From Peak to Cairn, climbing games are all the rage right now, and you can add Ascenders: Beyond the Peak to the list. So how does Ascenders stand apart from its peers? By offering a grim approach to mountaineering, blending it with Lovecraftian horror and resource management. In another macabre twist, the game even offers an option to cut some dead weight loose from your ascent--quite literally.

Billed as an exploration roguelite that fuses turn-based climbing and expedition management with rope physics and permanent consequences, each run takes place on a mountain cursed with mysterious Lovecraftian threats hidden within the rocks. Every expedition is a desperate attempt to reach the summit, and losing a member of your party doesn't just reduce your resources, but the overall morale of your group as you make your way to the top.

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Remember that C button on your Nintendo Switch 2? It's that button that you may have accidentally pressed instead of the Home button right above it. Well, Nintendo really wants you to use it to activate GameChat, and the company will grant you points and icons in return.

Until April 22 at 5:59 PM PT / 8:59 PM ET, you can earn 100 My Nintendo Platinum Points simply by opening GameChat, which Nintendo promoted as the Switch 2's "defining" feature. You can then use those points to claim up to 13 icons for your Switch profile, each 10 Platinum Points each. That means you'll need a little more than the 100 points you get from activating GameChat if you want every icon--you can earn Platinum Points from completing My Nintendo missions.

While you can look at these icon elements on the Nintendo Switch Online app within your Switch 2, you can't redeem any of them without actually starting up GameChat. We found that simply opening the GameChat menu without even starting a chat will do the trick and allow you to claim these limited-time icons, so you don't even have to fully use the feature.

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Microsoft is bringing back the Xbox FanFest event this year, and it's going on tour to help celebrate Xbox's 25th anniversary. Microsoft announced today that in addition to the Xbox FanFest that was already announced for Los Angeles, the show will hit the road and make seven stops globally.

These will include:

• Cologne, Germany
• London, UK
• Mexico City, Mexico
• Seattle, USA
• Sydney, Australia
• Tokyo, Japan
• Toronto, Canada

Microsoft said each FanFest will be "unique to the location in which it's held." Fans can expect "in-person experiences that bring the worlds of Xbox to life with opportunities for players to connect with one another," Microsoft said.

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Resident Evil creator Shinji Mikami has sold his new studio, Unbound, to Stellar Blade owner Shift Up.

Unbound is currently working on "original" PC and console based games that Shift Up said are being designed to appeal to the "global market." You can watch the announcement video for the partnership below.

Fans have theorized that some of the eerie-looking art mixed in with the developer quotes might be for whatever Unbound is working on, but that remains to be confirmed. Mikami is known for his work on spooky games, and the art in the video surely seems to be in line with that.

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The RPG Crimson Desert from developer Pearl Abyss continues to put up strong sales numbers. The Korean studio has now confirmed that Crimson Desert has passed 4 million in sales.

That's up from 2 million sales in the game's first 24 hours and 3 million in sales after less than a week. "Thank you to all the Greymanes who have been a part of this journey with us and for all of your incredible love and support," Pearl Abyss said of the new sales milestone.

Crimson Desert released on March 19, and Pearl Abyss has released numerous updates since then to address issues and fan feedback. One of the biggest updates replaced AI-generated art that fans noticed. Pearl Abyss hasn't fixed or addressed everything, though, as fans are still irked by the game's inventory management. On the more positive side, fans have discovered all kinds of cool stuff in the game, including the best drip and how NPCs will do work for you.

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The Super Mario Galaxy Movie hit theaters on April 1, and it's putting up huge numbers right out of the gate. The animated film brought in $34 million in the US for its opening day, which is good for the biggest opening day so far in 2026, outpacing Project Hail Mary ($33.1 million).

It's also the highest opening for a movie that opened on a Wednesday in April in US history, beating a record set by April 2023's The Super Mario Bros. Movie ($31.7 million), according to Deadline.

The Super Mario Bros. Movie went on to make $146.3 million over its first three days on Easter weekend in 2023 and $204.6 million over the five-day period from Wednesday-Sunday. The Super Mario Galaxy Movie, meanwhile, is projected to make $128.2 million over its first three days and $186 million for its first five.

