Category: IGN

Based on the first couple of days with it, Helldivers 2 strikes me as hilarious, smartly designed, and intense whether I’m playing solo, with a squad of other random Helldivers, or serving up a nice hot cup of Liber-tea across the galaxy with buddies. I still need to see more of its varied missions, unlock a wider selection of its huge catalog of weapons, emotes, armor, and abilities, and see how Managed Democracy’s campaign against alien bugs and robots plays out during the long haul, so I’m not ready to give a final review just yet. But for right now, I’m enjoying traveling to exciting new places, meeting exotic life forms, and killing them for the glory of Super Earth. God, what a sentence.

After a gut-busting opening piece of mandatory propaganda (refusal to pay attention is treason) that explains that Super Earth is under attack from the robotic Automatons and the “legally-distinct-but-still-totally-the-bugs-from-Starship-Troopers” Terminids (which are also definitely not Warhammer 40K’s Tyranids!), you’re dropped into Helldiver basic training. Your instructor tells you that he isn’t easily impressed… before letting you know how impressed he is by the fact that you’re not backing down. After mercilessly gassing you up (remember, Super Earth is run by fascists; everything they do is awesome and perfect) and telling you how invincible you are – while conveniently avoiding the fact that the average Helldiver has a lifespan of about, oh, I don’t know, about 30 seconds – you’re given command of your own destroyer space ship (I named mine the Elected Representative of Family Values) and sent to the front lines with your buddies.

Once you’re out in the Galactic War, you’re free to head to either the Automaton or Terminid front to bring Liberty and Managed Democracy to their occupied planets. Each world has multiple missions with multiple objectives, which range from destroying Termanid eggs to activating your local, nuclear-armed ICBM. Just a regular day at the office.

What’s nice is that once I’d picked my landing zone and dropped in, every mission so far has felt different, even if I’d done those objectives before. That’s largely because maps are distinct and unique, even on the same planet because of the way the terrain changes – one map might have a lot of water and hills, while another might be heavily forested. On top of that, each mission usually has a couple of optional objectives to complete, like blowing up outposts or terminating a treasonous broadcast. So especially if you’re checking those out, no two missions play out the same way.

You don’t start with a big selection of gear — a couple of primary weapon options, a sidearm, and a grenade — but shooting feels satisfyingly weighty, especially with the DualSense’s haptics. Plus, Helldivers 2 forces you to coordinate to succeed as a group – or play smart if you’re alone. You’re racing against the clock and your squad’s limited reinforcements (AKA extra lives) so you have to pick your priorities, manage your resources, and choose where to spend your time. It’s always challenging.

What makes Helldivers 2 cool, though, are the little touches that make sure you’re always thinking about how to manage your limited resources while hordes of bugs and robots throw themselves at your squad. Reloading, for instance, discards any remaining rounds you have in a clip; bullets don’t just teleport back into your inventory. If you want to call down reinforcements, special weapons, or a resupply, you’ve got to rapid-fire a series of directional inputs on the d-pad, which can be a little challenging when you’re running from a horde of bugs hellbent on tearing your Helldiver limb from limb. These abilities all have cooldown timers, forcing you to be careful when picking when to deploy them and to coordinate with your teammates.

It’s also generous with rewards. Don’t have a cool weapon yet? You’ll probably find something during the first mission or two. One of my favorites I’ve seen so far is the Anti-Material Rifle, an anti-armor behemoth of a rifle that let me take on the huge, bile-spewing bugs without ever getting close to them — and that’s handy because they can kill you in a single volley if you do. You don’t get to keep these weapons once the mission ends, but it does allow you to try them out before you permanently unlock them with in-game currency you get from completing mission objectives, which is a nice touch.

Speaking of unlocking stuff, Helldivers 2 has a ton of goodies for you to earn. Yes, there’s a paid battle pass with lots of weapons and armor, but there’s also a free one with more stuff than the paid one, and naturally you also unlock gear the old-fashioned way, just by completing missions. Helldivers 2 has microtransactions, sure, but thus far I’ve never felt like I was missing out on anything important by not going near them.

