The Pokémon TCG: Mega Evolution – Phantasmal Flames set was just released on Nov. 11, 2025, and with it, an elusive Pokémon TCG: Mega Charizard X ex Ultra-Premium Collection. As a huge Charizard fan, I had to have it, even with its pretty high $119.99 USD MSRP (or a lothigher on resale sites!)
I’ve always collected Pokémon trading cards, but I only just started playing using the official format in the last two years. A few decks have crossed my playmats, but variations of a Charizard ex deck have continued to be my main.
I knew I’d need the Phantasmal Flames’ Mega Charizard X ex and Oricorio ex cards to experiment with new deck builds, so that was a good enough excuse as any to try and grab this collection… even if I might try and get the non promo-art versions to play with instead.
Click through the slide show above to see everything included in the Pokémon TCG: Mega Charizard X ex Ultra-Premium Collection, plus some of the cards I pulled from the booster packs.
Here’s a complete list of what’s included in the Pokémon TCG: Mega Charizard X ex Ultra-Premium Collection:
1 foil full-art promo card featuring Mega Charizard X ex
1 foil full-art promo card featuring Oricorio ex
65 card sleeves featuring Mega Charizard X
1 playmat featuring Mega Charizard X
1 deck box featuring Mega Charizard X
1 metal coin featuring Mega Charizard X
6 damage-counter dice
18 Pokémon TCG booster packs:
2 Surging Sparks TCG booster packs
4 Journey Together TCG booster packs
4 Destined Rivals TCG booster packs
4 Mega Evolution TCG booster packs
4 Phantasmal Flames TCG booster packs
A code card for Pokémon TCG Live
I pulled a few playables from the Phantasmal Flames and Mega Evolution booster packs (still searching for more Lillie’s Determinations), but I didn’t get any Phantasmal Flames “chase” cards, like any of the rare cards listed on this Phantasmal Flames most expensive cards list.
My favorite random pull is absolutely the Destined Rivals illustration rare Team Rocket’s Houndoom, another one of my favorite Pokémon of all time. Fire and Dark-type Pokémon are my favorites, so I’m stoked for the Charizard X and Houndoom cards and Charizard-themed TCG accessories, what can I say.
The playmat included in this set features nice stitching around the edges that many other official playmats lack, too, so I see it lasting quite a while, and the Mega Charizard X coin is beautiful.
This should go without saying, but I don’t think this collection is worth it unless you aim to use the exclusive TCG accessories that come with it.
I would have preferred some variety between the playmat, deck box, and card sleeves, but at least the art they chose for the set is sick.
The coin brilliantly shines in an array of rainbow colors, and it makes for a neat easter egg balanced on top of my Charizard figure by First 4 Figures.
Though this absolutely is not new as far as Pokémon TCG collections go, I’d be lying if I said I wasn’t disappointed by the dated array of included booster packs. I would have loved to see more Phantasmal Flames, and even Mega Evolution, booster packs.
But maybe I’m just salty about this because one Mega Charizard X ex Ultra-Premium Collection was the only Phantasmal Flames product my partner and I could purchase between the two of us. I’m lucky I was also sent a press copy of this particular collection so I didn’t have to share! For reference, we succeeded in buying one at The Pokémon Center website, but failed everywhere else for everything else.
But, that’s an entirely different conversation. Even with the $119.99 price tag, I’m happy with the Mega Charizard X ex Ultra-Premium Collection as both a huge fan of Charizard and the TCG.
Best Phantasmal Flames Cards Chase Cards
According to marketplaces like TCGPlayer, certain Phantasmal Flames cards have already skyrocketed further in price, and, following up from our Mega Evolution round-up, we’ve ranked the ten most expensive cards so far just above. From aggressive Mega attackers to powerful evolution support, Phantasmal Flames brings a fiery mix of competitive threats and high-demand pulls.
Casey DeFreitas is the Deputy Editor of Guides at IGN and loves all things Pokémon. Catch her on all socials as @ShinyCaseyD
Recently, IGN teamed up with Nintendo Life to rank the Top 100 Best Nintendo Games of All Time. But this celebration wasn’t just about what we think: we also wanted to know what your list would be, too. This was calculated through our Face Off tool, which pits two games against each other until you’ve run through all of the permutations, and then places the games in order of their win percentage. So, following a face-off in which thousands of you voted — with your number one pick being involved in 21,405 duels — we’ve got a Top 25 based on the IGN audience’s opinion.
The games that appear in this list actually aren’t too different from the ones that make up our own top positions, albeit with quite a different order. You favour Super Mario and The Legend of Zelda series over most others. So much, in fact, that the top 10 is dominated entirely by these two Miyamoto creations.
