Author: Game Infliction

Black Friday has arrived, and as you’d probably expect, there are plenty of deals on Magic: The Gathering products. Our beloved, TCGplayer, however, is doing things a little differently.

The retailer is offering 10% store credit back on everything – cards, packs, decks, and just about anything else (and 13% or more back for subscribers). It’s not restricted to Magic, either, with the Pokémon TCG, Riftbound, Lorcana, and just about anything included.

With that in mind, I’ve put together a list of cards that I’d recommend picking up. These aren’t super pricey cards necessarily, but are wishlist items that it probably makes sense to pick up if you’re getting something back for them.

The Best MTG Cards to Buy at TCGplayer This Black Friday

Sol Ring

If you know a Spider-Man fan or a Magic: The Gathering player, then there’s a perfect product that’s tailor-made for them this Christmas.

Magic’s Spider-Man set includes cards depicting classic comic moments, costumed heroes, and nefarious villains, and you can get an instant collection with the Gift Bundle. Better yet, this unique product is reduced by 25% at Amazon for Black Friday.

The director of Clair Obscur: Expedition 33 always believed the turned-based RPG was going to be “cool,” but had no idea it would get this “big.”

Talking to Radio Times Gaming following this year’s Golden Joysticks awards, creative director Guillaume Broche spoke candidly about the studio’s work, admitting that the game’s reception from fans and critics alike has been so unexpected, saying “nobody really understands what’s happening.”

“I think people don’t really realize that, now it’s become big, but before the launch, it was not supposed to be big,” Broche said. “I think we all felt the same thing. It’s going to be cool. It’s not going to be big, it’s going to be cool. And what’s happening today is like, as we say, nobody really understands what’s happening.

“It’s a weird feeling, when you put your heart out into the world and the world embraces it and gives you so much love back. We get so much love from the players… it’s so touching and incredible that it’s very hard to explain.”

Ben Starr — who voices Verso in the RPG — feels the same, adding: “It was never intended to be as big as it is. It’s turned into this kind of cultural moment, phenomenon, but that’s just because the game is very honest, I think. And a lot of people have bought into that.

“I don’t think anyone expected this because it’s a small game. No one expected those numbers, and we’ve all just been messaging each other thinking, this is, well, this is just silly. This is just silly now. Everyone just stop. It’s a silly joke. But yeah, it’s been very cool.”

Clair Obscur: Expedition 33 launched on April 24 across PC and console, but also straight into Xbox Game Pass as a day-one title. In IGN’s 9/10 review of Clair Obscur: Expedition 33, we described it as a “modern RPG classic,” adding: “In so many ways, Clair Obscur: Expedition 33 reminded me of numerous classic and contemporary RPGs I love, but developer Sandfall truly understood why those games are special and made the pieces it borrowed its own.”

Clair Obscur: Expedition 33 has sold 5 million copies in five months, making it one of the biggest hits of the year. It also received a record-breaking 12 nominations at this year’s The Game Awards, and is up for Best Direction, Best Narrative, Best Art Direction, Best Score and Music, Best Audio, Best Independent Game, Best Debut Independent Game, and Best RPG, as well as the ceremony’s coveted Game of the Year gong. Three of its performers are also up for Best Performance.

If that’s convinced you to give it a go, be sure to check out our tips for the important things to know before going into Clair Obscur: Expedition 33. The studio recently published update 1.4.0, adding key features like a Battle Retry option alongside a host of quality-of-life changes, visual improvements, and bug fixes.

If you’re hunting for the best offers this week, we’re actively rounding up the strongest Black Friday deals on video games, tech, and more. You can find all our top picks and price drops in our full Black Friday hub, or check out our relevant pages for PlayStation, Nintendo, and Xbox deals.

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.

The Holidays are approaching, and you know what that means: tanks. Lots and lots of tanks. And to celebrate the season, Wargaming just revealed that none other than Benedict Cumberbatch will be the official Ambassador for the World of Tanks Holiday Ops 2026 event. You can check out an exclusive behind the scenes look at the actor’s appearance in the game in the player above.

Cumberbatch sat down with IGN to dive into his participation in World of Tanks, break down his favorite video games as a kid, and share whether Doctor Strange would beat Doctor Doom in a fight.

“World of Tanks is about as good as it gets,” Cumberbatch says. “My character in the game does much more than just handing out assignments. From the winter garage, he shares bits of life (and) wisdom through stories that inspire players to push forward. There’s also the special Holiday Ops Challenge filled with over 50 battle missions that grant exclusive, customized rewards – including my role as a tank commander with my own voice in the game.”

