World of Warcraft: Forever's launch hit some minor hiccups immediately upon release, but overall is going surprisingly well, much to the surprise of players who anticipated the worst.

As soon as the countdown timer clicked to zero at 3 PM PT, players began to encounter short login queues. Sitting through the queue would bring up the game's list of possible rulesets, but they were grayed out an unavailable. It took around 30 minutes of players requeuing and waiting with bated breath to see if the servers would come online or if they were out of luck, but lo and behold, eventually everything started working as intended.

In all previous versions of WoW, players picked a server to call home and create their character on, then logged in to that server to play. Servers generally ranged from anywhere between 3,000 to 10,000 or more players, with server sizes increasing in recent years as Blizzard experimented with larger, but fewer, servers. In the past, that approach to WoW Classic launches have seen their fair share of issues, from hours-long queues to login issues.

https://www.reddit.com/r/classicwow/comments/1xo3xzs/was_release_smooth_enough/

For Forever, Blizzard opted for a different, "realmless" approach. Instead of individual servers, players would instead pick their desired "ruleset," like player vs. environment, roleplaying, or player vs. player. All players on the same ruleset are then placed on essentially one giant mass of interconnected servers.

So far, that seems to have been a good call. Aside from the first 30 minutes, launch has been smooth, with minimal lag and few issues. Starting zones are crowded, but it's not impossible to make progress on quests. Some players on Reddit are calling it "possibly the best Blizzard launch ever," with another saying they've "never seen a smoother launch."

In other Forever news, Blizzard gave all classes a big damage boost ahead of launch, is teasing what looks to be a new legendary weapon players will be able to acquire, and even hinted at new class and race combos that could be coming to the game in the near future.

World of Warcraft: Forever's launch is imminent, and Blizzard is using the occasion to reveal what might be the game's first new legendary weapon.

Earlier today, a stream went live on the Warcraft Twitch channel that shows the creation of what looks to be a full-scale night-elf-themed staff weapon. The name of the stream is titled Camelot_revealv2_final.mp4, with Camelot being a reference to Forever's development codename. Twitch itself is hyping up the stream, stating in a blog it will lead to a "major reveal and a particularly exciting moment you don't want to miss."

The builders on stream can be seen using 3D printers and all other kinds of tools to craft what looks like a life-size replica of a specific staff that has been popping up in recent Forever promotional materials. A staff wielded by a skyborne Druid that looks extremely similar to the one being built can be seen in the recent Warpath animated music video. New promotional Forever artwork on Battle.net also looks to feature the same, distinct staff, once again wielding by a skyborne Druid.

New WoW: Forever promotinal artwork looks to show the same staff.

In the latest episode of the WoW: Forever podcast, a board in the background contained a night elf phrase that fans have roughly translated to something close to "The Hidden Blade is the guiding light." Given the words were written in the night elf language and that the staff that keeps appearing is also night-elf-themed, players are beginning to think the two are connected.

How players will find this new weapon remains to be seen, as are these classes that will be able to wield it. So far, it seems likely it will be a Druid weapon, but it's possible other staff-wielding classes could also acquire it.

https://www.reddit.com/r/wowforever/comments/1xiovjz/anyone_speak_elven/

Forever's raids don't unlock until December 9, but two of them, Hyjal Summit and the Barrow Downs, both have deep night-elf-lore connections. It seems plausible the staff will be related to these two raids in some way, but given how involved previous legendary weapon questlines in WoW Classic are, players shouldn't expect it to be a straightforward, easy, or quick process.

Whatever the reveal ends up being, we'll update this post once we know more. WoW: Forever launches today on PC, but sounds like it could come to other platforms in the future thanks to its controller support. In other Forever news, Blizzard looks to have teased new class and race combos that could come to the MMORPG in the near future.

Developer Blizzard may have just revealed new World of Warcraft: Forever class and race combos less than a day before the game's launch.

Forever already features a number of new class and race combos not seen in WoW Classic, like troll Warlocks, human Hunters, and more. In a launch overview video diving into what players need to know about this new version of Blizzard's genre-defining MMORPG, however, eagle-eyed players noticed a few peculiar sights.

Along what appeared to be various class abilities that aren't currently in the game, certain class and race combinations that aren't currently possible can also be seen. A total of three new race and class combos are shown in the footage, including a tauren Mage casting frostbolt, a skyborne Paladin, and what appears to be a night elf Shaman (or at least a night elf wearing a Shaman armor set). 

