvel Rivals has enjoyed explosive popularity since launching in December, and it is speculated that this has come at the cost of interest in Overwatch 2. Blizzard’s game, according to the current narrative, is dwindling as NetEase’s Marvel Rivals gobbles up its players.

In a recent interview with GamesRadar, Overwatch 2 director Aaron Keller discussed the new reality Blizzard finds itself in, with Marvel Rivals now out in the wild and attracting tens of millions of players.

“We’re obviously in a new competitive landscape that I think, for Overwatch, we’ve never really been in before, to this extent where there’s another game that’s so similar to the one that we’ve created,” Keller said.

You’d think this would be a bad thing for Overwatch, then, but Keller called the situation “exciting,” and even said it was “really great” to see Marvel Rivals take ideas established by Overwatch in a “different direction.”

Still, Keller admitted Marvel Rivals’ success had forced a change in attitude within Blizzard when it comes to Overwatch 2, saying: “this is no longer about playing it safe.”

To that end, Blizzard has announced radical changes coming to Overwatch 2 in 2025. While the roadmap ahead includes much of what you’d expect to see in terms of new content, the core gameplay itself will see a seismic shift, including the additions of hero perks and the return of loot boxes.

All eyes will be on Overwatch 2 to see if these changes spark a resurgence in interest. We’re now nearly nine years out from the debut of Overwatch in 2016, and two-and-a-half from the launch of Overwatch 2. And while Blizzard does not make Overwatch player numbers public, we can see concurrent player numbers on Steam are as low as they’ve ever been since Overwatch 2 launched on Valve’s platform in 2023, with a 37,046 concurrent player peak over the last 24 hours.

Marvel Rivals, meanwhile, remains a top 10 most-played game on Steam, with a 310,287 concurrent player peak over the last 24 hours.

Overwatch 2 still has a ‘mostly negative’ user review rating on Steam. Indeed, in August 2023, Overwatch 2 became the worst user-reviewed game on Steam ever. Most of the negative reviews focused on monetization after Blizzard was heavily-criticised for forcing its premium predecessor to update into a free-to-play sequel, rendering the original Overwatch unplayable, back in 2022. Overwatch 2 subsequently endured a number of controversies including the cancellation of its long-awaited PvE Hero mode — the one feature, players said, that justified the sequel’s existence.

IGN has loads more on Marvel Rivals, including the developer’s clarification on datamining, and thoughts on the possibility of a Nintendo Switch 2 version.

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.

A Mortal Kombat 1 dataminer has unearthed what looks like compelling evidence that the gory fighting game will get Hara-Kiri Fatalities in the form of Quitalities.

Redditor InfiniteNightZ published a video, below, showing off what look like Hara-Kiri Fatalities in Mortal Kombat 1. A Hara-Kiri finisher, first introduced in 2004’s Mortal Kombat: Deception, sees the defeated player cause their own death with a self-Fatality.

What’s interesting here is that InfiniteNightZ found Hara-Kiri animations for recently released DLC characters, such as Ghostface, adding credence to the speculation that they will be added to Mortal Kombat 1 in a future update rather than left on the cutting room floor. “After seeing that they’re adding it to the downloaded roster now, I think it’s highly possible,” InfiniteNightZ said.

InfiniteNightZ then suggested the Hara-Kiri animations could arrive as Quitalities, given that’s how they’re referenced in the game’s code. Quitalities are quick-fire finishers that trigger when a player quits a multiplayer match, and have been in previous games in the series. “They are listed as Quitalities, there’s still hope,” InfiniteNightZ said of the animations.

High-profile Mortal Kombat 1 dataminer Interloko found additional Hara-Kiri animations, after InfiniteNightZ’s find was made public.

Thanks @MatthewDim40523 for tag me
Here are another 2 missing from the video, so looks like only Omniman and Conan doesn’t have one.

I didn’t try to trigger it in the game because I’m bussy finishing some stuff of the demo of my own game https://t.co/TqBKyauY0G pic.twitter.com/hL4QzLRXwf

— Interloko (@interloko) February 16, 2025

Of course, this may all amount to nothing, and it’s worth noting that neither NetherRealm nor publisher Warner Bros. Games has announced Quitalities for Mortal Kombat 1.