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Like lots of games, Minecraft is celebrating April Fools' Day with a good, old-fashioned joke. But rather than simply making a silly social media post, developer Mojang is fully committed to the bit, and this year's joke comes in the form of a playable game update.

The Herdcraft Update is live now, and gets rid of the inventory system entirely, leaving players' inventory items to follow them around the in-game world like sheep.

"Herdcraft is a completely new (and very permanent) way to play Minecraft," creative communications director and writer Cristina Anderca explained in a blog post announcing the update. "Instead of spending minutes, hours, years on end trying to organize the chaos in your inventory, you get to be present in the world, together with your new friends: all the items and blocks that you own!"

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Embark Studios released a bonafide hit in Arc Raiders, and its use of AI was controversial. The studio's top boss, Patrick Soderlund, was recently promoted to executive chairman of publisher Nexon, and now he's given a presentation in which he shed more light on the company's approach to AI in gaming.

"Every company has a plan; most will get it wrong," he said about how game developers will use AI (via GamesRadar).

He said there is a "race" going on now to find and implement the best AI-based strategies to help developers, but he said the winners "won't be the first movers."

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Call of Duty has featured famously small maps like Shipment before, but Black Ops 7 takes things further for April Fools' Day, adding a hilariously tiny map in a limited-time game mode.

Developer Treyarch shared what looked like the layout of a small map on social media, and you can play on it right now. The game mode called "GRWM" (an acronym for "get ready with me") puts you in a free-for-all match with a max of eight players in what appears to be a walk-in closet or changing room, the most intimate setting for a firefight that Call of Duty has conceived.

Unsurprisingly, with all players together in such close quarters and very little cover, chaos and carnage follow as soon as the match starts. Matches end once a player reaches a score of 67, a not-so-subtle reference to the 6-7 meme that has arguably gone out of fashion.

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Many Crimson Desert players are getting lost in the world of Pywell, doing things like watching NPCs or managing inventories, all while killing bosses and recruiting allies to revive the Greymanes. You need a good outfit to go along with your adventuring in Pearl Abyss' action-adventure RPG, and Redditors are out here posting the drippiest fits around for everyone to consume and copy.

There are likely hundreds of pieces of equipment for you to collect in Pywell. From unique swords and legendary shields to iconic chestplates to rare helmets, Crimson Desert players on Reddit are finding and sharing it all. And in the process, they're swagging out the playable characters in idiosyncratic garb and familiar cosplay. Redditor frankiexile posted a Jon Snow cosplay, with their Kliff donning what appears to be an archetypal Night's Watch uniform, replete with an all-black ensemble and a big sword to match. Meanwhile, user Jaycoon335 dressed all three characters--Damiane, Kliff, and Oongka--in more East Asian-inspired outfits with ornate adornments, expensive plating, and gold accents.

Elsewhere in the official Crimson Desert subreddit, users DrGreenThumb117 and MrSkits94 shared Kliffs who look like a human boss you'd see roaming around The Lands Between in Elden Ring. Redditor xehparr posted a red-clad Kliff who'd fit perfectly as a Red Mage in a, say, Final Fantasy XIV party. And posters Agreeable-Wall-9781, ovingzz, and Hor-Re-Behedeti put their Kliffs on display, all of which wouldn't look out of place inside the fantasy settings of Skyrim and Tainted Grail: The Fall of Avalon.

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Nothing lasts forever, and that includes Fortnite's "cultural moment," according to one industry expert.

Researcher and industry expert Joost van Dreunen said on his blog that Epic's recent round of 1,000+ layoffs are further evidence of the "real-time collapse of American cultural dominance in interactive entertainment." US-based game developers are now facing a "bevy of strategic and economic challenges," and this has contributed to a scenario where Fortnite's star is burning less brightly.

"We can observe the signs of this decline when even the largest, most innovative, and most successful entertainment firms begin to struggle. As I see it, Epic Games is more than a casualty of bad timing or a bad quarter. It is the most legible example yet of what happens when structural conditions make decline inevitable," he wrote.

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The Super Mario Galaxy Movie introduces Fox McCloud and other characters not seen in the 2023 movie, but getting him in the movie was not Nintendo's idea. Not only that, but adding Fox required Nintendo to break its rules about mixing IPs. And when it came to finding a voice actor, it turned out that Glen Powell had already pitched himself, not knowing Illumination and Nintendo were planning to put Fox in the movie.