Better still, a lot of these unlocks can make a huge difference in how you play. One of the first things I earned was the ability to call in a stationary turret that automatically blasts away. I found out the hard way that friendly fire is a thing and this thing can kill you if you stand in front of it, which makes for some really funny moments, but it’s a legitimate game-changer when you have to hold off a swarm of bugs or defend your extraction zone. I never leave the Elected Representative of Family Values without it.

If there’s a downside here, it’s that there’s just so much stuff to unlock that it’s tough to decide which things to get first. Should I save up for an airstrike, the Anti-Material Rifle, or a portable supply pack? Without a guide (like the one our IGN Guides team is actively cooking up as we speak) to help me craft a potent build it’s a bit like flying blind, but again, none of those options are battle pass items so it’s not like it’s trying to trick you into spending money for something you don’t know if you’ll want. You get these by just playing. That might sound like faint praise, but in an era where so many games are trying to nickel and dime us for absolutely everything, the fact that Helldivers 2 doesn’t force you to deal with a battle pass to make your experience better feels awesome.

I still have a lot more to play before I issue a final review and a score. I feel like I’ve just scratched the surface when it comes to unlocks and I’ve spent most of my time killing bugs. Those robots look like they could use some freedom, and I wouldn’t want to deprive them of it. So, if you’ll excuse me, I’m going to make myself a nice hot cup of Liber-tea and get back at it, and hopefully I’ll be able to squash enough enemies to finish off this review next week. Managed Democracy isn’t going to spread itself, you know.

As the first anniversary of Resident Evil 4 Remake approaches, the game’s producer has addressed lingering questions regarding The Darkside Chronicles, clarifying whether or not a certain chapter in the 2009 on-rails shooter is considered canon to the current main story of Resident Evil.

In an email interview with IGN, Resident Evil 4 Remake producer Yoshiaki Hirabayashi clarified whether or not Resident Evil: The Darkside Chronicles is considered canon to the Resident Evil universe. Specifically, the in-game scenario titled “Operation Javier” focuses on Leon Kennedy and his first mission as an agent for the United States government with his partner, Jack Krauser.

Warning: Potential spoiler for the end of the Resident Evil 4 remake below:

Resident Evil fans are likely familiar with Operation Javier as the events of that mission played a key role in Jack Krauser and his disdain for both Leon and the U.S. government. While the mission was not directly mentioned in the original Resident Evil 4, the 2023 remake references Operation Javier towards the end.

When asked about Darkside Chronicles’ status as a canonical entry in the Resident Evil lore, Hirabayashi clarified that while Operation Javier itself is canon to the Resident Evil universe, the events depicted in Darkside Chronicles are not exactly the same as those depicted in the remake.

“The fact that ‘Operation Javier’ occurred is in fact part of the current Resident Evil main story. However, as to what that mission was, it’s not exactly the same as the events portrayed in Resident Evil: The Darkside Chronicles,” Hirabayashi told IGN. “I can’t share the details, but you will find that the relationship between Leon and Krauser, as well as their conversations, give you some idea!”

For years, Resident Evil fans often discussed whether or not the on-rails spin-off games the Umbrella and Darkside Chronicles are considered canon to the Resident Evil lore. Both games released in 2007 and 2009 as exclusives on the Wii before getting ported onto the PS3, provide retellings of some of the mainline Resident Evil games, such as Resident Evil 0 and Code Veronica. Both games also had original scenarios not found in other Resident Evil games, such as Operation Javier.

In our review of Resident Evil: The Darkside Chronicles, we said: “The rail shooter genre will never be the true Resident Evil experience, but Resident Evil: The Darkside Chronicles shows that the franchise can be spun out into different, successful styles of gameplay. Even with my complaints about the bouncy camera, I believe this follow-up is a significantly better experience than the original Umbrella Chronicles and one fun ride from start to finish.”

Taylor is a Reporter at IGN. You can follow her on Twitter @TayNixster.