What follows is the Top 25 as voted by IGN readers, with a handy comparison below that shows your picks alongside the IGN and Nintendo Life’s list.
25. Mario Kart 64 – 59.0% Win Rate
24. Super Mario Bros. – 59.2% Win Rate
23. Pokemon Yellow (Red/Blue) – 59.4% Win Rate
22. Donkey Kong Bananza – 61.2% Win Rate
21. Chrono Trigger – 61.2% Win Rate
20. GoldenEye 007 – 61.9% Win Rate
19. The Legend of Zelda: Link’s Awakening – 62.7% Win Rate
18. Super Metroid – 62.7% Win Rate
17. Super Smash Bros. Melee – 63.4% Win Rate
16. The Legend of Zelda: Twilight Princess – 65.3% Win Rate
15. Metroid Prime (+ Remastered) – 65.6% Win Rate
14. The Legend of Zelda: Majora’s Mask – 66.1% Win Rate
13. Mario Kart 8 Deluxe – 66.1% Win Rate
12. Super Mario Galaxy 2 – 66.8% Win Rate
11. Super Smash Bros. Ultimate – 66.9% Win Rate
10. Super Mario. Bros 3 – 67.9% Win Rate
9. The Legend of Zelda: The Wind Waker – 68.4% Win Rate
8. The Legend of Zelda: A Link to the Past – 69.0% Win Rate
7. Super Mario Galaxy – 69.6% Win Rate
6. Super Mario World – 70.5% Win Rate
5. Super Mario 64 – 70.5% Win Rate
4. Super Mario Odyssey – 71.3% Win Rate
3. The Legend of Zelda: Tears of the Kingdom – 73.2% Win Rate
2. The Legend of Zelda: Breath of the Wild – 77.1% Win Rate
1. The Legend of Zelda: Ocarina of Time – 77.5% Win Rate
So, that’s what you voted as the 25 best Nintendo games ever, but how does it compare to IGN and Nintendo Life’s version? Well, there are a few notable differences. The IGN readers picked Mario Kart 64 as number 25 — a game that didn’t even make our Top 100 as one of our two Mario Kart entries. On the flip side, we had Tetris placed at 5, but it was all the way down at 33 in the public vote.
You can check out the table below to get a direct comparison between the top 25s. Which do you ultimately agree with more? Let us know in the comments below!
Simon Cardy is a Senior Editor at IGN who can mainly be found skulking around open world games, indulging in Korean cinema, or despairing at the state of Tottenham Hotspur and the New York Jets. Follow him on Bluesky at @cardy.bsky.social.
The name “Disney” has been showing up in quite a lot of gaming-related headlines as of late. As part of its arms race with Netflix, the conglomerate announced plans to add AI-powered user-generated content and “game-like features” to Disney+. Last year, it acquired a $1.5 billion stake in Epic Games, adding yet another cash cow to its portfolio. That deal paved the way for Disneyland Game Rush, a Fortnite island released earlier this month to celebrate the theme park’s 70th birthday that features well-received minigames based on Space Mountain, Haunted Mansion, and other iconic rides.
These developments are more than a little surprising, not least because it’s been close to a decade since Disney pulled the plug on its own, in-house gaming initiatives. Disney Interactive Studios, lovingly remembered for its work with Square on Kingdom Hearts and that 1989 NES DuckTales platformer that inspired the bounce mechanic in Shovel Knight, closed down in 2016 following the cancellation of its flagship project, Disney Infinity. Asked why, Bob Iger – who was then nearing the end of his first stint as CEO – told shareholders that while the company was great at making movies and building theme parks, they weren’t nearly as skilled at designing games.
Others would beg to differ. While it’s true that Disney has never managed to compete with Nintendo, Ubisoft, or Electronic Arts, its influence on games as a medium might well be greater than all of these three companies combined. To understand how the company was able to leave a mark on the one part of the entertainment industry it couldn’t conquer, you need to go where Fortnite has gone: to Disneyland.
When Don Carson quit his job as a senior designer at Walt Disney Imagineering – the research and development group in charge of creating new rides for Disney’s theme parks – he filled up some of his spare time playing video games. To his surprise, his new hobby heavily reminded him of his old job, so heavily that he felt compelled to write a long and – in due time – widely-read article for Game Developer (formerly Gamasutra) about what people working in one industry could learn from those working in the other.
Carson’s article was originally published in 2000, when 3D games like Wolfenstein, Doom, and Quake III Arena were all the rage and the industry found itself on the cusp of a revolution. “The ability to create virtual worlds is relatively new to us,” reads one particularly nostalgic line. “With the growing popularity of multiplayer games and the promise of higher band widths, I relish the day I can meet friends and explore these worlds together.”
