ENTERTAINMENT

This year’s Samsung Galaxy Unpacked event has unveiled the company’s newest line of 2025 Galaxy S25 smartphones. They come in three familiar variants: the Galaxy S25, the Galaxy S25+, and the Galaxy S25 Ultra. All three models have been officially released and are now shipping out from Samsung and other retailers.

Samsung direct is generally the best place online to preorder an unlocked Galaxy phone. Not only do you get a phone that’s free of bloatware, you can take advantage of a combination of instant savings, bonus Samsung credit for your next purchase, and generous trade-in values. Amazon is also offering its own bonus gift card deal as well.

For those of you who had placed a reservation online in advance of Galaxy Unpacked, you can cash in on additional savings in the form of a bonus $50 Samsung credit and bigger trade-in values.

Samsung Galaxy S25

Up to $50 off discounts, up to $100 in Amazon credit, and up to $500 off with trade-in

Pokémon Trading Card Game Pocket has a strange black market where players are buying and selling the digital cards online via its controversial trading mechanic.

Myriad listings for Pokémon TCG Pocket cards have appeared on eBay, with players charging $5 to $10 per card. This is only possible through the game’s recently introduced trading mechanic, as these sellers are simply asking to exchange friend codes with the buyers and then sending a card over.

One $5.99 listing for a Starmie ex, for example, asks buyers to ensure they have 500 Trade Tokens, one Trade Stamina, and most importantly, an “unwanted Pokémon ex” to exchange for the card they actually want.

This is where things get a bit strange. While it’s already a blatant breach of the Pokémon TCG Pocket terms of service — as “buying or selling virtual contents or data on the service” is not allowed — the seller in these situations essentially loses nothing.

The buyer gives up a card they don’t need for a card they do, which is a regular trade beyond the price tag, but the buyer doesn’t lose stock. Per the restrictions on trading, only cards of the same rarity can be traded, meaning the seller gains an ex Pokémon when they sell one and can therefore just sell it again.

Myriad listings for ex Pokémon and 1 Star, alternate art cards, the two rarest available to trade, are listed on eBay, each with varying price tags. Entire accounts are on sale too, offering the likes of Pack Hourglasses and rare cards within them, though this is a fairly common for online games, breach of service or not.

Trading in Pokémon TCG Pocket proved controversial upon its release last week, though this trading online isn’t directly related to the complaints.

Alongside the standard mechanic that restricts players from opening packs or Wonder Picking or, now, trading too much without spending real world money, the feature was also introduced with an extra restriction called Trade Tokens. Players criticized the high cost of obtaining these, as they essentially had to delete from their collections five cards before trading one of the same rarity.

This black market would have spawned even if trading had been released with absolutely no restrictions, however. The only relation to what players have complained about so far is in how bare bones the mechanic is, as there is no way to trade without being friends with another player.

This is because some players, like siraquakip on Reddit, were hoping for “a pretty safe way for the community to connect more.” Players have called for the ability to put cards up for trade publicly within the app, alleviating the need for using external websites like Reddit and Discord, and now eBay, to find the cards they need.

Developer Creatures Inc. has already warned players against buying and selling cards using real world money and other methods of cheating, telling players before trading launched that “if we confirm that a player has engaged in behavior that violates the Terms of Use, we will warn them, suspend their account, or take other action.”

The irony is that Creatures Inc. deployed the hated Trade Tokens mechanic in order to stop exploiting the system in ways exactly like these eBay sellers are doing. It’s therefore clearly not worked, but has turned much of the community against the developer.

It’s currently “actively investigating ways to improve” the trading feature but hasn’t released any specifics on how it will do so despite complaints starting three weeks ago when it first unveiled the feature.

Fans have claimed trading is being implemented as a means of increasing revenue for Pokémon TCG Pocket, which is estimated to have made half a billion dollars in less than three months, before trading was possible.

This is also evidenced by the inability to trade cards of 2 Star rarity or higher, as if players could immediately trade for their missing cards, they wouldn’t need to spend $10 or $100 or more for a random chance of getting them. It cost one player around $1,500 just to complete the first set, for example, and the third in three months arrived last week.

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

Player housing is coming to World of Warcraft, and Blizzard has unveiled its first look at how the MMO will handle it. In a new preview, the WoW team walked through early details, and even threw a quick jab at Final Fantasy XIV’s housing in the process.