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=n2Wg46fwmb0

Those would each be big additions, particularly when it comes to more options for Paladin and Shaman players. Currently in Forever, only dwarves can be Shamans on the Alliance side of the MMO's faction divide, while the only Paladin option on Horde is undead. Having additional choices is never a bad thing, and a second Shaman option would likely be well received by the game's community.

Since skyborne can be either faction, this would give Horde players another race choice for Paladin, but could also ruffle some feathers. Skyborne are currently locked behind a $30 paywall, and some players might not take kindly to having a new paladin option cost additional cash. 

Though it's certainly possible the new race and class combos seen in the launch overview video were included by mistake and no longer something Blizzard is planning, that seems unlikely given Blizzard's past comments.

While they won't be included in the game at launch, Blizzard has made clear they are something players should be expecting in the near future. In an interview with GameSpot last month, Forever associate production director Clay Stone said Blizzard was "holding back" some features that were originally planned for day one. He specifically said players can expect new class and race combos "not that far after launch."

WoW: Forever launches today for PC, but thanks to its controller support, it certainly sounds like it might be playable on other platforms in the future. Blizzard has made some big changes to Forever just in time for release, including a major damage boost for all classes and updates to racial abilities.

Rockstar Games has announced that Grand Theft Auto 6 will now released in stores two days earlier than anticipated--but this doesn't change anything about when you'll actually be able to play the game.

GTA 6's code-in-a-box physical edition will be available to purchase in stores starting on November 10; it was previously going to be November 12.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=klc0fQmAL6k

Rockstar also moved up the preloading date for GTA 6 from November 12 to November 10 for the digital and code-in-a-box versions. The developer offered no explanation as to why it made these changes, and the company did not respond to GameSpot's request seeking comment.

While you might walk into a Target or Best Buy or GameStop on November 10 and see a copy of GTA 6 that you can spend real money on, you cannot actually play the game until November 19 when the game goes live. If you're in the US, you'll be among the last people in the world to get in due to how the game is launching non-simultaneously.

Also in the post, Rockstar confirmed what everyone expected: The $100 Ultimate Edition of GTA 6 is not going to be sold in stores. This move, along with ditching discs entirely, is all about making money.

GTA 6 launches on November 19 for PS5 and Xbox Series X|S. A recent poll said lots of people are excited to play GTA Online, but GTA 6 is a single-player game with no multiplayer component, at least not yet.

Grand Theft Auto 6 launches on November 19, and the game's file size, 212GB, is truly massive. One internet company, Spectrum, is turning this into a marketing moment for its own services by offering members a "free Gig Speed Lift" in November to help download the game faster.

Available November 9-30, the offer has "no cost and no strings attached," the company said. The offer is fairly straightforward: Customers with a qualifying internet plan and compatible equipment can use the My Spectrum app to opt in. Then on November 9, customers will have their download speeds upped to 1Gbps. If you're already on a plan offering that, you'll get boosted to 2Gbps.

Spectrum said the boost should allow people to download GTA 6 in under 30 minutes.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wmKu9Uow-os

The free upgrade offer runs through November 30, so that also covers Thanksgiving, when you might have a bunch of people in your home and want faster internet. It also covers the Black Friday and Cyber Monday shopping holidays.

After November 30, the speed boost gets pulled from your account with no further action required on your part. The whole idea here is that Spectrum thinks you'll enjoy it so much that you'll pay to upgrade on a more permanent basis.

GTA 6 launches on November 19 for PS5 and Xbox Series X|S. For more, check out the exact GTA 6 worldwide release times to find out when it unlocks where you live.

Grand Theft Auto 6 releases on November 19, and a lot of people are very excited to play some kind of online mode, according to a new study. The only problem is that GTA 6 is a strictly single-player game and has no online mode, at least not one that Rockstar has talked about yet.

Research firm Piper Sandler recently polled 9,000 teenagers, with 90% saying they intend to play GTA Online. It would be shocking if GTA 6 doesn't eventually have an online mode, but the company has not said anything about that.

Product listings for GTA 6 at retailers make it clear that the game is a "single-player experience," so it's not something Rockstar is trying to be coy about.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=klc0fQmAL6k

The poll also found that 40% of respondents said they planned to make additional in-game purchases.

Additionally, the survey found that 70% of respondents who own a PS5 or Xbox Series X|S plan to buy GTA 6. Of those, 55% said they are planning to buy GTA immediately, and 15% said they would wait several months.

Before this, Circana reported that nearly 1 in 3 console and PC gamers in the US plan to buy GTA 6; that's the highest purchase intent that Circana has ever measured.