Despite its age, the article’s central argument – that gaming and themed entertainment “are not that far apart” – still rings true today, perhaps even more so than it did 25 years ago. Sure enough, the two have more in common than you’d think. Both can be described as immersive experiences where people move through a carefully constructed space that responds to their presence. More importantly, both are born from the same design philosophy – one Carson boils down to the following question: “How do I draw my audience into my imagined world and make them want to stay?”
How do I draw my audience into my imagined world and make them want to stay?
All too often, the answers point to the original Disneyland. Prior to its opening in 1955, most theme parks were disappointingly light on theming. As one the world’s leading providers of escapism, Walt Disney did not merely want to distract guests with thrills and frights – he wanted to transport them to a different reality. To sell this fantasy, Disneyland turned its ride vehicles into boats, spaceships, and teacups, covered up tracks and scaffolding, and made sure that each of its major attractions told a story that incorporated the rider. When you get on the Cyclone at Coney Island, you are you, riding the Cyclone at Coney Island. Not so in Disneyland. On the Jungle Cruise, you’re a tourist exploring the tropics. On Peter Pan’s Flight, you’re placed in the shoes of its titular character, soaring over London and Neverland. The list goes on.
Video games have traveled down a similar road, enhancing raw experience with increasingly immersive theming. While some of the first-ever arcade games – think Pong and Pacman – took place in geometric voids, subsequent titles mapped their gameplay loops onto more clearly defined locations and situations, from Donkey Kong’s construction site to the roads and rivers of Frogger.
This transition repeated itself when gaming veered into the third dimension. While large parts of Super Mario 64 played out in liminal spaces, levels in Super Mario Sunshine – released 6 years later, in 2002 – are all part of a single, interconnected, fully realized setting: Delfino Island. Echoing Disneyland’s ride design (Tokyo Disneyland, featuring many of the same attractions found in LA, opened in 1983,) Sunshine not only fleshes out the environments, but also serves up a more ambitious narrative. No more saving Princess Peach from Bowser because game. This time, Mario is going vacation, is framed for a crime, and has to clear his name to earn back his freedom.
Disneyland’s influence on games is most evident when it comes to level design. To help guests find their way around the park – and encourage exploration on their own terms – Walt Disney envisioned a hub-and-spoke layout, with various lands connected to a central vocal point: Sleeping Beauty’s Castle. As mentioned in this Game Developers Conference (GDC) talk from 2022 – which covers the same ground as Carson’s article – Uncle Walt famously referred to the castle and other tall structures scattered throughout the park as “weenies,” because they lured guests from one area to another in the same way that he himself used hot dog wieners to lure his poodle around the house.
If you’re familiar with Mark Brown’s popular YouTube channel Game Maker’s Toolkit, you may know that weenies have worked their way into the language of video game design as well. They’re especially common in the open-world genre, where they help players orient themselves and guide them towards worthwhile content scattered throughout the sprawling sandbox environment. In this sense, structures like the Erdtree and Minor Erdtrees in Elden Ring function as the digital equivalent of Mount Kilimanjaro in Animal Kingdom or Spaceship Earth in EPCOT. The Legend of Zelda: Breath of the Wild and Tears of the Kingdom are filled with various types of weenies, from shrines and Sheikah Towers to the Divine Beasts and – of course – Hyrule Castle itself. One game that particularly resembles Disneyland in outline is 2018’s God of War, where Midgard’s centrally located Lake of Nine (complete with a Jörmungandr-weenie) opens up into several branching paths, some leading to other realms.
Walt Disney envisioned a hub-and-spoke layout, with various lands connected to a central vocal point.
These similarities do not imply that developing a game is functionally identical to designing a ride or an entire theme park. On the contrary, each industry works under unique constraints and pressures. Ideas for new attractions have to consider things like safety and carrying capacity. Short ride times, large vehicles, and efficient loading areas keep wait times low and guest experience positive. Another important distinction concerns user experience. While games can be enjoyed in isolation, theme park rides are made for large groups. Unlike with games, where no two play-throughs are exactly alike, most attractions offer a near-identical experience to every rider, every time they ride. Customization and personalization, standard features in games, are largely unattainable in attractions.
Still, while some of the details are different, the big picture is anything but. Whether you work at Universal Studios or Sony Santa Monica, your day-to-day job will see you navigating the same challenge: meeting economic and logistical demands without compromising the immersive quality of the final product.