World of Warcraft is adding a sought-after housing feature in its upcoming expansion, World of Warcraft: Midnight. Amid its pillars and goals for housing in the recent dev blog, Blizzard listed “A Home for Everyone” as one of its targets.

“As a part of our focus on wide adoption, we wanted to ensure that Housing is available to everyone. If you want a house, you can have a house,” Blizzard said. “No exorbitant requirements or high purchase costs, no lotteries, and no onerous upkeep (and if your subscription lapses, don’t worry, your house doesn’t get repossessed!).”

Player housing is, in essence, what it sounds like: physical homes players can buy in these MMO worlds, with plenty of room for personalization and decoration, that other players can visit. It’s a very popular facet of Final Fantasy XIV where housing feeds player ingenuity, resulting in theater productions, nightclubs, cafes, and museums.

Of course, Final Fantasy XIV also has some rather infamous housing woes. There are a limited number of plots per server, you have to pay high amounts of Gil and enter a lottery, and then risk your house being demolished if left alone too long.

World of Warcraft’s aim seems to be countering some concerns players might have about housing, based on Final Fantasy XIV’s situation. Housing is even shared among the Warband, so characters can come and go, and rewards are also shared across characters and factional lines. While a Human character can’t buy a house in the Horde zone, a Troll character in your Warband can, and then the Human character can use it.

Additionally, while World of Warcraft’s housing will be split into just two housing zones and “Neighborhoods” of roughly 50 plots apiece, they are instanced and have both Public and Private options. The former is maintained by game servers and created “as needed,” so there’s no clear limit yet on Neighborhoods.

Blizzard seems to be in it for the long haul with World of Warcraft housing. In its stated pillars, alongside “boundless self-expression” and “deeply social,” the team said it wants housing to be a “long lasting journey” with its own roadmap, and updates stretching out into future patches and expansions. It certainly feels like a commitment, and though it took a jab at XIV’s systems, it also shows Blizzard is aware of the pitfalls.

There are still more details to iron out between now and the expected summer unveiling of World of Warcraft: Midnight.

Eric is a freelance writer for IGN.

Old-school Transformers fans with a fondness for the Japanese G1 spinoff Transformers: Victory will be stoked to see Hasbro’s latest Transformers figure reveal. The company is producing a massive Liokaiser Combiner figure, featuring no fewer than six Decepticon figures that combine to form one truly massive toy.

IGN can exclusively debut the first images of the Transformers Legacy: HasLab Liokaiser Combiner figure. Get a closer look in the slideshow gallery below:

This set consists of six individual Chest-force Decepticon figures – Leozak, Gaihawk, Ellbat, Jaruga, Killbison, and Drillhorn. Each figure is part of the Voyager Class scale and measures about 5.5 inches tall. Each also includes a removable Chest Animal accessory that converts into a weapon. Together, the six figures merge to form Liokaiser, which measures 14 inches tall.

The Liokaiser set is produced in conjunction with TOMY and is being crowdfunded through Hasbro’s HasLab program. It’s a follow-up to previous Transformers: Victory-inspired figures Star Saber and Deathsaurus (both of which are sold out and no longer available, unfortunately). The Liokaiser figure is priced at $299.99, with the campaign running from February 7 at 8:59pm PT to March 24. If successfully funded, the preorders are expected to ship beginning in Fall 2026.

The HasLab campaign has a minimum of 10,000 backers in order to be successfully funded. But as with past campaigns, there are several stretch goals that unlock at higher thresholds. At 13,000 backers, Hasbro will include a seventh Deathcobra figure. At 16,000 backers, they’ll include an electromagnetic nunchaku accessory. At 18,000 backers, they’ll include a set of three display bases that can be used to recreate the opening shot from the anime and also combine to form a support structure for Liokaiser.

Will you be backing the Liokaiser campaign? Let us know in the comments.

In other Transformers news, find out how to watch the Transformers movies in order and learn more about the upcoming Transformers/G.I. Joe crossover movie. You can also check out the many collectibles available on the IGN Store.

Jesse is a mild-mannered staff writer for IGN. Allow him to lend a machete to your intellectual thicket by following @jschedeen on BlueSky.