Analyst James Callahan reiterated a $290 price target on Take-Two's stock. After getting crushed so far in 2026, Take-Two stock today stands at about $210/share (after a huge rally today, November 4).

It remains to be seen what Rockstar may do with the existing GTA Online for GTA 6 after GTA 6 comes out--whatever the case, gamers are going to be mad.

GTA 6 launches on November 19 for PS5 and Xbox Series X|S. Preloading starts on November 10, and gamers in the US will be among the last in the world to get to play the game, so maybe pack your bags for New Zealand.

Santa Monica Studios has delayed God of War Laufey. The new God of War game for PS5 is no longer set for release in February 2027, and has shifted to May 2027.

The game will now launch on May 20, 2027, which is a delay of about three months from its original February 16, 2027 release date.

"We will make the most of each moment until then by putting in the finishing touches and pushing the game to its fullest potential," the developer said. "On behalf of everyone on the team, we appreciate your patience and we'll be back to share more updates soon."

https://twitter.com/SonySantaMonica/status/2118025571020271817

God of War Laufey stars Deborah Ann Woll as Faye. Starring alongside Woll is The Boys actor Jack Quaid, who plays a gelatinous cube named Phranque.

Compared to Kratos and his skillful application of brute force to help solve problems, Faye is far more graceful and nimble. Like the previous games, God of War Laufey is a third-person action experience built around chaining together various skills and weapons to dish out tremendous amounts of damage.

You can see the game in action in the gameplay trailer below.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=upjpP54xDIc&t=4s

A new Kratos-led game is coming after that, and it will pick up where Laufey left off.

Nexus Mods owner Victor "Foledinho" Folmann has outlined plans to make AI disclosures mandatory for PC mods uploaded to the site. While content built with AI tools won't be banned--despite it being a contentious subject in the modding community--Folmann did reveal that Nexus Mods will ultimately require modders to clearly communicate when AI has been used.

"We already have tags for AI-generated and AI-assisted mods, but we recognize that there’s a lot more we can do to make that information more accessible and clear for you all," Folmann wrote. "As of today, we're making AI disclosure mandatory when uploading a new mod, meaning mod authors will need to declare whether AI has been used in their work. All existing mods will have one of two popups: a persistent one when editing a mod in the upload form, and a dismissible one on the 'My Mods' page."

At the same time, Nexus Mods users will be able to filter out AI-produced mods entirely from their search results, similar to what Itch.io does as part of its efforts to combat AI spam uploads. As for why Nexus Mods will allow AI content to remain on the site, Folmann added that an outright ban would likely lead modders to simply not declare their use of AI tools in their mod-creation-efforts. By allowing and moderating it, the site can motivate users to be more transparent.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WB0C8z2j6nA

"An outright ban will not eliminate AI from the modding process but will prevent people from mentioning its use. We'd prefer the opposite; it should be out in the open, clearly labelled, and regulated according to the rules that we can implement on our platform," Folmann wrote. "Mod authors should have a chance to decide about the further use of their work, and you should be able to decide for yourselves how much AI-based content you want to see, whether more, less, or no content at all."

Nexus Mods' official stance is that it will not use mods to train AI, nor will it sell or license them out, Folmann added. The site will continue to fine-tune its approach to AI-assisted mods while also punishing anyone caught breaking its new disclosure rules.

AI has been a hot-button issue lately for PC gamers, with the recent Steam Next Fest highlighting a growing problem of slop flooding the platform.

Game developers have also reported that the mandatory QA check every game must pass before launch is taking even longer now, with studios blaming a deluge of AI-generated games for slowing down the process. This week, Steam announced new game submission rules to get things back on track, including requiring developers to ensure their game can run through the Steam Client for at least five minutes before they hit the submit key.

Bethesda just recently lifted the lid on the next Elder Scrolls game, revealing its title to be "Sentinel" and telling fans it will be "some time" before more is shared.

But just when could Sentinel be released? According to reporter Jason Schreier, the game isn't expected to launch for another two+ years.

"TESVI: Sentinel is more than two years away," he wrote on Reddit.

The Elder Scrolls 6 was announced more than eight years ago, and until this week, Bethesda hadn't said much at all in an official capacity about the game. The latest information wasn't much to go on, either, as Bethesda only confirmed the game's title and published a title card video featuring a scroll emerging from the sand. The video also hinted that Hammerfell being the game's location.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=IJCcHs78iBw

Game director Todd Howard has questioned whether it was the right call to announce The Elder Scrolls 6 so early. “I have asked myself that a lot,” he said. “I don’t know. I probably would’ve announced it more casually.”