It looks like Sony’s PlayStation 5 has sold around double the number of units as the Xbox Series X | S, according to data shared in a recent Take-Two Interactive earnings report (h/t GameSpot).

In one slide, the gaming company shared that 77 million Gen 9 consoles have been sold as of December 31, 2023. While that figure doesn’t give us too much insight on its own, on December 20, 2023, Sony announced that it had just sold a little more than 50 million PS5s. Microsoft usually keeps its numbers under wraps, but with Take-Two’s information in mind, we can estimate that Xbox Series X | S sales sit at around 27 million units sold.

It’s an approximate look at the state of Gen 9 that keeps in line with previous sales updates. In July of last year, Sony revealed that its latest PlayStation console was still going strong with 40 million units sold. At a games event in Brazil around this same time, Xbox Series X | S sales were said to be at just over 21 million.

Both the PS5 and Xbox Series X | S launched in November 2020. The Sony console received a bit of an update with the Slim model last year. While the Xbox Series X | S consoles haven’t quite gotten their mid-gen refresh yet, leaked documents suggest that Microsoft might have plans to release something later this year.

Today’s Gen 9 update are interesting in the context of other rumors surrounding Xbox’s future. More than a few reports have recently come out, suggesting that many Xbox exclusives — including games like Indiana Jones and the Great Circle, Starfield, Sea of Thieves, and Hi-Fi Rush — will soon come to console competitors like PlayStation. When fans were shocked by the news that exclusive titles may soon come to rival platforms, Xbox head Phil Spencer chimed in with a promise to address concerns as part of a business update next week.

For more, be sure to check out our thoughts on Xbox’s future and Microsoft’s messaging strategy. You can also take a look at our list of the best-selling consoles of all time.

Michael Cripe is a freelance contributor with IGN. He started writing in the industry in 2017 and is best known for his work at outlets such as The Pitch, The Escapist, OnlySP, and Gameranx.

Be sure to give him a follow on Twitter @MikeCripe.

For me the disappointment of Suicide Squad: Kill the Justice League isn’t just about its quality. It’s about what it’s not as much as what it is. There’s very little of what made developer Rocksteady’s games so great in the past – near-unparalleled superhero power trips that sit alongside Insomniac’s critically acclaimed Spider-Man series. It’s also the latest in a frustratingly long line of beloved single-player-championing studios delving into unwelcoming loot-infested live-service waters. It’s been a perilous leap for many to make, with success limited to very few not called Bungie, and I hope we’re now at the end of this detrimental trend that’s plagued so many.

In recent years, BioWare abandoned the comfort of its trademark deep RPG writing in favour of Anthem’s cold, hollow, RNG-fuelled exosuits. It was the first real notable example of this happening; a studio ripping apart from its roots to chase high-risk trends popularised by the likes of Destiny. “Anthem was the ultimate expression of that,” BioWare veteran James Ohlen told Rock Paper Shotgun. “It got away from everything. It’s kind of like the anti-BioWare game.”

There have since been others chasing these online looter shooter trends that have rapidly gone out of fashion with each passing year. Arkane brought none of its best-in-class level design to the empty, vampiric streets of Redfall. Crystal Dynamics promised much in its Marvel’s Avengers campaign, but lost its way completely regarding its live-service offerings. And most recently, Rocksteady traded in their expertly designed Gotham for a shallow Metropolis.

Suicide Squad’s main problem isn’t in its art direction, character design, or storytelling (although mileage may vary on that last one). These are all things we’ve come to expect and enjoy from Rocksteady, masters of their craft when it comes to creating superhero open worlds. But while it has largely delivered on that trio of creative disciplines, the studio’s other notable strengths – best-in-class campaign design, genre-leading combat systems, and engaging open worlds – are the areas in which Suicide Squad has stumbled. And that faltering is rooted in the pivot to creating a long-term content delivery machine – AKA a live-service shooter.

