Astarion's new prequel story for Baldur's Gate 3 was doomed from the start. Larian Studios' 2023 Dungeons & Dragons game was a major success, driving player interest in the world of their companions, and D&D publisher Wizards of the Coast responded with supplementary material including miniatures, character sheets, and crossovers in Idle Champions of the Forgotten Realms and Magic: The Gathering.
Final Fantasy 11, Square Enix's first massively multiplayer Final Fantasy game, has received a long-awaited change to its free trial that makes it easier to play than ever. The game is over two decades old but is still alive and well.
The Street Fighter movie's version of Guile's iconic theme keeps the original composition while adding a guitar solo and cinematic tweaks, with the score produced by Leo Birenberg and Zach Robinson of Cobra Kai. The full soundtrack features 39 tracks and launches October 16, the same day the film releases, with WWE's Cody Rhodes playing Guile.
Publisher Joystick Ventures and developer Summitsphere announced that ANTONBLAST will launch for PS5 and PS4 in mid-October. The side-scrolling action platformer first launched for PC via Steam on December 3, 2024, followed by Switch on December 13, 2024. Players take on the role of Dynamite Anton or his coworker Annie to destroy bizarre worlds and reclaim his Spirits from Satan.
Alinea Analytics' Rhys Elliot has argued that Gears of War: E-Day shouldn't have been cancelled on PS5, citing "soft" Steam pre-orders. He said the game has amassed just 120k pre-orders on Steam, low for a big-budget AAA production, and noted the port was reportedly already in the works. He also stressed the game's online multiplayer focus requires a large crossplay audience.
Diablo 5 game director Joe Shely said on Twitter that while the game will keep some DEX (moment-to-moment execution) mechanics, it will on balance be an INT/STR game built around planning and investment. The community responded skeptically, with top Reddit comments saying Blizzard has made such promises before and will likely reverse course after launch. Diablo 5 is still a couple of years away.
Former Halo franchise creative director Frank O'Connor has advised Activision Blizzard to hire laid-off developers from Bungie, Halo Studios, and elsewhere for the next mainline Halo game. In a September 25 LinkedIn post, he outlined three possible directions: a classic sandbox shooter, a modern reinvention, or an Activision-style sandbox game with player progression and business models. He also warned against tying the game to hardware or services launch cycles and against abandoning its sandbox.
PlayStation revealed October's PS Plus monthly games on September 30, available to all subscribers across all tiers and able to be added permanently starting October 6. The lineup is F1 25 and Hunt: Showdown 1896 on PS5, plus Earth Defense Force: World Brothers 2 on PS4 and PS5, with only Hunt: Showdown 1896 offering spooky-adjacent vibes. The games can be claimed for free until November 2, while September's Sniper Elite: Resistance, MLB The Show 26, Wobbly Life, and Chained Echoes must be grabbed by October 5.
The Pokémon Center has opened pre-orders for Delta Reign, its Rayquaza-themed TCG set releasing on Nov. 4, featuring over 135 cards, 14 Illustration Rare cards, 17 Ultra-Rare cards, and six Special Illustration Rare cards. Pre-order items include the $59 Elite Trainer Box with 11 booster packs and a Kyogre illustration rare card, a $26.94 Booster Bundle, and a $159.99 Display box. The Pokémon Center has not yet opened pre-orders for the 30th Celebration Ultra-Premium Collections Day & Night boxes, the Ditto Premium Collection, or the 30th Celebration Figure Collection, all launching Nov. 6, 2026.
Publisher Joystick Ventures and developer Summitsphere announced that ANTONBLAST will launch for PS5 and PS4 on October 1 in Australia and New Zealand, with a worldwide release to follow in mid-October. The side-scrolling action platformer first launched for PC via Steam on December 3, 2024, and for Switch on December 13, 2024. Players take on the role of Dynamite Anton or his coworker Annie to destroy bizarre worlds and steal Spirits back from Satan.
GameSpot rounds up 11 new horror games launching in October, alongside a look back at horror games from earlier this year. Those earlier highlights include Capcom's Resident Evil Requiem, Reanimal from the team behind the first two Little Nightmares games, the Fatal Frame 2 remake, John Carpenter's Toxic Commando, and No More Room In Hell 2.
Former PlayStation boss Shawn Layden advised new Xbox CEO Asha Sharma to "pick a lane," calling her decision Xbox's "Dreamcast moment." He framed the choice as either competing with PlayStation as a platform or exiting hardware to focus on software as the world's biggest game publisher. Xbox is mid-restructure, with nearly 2,000 staff laid off, multiple studios exiting or facing closure, and various games canceled.
Publisher SOEDESCO and developer Senscape announced that the supernatural horror adventure game ASYLUM will launch for PS5, Xbox Series, PS4, and Switch on October 30. The game first launched for PC via Steam and GOG on March 13, 2025. Players take on the role of an ex-patient suffering bizarre visions in the Hanwell Mental Institute.