He later said announcing The Elder Scrolls 6 in the way that Bethesda did was “not my preference,” but it happened anyway.

He went on to joke: “Just pretend we didn’t announce it. It doesn’t exist. No one has heard a word.”

One of the reasons that The Elder Scrolls 6 might have been announced so early was for the purposes of recruiting staff to work on it. This is a common practice in gaming.

It remains to be seen if Sentinel will be exclusive on console to Xbox or if Microsoft will also bring it to PlayStation 5. We also don't know if the game is in the works for Xbox Series X|S, or the planned next console, Project Helix, or both.

In addition to Sentinel, Bethesda is working on Fallout 5, along with remasters of Fallout 3 and Fallout: New Vegas. This is all happening amid a "reset" of the Xbox business that has The Elder Scrolls 6 developers fearing for their jobs.

A Gears of War movie is in development at Netflix, but is it ever going to happen? That remains to be seen, but director David Leitch of John Wick fame recently said the movie will "hopefully" come to fruition "soon."

Speaking to ScreenRant, Leitch said, "I think everybody's excited about the potential of this as a film universe."

He added: "I wish I could tell you more, because there's some much cool stuff going on."

Netflix recently underwent a big shift in management, with film chief Dan Lin exiting the company alongside longtime chief content officer Bela Bajaria. Former Former Disney and Fox executive Peter Rice is now the new chief content officer. He was only just recently installed in the post, so it remains to be seen what changes Rice could make. There is, however, precedent for new management making big changes, as Netflix's BioShock movie was scaled back under the leadership of Lin.

The latest script for the Gears of War movie as of 2025 was written by Jon Spaihts, who previously wrote Prometheus, Doctor Strange, and Passengers, along with Dune 1 and 2.

A decades-long wait

Gears of War fans have been waiting decades for their promised Gears of War movie. All the way back in 2007, a year after the first Gears of War game came out, New Line Cinema purchased the rights to make a movie based on the game. Nothing ever came of that. Then in 2016, the Gears of War movie rights changed hands and went to Universal. Nothing came of that, either.

In 2022, Netflix announced a deal with Microsoft to make not only a Gears of War movie, but also an animated TV series (which we don’t know anything about). It’s been four years since then and the project remains in development, but things tend to fall apart in Hollywood, so there are no guarantees it’ll actually happen.

Netflix is also working on an Assassin’s Creed TV show, and that one is actually going to happen, as it is now filming. Additionally, Netflix is behind the BioShock movie from The Hunger Games director Francis Lawrence, and it’s set to begin production in 2027.

Who could be in the Gears of War movie?

Wrestler-turned-actor Dave Bautista has lobbied for years to play Marcus, and he does bear a strong resemblance to the character, but no casting announcements for the Gears of War movie have been made. He's already involved in a big video game project, as he's starring as Kratos in Prime Video's God of War show. Meanwhile, Gears of War designer Cliff Bleszinski has previously been adamant that Chris Pratt shouldn’t play any role in the film.

What about the Gears of War games?

The latest entry in the game series was this year's Gears of War: E-Day, a highly regarded action game that reportedly has not sold very well. No new games in the series have been announced, but developer The Coalition has said it won't take another seven years to make a follow-up.

Zooming further out, Xbox is undergoing a major "reset" that has included mass layoffs, game cancellations, and studio closures/divestitures. Developers at The Coalition said they fear for their jobs.

One of the minds behind the legendary music of Halo fell short in his mission to pivot to politics. Marty O'Donnell, formerly a composer and audio director for Bungie, lost his bid to join the U.S. House of Representatives by a wide margin.

With 86% of votes counted, AP News called the race in Nevada's 3rd congressional district for incumbent Representative Susie Lee, a Democrat. O'Donnell ran as a Republican and had the endorsement of President Donald Trump. The current count has O'Donnell with 38.6% of the vote, trailing Lee's 59.1%. Nevada's 3rd district includes much of Clark County and part of Las Vegas.

Lee, who has held her seat since 2019, has been a target of Republicans in previous election cycles. As it became clear early Wednesday morning that Lee was favored to win re-election, her social media account posted the famous "Halo theme song performed by 80 guys in 1 bathroom" video to mock O'Donnell. O'Donnell responded by saying in a post: "Susie has a lot of class. And it’s all low."

https://twitter.com/MartyTheElder/status/2117901086279541197?a=Tdcz1QfGJvr7Nxw7kxo&s=20

O'Donnell heavily leaned on his video game industry background, hosting a campaign event that doubled as a celebration of early Halo games. At the event, O'Donnell declared that "gamers are not woke" and insisted that games, movies, and comics were "co-opted by left-wing politics."