Cumberbatch follows in a long line of celebrities who’ve participated in World of Tanks Holiday Ops events including Arnold Schwarzenegger, Jason Statham, Milla Jovovich, and Vinnie Jones. Cumberbatch says that his favorite tank in the game is the M24 Chaffee, but that all the artillery in the game wouldn’t stand a chance against one of his famous on-screen characters.

When we asked Cumberbatch who would win a face-off between every single tank in World of Tanks combined and Doctor Strange, he scoffed. “Doctor Strange. Come on guys, of course it would be the good Doctor.”

Cumberbatch, who’s appeared in games like The Nightjar, Sherlock: The Network, LEGO The Hobbit, and Family Guy: The Quest for Stuff, says video games were an essential part of his childhood. “It all started with a little Nintendo Donkey Kong Jr.,” Cumberbatch says, “which I was obsessed with, and then Mario Brothers of course. I had an Atari console which I used to remember playing very basic ping-pong with my dad and a rather scary end of days nuclear strike game where you had to intercept intercontinental ballistic missile(s)! I remember how stiff the control sticks were but (they were) all very fond memories and despite the simplicity a great deal of fun.

“I had a SEGA Game Gear a little later on, but apart from that now the console and gaming world kind of left me behind with adult life. At moments like this I wish I could find some time to while away the hours either with a shoot ’em up or strategy-heavy game. Everything that happened (with World of Tanks) was a completely new experience for me – engaging with the video gaming world and its creative side in such an intense way. It’s been fascinating, and I’m excited to see how players will receive it.”

Cumberbatch, who’s known for his appearances in the MCU, on-screen roles like Sherlock and Smaug, and critically acclaimed turns in films like The Power of the Dog, August: Osage County, and The Imitation Game, says he and the Wargaming team recorded hundreds of voice lines to give his character depth and make him “instantly recognizable.”

“Like all things gaming, (World of Tanks is) wild and clever and fast moving. Here I am stepping into a completely new world and exploring a role that’s both grounded in a certain reality that then slowly swirls into magic realism and absurdity via some great comedic beats.

“I’m the virtual commander in World of Tanks, but in the guise of a highly inappropriate therapist. I’m guiding players through the battlefield with a steady hand. My character is eccentric and high-energy but also the embodiment of calmness. He is a tactician and strategist who knows that true strength lies in composure and clarity of thought.”

Beyond World of Tanks, fans are eager to know if Cumberbatch will appear as Doctor Strange in next year’s Avengers: Doomsday. While he’s tightlipped on that possibility, Cumberbatch does have an opinion as to who’s the ultimate Doctor in the MCU. When we asked him who would win in a fight – Dr Strange or Doctor Doom – he didn’t mince words.

“I hope Dr Strange!”

The World of Tanks Holiday Ops 2026 event kicks off on December 5, 2025, and continues through January 12, 2026.

Michael Peyton is the Senior Editorial Director of Events & Entertainment at IGN, leading entertainment content and coverage of tentpole events including IGN Live, San Diego Comic Con, gamescom, and IGN Fan Fest. He’s spent 20 years working in the games and entertainment industry, and his adventures have taken him everywhere from the Oscars to Japan to Buenos Aires, Argentina. Follow him on Bluesky @MichaelPeyton

I’m parked at the back of the grid on Mount Panorama, awaiting the race start, and there are cars ahead of me literally facing backwards. This is not going to go well. As you’d expect, pandemonium ensues when the lights go off. The race has just begun and it’s already a mess.

Unfortunately, this is Project Motor Racing in a nutshell right now.

On paper, Project Motor Racing is precisely the sort of racing game I want to play. It has a great selection of cars, a number of which are thoroughly underrepresented in modern racers. It’s also not crippled with free-to-play chicanery or subject to a monthly subscription, and its focus isn’t primarily multiplayer. All of this is high-octane music to my ears. In practice, however, Project Motor Racing simply hasn’t worked out, and I’ve totally bounced off it in its current state thanks to AI that essentially ignores your presence on track, a hopelessly uneven penalty system that serves only to frustrate and ruin your races, and its array of bugs and peculiar physics quirks.

Project Motor Racing arrives as a spiritual successor to Slightly Mad Studios’ now-defunct Project CARS series, which failed to survive the Codemasters acquisition of Slightly Mad (and the subsequent EA purchase of Codemasters). There may be some different logos on the loading screen, sure, but developer Straight4 Studios is basically a rebirthed Slightly Mad after someone hit the VIN with an angle grinder.