Speaking to Forbes, Nintendo legend Shigeru Miyamoto said it was Illumination boss Chris Meledandri who came to him to pitch Fox. It wasn't an immediate yes, though, as Miyamoto pointed out that Nintendo tends to "avoid mixing IPs." However, Miyamoto ultimately agreed to the idea, in part because The Super Mario Galaxy Movie takes place in space and Fox is a character who flies through space.

"I felt that I wanted to see that," Miyamoto said of putting Fox in the movie, even if he expected the idea to face an uphill battle with the powers-that-be at Nintendo.

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Anyone who plays World of Warcraft knows the real endgame is looking cool, and Blizzard is giving players another way to do just that with a new transmog feature coming in patch 12.0.5.

As revealed in the latest 12.0.5 public test realm development notes, players will soon be able to choose how to sheath their one handed weapons using the game's transmog system. Those options include sheathing weapons on the back, hip, or whether to be hidden entirely. For those classes or specializations that dual wield one-handed weapons, each weapon can be transmogged independently, meaning one weapon could be on the back while another could be on the hip.

Unfortunately, two-handed weapons aren't currently able to be worn on the hip (likely because they would be dragging through the ground), but they can still be hidden if desired. In the live game, the only way to do this currently is by using certain cloak transmog appearances that hide weapons.

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Dandadan Season 2: Collector's Edition Blu-ray

$65 | Releases June 30

Preorder at Crunchyroll Store

Dandadan Season 2: Standard Edition Blu-ray

$35 | Releases June 30

Preorder at Crunchyroll Store

Several new anime series have made a splash in the last couple of years, with Dandadan considered one of the biggest breakout hits. The second season of the critically acclaimed series is headed to Blu-ray in July, and like its first home media release, fans can choose between a standard Blu-ray for $35 and a $65 deluxe version loaded with extras.

Dandadan Season 2: Collector's Edition Blu-ray

$65 | Releases June 30

Preorder at Crunchyroll Store

The Collector's Edition Blu-ray includes all 12 episodes from the second season across two discs. On-disc special features include scene breakdowns, behind-the-scenes featurettes, clean opening and closing credit sequences, and trailers. It also comes with a 76-page booklet of illustrations, three sticker sheets, and is bundled inside a slipcase with exclusive cover art of the show's cast. Audio options include English and Japanese dubs, with optional subtitles.

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Crimson Desert has loads of systems for you to engage with, like fishing, bounty hunting, armor dying, and cooking. There's even a point where you'll start recruiting NPCs to join your camp, and players are enamored by watching Pywell's many denizens get to work in real time, as they're replete with schedules and everything.

Over on the game's official subreddit are three separate posts of three redditors requesting the same construction: a stone statue. After unlocking the Greymane Camp at the start of Chapter 3, you can begin to recruit and dispatch workers to complete activities. This ranges from lumbering and mining to building and guarding, and some redditors have captured the activity in real time. Users lakitu76, TopSeaworthiness1679, and Responsible-Wind1788 shared posts of a time-lapse of workers hammering away at a statue, fiddling with and sticking on pieces of stone as Kliff just stood idly by. Meanwhile, user Vinjulmik posted a screenshot of their entire camp working on a bridge as Kliff watched them sweat.

When you send your recruits to do some work, they actually leave, too. According to users in the game's subreddit, your hires will head to the location you send them to and stay there until the job is finished; once they're gone, they'll be greyed out in your Comrades tab, indicating that they've not yet returned from their duties.

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One of the most-requested Pokemon is making their debut in Pokemon Go today, and it's not an April Fool's Day prank. Mimikyu has finally come to Pokemon Go, and dedicated players will be able to add them to their lineup starting today. The decision to debut the character on April 1 may be an unusual choice, but Mimikyu's silhouettes are already appearing in the game.

Pokemon Go's Spotlight Hour--which starts tonight at 6pm local time--will feature multiple Mimikyu spawns, as well as Pikachu appearances. But if you can't play during that time, Mimikyu will still spawn for players in addition to appearing in random task rewards.