As Lee's social media video hints at, this wasn't O'Donnell's first attempt at entering national politics. O'Donnell ran for the same congressional seat in 2024, placing fourth in the Republican primary. He won the Republican nomination in 2026 with the backing of Trump.

O'Donnell began his career in video game music composition as a freelancer, producing the music for Bungie's Myth and Myth 2. He joined Bungie as a full-time employee starting with 2001's Oni and went on to compose music for all of Bungie's Halo titles and the first Destiny game. O'Donnell was fired from Bungie in 2014; the composer claimed that he was terminated "without cause" and pursued legal action against the company afterward. According to his campaign website, O'Donnell is now retired from the game industry.

As PlayStation prepares to embrace an all-digital future starting in 2028, Nintendo is seen as one of the last bastions of physical games with its Switch cartridges. A new challenge has emerged: one of Nintendo's major ROM chip manufacturers, Macronix, is preparing to exit the market and shift its focus to the more lucrative flash and memory chip market.

In its latest earnings call (via MST Financial analyst David Gibson), Macronix revealed it plans to drop ROM manufacturing entirely. The company says ROM chips account for only 5% of its business, down from 26% a year ago. While Macronix isn't the only company that manufactures ROM chips for Nintendo, it is a major supplier overall, and losing it could put further pressure on the company and other game publishers to ship more games on Game-Key Cards, or increase prices for cartridges that do have full games installed.

ROM chips--which stand for Read-Only Memory--are specialized storage chips that data is permanently written to. The great thing about them is that they let games load quickly, since a console can read the game code straight off the chip without first installing data to an internal storage drive. Nintendo's proprietary game cards rely on specialized, high-speed ROM tech tailored specifically for Nintendo hardware.

https://twitter.com/gibbogame/status/2117805196130582970

Because of that design, they have high manufacturing costs and only a handful of silicon suppliers--including MegaChips and ROHM--manufacture them for Nintendo. This, in turn, affects publishers' profit margins, which is why Game-Key Cards on Switch 2 are a popular alternative. In comparison, they act as digital authentication keys that require a game to be downloaded directly to the Switch 2 flash storage.

We have reached out to Nintendo, and will update this post if we hear back from them.

The rise of AI companies has also had an impact on virtually every aspect of consoles, and memory is no exception, as prices have risen dramatically over the last two years. Several tech companies have also shifted from selling products to consumers to selling exclusively to AI companies, which have an incredible appetite for memory and storage. That pivot has proven lucrative, as all the RAM for 2027 looks to be sold out already.

For its part, Nintendo says it doesn't plan to abandon physical games yet, as it prefers to offer consumers an "agnostic" platform to play games on.

The video game research company Sensor Tower has updated its GTA 6 sales tracker to reveal the latest, albeit unofficial, sales data for the open-world crime game. According to Sensor Tower, GTA 6 has now sold 7.71 million total units via pre-purchases, which works out to about $751 million in gross revenue.

The report said PS5 sales are dominating the mix, with GTA 6 selling 5.74 million units on PS5 so far, compared to 1.97 million on Xbox Series X|S. That means of the 7.71 million GTA 6 sales so far, 74% are on PS5 and 26% on Xbox Series X|S.

In total, GTA 6 sales for PS5 have so far reached $559 million in revenue, compared to $192 million for Xbox Series X|S. Sony and Microsoft keep about 30% of revenue due to their platform fees, so GTA 6 being a huge success directly benefits both of those companies.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wmKu9Uow-os

The huge gap in sales between platforms is not surprising because the PS5 is dominating Xbox Series X|S in terms of console sales. In fact, GTA 6 is breaking records on Xbox, Microsoft has said, and the sales numbers for GTA 6 on Xbox line up with Xbox's share of the console market.

Sensor Tower is projecting as many as 25 million total pre-purchases for GTA 6 by launch, and if the 74/26 split holds, that would be about 18.5 million units on PS5 and 6.5 million on Xbox Series X|S.

Sony holds the marketing rights for GTA 6 on PS5, but that doesn't mean that Microsoft is doing nothing to try to promote the game. Just recently, Microsoft announced a GTA 6-inspired custom Xbox console that sits inside an alligator.