Mortal Kombat 1 recently enjoyed a resurgence with the addition of a secret fight with Floyd, the pink ninja, and the community-driven effort to work out his unlock conditions. Meanwhile, Mortal Kombat 1 fans have the T-1000 guest character to look forward to, and potentially more DLC to come, although NetherRealm has yet to confirm that.

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.

What happened to Rare’s Everwild? It’s been over five years since the game was announced back during Microsoft’s X019 presentation. Repeated no-shows during Xbox showcases and rumors of reboots have caused some to wonder whether Everwild had fallen by the wayside. Not so, Xbox boss Phil Spencer has said.

In an interview with XboxEra, Spencer listed Everwild as one of the games yet to come out that he was excited for, adding he’d recently visited UK studio Rare, which runs live service pirate adventure game Sea of Thieves, to get a look at Everwild and the progress the developers were making.

“Yeah, State of Decay is just one of the franchises I love back from the original one, so that one stays on the board. I do think the work that Double Fine’s doing and how Tim [Schafer] kind of solicits feedback from the team. And the other one, I’ll say because I was recently out at Rare. It’s nice to see the team with Everwild and the progress that they’re making.”

Spencer said Microsoft had been able to give the developers of those games (State of Decay, the next game from Double Fine, and Everwild) time while still having a packed schedule of releases (bolstered, obviously, by the acquisitions of Bethesda and Activision Blizzard).

“We can give those teams time,” Spencer said. “And next week I’m going to be up in Vancouver with the Coalition [Gears of War developer] — and how fun is that?”

As for Everwild, it’s faced concern over the years after the aforementioned reboot rumor, which Microsoft has denied, and the exit of creative director Simon Woodroffe in 2020. Rare filled the director’s chair with veteran designer Gregg Mayles, who previously worked on Donkey Kong Country, Banjo-Kazooie, Viva Pinata, and Sea of Thieves.

But what is Everwilds? Reports have indicated it’s a third-person adventure game with god game elements, but given how long it’s been in development, that may have changed. The last Everwilds trailer, released in July 2020, carried the following description: “Everwild is a brand new IP from Rare. A unique and unforgettable experience await in a natural and magical world.”

Microsoft has a long list of in-development games, including the Perfect Dark reboot, the next Halo, and Playground’s new Fable game. Meanwhile, Bethesda is working on The Elder Scrolls 6, and Activision is of course working on this year’s Call of Duty. In the shorter term, id Software’s Doom: The Dark Ages launches in May.

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.

Composer Jack Wall has discussed why he failed to return for Mass Effect 3 having created the much-loved music for the first two games in the series.

Wall worked with developer BioWare to create the 80s sci-fi music-styled soundtracks for Mass Effect, released in 2007, and its sequel, 2010’s Mass Effect 2. Mass Effect 2 in particular is often cited as one of the greatest action role-playing games ever made, and Wall’s soundtrack, which includes the rousing ‘Suicide Mission,’ is considered a series high-point by fans.

But Wall failed to return for 2012’s Mass Effect 3, which came as a shock to fans. Now, in a new interview with The Guardian, Wall discussed why, pointing to a falling out with then Mass Effect development chief Casey Hudson.

“Casey was not particularly happy with me at the end,” Wall said. “But I’m so proud of that score. It got nominated for a Bafta, and it did really well … [even if] it didn’t go as well as Casey wanted.”

The Guardian suggested a “creative tension” between Wall and Hudson, but Wall remained vague. “Fallouts like that happen, it’s just part of the deal,” he added. “It’s one of the few times in my career that’s happened, and it was a tough time, but it is what it is.”

Wall did, however, go into a bit more detail on the challenges he and BioWare faced getting Mass Effect 2 out the door and Suicide Mission into the finished product, which may provide some insight into Wall and Hudson’s relationship at the end of the project.

“It was the biggest mind-f***ing thing I’ve ever done in my entire life,” Wall said. “And there was no one available to walk me through it, because they were all freaking out trying to finish the game. I handed it in, and they had to do a lot of massaging on their end in order to get it to work, but they did it… and the result is still one of the best ending sequences to a game that I’ve ever played. It was worth all that effort.”

After Mass Effect 2, Wall went on to make music for Call of Duty games, most recently composing the soundtrack for Black Ops 6. BioWare, meanwhile, is currently working on the next Mass Effect game following the release of Dragon Age: The Veilguard. BioWare is yet to announce the composer.