In the nine years it has taken the London-based studio to finish work on Kill the Justice League, numerous examples of exactly the same kind of pivot project failing have come and gone, yet no change of direction has seemingly been plotted. That’s likely because of the weight of the AAA machine; like a heavy cruise liner, it can be difficult to change the course of all those resources and staff when the journey begins. But the result of that is a wholly incongruous mess of a looter shooter where bland gunplay makes neither canonical sense nor an engaging gameplay loop.

Gear progression and how it intertwines with talent trees and class abilities is a delicate balance that is by no means easy to achieve. The Borderlands series has historically done it very well, and while the Pandora gunfests do have significant stories told throughout, you always get the feeling that developer Gearbox’s focus is on making the most outrageous and fun arsenal to play with possible. But Borderlands games are, of course, not live-service. Tackling that added demand of a long, long life of ever-expanding content adds a whole new weight on top of all that to balance.

A more pertinent example, then, might be Diablo, which has achieved this as successfully as anyone over the years thanks to Blizzard, a studio whose very DNA is built around online multiplayer experiences. For almost 30 years the developer has refined a game loop completely centered on chasing that next piece of loot. That desire to want to come back repeatedly and grind for the next piece of gear is key to the success of loot-based games, and is what I look for over all else in the genre. Strike gold with that, and even games that possess just a slither of Rocksteady’s storytelling chops, such as 2021’s Outriders, can keep me engaged enough to keep playing thanks to fun weapons and abilities.

One note combat is a common thread between all of these recent failed experiments. Redfall’s selection of identikit weapons didn’t offer anywhere near the sort of malleable approaches that Dishonored’s blades and powers brought to encounters. Although Marvel’s Avengers’ heroes did each have a set of abilities intrinsically linked to their character, the rote defend and capture the objective scenarios you were placed in offered limited thrills. And Anthem’s mission design was near non-existent as you jetted around its open world searching for any semblance of BioWare’s famous quest writing.

Rocksteady created one of the most influential combat systems in the form of Batman Arkham’s counter-based melee flow, and to step away from this and create a gun-based looter shooter was a bold move. Sadly, it just didn’t pay off. Each gun feels fundamentally very similar to the next and last, with interesting perks and alternate fires kept at a real premium. The least you’d expect from a looter shooter is to have interesting loot to shoot with, but the focus on that in Suicide Squad just isn’t quite there. I’m all for developers trying something new in an attempt to avoid things becoming stale, but successful new beginnings are rooted in a recognition of historic strengths. I wish Rocksteady had used its previous top-tier melee combat, dense open world, and thrilling storytelling experience as a base, rather than shifting to what is an almost entirely different development format.

This challenge is something, to its credit, that Sony has managed well with PlayStation Studios. Time is given to each creative team to make the project they want to make, with story-driven single-player games remaining a dominant focus. Naughty Dog has become the standard bearer for this philosophy in the years that Rocksteady has spent making Kill the Justice League. But that isn’t to say they didn’t attempt to branch out to multiplayer in that time, either, with Sony recently cancelling a stuttering The Last of Us online project. We’ll never know how this would’ve turned out, but if recent history has told us anything, it’s that halting development before it rumbles on for years might have been the right move by PlayStation. Something confirmed by Naughty Dog itself in the statement announcing the cancellation:

“To release and support The Last of Us Online we’d have to put all our studio resources behind supporting post launch content for years to come, severely impacting development on future single-player games. So, we had two paths in front of us: become a solely live service games studio or continue to focus on single-player narrative games that have defined Naughty Dog’s heritage.”

That’s not to say that risks can’t and shouldn’t be taken, though, if approached in a sensible and measured manner. Interesting results can come from developers stepping out of their comfort zone and trying something new; dipping their toes into the water before diving headfirst. In regards to PlayStation, Sucker Punch’s Legends expansion to 2020’s Ghost of Tsushima was a well-constructed online co-op offering rooted in its fundamentally exciting sword combat. The experience was scaled appropriately for an experimental DLC, offering a small but rewarding pool of gear for progressing through missions, which culminated in a challenging multi-part raid full of memorable art direction. The key, though, was that this focus was narrow, adding a handful of hours of multiplayer fun onto an already solid single-player base.