Circana has released new data that shows that GTA 6 holds 29% purchase intent among US console and PC gamers. That means nearly 1 in 3 console and PC gamers in the US plan to buy GTA 6–this is the highest purchase intent that Circana has ever measured for any game.

GTA 6 may indeed be a gigantic hit commercially, and one that helps lift the entire industry with increased sales of hardware and accessories. But anyone looking to buy a new console to play GTA 6 is set for major sticker shock, as consoles today are more expensive than ever. Not only that, but GTA 6 is not going to save the industry’s many serious and deep-rooted issues, experts believe.

GTA 6 launches on November 19 for PS5 and Xbox Series X|S. The game's file size is about 212GB, and thankfully, preloading begins more than a week before launch. The game unlocks on November 19 at midnight local time, and that means US players will be among the last in the world to get in.

People in New Zealand, meanwhile, will be the first in the world to play GTA 6. If you're thinking about booking a flight to the land of Hobbits, here are some tips for packing your PS5 safely.

Reviews are in for The Legend of Zelda: Ocarina of Time remake, and they're pretty good so far. On GameSpot's sister site Metacritic, Ocarina of Time has a review aggregate score of 96 from 81 reviews, making it the highest-reviewed game of the year so far--and with only a few months to go, it might stay in the top spot.

A few more reviews will likely filter in over the next few days from other sites Metacritic tracks, but don't expect the needle to shift much in either direction, or at all. According to Metacritic, twin-stick shooter Sektori is second for best-reviewed game of the year (93 based on 10 reviews), followed by the Switch 2 Deluxe Edition of the Resident Evil 2 remake (also 93, based on 16 reviews).

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_xMM7L2XoMc

But could Grand Theft Auto 6 dethrone Link from the number one spot? Historically, mainline entries of GTA games have reviewed very well, and looking back at previous entries, they've all earned review aggregate scores that are often on par or even higher than Legend of Zelda games. Here's a quick breakdown of how GTA has done over the years:

• Grand Theft Auto -- No metascore
• Grand Theft Auto 2 -- 70
• Grand Theft Auto 3 -- 97
• Grand Theft Auto: San Andreas -- 95
• Grand Theft Auto 4 -- 98
• Grand Theft Auto 5 -- 97

The pattern here is that the games developed from GTA 3 onwards earned the highest metascores, and if the tradition holds, then GTA 6 should also be in the 90s when reviews land and the scores are tallied up. That's depending on if the game is actually good, but considering Rockstar's track record, GTA 6 should be a polished experience, even if the new immersive gameplay mechanics create some sense of friction for players who are used to going on crime sprees in GTA games while not worrying too much about the consequences of their in-game actions.

For now, the Ocarina of Time remake will likely remain the best-reviewed game of 2026, a feat that Nintendo and Rockstar have achieved multiple times. The Switch 2 edition of The Legend of Zelda: Tears of the Kingdom was the best-reviewed game of 2025, and 2017's Breath of the Wild also took the top spot. Rockstar's Red Dead Redemption 2 was 2018's best-reviewed game, as was GTA 4 in 2008 and GTA 5 in 2013. Who will emerge victorious this year? You'll have to wait until November 19 to find out when GTA 6 launches.

Time is running out for Arkane Lyon to find a buyer, but Ubisoft could acquire the Marvel's Blade developer, according to a new report. Arkane was one of several studios that Xbox divested itself of earlier this year, and while most of those developers have since gone on to become indie studios again--except for Ninja Theory, which is expected to be closed after deals fell through--Arkane has found itself in a tough spot as it navigates life after Microsoft.

Bloomberg reported that Ubisoft was in talks with Microsoft to acquire Arkane Lyon and help it finish work on Marvel's Blade. The report added that Microsoft is also exploring selling Arkane Lyon back to its management, but if plans fall through before a deal can be struck by December, it looks likely the studio will ultimately be shut down. Bloomberg claims Ubisoft is one of three companies that have submitted bids for Arkane Lyon, but it has not yet revealed the identities of the other two bidders.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wB9ye56mSfk

Arkane Lyon moving to Ubisoft does make sense on paper, as both the developer and the Assassin's Creed publisher are based in France. At the same time, Ubisoft has embarked on a major restructuring process throughout 2026, setting up new Creative Houses to spearhead development on its biggest franchises and downsizing operations across the globe. Recently, Ubisoft laid off 72 people from its Skull & Bones developer, Ubisoft Singapore, and Trials studio RedLynx might be shut down next.