Rarely does this balancing act succeed without something breaking. When Disneyland opened, it quickly became clear that the quaint, narrow streets of its opening area – a traditional American town loosely based on Walt Disney’s birthplace of Marceline, Missouri – had to be widened in order to accommodate the large summertime crowds: an imperative that completely went against Disney’s original vision.
Likewise, Carson – who after his Imagineering days ended up going into game development himself – recalls a time when he’d sunk weeks into programming realistic-looking flames for an Indiana Jones-style game, only for his colleagues to ramp up their flickering animations to unrealistic speeds. “When I complained,” he writes, “the programmer proudly argued (…) that ‘gamers’ should appreciate the visual effect of a high frame rate over the realism of my environments.”
If the video game industry’s indebtedness to Disneyland’s theme park design was already evident during the arcade era, this relationship has only deepened over time. Already in the late ‘90s, Carson observed that “we can visit and explore worlds on our computer screens that are increasingly dramatic and realistic” – so dramatic and realistic that he had on more than one occasion “been blown to bits because I dared hesitate to admire a beautiful piece of virtual architecture.” Just as Disneyland made it all but necessary for theme parks to conceal the machinery of their own attractions behind mock-up space stations and plywood mountains, so too did the gaming industry arrive at a point where we expect developers to cover up the artificiality of their games by means of organic level design, invisible walls, and hidden loading screens.
Games also bear a closer resemblance to theme park rides in that playing them has become an increasingly social experience. That moment Carson dreamt about, when you could meet friends and explore digital worlds as you would the real one, didn’t take long to arrive. Within just a few years, online play – from browser games like Habbo Hotel to multi-player shooters like Call of Duty and Battlefield – had become the backbone of the industry, paving the way for our current live service era. At present, even purely single-player experiences are plugged into globe-spanning networks thanks to vibrant fan communities on Reddit, YouTube, TikTok, and other platforms.
Now, after decades of theme parks influencing games, the relationship appears to be reversing. While the gaming industry continues to boom, the world of themed entertainment is currently struggling due to mounting costs and decreased attendance. To stay with the times, ride designers are increasingly working with and learning from game developers. From Los Angeles and Florida to Paris and Tokyo, more and more theme parks are adding digital, interactive, AI-assisted elements to their attractions, blending the distinction between rides and games. Smuggler’s Run, the Millenium Falcon simulator at Disney’s Galaxy’s Edge park, is built in Unreal Engine and its next iteration will feature branching pathways to allow player choice. Then there’s the various Mario Kart attractions at Super Nintendo World, where riders wear augmented reality headgear that project virtual elements onto the physical ride itself, or Web Slingers: A Spider-Man Adventure at Disney California Adventure, which uses motion tracking technology to allow riders to shoot their own webs. Before long, we might just see Fortnite show up inside Disneyland, rather than the other way around.
Tim Brinkhof is a freelance writer specializing in art and history. After studying journalism at NYU, he has gone on to write for Vox, Vulture, Slate, Polygon, GQ, Esquire and more.
This week, Fortnite players got their first glimpse at something never seen in the game before: nipples. Specifically, Homer Simpsons’ nipples. And big ones too, at that.
Yes, an upcoming Fortnite model will feature a giant-sized version of Homer wearing just his underpants, with everything else (including his nipples) on show. Why is this such a big deal to Fortnite’s faithful? Well, it’s because the game has refused to depict any kind of areola previously.
While never publicly stated, Fortnite developer Epic Games has seemingly mandated that its battle royale should be nipple-less. The apparent rule was first discussed among fans all the way back in 2019, when the game’s high-profile Travis Scott concert (and his purchasable in-game skin) both showed the rapper with a smooth, nip-free chest.
Since then, numerous Fortnite-original characters and a whole parade of other famous figures have appeared in the game shirtless, but also nipple-less. A non-exhaustive list includes God of War’s Kratos, Avatar: The Last Airbender’s Aang, WWE’s John Cena, Dragonball Z’s Goku, and Marvel superheroes such as Drax and The Hulk.
IGN has often asked Epic Games if it would like to comment on the lack of nipples in Fortnite, but has never received an official, on-the-record response.
Curiously, we’ve noted that Fortnite’s nipple-free decree also extends to Fortnite’s third-party modes. Earlier this year, Philips launched Body Royale, a promotional mode designed to highlight its latest OneBlade shaver. On Philips’ website, photos for the product depict its use across all types of body hair, by male models who definitely have nipples in real life.
But within Fortnite, in Body Royale, the action plays out against the backdrop of an in-game model who is distinctly nipple-less. Did Philips have to remove the nipples at Epic Games’ request, in order to get this experience in the game? (Philips has also not responded to IGN’s requests for comment.)