I still want to see more Sucker Punch single-player stories, but this smaller-scoped experiment has at least given me confidence that they could make the looter-shooter live-service jump where others have fallen. Maybe it would have been wise for Rocksteady to test out some of Suicide Squad’s online components in an Arkham Knight expansion before fully implementing those ideas nine years later.

Unfortunately, it’s still unclear to see how far those who leaped have fallen. It can’t be a coincidence, though, that these studios all find themselves reverting back to what made them such respected names in the single-player space. BioWare is hoping to recapture that story-driven RPG magic with new Dragon Age and Mass Effect games in development. Arkane has light at the end of the tunnel with Marvel’s Blade being helmed by their Lyon studio, a stealth combat game that hopes are high for. Crystal Dynamics finds itself under the parasitic control of Embracer Group, who has seemingly done nothing but cancel projects and lay off staff since making their huge financial gamble – I hope the Tomb Raider studio manages to survive and thrive again.

I sympathise with all of these developers, none of whom set out to make games that would go on to be considered dead on arrival. Instead, eyes need to be turned towards those making the decisions, whether those be studio heads, publishers, or other executives, on what type of games these studios should make. The list of previously mentioned failures to launch should be the wake-up call needed to stop mismanaging talent and siphoning their passion into projects that benefit neither their developer’s skillsets nor the player’s ultimate enjoyment.

It’s a lesson that Warner Bros. seemingly never learned with Kill the Justice League – although hopefully one they’ve now learned, considering Suicide Squad’s questionable success (as of writing, it’s not even in Steam’s top 100 played games) comes not long after the news that WB’s own Hogwarts Legacy, a single-player open-world story-driven game, happened to be 2023’s biggest-selling game. It’s too soon to say what’s next for Rocksteady, which still has the first steps of its live-service roadmap to make when Joker arrives as a playable character next month. Suicide Squad could buck the trend, becoming a huge success that grows strong as the months and years go on. Warner Bros. will certainly be hoping so. I have my doubts, though. I just hope it does well enough that a studio home to so much single-player talent is allowed to spread its (bat)wings again.

Simon Cardy really does hope this signals the end of the trend. Follow him on Twitter at @CardySimon.

VR fans hoping for Ubisoft to invest more in the space will be disappointed to hear that the company is not planning to increase investment in VR games following disappointing sales of its most recent VR endeavor Assasin’s Creed Nexus VR.

During a financial Q&A to discuss Ubisoft’s third-quarter sales for the 2024 fiscal year, Ubisoft CEO Yves Guillemot responded to a question from a caller who asked what the company plans for VR development due to the recent hardware releases, most notably Apple Vision Pro. Guillemot revealed that Ubisoft does not want to invest too much in the VR market due to Nexus VR’s sales.

“We have been a bit disappointed by what we were able to achieve on VR with Assassin’s Creed,” Guillemot explained during the Q&A session. “It did ok, and it continues to sell, but we thought it would sell more, so we are not increasing our investments on VR at the moment because it needs to take off.”

Guillemot also noted that Ubisoft was “very impressed” with Apple’s new spatial computer that launched last week, however the company is not going to expand more on VR development, saying that it will continue to “look at but not invest too much in, until it grows enough.”

Assassin’s Creed Nexus VR was released last November exclusively on the Meta Quest headsets. In our review, we said: “Assassin’s Creed Nexus is an impressively complete Ubisoft game, even if not all those parts stick the landing in VR.”

However, it is not Ubisoft’s only attempt to dive into the market as the French-based publisher has produced several games for virtual reality headsets. In 2017, Tom Clancy’s developer, Red Storm Entertainment, released Star Trek: Bridge Crew for PSVR, PC VR headsets, and the Meta Quest. Additionally, Ubisoft released Space Junkies in 2019 and Transference in 2018, the latter of which supports VR and non-VR formats. Ubisoft has also developed virtual reality experiences, like Far Cry VR: Dive Into Insanity and Escape The Lost Pyramid.