Perhaps more specifically, it’s attempting to pick up where Project CARS 2 left off – brushing aside the bafflingly casual reinvention of the series in Project CARS 3. If you need a comparison to chew on, it’s a little like how Jaws 4 ignores the events of Jaws 3D. Unfortunately, just like Jaws 4, things get real fishy, real fast.

Superficial Intelligence

To be fair, Project Motor Racing’s single-player set up has a good base and I do like how malleable it initially is, with three starting budget figures that give us the flexibility to approach the career mode however we choose. That is, you can select to begin with just enough cash to scrape into the entry-level categories, or a wallet big enough to buy any car on offer and head straight to the top classes. It’s smart that it has these options. There are actually slots to have three separate careers on the go simultaneously, so it’s possible to experiment with multiple approaches (or, in my instance, for my sons to dabble with their own career saves without messing around with mine – an underrated addition to any racing game).

Your in-game payouts can also be tweaked to fit your playstyle. For instance, you can opt to keep things simple and take a flat payout per event, or you can mix it up and take bonuses for winning only – or even have your damage repair bills covered in return for a steady portion of your event takings. This is an equally smart way of slinging out credits to us, regardless of how differently you or I may plan to go about our racing.

The management component plateaus here, though, since there are no other meaningful aspects to it. There’s no in-game way of creating a custom team appearance for the cars you buy and race, or applying sponsor logos. In this regard, don’t expect anything like, say, the recently released NASCAR 25. Support for mods is a much-touted feature of Project Motor Racing on both PC and console – and I have no doubt that many recognisable liveries will be convincingly recreated and available via user-created mods – but mods feel unlikely to fill this specific gap.

Once you have a team and a car, the campaign mode becomes a simple matter of selecting a championship or event, paying the entry fee, and competing. At this point, the overall objective is really that of any real-life race driver – spend your work days at high speed on 18 world-famous race tracks and do your best to win (or, failing that, not send your team bankrupt). This approach works for me. Or, at least, it would have, if Project Motor Racing had not been so bafflingly irritating to race in.

The racing is frustratingly close to being entirely decent, but it’s currently completely undermined by its aggressively oblivious AI and its brazenly unfair penalty system – both of which are so annoying I have no desire to keep playing at the moment.

The big problem with the AI is that they regularly drive like you’re not on track. I’m not just talking about them coming across on you when you only have a slight overlap and probably got optimistic sticking your nose there in the first place (although they will do that, and watching the replays exposes that they’ll do so by sometimes clipping through your front end like you’re a ghost). I’m talking about the absolute argy-bargey that occurs when you’re right alongside them and they want to carry on sticking to the racing line like freight trains, so they thump into you with zero regard for your existence. It certainly doesn’t help that it currently features no radar or proximity indicators for the cars around you, and no spotter either.

On PS5, the single-player opponent count is actually limited to just 15 (crossplay multiplayer allows up to 32). Frankly, 15 isn’t near enough for a racing sim of this type but, considering the way they drive, I guess I don’t know that I’d want any more of these lunatics out there right now.

Let’s be clear, my favourite real-world racing categories are old school Super Touring and V8 Supercars, so I am unequivocally all for elbows-out, panel-punishing racing in my games, too – but this just takes the piss. Project Motor Racing’s AI regularly reminds me more of classic Gran Turismo, where the AI racers always felt exponentially heavier and generally incapable of being affected by the player’s car. To experiment, I’ve cannoned into the back of opponents for no result. They just carry on cornering without losing a position, while I’m parked in the gravel.

The issue is compounded by a ruinously strict track limit penalty system that will just nuke your whole race for zero reason. Get bumped off track by the AI? That’ll be a two-second penalty for breaching track limits. It doesn’t matter that it wasn’t your fault, and it doesn’t matter that you’ll have already likely lost time because of it. If you have the opponent strength slider set at just the right level to have your times toe-to-toe with the AI, two seconds can be a lifetime. It just immediately ruins races. It’s a real buzzkill to be in the groove, lapping consistently with the pack a bit spread out, and thinking, “You know what? This actually feels pretty good right now” – then, bam; tiny moment, dud penalty.