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.

Life is a highway, so they say. And in Broken Arrow, the upcoming modern warfare RTS from Steel Balalaika and Slitherine, it’s a highway littered with exploded BMD fighting vehicles that I just took out with a heavy armored advance, before getting caught out by an AT attack on my flanks. Set in a fictional Eastern European war between Russia and the United States, it has a lot of tactical depth while remaining very easy to control.

The scenario is a bit cloudy from the couple of missions I played. I spent half the time driving an American dignitary around a joint Baltic States base in a tutorial mission, with the snarky implication that he only really cares about selling more tanks and planes. The other was securing a convoy route to Kaliningrad. There’s not a lot of time wasted on the details of, say, why such a conflict wouldn’t immediately go nuclear. Or what sparked it in the first place, for that matter. That’s really not the focus. This is one for the Fulda Gap fans.

If you’ve ever played games like Steel Division, you’ll find a lot of familiar mechanics here. Infantry, vehicles, aircraft, and support weapons are called in using a ticking income of requisition you get from holding control points, and reinforcements will spawn at specific bases before moving out to their final destination. Thus, a lot of attention has to be paid to making sure the way to the front is secure, or you might get sniped trying to bring in fresh troops.

Follow Orders

One thing I was immediately impressed by is how easy to control everything is in Broken Arrow. Units are very responsive to my commands to charge or fall back, even when I’m panic-clicking to try to fight my way out of an ambush. There are several targeting options for artillery, all of which are intuitive and easy to use. You select a munition, how long of a barrage you want, then draw a line or mark a spot and watch the shells fly. Aircraft have semi-realistic maneuverability stats, so you have to think about leaving room to turn around between strafing runs.

The Russian faction also uses drones, but they weren’t available to me in either of the missions I got to play (both as the US), so it’s hard to tell what their role will be. I’m particularly interested in the details there, since I’ve played plenty of modern war RTSes set in the “War on Terror” era, and drone warfare is one of the major factors that could take a game about our present moment and set it apart from those familiar tactical paradigms. I did get to play with some attack helicopters, which are just as responsive to commands as the other units and have a “stealth” mode where they can fly much lower to avoid detection, at a sharp cost of speed.

Support units in Broken Arrow are modeled by cargo trucks that can carry a variable amount of supplies, depending on if you just need to deploy a quick top-up to a problem spot or create a dedicated supply depot after your tanks got beat up in a head-on scrape. Once the supplies are dropped on the ground, they create a small, circular repair aura that will automatically get any vehicles inside it back to factory shape. This is a little bit of an arcadey abstraction, but it’s not one I really minded much. The fact that we’re taking into account the need to bring supplies to the front at all is nice.

Boots on the Ground

Infantry are especially fragile and easy to suppress, to the point that I didn’t find myself using them that often. They can be garrisoned in buildings, but any amount of enemy armor seems to make light work of dislodging them. At least in the missions I played, there weren’t a lot of opportunities for firefights in the streets, going house-to-house to capture a village, or holding the line with rifle squads. The focus seems to definitely be on the vehicles. But that could have just been a product of what this particular demo chose to show off.

There is a fairly detailed line-of-sight system that adds a lot of tactical depth. On one training exercise, I was able to park my tank in a bit of sunken ground where the enemy couldn’t see it, peek out to take a shot, then reverse back into my hole where I was safe. In another battle, I basically used a highway overpass for cover. A lot of weapons have a longer effective range than their vision radius, making scouting valuable. Indirect fire is also a consideration, although I only had access to some lighter mortars in the demo. I’m very interested in what heavier options are available and how they could open up more possibilities.

Even on max settings, Broken Arrow does have a little bit of a budget look to it. The explosions are great, but the vehicle models are a bit flat, with fairly simple, clay-like textures that don’t really react to light in a way that makes you go, “Wow!” This isn’t exactly a Microsoft Flight Simulator-level replica of the F-15. But I’m generally playing so zoomed out that I’m not nitpicking the little details anyway.

From what little I’ve seen of Broken Arrow, I’m quite interested in finding out what the rest of its campaign, its multiplayer modes, and army builder will add to its snappy, easy-to-command RTS battles. We’ll be able to take the full version for a ride this June.