Unfortunately, Ubisoft’s confirmation of not further investing in VR is not entirely surprising. During an earnings call in July 2022, the company announced it had canceled a VR game based on Tom Clancy’s Splinter Cell franchise. Like Nexus VR, it also would have been exclusive to the Meta Quest headsets.

Taylor is a Reporter at IGN. You can follow her on Twitter @TayNixster.

The Florida Joker is back, this time to tell Rockstar he’s not going to sue over a character in GTA 6 anymore. Rather, he’d very much like to voice the character instead.

First, some background. Lawrence Sullivan — aka the Florida Joker — had complained about the GTA 6 trailer by threatening a lawsuit against developer Rockstar Games unless he was paid.

GTA 6 takes place in the state of Leonida, Rockstar’s version of Florida, and following the release of the record-breaking debut trailer fans noticed several real-life references. Among them was what appeared to be a reference to Sullivan, a tattoo model who garnered plenty of online attention after his mugshot went viral in 2017. He earned the nickname Florida Joker due to his green hair and face tattoos.

The GTA 6 version, seen in a quick shot of news footage, is a bit different — purple hair instead of green, some different face tattoos — but the similarities are certainly hard to ignore, which Sullivan didn’t. He acknowledged the GTA 6 video in a TikTok posted last year, and then posted a follow-up demanding millions of dollars in compensation.

In that TikTok, Sullivan appeared with purple-dyed hair to ape the GTA 6 character more closely. “GTA, I’m giving you the biggest free marketing you got in the entire history of running this GTA game,” he said. “For that, I want an extra million dollars. Y’all taking forever to respond back to me. GTA we gotta talk.”

Then, Sullivan said: “You think I’m playin? You got three days… three days before my lawyers go crazy on this case. I got hard evidence.” IGN had asked Rockstar to comment on Sullivan’s claims, but didn’t hear back. In a previous TikTok, Sullivan demanded up to $2 million from Rockstar Games over the character’s appearance in the trailer. “Florida Joker ain’t having that,” he said, “y’all took my likeness, y’all took my life.”

Now, Sullivan has taken to TikTok once again, this time singing a different tune. “GTA, Rockstar, Take-Two, we gotta talk,” Sullivan said. “I’m not suing y’all no more, but y’all still out your goddamn nuggets. It’s been two whole months. Y’all still haven’t reached out to me. Still haven’t DM’d me. Let’s do what’s right. Show me like $50,000, $100,000. Let me voice the character, let me go to the meet-and-greets when the game is released, sign, take pictures with the fans. Come on man, we make worldwide news, every blog. Every news outlet covered me on the game. Everyone knows who I am, trust me. So GTA, Rockstar, we gotta talk.”

Sullivan then goes on to say perhaps the silliest thing he’s said throughout this entire saga: “I’m making the game more relevant. People want to play it. I’m the reason the game is so hype right now.”

Despite Sullivan’s various TikToks, it seems unlikely he will get anything out of Rockstar Games. Last year Roger Clark, the voice actor behind Red Dead Redemption 2 protagonist, Arthur Morgan, warned Sullivan from taking on the might of Rockstar. “They’re [Rockstar Games] not going to talk to you,” he said in a since-deleted TikTok.

“They’ve had people like you trying to sue them for decades. They are lawyered up, man. They know exactly what they can and cannot get away with. If I were you, I would use the notoriety they just threw your way to your advantage. Capitalize on it somehow. You ain’t getting a job at Home Depot with that face.”

Sullivan’s TikToks are only the latest development in what’s been a whirlwind since the leak, and then the official launch, of the hotly anticipated GTA 6 trailer. It broke YouTube viewership records and spurred a number of theories as fans eagerly await the game’s 2025 release, although PC gamers will have to wait.

This week, Ubisoft CEO Yves Guillemot said he expects a GTA 6 release sometime after March 2025. This is notably a little later than what some have been speculating based on past remarks by Take-Two Interactive, GTA 6’s publisher.

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.