Now, Homer Simpson looks set to change all of that. But why? Is there something about Homer’s design that allows his nipples — nothing more than a pair of black dots — on his animated body? It seems unlikely — other cel-shaded characters have still been nipple-less before.
Does The Simpsons come with its own set of brand rules that require nipples and supercede Epic Games’ own? Or perhaps there’s something specific here about the fact that nearly-naked Homer’s in-game appearance has to match up with the same design shown in The Simpsons’ accompanying Fortnite crossover Disney+ shorts.
Alternatively, fans say, this could all point to something of a wider policy change within Epic Games. As Fortnite shifts to its new Chapter Seven era and collaborates with Quentin Tarantino, perhaps now is the time to ease this particular restriction. After nipples, what’s next? If Epic Games ever acknowledges this, we’ll let you know.
Tom Phillips is IGN’s News Editor. You can reach Tom at tom_phillips@ign.com or find him on Bluesky @tomphillipseg.bsky.social
If there’s a big winner in the wake of the delay of Grand Theft Auto 6 from May 26, 2026 to November 19, 2026, it’s 007 First Light.
In September last year IO Interactive, the Danish developer of the Hitman games, had slapped James Bond action adventure 007 First Light with a March 27, 2026 release date — just two months ahead of the release of GTA 6 before Rockstar announced its delay to November.
Two months would be, under normal circumstances, plenty of room for two video games to breathe, but this is GTA 6 we’re talking about. It looks set to become not only the biggest video game launch of all time, but the biggest… anything launch of all time. You could see a situation where the wider gaming public might save their hard-earned cash for GTA 6, even if they quite like the look of the promising 007 First Light — especially with speculation that Rockstar could end up charging even more than $70 for it.
And so, two months was certainly close enough for 007 to be caught up in the gravitational pull of Rockstar’s behemoth, so massive an impact it will surely have on the video game space. Not even James Bond in a souped-up Aston Martin would have much of a chance of breaking free.
And it sounds like the developers at IO Interactive knew that all too well. In an interview with GamesIndustry.biz, CEO Hakan Abrak was asked about GTA 6 kindly getting out of 007’s way.
“It would be a lie not to say that obviously spring looks really good,” he replied. “I want to say in the same breath that GTA 6 is a welcome thing for the industry. I do believe a lot of gamers who maybe haven’t played for a while will get into things again, and generally for the industry as a whole, I think that will be amazing.”
Abrak’s comments about the positive impact of GTA 6 echo those of Take-Two CEO Strauss Zelnick, who has suggested the game’s release on PlayStation 5 and Xbox Series X and S (sorry PC gamers, no launch for you… for now) will spark a surge in console sales. Such is the might of GTA 6 that it will no doubt convince an army of gamers to finally upgrade from the PlayStation 4 or Xbox One to the current-gen, or push PC gamers over the edge so they can get in on the fun at launch.
And let’s not forget Star Wars movie The Mandalorian and Grogu, which was set to come out in the same week as GTA 6. Yes, GTA 6 will probably hit all forms of entertainment hard as the world dives into the next iteration of Vice City. The Force be damned.
But while there are winners in all this, there are losers, too — something we at IGN have looked into following the GTA 6 delay. Microsoft has a raft of games due out next year that may end up hit hard by GTA 6, such as the next Fable, Halo: Campaign Evolved, Gears of War E-Day, and even 2026’s Call of Duty. But Sony is probably shifting nervously at the prospect of Insomniac’s PlayStation 5 exclusive, Marvel’s Wolverine, getting absorbed by the GTA 6 effect, too.
All the while, James Bond himself is off having a celebratory vodka martini, “shaken, not stirred” of course. With GTA 6 out the picture, the world famous secret agent has a clear run to success.
Wesley is Director, News at IGN. Find him on Twitter at @wyp100. You can reach Wesley at wesley_yinpoole@ign.com or confidentially at wyp100@proton.me.
Everyone’s playing shooters these days, at least according to some new data from Newzoo shared with IGN.
Newzoo, whose revenue estimates cover digital full-game purchases, including but not limited to DLC, subscriptions, and microtransactions, has revealed the top 20 PC and console games for the month of October, both by revenue and MAUs (monthly active users), combined across the U.S., UK, France, Germany, Italy, and Spain. And boy, there are a lot of shooters on that list! Battlefield 6, in its debut month, is at the top of the revenue charts and the third in monthly active users. While Battlefield’s dominance has been well documented already, it’s nonetheless an impressive feat given that Battlefield was only out for one week in October.