Mimikyu won't be the only creature debuting Pokemon Go this month. Silicobra and shiny Toedscool are both slated to arrive as part of April's Pokemon Go events. Players will also have the opportunity to catch some Pokemon that are dressed in wild costumes in Fashion Raid Day, which will take place on April 4.

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The Super Mario Galaxy Movie is now in cinemas, and while it's expected to be a commercial hit, it's not doing so well on the critical front currently. Early reviews for the sequel to The Super Mario Bros. Movie have gone live, and on GameSpot's sister site Metacritic, The Super Mario Galaxy Movie currently holds a "generally unfavorable" metascore of 37. That's even lower than 2022's Mario movie (46) and just two points better than the 1993 live-action Super Mario Bros. movie, but there's more to this story than just simple digits.

Generally, gaming websites are offering more positive reviews, ranging from a 6/10 at IGN to 8.5/10 at Game Informer. The general consensus is that The Super Mario Galaxy Movie looks great, has plenty of Easter eggs for fans, and its story isn't going to win any Academy Awards. Most importantly, it's clearly designed for its target market of kids while adults can enjoy spotting all the references to decades of Mario history.

Film industry and news sites like Variety, The Wrap, and SlashFilm have delivered scathing reviews so far, describing it as hollow and lacking in any cinematic substance. In one brutal review, The Times scored the movie a 0/10 and called it a "torturous" slog. And that's fair, because reviews are opinion pieces after all. The Super Mario Bros. Movie also had plenty of detractors when it first hit cinemas, but it does have a positive user review score of 8.1 and a global box office gross of over $1.2 billion, so those negative reviews didn't dampen the enthusiasm for it.

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PlayStation has revealed this month's batch of free games for PlayStation Plus subscribers. All PS Plus members will be able to claim a trio of freebies starting April 7: Lords of the Fallen, Tomb Raider I-III Remastered, and Sword Art Online Fractured Daydream. If you haven't claimed March's PlayStation Plus free games yet, make sure to do so before next Tuesday, April 7.

Lords of the Fallen sees players embark on a quest as one the legendary Dark Crusaders, warriors sworn to stop a demonic tyrant from plunging the world into darkness. The 2023 game features all the hallmarks of the souls-like genre, from intimidating enemies to risk-and-reward gameplay, but the brutal checkpoint system, confusing level design, and bosses that took forever to kill made it a tough game to recommend to fans of the genre.

If you're feeling like taking a trip back to the '90s, you can check out Tomb Raider I-III Remastered. This trilogy of classic Lara Croft adventures contains all expansions and secret levels, as well as an option to switch between the upgraded graphics and the original polygons instantly. A new Challenge Mode was also added, and it's a great option for revisiting the janky games ahead of the upcoming Tomb Raider remake for PC and console.

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Mortal Shell 2 developer Cold Symmetry has shown off the first gameplay trailer for the upcoming souls-like, and unsurprisingly, the sequel isn't straying from the foundation established in the original 2020 game. The deep-dive video shows off three playable Shells--Tiel the Acolyte, Eredrim the Venerable, and Proxima the Broodseeker--as they explore the dangerous world around them.

Each Shell offers a different approach to combat, with all the action now taking place in the cold and marshy patches of Fallgrim. Unlike the more confined spaces of its predecessor, Mortal Shell 2 goes all in on an open-world environment, which is naturally populated by dark and bloodthirsty monsters. The world is also designed to be deliberately compact, as Cold Symmetry says that it wants to respect a player's time.

Just like the first game, the dormant forms of forgotten warriors are scattered throughout the game, and once a Shell has been discovered, it can be awakened and possessed to unlock new abilities. Billed as a standalone sequel, Cold Symmetry says that no familiarity with the first Mortal Shell game is required to play Mortal Shell 2 to its fullest, and Fallgrim will have more than 60 dungeons to explore.

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While PS5 console prices are rising on April 2, there's a unique PS5 accessory that's actually getting a price cut. Right now, you'll find the popular dbrand Darkplates 2.0 with a 50% discount. That means you can customize your rig for as little as $40 (was $80), though add-on content like lightstrips and additional skins are also quite cheap. An end date for the sale isn't being advertised by dbrand, so be sure to check out the savings while you can

Dbrand Darkplates 2.0$40 (was $80)

See at dbrand

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