Hideo Kojima has returned to his once dormant YouTube channel, HideoTube, after seven years to discuss Death Stranding 2, his recently announced return to the action-espionage genre, and to talk openly about a difficult time he went through during the height of the pandemic.

During the PlayStation State of Play January 2024 showcase, Metal Gear creator Hideo Kojima announced his return to the action-espionage genre with a video game and movie hybrid codenamed Physint that’ll have “near life-like graphics”.

We don’t know much about Physint, but what we do know suggests a PlayStation 6 launch is a distinct possibility. During State of Play, Kojima said production is expected to begin “in earnest” at Kojima Productions after Death Stranding 2 and in partnership with Sony.

In the new video, Kojima again bigged up Physint’s visuals. “It will be both a game and a movie at the same time,” he said. “That’s why we were at Sony Pictures. A new action-espionage game. Of course, it will be a game. However, if your mother walks in and sees you playing this game, she’ll think you’re watching a movie. I’m not sure how far we can take it yet.”

Kojima is of course famous for his fancy cutscenes and hyper-detailed character models. The way he’s talking about Physint, it sounds like we can expect another leap in visuals.

Kojima then went on to discuss why he decided to make Physint, pointing to the many requests he’s had to make another Metal Gear game. “… because I became independent, I wanted to do something new with my own IP,” he said. “So to challenge myself, I first made DS. Then, to create a franchise, I made DS2. And I wanted to do something even newer, so I started working on OD. And since then, there have been a lot of new ideas. But in the last eight years, every day on social media, from users all around the world, people have been asking me to create another Metal Gear and stuff like that.”

Kojima then talked about a moment in 2020 during the pandemic when he became so ill he had to have surgery and even wrote a will. It sounds like a serious moment in the life of the 60-year-old, so much so that he considered leaving video game development behind. But it was a message from Hollywood director Guillermo del Toro, who starred in Death Stranding, that Kojima credits as “saving” him.

“I fell ill in 2020,” Kojima said. “It was also during the pandemic, so I was sick and isolated during all of it. I even had surgery. And I thought, ‘I can’t anymore.’ I was at my lowest and felt like I couldn’t go back to making games. I wrote a will, too. And in that moment, I realised that people die. But, I turned 60 last year. I’ll turn 70 in 10 years. I hope to never retire.

“Having said that, if the users desire it so much, I thought I should change my priorities a bit. I still want to do new things, but I decided to make an action-espionage game. I get many requests from Hollywood to make films, but I’ve refused them. Because I have my own company now, I can’t leave for one or two years to go make a movie. The company would collapse. I was in a tough spot.

“And I talked to Guillermo del Toro about it. And he said, ‘Hideo, what you’re making is already a movie. Keep going as you are.’ His words saved me.

“And since we’ll be working with many creators in the business, though the output is a game, it won’t be too different from movies.”

Kojima’s video is worth a watch as it goes into more detail on Death Stranding 2, revealing various story and character details while retaining much of the mystery he’s famous for fostering.

It’s a busy time for Kojima, who is working on Death Stranding 2, OD for Microsoft, and Physint for Sony. There’s also an untitled Death Stranding film in the works.

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 Suicide Squad: Kill the Justice League player has unearthed a hidden message that looks like a strong hunt at the return of a crucial character.

Suicide Squad: Kill the Justice League spoilers follow.

In Suicide Squad: Kill the Justice League, Harley Quinn kills a mind-controlled Batman in what has proven to be one of the most controversial story moments in Rocksteady’s looter shooter. This is the Batman from Rocksteady’s much-loved Arkhamverse, and so the cutscene sparked a vociferous debate about the character’s demise.

That, many players thought, was that. But could Batman return? A new video from Batman Arkham Videos suggests Batman is set for a return. As detailed in the video, Suicide Squad players can find 12 calendars throughout Metropolis, each highlighting a specific date. Importantly, the calendar for December features a bat symbol on the marked day, and is found in the location of a crucial Batman scene.