It is worth noting that while the suite of Call of Duty games were 9th on the revenue chart, they came in at the second spot for MAUs, ahead of Battlefield. Again, though, Battlefield only had a week compared to Call of Duty’s full month, so the real test will be looking at November’s data when Call of Duty: Black Ops 7 will face off against Battlefield. MAUs are a bit of a better comparison metric for Call of Duty, given its precense on Xbox Game Pass.
Breakout extraction shooter Arc Raiders debuted at No. 7 for revenue and No. 18 in MAUs, similarly hampered somewhat by the fact that it was only out for two days in the reporting period of October, so we should see a clearer picture of its success in November as well.
These new games are joined by a lot of the usual suspects: Counter-Strike 2 at No. 8 in revenue and No. 9 in MAUs, Fortnite at No. 3 in revenue and No. 1 in MAUs, and just on the MAU chart: GTA 5 at No. 7, Helldivers 2 at No. 16, Borderlands 4 at No. 17, Apex Legends at No. 19, and Overwatch at No. 20. Those are just shooters; Roblox, Minecraft, Valorant, League of Legends, and annual sports titles remain strong. It’s as challenging as ever for new games to crack the dominance of the handful of live service giants that consume so much of audience time, attention, and money.
There was a bit of a face-off this month in monster RPGs, with Pokémon Legends: Z-A coming in at No. 5 in revenue and No. 15 in MAUs, and Digimon Story Time Stranger at No. 13 in revenue. It was never in doubt that Pokémon would win that battle, but Newzoo noted that Z-A “underperformed compared to Legends: Arceus,” which may suggest some hesitance around its move to a real-time, action-based combat system, or perhaps caution after the state of Scarlet and Violet’s launch. It’s worth noting that Pokémon Legends: Z-A launched as a cross-gen title, both on Nintendo Switch and Nintendo Switch 2.
Nintendo’s official sales figures show Pokémon Legends: Z-A sold almost 6 million copies in its opening week. Pokémon Legends: Z-A, which debuted on October 16, sold 5.8 million units worldwide, with around half of those bought for Switch 2. This means the first Pokémon game to feature real-time Pokémon battles is the fifth best-selling game of the franchise in terms of first week sales. By comparison, that’s more than Pokémon X/Y and Let’s Go Pikachu / Eevee managed in their first weeks, but not as much as Pokémon Scarlet / Violet, Pokémon Legends: Arceus, and Pokémon Sword / Shield managed.
IGN’s Pokémon Legends: Z-A review returned an 8/10. We said: “Pokémon Legends: Z-A finally feels like Game Freak hitting its stride in Pokémon’s 3D era, with a fun setting to explore, a well-written story, and a total battle system overhaul that works surprisingly well.”
Top 20 PC and Console Games by Revenue for October 2025
(Data covers U.S., UK, France, Germany, Italy, and Spain)
Battlefield 6/Redsec (NEW)
EA Sports FC 26
Fortnite
Ghost of Yotei (NEW)
Pokemon Legends: Z-A (NEW)
NBA 2K 26
Arc Raiders (NEW)
Counter-Strike 2 & GO
Call of Duty: MW2/MW3/WZ/BO6
EA Sports Madden NFL 26
The Sims 4
Minecraft
Digimon Story Time Stranger (NEW)
Valorant
Super Mario Galaxy 2 (NEW)
Roblox
League of Legends
Jurassic World Evolution 3 (NEW)
World of Warcraft
Marvel Rivals
Top 20 PC and Console Games by MAU for October 2025
(Data covers U.S., UK, France, Germany, Italy, and Spain)
Fortnite
Call of Duty: MW2/MW3/WZ/BO6
Battlefield 6/Redsec (NEW)
Roblox
Minecraft
skate.
Grand Theft Auto V
Rocket League
Counter-Strike 2 & GO
EA Sports FC 26
Tom Clancy’s Rainbow Six Siege X
Marvel Rivals
NBA 2K26
EA Sports FC 25
Pokemon Legends: Z-A (NEW)
Helldivers 2
Borderlands 4
Arc Raiders (NEW)
Apex Legends
Overwatch 1 & 2
Rebekah Valentine is a senior reporter for IGN. Got a story tip? Send it to rvalentine@ign.com.
One title due for launch remained “unannounced” in Ubisoft’s official presentation, but a new Insider Gaming report has now stated that this not-so-mysterious project is the new version of Black Flag, which is scheduled to arrive during the week of March 23, 2026.
Despite years of internal leaks, fan speculation and even hints from the game’s lead actor, Ubisoft is still to officially confirm its Black Flag remake exists. But players have been tracking its progress for a while now, and think they have a pretty good idea of how it will play.