For comparison, Assetto Corsa Competizione also dishes out penalties, but only if it detects an advantage. If you’re forced off track – or if your ego writes a cheque your tyres can’t cash and you grab a bit of impromptu dirt on a corner exit – ACC won’t penalise you if you didn’t benefit from the off-track excursion. Project Motor Racing is the exact opposite, whacking you with penalties for tiny mistakes that have already cost you time. Hell, they don’t even have to be tiny; you can spin, get overtaken by the whole field, and still be slapped with a two-second penalty the moment you rejoin. I wasn’t cheating; I was crashing. Confusingly, I had better luck actually cheating, because the penalty system allowed me to blast straight ahead at T1 on Project Motor Racing’s off-brand version of Monza, pay my dues by slowing to 60km/h, and immediately go from 16th to 1st. This is repeatable, too – and sometimes I actually didn’t get penalised at all.

At any rate, it’s thanks to the penalty system I certainly have no interest playing the career on “authentic” difficulty, which locks the opponent strength at 100 and does not allow race restarts. This might be a problem if trophies are important to you, because a horde of them are tied up behind completing the career on “authentic”. Authentic mode is optional, but Project Motor Racing would do well to remember we’re not all as quick as real racing drivers when we play video games. That’s why I play video games. For now, any time I get pinged unfairly in my current career I typically just hit the pause menu and try again. I just need to hope that everyone is facing the right way when we restart.

A Storm is Coming

Project Motor Racing’s weaknesses on track are annoying considering how much I like its current garage, and doubly so considering how excited I was to learn that Australian touring cars from two separate eras of the Supercars series are planned to arrive as DLC later next year.

Project Motor Racing features over 70 cars, and I admire the distilled approach of focusing strictly on racing models. Ferrari and McLaren appear to have turned down a seat at the table for now – which does create some hefty holes in the categories it focuses on – but it’s particularly neat to see some of the old GT and N-GT cars that rarely get much love in contemporary racing games. For instance, I’ve always had a soft spot for the Lister Storm and its 7.0l V12. After all, there ain’t no replacement for displacement.

The cars look nice in the menu screens, but they’re not as glamorous out on track. In action, it’s actually quite washed out, and it absolutely does not look a generation newer than the excellent Project CARS 2. Damage is underwhelming, as is the rain. There are a lot of layers to the sound, which does capture a good deal of the raw, mechanical noises of a race car – although broadly speaking there’s room for improvement, and I’d love the engine notes to be a little thicker and throatier.

In terms of how the cars handle, however, I’m tugged in two directions – literally, in this instance. There’s really nothing more important to a race sim than the handling, and I have to say there are some car and track combos in Project Motor Racing where I’ve felt very satisfied with the overall feel on a wheel (the only PlayStation wheel I have is the Thrustmaster T-GT II, which isn’t a direct-drive wheel, but is about as good as belt-driven wheels get in terms of force feedback).

For instance, in a GT3 car like the Audi R8 or the Ford Mustang at Mount Panorama, I can lap clean and the cars feel compliant beneath me. Am I as quick as a real GT3 driver? Not at all, and I’m probably underdriving the cars by some margin – but it does all feel quite intuitive to me at the speed I race. The buzz from kerbs is strong, and the sensation of weight fluctuating is impressively pronounced – like everything lightening up for a beat as you barrel over a crest and your car becoming heavier and stickier as you scoot from the end of a slope. This is a big factor on a track with such profound elevation changes, like Bathurst. The disparity in performance on a cold tyre versus a warm tyre is also huge in Project Motor Racing, and the very real necessity to drive the first lap or so more delicately is also a satisfying enough challenge here.

I’ve been far less confident in other cars, however. The hypercars are the worst culprits. They just want me dead. Obviously I’m not a professional racing driver, and I’m not going to speak to you like I am – or act like I know exactly what’s going on beneath the surface of something like Project Motor Racing when it comes to simulating a Le Mans prototype. The hypercars, however, are undriveable out of the box – even on a wheel. They pull left and right, they slip, slide, and scrub – and there’s just zero feeling of the immense downforce I expected. For clarity, we’re talking about cars that produce four times as much downforce as they do drag.

Unfortunately, on gamepad, the news is worse. It’s just way too twitchy to be a satisfying sim on a standard controller – especially when the tiniest erroneous flick of a stick can mean a nonsense penalty. I tried dialling down the sensitivity of the steering, but it really had little effect. Cars (especially the prototypes) get so unsettled when steering from left to right on a gamepad I just can’t really recommend picking up Project Motor Racing if that’s exclusively the way you plan to play it.