Marvel's Blade was announced at The Game Awards in December 2023, and since then, Arkane has gone radio silent about the game's status. Reports say it's close to completion and could launch in Q4 2027 if Arkane Lyon can keep working on it under a new publisher.

Valve currently has a review backlog on Steam, as the mandatory QA check every game must pass before launch on the platform has reportedly seen wait times balloon from a few days to over two weeks. The problem appears to be a massive number of builds, thought to be AI slop, that fail basic technical checks and are sent back for re-reviews, gumming up the works. To make headway and reduce back-and-forth friction, Valve has announced it's tightening the rules on what developers must verify before submitting builds.

According to Valve, developers must ensure their games can run through Steam for at least five minutes, since the platform often receives builds that have never launched through Steam. Developers must also explicitly state whether their game requires common components like DirectX, Visual C++, or .NET so Steam knows to install them automatically, and, if advertised, prove that cloud saves work.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WB0C8z2j6nA

On top of that, Steam will run automated checks to flag broken or incomplete achievements, and it will enforce stricter image categories. This is to ensure that players aren't misled by non-gameplay images posing as screenshots. Finally, dynamic reminders will pop up in the submission portal to nudge developers to deliver the content they originally promised.

Is this a response to a flood of AI slop content on Steam lately? Valve didn't directly refer to that content, but as the recent Next Fest proved, mass-produced asset flips and AI-generated shovelware were everywhere. Content like that could be choking Steam's manual review queue, and indie game platform Itch.io addressed it this week with new guidelines for submitting games.

Requiring developers to prove they've actually booted up their game and tested basic features through Steam could bring the review process back to manageable times, but it's not a silver bullet for the bad actors out there.

Developers can voluntarily disclose that AI assisted in some form in building a game, and according to Game Discovery Tool, more than 50% of the games released on Steam last month included that disclosure.

The issue has been highlighted by several studios and developers recently, including Food Devils game director Alfred Camon, who revealed that the Steam Early Access launch date for the game had been postponed after waiting over three weeks without build approval, and Wheel Make It publisher 2 Left Thumbs detailed how they missed their launch window by two weeks because of minor build rejections that sent them back to the end of an increasingly congested queue.

The developer behind Lacey's Flash Games also posted an official release update revealing a multi-day delay due to Steam's build verification pipeline.

ArenaNet may be hard at work on a new entry in the Guild Wars series, but it apparently won't stop it from releasing brand-new content for the 21-year-old original. Guild Wars Afterlife has just been announced, and it's a full paid expansion for Guild Wars arriving next January.

Excitingly for old-school Guild Wars fans, Afterlife seems to bring back some content from the long-cancelled Utopia campaign, including the mystical, Mesoamerican-inspired setting of Xotecha. The new expansion will take players away from the continent of Tyria and into the Mists to explore the lost land of the dead.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yaHUtkayKzk

The expansion's mechanics seem to be purpose-built for replayability. Xotecha's new dungeon is an ever-changing expanse called the Unformed, where no two runs will be the same. This dynamic design even extends to your character build, with a custom skill-drafting mechanic allowing you to change up your abilities on the fly.

While the skill-drafting mechanic seems unique to Xotecha, playing through Afterlife lets players unlock rewards they can take back with them out of the Mists.

Afterlife will be the second true expansion for the original Guild Wars, after 2007's Eye of the North. Players looking to get into the new expansion will need Guild Wars Reforged, the 2025 re-release of the original game.

Alongside Reforged, ArenaNet continues to support 2012's Guild Wars 2, while the brand-new Guild Wars 3 is also in the works. When the new game was announced, ArenaNet said it was committed to "actively developing all three games at the same time," and the Afterlife announcement shows the studio isn't taking that promise lightly.

Guild Wars Afterlife will launch on PC, Steam, the App Store, and Google Play on January 13, 2027. The expansion will retail for $30 at full price, but ArenaNet is offering a discounted pre-order price of $24.

Given that Sony holds the marketing rights for Grand Theft Auto 6, Microsoft has had to get creative to promote the open-world crime game for Xbox--and the company's latest effort in that department goes big.

Say Hello to the X-Bite, a playable Xbox Series X console that was designed to look like it was swallowed whole by one of Florida's millions of alligators. Microsoft only made one of these ornate consoles, and you have to win a contest to get it.