Alongside visual and gameplay upgrades to bring the game closer to Assassin’s Creed Shadows’ level of fidelity and more RPG-like focus, a recent report detailed plans for the game to feature all-new content and missions for its pirate hero Edward Kenway. At the same time, however, Black Flag’s modern day gameplay sections have apparently been excised — something that many fans aren’t happy about.
It’s believed that work on this new Black Flag remake has been spearheaded by Ubisoft Singapore, which previously launched the long-delayed Skull and Bones — a game that began life as an offshoot of Black Flag’s maritime gameplay.
Ubisoft is going all-in on Assassin’s Creed, its biggest franchise, with this year’s Assassin’s Creed Shadows followed by a recent Saudi Arabia-funded free update to 2023’s Assassin’s Creed Mirage. Alongside its Black Flag remake, next year is expected to bring a second major Shadows expansion. Beyond that, Ubisoft has already announced that a multiplayer Assassin’s Creed game and its next big blockbuster, the witchcraft-themed Assassin’s Creed Hexe, are also in the works.
This morning, Ubisoft said its latest positive financial results had been driven in part by a “strong performance” for its Assassin’s Creed franchise. But while the company noted that Mirage had now passed 10 million sales, there was no new figure provided for how well this year’s Shadows has sold.
Tom Phillips is IGN’s News Editor. You can reach Tom at tom_phillips@ign.com or find him on Bluesky @tomphillipseg.bsky.social
Ubisoft has celebrated a fresh set of financial results that it says has been driven by a “strong performance” for its Assassin’s Creed franchise. But while there’s an update on sales figures for 2023’s Mirage, there’s no new figure for how this year’s Shadows has sold.
The French publisher’s latest earnings report, published this morning, covers the company’s performance over the first half of the current year: April through September. Last week, Ubisoft delayed the publication of these results at the last minute, prompting speculation that something had gone wrong with the company’s big Tencent deal — though there’s no suggestion of that today.
Ubisoft has framed the results in a positive light, with net bookings for the past quarter “above expectations” and up 39% year-on-year. “The outperformance was driven by stronger-than-expected partnerships,” Ubisoft noted, “and was supported by a robust back-catalog, both highlighting the strength of the Group’s brands.”
One back catalogue game seemingly doing very well is Assassin’s Creed Mirage, the series’ return to a smaller, city-based adventure that launched a couple of years ago. Today, Ubisoft announced a new 10 million sales milestone for the title, and said its recent Saudi Arabia-funded free update had received “very positive” feedback from fans.
But on the sales performance of Assassin’s Creed Shadows, the franchise’s blockbuster feudal Japan entry launched in March, Ubisoft was less clear. Without providing a new sales total, Ubisoft simply said the game had “benefited” from the launch of its New Game+ mode and recent Claws of Awaji expansion, which seems obvious. The company then pointed to the game’s upcoming Switch 2 launch as an oppurtunity for it to “reach a broader audience.” Back in July, Ubisoft said Shadows had surpassed 5 million players, and that its performance had been in line with expectations.
Outside of Assassin’s Creed, Ubisoft noted that Rainbow Six Siege’s cheating issues were continuing to temporarily impact “activity and player spending versus expectations,” following the game’s previous move to an essentially free-to-play model.
Ubisoft still expects to finalize its $1.16 billion deal with Chinese conglomerate Tencent in the near future, company boss Yves Guillemot said, noting that “all conditions precedent have been satisfied.” The transaction will secure funding for Vantage Studios, Ubisoft’s new self-contained subsidiary in charge of its biggest brands, including Assassin’s Creed.
Guillemot revealed that more of these companies, termed Creative Houses, will be detailed in January — a point at which the Tencent deal should presumably be sorted. After this, the future shape of the company should become clear, following years of internal turmoil.
“These Creative Houses will be autonomous, efficient, focused and accountable business units, each with its own leadership, creative vision and strategic roadmap,” Guillemot concluded. “This Group-wide transformation reflects our ambition to renew how we create and operate in order to deliver great games for our players and lasting value for our partners and shareholders.”
Tom Phillips is IGN’s News Editor. You can reach Tom at tom_phillips@ign.com or find him on Bluesky @tomphillipseg.bsky.social
The Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles are reportedly in for some shell shock of their own, with Paramount planning a live-action movie reboot series inspired by the Sonic film franchise.
Sources told The Hollywood Reporter that Paramount has ditched the R-rated The Last Ronin, a live-action / animation hybrid (although it could return to it one day), and will now instead focus on a live-action movie. The sequel to Mutant Mayhem is still due out September 17, 2027.
First released back in 2020, The Last Ronin features a dystopian world in which all but one of the Turtles have perished, drawing inspiration from God of War among other works. It written by original creators Kevin Eastman and Peter Laird, who said it was based on an outline from a story in 1987.