The Witcher 3: Wild Hunt Remastered is reportedly showing vastly different performance on PS5 Pro depending on the player, with some reporting stable frame rates and others complaining of dropped frames, bad frame pacing, screen tearing, and broken visuals. The remaster is available as a free update for existing owners, and testing visual options, telemetry settings, old saves, and TV 120Hz settings has not replicated the issues. The cause remains unknown.
Pearl Abyss has delayed Crimson Desert's first expansion, Charting the Unknown, by two weeks from its original mid-October window to October 29th, citing a need for additional development time to deliver a more polished and stable gameplay experience. The expansion's Steam page promises an ominous presence in the desert, a dangerous political conflict, ship sailing, deep ocean diving, house building and relationship forging, and also carries a generative AI content disclosure notice stating that AI is used in a supplementary capacity for some 2D prop assets.
A "Raincoat Pikachu" Pokémon TCG card sold at auction on Fanatics Collect for $8.4 million, the second-highest price ever paid for a PTCG card. The card was created in 2015 through a Pokémon Art Academy competition on 3DS, with only 100 copies privately printed, yet PSA lists 57 of them in PSA 10 condition. The same card sold for $156,250 at Heritage Auctions in June this year, making the jump hard to explain.
The free Witcher 3: Wild Hunt - Remastered upgrade has split players, with some complaining the new lighting makes the game too bright and washed out and asking CD Projekt Red for a way to roll back. PC players can turn off a Bloom setting to help, but console players have no such option, and AMD users, Switch 2 handheld players and older Xbox Series S owners are also reporting graphical glitches, blurry visuals and performance drops. Plenty of players, however, say the game looks much better now.
Arc Raiders executive producer Aleksander Grøndal admitted Embark overestimated its capacity for work after transitioning to live service, saying he "wasn't completely prepared for how hard it was." He said the team was exhausted from constantly overshooting its capacity, leading to player drop-off, and that it has since re-evaluated its long-term plan to prioritize quality and work-life balance.
World of Warcraft: Forever players claim Blizzard sent them a Battle.net survey asking about interest in a range of new classes, including Bard, Illusionist, Tinker and Witch. Details leaked online and were covered by YouTubers such as Belluar, though Eurogamer cannot verify the survey's accuracy. Some listed classes, like Death Knight, Demon Hunter and Monk, are reworked takes on modern World of Warcraft classes.
Riftbound's Radiance set launches October 23, and the Overnumbered variant of Ekko, Boy Who Shattered Time has been revealed. The Fury/Mind legend can exhaust a rune and Ekko to empower him, or disempower and exhaust Ekko to reduce the next unit's cost by 2 and grant it a recycled rune of any color, though that unit is killed at end of turn. Radiance is Riftbound's fifth major set, with Pre-Rifts prerelease events at local game stores starting October 16.
Former PlayStation boss Shawn Layden advised Xbox CEO Asha Sharma that Xbox should "pick a lane": either compete as a platform against PlayStation or accept its role as one of the world's biggest game publishers and focus on software. He called it Xbox's "Dreamcast moment," citing Sega's exit from hardware to become a software company. Xbox has recently seen waves of layoffs, parted ways with several studios, and consolidated remaining developers under Activision, Blizzard, King, and Bethesda.
Sony has officially added a requirement for buying the PS5 Pro, the more powerful version of the PS5. Demand is high, console prices are steeper than ever partly due to rising RAM and component costs, and scalpers are reselling the PS5 Pro at astronomical prices.
Publisher Joystick Ventures and developer Summitsphere announced that side-scrolling action platformer ANTONBLAST will launch for PS5 and PS4 on October 1, and it is available now in regions where it is already October 1. The game first launched for PC via Steam on December 3, 2024, followed by Switch on December 13, 2024.
Frank O'Connor, who spent nearly 20 years at Xbox and left in 2023 as creative director of the Halo franchise, shared his view on Halo's future in a LinkedIn comment, laying out three possible directions for Activision: a "classic" Halo experience for the core audience, a modern reinvention of the game and universe, or translating the Halo IP into Activision's proven player, progression and business models. He also advised Microsoft not to tie the next Halo to the Xbox hardware or services cycle, and urged Activision to hire recently laid-off talent from Bungie and Halo Studios.
Rockstar has confirmed GTA 6 will feature 170 species, including 60 birds, more than 30 land mammals, and a variety of fish and reptiles, plus at least one visitable zoo. IGN has compiled around 50 animals confirmed so far from trailers, the Extended Look, and released screenshots — less than a third of the final total, with Rockstar keeping the rest under wraps.
The Witcher 3: Wild Hunt — Remastered launched on Sept. 29 and became the best-reviewed new release of the year. It is free to anyone who owns a digital copy of The Witcher 3, and Switch 2 players can claim it even without a digital copy thanks to a loophole.
Control Resonant director Mikael Kasurinen confirmed the game deliberately avoids yellow paint and similar guidance markers, saying player autonomy matters more than pointing players where to go. He added that yellow can be used if it fits the game's world thematically, but it must not feel like the game is deciding for the player. The decision stands out given Resonant's map is larger than the original Control's office-building setting.