While this Easter egg appears to be the work of Batman supervillain Calendar Man, it is very much about Batman himself. As Batman Arkham Videos worked out, is that converting the dates into letters based on the day of the month, and sorting each letter in order by month, they spell out a hidden message: “He will return.”

As you’d expect, the discovery has caused the Suicide Squad community to excitedly predict how Batman might return. On the face of it, it seems unlikely (he was shot in the head after all). But there are all sorts of theories beyond the simple, ‘this is a comic book story so superheroes never die’ explanation. For example, some theorise the Justice League characters who are killed in the game are clones created by Brainiac, and the original characters are holed up somewhere for safekeeping. Another theory suggests multiverse shenanigans, which may or may not mean Batman from another universe turns up to save the day. Some even reckon the entire game takes place in an alternate universe separate from previous Arkham games.

There’s more: datamining has shown strong hints that Flash and Green Lantern are set to return in some form, so adding Batman to the list wouldn’t be a big reach. Officially, all we know is that Joker is set to arrive in Suicide Squad as a playable character. Other characters suspected to be on their way include Mrs Freeze (Nora Fries), Lawless, and Deathstroke.

But it’s the return of Batman that would be the highest-profile change, given how Suicide Squad’s story has gone down with some. Developer Rocksteady and publisher Warner Bros. have yet to comment.

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.

Helldivers 2 has become Sony’s biggest ever game launch on Steam, despite a ‘mixed’ reception from players.

Arrowhead Game Studios’ cooperative action game is published by Sony Interactive Entertainment across PS5 and PC via Steam. While Sony does not publish player numbers for PlayStation games, Valve does for Steam games. Yesterday, February 8, Helldivers 2 launched big on Steam with a peak concurrent player count of 81,840. That puts it ahead of Sony Santa Monica’s God of War, which enjoyed a peak concurrent player count of 73,529 when it launched on PC two years ago, according to SteamDB.

.@helldivers2 is now the most concurrently played game on Steam published by @PlayStation at 81k players.

Previous record was God of War at 73k players. pic.twitter.com/Ki0cJtdi4n

— SteamDB (@SteamDB) February 9, 2024

Helldivers 2’s PC success comes despite it launching day-and-date alongside the PS5 version, which is an unusual but not unprecedented strategy for Sony. Sony published IllFonic’s Predator: Hunting Grounds, for example, across PS4 and PC on the same day in April 2020. Helldivers 2 is also the top-selling game by revenue on Steam, ahead of smash hits such as Palworld and Call of Duty. It’s worth noting Helldivers 2 is not a full-price game but cheaper at $39.99.

Whether Sony might be willing to relax its policy for its big first-party exclusives remains to be seen. The recently released Marvel’s Spider-Man 2 is not available on PC and Sony has yet to announce a PC version. Shift Up’s eye-catching action game Stellar Blade is down for release on PS5 only, as is Team Ninja’s Rise of the Ronin. Concord, a brand new PvP multiplayer first-person shooter from Firewalk Studios, is due to launch on PS5 and PC.

Despite Helldivers 2’s Steam success, it has a ‘mixed’ user review rating, with some users pointing out performance problems that are causing issues on PC. Arrowhead has released a patch to Steam that appears to have eased matchmaking issues for PC as well as some crash issues.

“We know there’s more to solve, and we’re working our way through it,” Game Director Mikael Eriksson said. “Nevertheless, we hope this rapid patch goes a long way to making your experience better.

“Now go smash some bugs (and bots)!”

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.

Cardy, Matt, and Jesse have been blowing loads up aliens up in Helldivers 2 and having a bloody laugh doing it, too. There’s also a big delve into the first couple of chapters of Final Fantasy 7 Rebirth and whether it lives up to the high standards of Remake. Plus, there’s also plenty of time to look back at Uncharted: The Lost Legacy, chat about True Detective: Night Country, natter about The Iron Claw, and break huge chocolate biscuit news.

Get in touch at ign_ukfeedback@ign.com.

IGN UK Podcast 735: Helldiving into Final Fantasy 7 Rebirth

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