The Last Ronin was a big success for the Turtles, earning the story a sequel featuring a new generation of turtles. A Last Ronin video game is also in development, although we haven’t had an update on it for some time.
The last live-action or live-action / animation hybrid Turtles movie was 2016’s Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles: Out of the Shadows, which flopped at the box office. Successful animated Turtles movies, including 2023’s Mutant Mayhem, followed.
Paramount has reportedly drafted in Neal H. Moritz, the producer of The Fast and the Furious and Sonic movie franchises, to lead this new Turtles charge in a bid to “fully unlock its potential,” THR said.
Given the success of the Sonic films, you can see why Paramount would want to get the producer responsible to repeat the trick with the Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles. In January, Paramount hailed the success of the Sonic movie franchise after Sonic the Hedgehog 3 helped it pass $1 billion at the global box office. 2024’s Sonic the Hedgehog 3, which stars Keanu Reeves as Shadow, made nearly half a billion dollars during its theatrical run.
It feels like early days for this new era of Turtles films, and there’s no indication when the first movie will come out.
Wesley is Director, News at IGN. Find him on Twitter at @wyp100. You can reach Wesley at wesley_yinpoole@ign.com or confidentially at wyp100@proton.me.
When I played Escape From Tarkov for the first time in 2018, I remember being captivated by its obtuse, insanely challenging structure. Like PUBG was to the battle royale genre, this promising prototype of an extraction shooter had so many unique elements going for it that made me absolutely certain it would be the next big thing, even if it was sometimes completely broken in its Early Access state. All these years later, now finally hitting 1.0, it’s pretty shocking how much has changed while it also remains exactly as exasperating as I remember it. The hands-off approach to onboarding that forces newcomers to beat their heads against its unforgiving mechanics for dozens of hours before claiming even a single victory captures the same relentless challenge I’ve always adored, while other frustrations, like its continued bugs, poor technical performance, and inability to address an abundance of cheaters, remains disappointingly worse than ever. I’ve only spent 30 hours with the 1.0 version so far, which (as any veteran player will surely tell you) is no time at all, but right now it feels like this progenitor may have been left in the dust of the genre it spawned.
Escape From Tarkov isn’t just the original standalone extraction shooter, but also the one most fanatically adherent to the ruthless principles on which the genre was founded. Not only are you thrown into a deadly hellscape filled with lethal NPCs and merciless human opponents, but you’re given absolutely no guidance in your quest for survival and loot. Practically none of the progression systems are explained to you, there’s no map for you to look at while out in the field to indicate where the extraction points are, and you could easily spend tens of hours studying weapon attachments and ammo types just to understand how the heck to use the tools of death you’ll find in your journey.
In some ways, I really admire how unrepentant Tarkov is – its beautifully exacting game design, and the sense of discovery that takes place across hundreds of lessons learned the hard way can be incredibly rewarding. But then there are times where it’s all just so dang frustrating, like how atrociously the UI and menus are organized, as if they were designed specifically to offend you. Whether or not the payoff of finally feeling comfortable enough to bring your best equipment out and try for a proper extraction is worth it will ultimately depend on couple things: your tolerance for pain, and your drive to master something designed to really test your expertise of systems Tarkov refuses to teach you. At least in these early hours with 1.0, I find myself somewhere in the middle of enamoured by its harsh edges and utterly disgusted by outdated design choices.
Unfortunately, the intentionally punishing design is marred by completely unintentional issues that have made this full launch that much harder to enjoy. The servers so far have been incredibly unreliable, with regular disconnects and wait times greater than 15 minutes to get into a match, and cheaters are very prevalent since accounts and items can be sold for real money in the gray market. As a result, I decided to spend most of my time this first week just focusing on the PvE mode for the sake of my sanity.
There’s also the matter of just how bad this thing looks and performs by the standards of the day. I remember thinking Escape from Tarkov already didn’t look great when I last revisited it, and coming back to it again a few years later has not done it any favors. Objects in the environment are blurry and low res, and with the exception of the vendors you’ll chat with as you complete quests, human faces look like they were modeled using the monster-generator that is The Elder Scrolls IV: Oblivion’s character creator. It’ll take me a while before I’ve played enough to call this review final, so hopefully developer Battlestate Games will smooth out the worst of these issues before they drive me insane, but it’s been an incredibly rocky start.
Anyway, I should get back to it – between the PvE mode, PvP mode, and Arena, I’ve got plenty more to see and do before I can make a recommendation either way. For now, diving back into this influential, daunting game has been equal parts fascinating and irksome, but I’m looking forward to going as deep down the rabbit hole as I can.