PS Store's Autumn Adventures sale runs until 7th October 2026, and Push Square has picked over 40 PS5 and PS4 games worth buying from the thousands discounted. Every game listed scored at least 7/10 from Push Square and is at its lowest price, with some hitting new all-time lows. The list includes Baldur's Gate 3, Celeste, Dave the Diver, and Castlevania Dominus Collection.
The PS5 vapourware title Abandoned appears to be making a return, as its PS Store page was recently updated with new key art showing the title "Abandoned Prologue" and a release date of 2027. The description lists three versions: Realtime Experience, Prologue chapter, and Base game. Developer Blue Box Game Studios originally surfaced the project in 2021 before it fell into obscurity.
Alinea Analytics claims daily active players in Resident Evil 2 rose 48% in the week after Zach Cregger's new Resident Evil film released, from 78,000 to roughly 116,000, while the Resident Evil 4 remake gained 24% and Resident Evil 3 added 25%. On PS5, the outlet says Resident Evil 2 sales almost doubled during a sale and Resident Evil 4 purchases spiked 77%, predicting an 11% and 14% sales increase respectively from the film's impact. The stats are not official and Capcom also heavily discounted many Resident Evil titles around the movie's release.
A new SEGA sales report shows North America now accounts for roughly 40% of all Persona series sales, making it the franchise's biggest market, with Europe at 20% and Japan plus the rest of Asia splitting the remaining 40%. The report also puts Persona 3-related sales above 5 million, Persona 4-related sales at 5.7 million, and Persona 5-related sales at 13 million. The rumoured Persona 6, said to launch next year, is expected to get a global release, which would be a first for a mainline Persona title.
Fire Emblem: Fortune's Weave topped the Japanese physical charts with 127,131 copies sold in the week of 14th-20th September, per Famitsu. Trails in the Sky 2nd Chapter debuted at No. 2 on Switch 2 with 24,724 sales and No. 4 on PS5 with 21,753. Switch 2 led hardware with 34,341 units, while Xbox Series S came last with just 19.
Three classic Toy Story games — Buzz Lightyear of Star Command (PS1), Toy Story 2 (PS1), and Toy Story 3 (PSP) — have been delisted from the PS Store and removed from PS Plus Premium, with installed PS Plus versions also locked out. The delisting comes ahead of the release of Toy Story Retro Roundup and Toy Story 3 Complete Edition, meaning players will need to buy these new bundles to keep playing them.
Argos, Smyths and Amazon UK have discounted the Switch 2 to £354.99, the console's cheapest price in the UK and £65 below its £419.99 price. Nintendo also plans to launch a Zelda 40th Anniversary Switch 2 on 29th October for £429.99, which is sold out at most retailers.
CD Projekt Red has added the Fire Horse Gear Set to The Witcher 3 Remastered on PS5, giving Roach new saddlebags, a saddle, and blinders in a nod to Oblivion's infamous $2.50 horse armour DLC. The set is free but requires watching 90 minutes of a Twitch stream with Twitch Drops enabled. The offer runs from today until 27th October 2026.
Xbox hosted a FanFest event in London this past weekend with around 500 attendees, offering playable games including Fable, Call of Duty: Modern Warfare 4, Gears of War: E-Day and Minecraft Dungeons 2. Activities included a Fable-themed Chicken Kicker booth, a Gears-themed indoor grenade-throwing game, controller customisation, an Xbox tattoo station and classic games on scattered consoles, with Major Nelson and AceyBongos hosting an Xbox pub quiz. Attendees received swag bags with a London FanFest t-shirt, pint glass, Fresh Ego Kid Xbox25 hat and 8BitDo Xbox25 controller dock, plus three free drinks, though queues were long and Fable and Gears slots booked up quickly.
Troy Baker hyped up Naughty Dog's Intergalactic: The Heretic Prophet at Ottawa Comiccon, saying players "are not ready" and praising Tati Gabrielle's performance as lead character Jordan. He said the cinematics have just wrapped, and the game is expected to release sometime in 2027.
Ghost Ship Publishing and developer Guidelight Games have announced ACORN: Seed of Resistance, a roguelike RPG auto battler coming to PC via Steam in 2027. Players rebuild a fallen order by recruiting refugees, mercenaries and sympathizers, exploring procedurally generated lands and fighting fast-paced auto battles. Each roguelike adventure lasts roughly 15 minutes, set in a dark fantasy world of animal characters.
Dynasty Warriors 3: Complete Edition Remastered arrives on Switch 2 this week, and Omega Force producer Tomohiko Sho has revealed the Switch 2 version is adjusted to handle the same number of on-screen characters as other versions. It runs at a variable 30 to 60fps, displays at 2560 x 1440p in docked mode and an upscaled 1920 x 1080 image in portable mode. The team is also considering graphics-priority and performance-priority modes as a future update, and the game launches on 1st October 2026 with a demo now available on the eShop.
Bandai Namco is bringing Tales of Eternia Remastered to Switch and Switch 2 next month, with a physical release available outside the US. The original Switch physical version includes everything on the game cart, while the Switch 2 physical release is a Game-Key Card requiring a download. There is no Switch 2 Edition upgrade pack and save data cannot be shared between versions, though both run at 60fps at different resolutions.