Microsoft's blog post doesn't mention GTA 6 or Rockstar Games, but Xbox marketing boss Josh Munsee said the system has "pure Miami vibes," and that's a pretty obvious reference to GTA 6 given the game takes place in a stand-in, Vice City, for the popular Florida city. The blog post says the winner of the console can play "some of the biggest games of the year" using it, and that's no doubt another nod to GTA 6.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YJptn7J1xeI&t=1s

"This November, Xbox is heading to Florida--home to incredible wildlife, unforgettable places, and every now and then, stories you have to see to believe," Microsoft said in its announcement of the X-Bite.

The X-Bite is about five feet long, and the console itself sits inside the alligator, with the Nexus/Guide button illuminated through the gator's skin. The lucky winner will also get a custom Xbox controller with simulated bite marks on it.

The custom console was designed by creature animatronic specialist John Nolan Studio, which did work for The Witcher and Jurassic World Dominion.

Microsoft's fine print states that the gator console is a "custom fabrication" and wasn't made from a real alligator. "No actual alligators were used or harmed in the making of this console," Microsoft said. The estimated value of the console is $800, Microsoft said.

The X-Bite.

You can enter for a chance to win the X-Bite by following Xbox on X, Instagram, or TikTok, reposting the sweepstakes post, and then add #XbiteSweepstakes to your repost. You'll also need to have a public account.

The sweepstakes runs now through November 10. The winner, who will be chosen by a random draw, will have 48 hours to respond if they're selected. "Miss the window, and this gator makes a clean getaway," Microsoft said in yet another reference to GTA 6.

GTA 6 is getting special treatment for its PS5 edition, and this has so far included a limited-edition DualSense controller inspired by the game and trailers for GTA 6 that end by telling people the game "plays best" on PS5. The game's recent launch trailer does not include the Xbox logo, either.

GTA 6 is of course not exclusive to Xbox, and there is no evidence that it "plays best" on PS5.

According to Sensor Tower, GTA 6 has sold about 2 million copies so far on Xbox Series X|S, compared to 5.75 million on PS5. Xbox is not worried the PS5 version massively pacing ahead of Xbox, in part because the 74%/26% split in favor of PS5 over Xbox reflects Xbox's current share of the console market. GTA 6 is breaking records already for Xbox, the company has said.

Microsoft takes a 30% cut of games sold on the Xbox platform, so that could end up being a huge number when the game launches, even if it's far behind PS5. At about 2 million copies sold on Xbox so far, according to Sensor Tower, that's $192 million in gross revenue; Xbox's cut would be about $57.6 million. Sensor Tower has said the majority of GTA 6 preorders should come in the final week before release, and could reach 25 million.

If the split stays about where it is now, that would be about 6.5 million units on Xbox by launch, generating more than $170 million in platform fees paid to Xbox. Of course, these are just ballpark estimates, but it's a sure thing that GTA 6 is going to be a big deal for Xbox. Microsoft already alluded to this, as the company forecast major growth for Xbox content and services in the current quarter, and while management didn't attribute this to any particular title, the gargantuan release of GTA 6 is no doubt factored in.

GTA 6 launches on November 19 for PS5 and Xbox Series X|S.

World of Warcraft: Forever just received a massive batch of class-balance updates ahead of launch that have boosted power across the board, but one group of players isn't happy with the changes: Shamans.

Developer Blizzard recently released Forever's launch patch notes based on feedback and data accumulated during the beta, resulting in a power spike for all classes and major reworks for classes like Paladin and Rogue. Shamans, too, received some significant changes, most notably the removal of a key Elemental specialization ability, Lava Burst, along with any interactions other abilities had with it.

It's that change, and other changes to specialization-specific abilities like Restoration's Riptide and Enhancement's Maelstrom Weapon, that have resulted in the WoW Classic Shaman Discord going into lockdown in protest. The entire server, which has around 80,000 members, has been made read-only, with a message declaring the reason for why it took what it described as such a "drastic measure."

"Community feedback gets completely ignored and class fantasies are getting destroyed," the server declared. "With this we intend to give them [Blizzard] a sign and show them that the community is not [happy] with how they approached our beloved class. Give us back our class and spec identities and fantasies."

https://www.reddit.com/r/classicwow/comments/1xmovqz/classic_shaman_discord_server_just_went_full_ret/

While the protest is in regards to class changes in Forever specifically, the server is also home to Shaman discussions as they relate to other "classic" versions of the game as well, including WoW Classic and Mists of Pandaria Classic. As of writing, all of those channels are also locked and set to read-only. 

In a follow-up post, the server went into more detail about its complaints in regards to how Blizzard has approached Forever's Shaman design. It stated its complaints aren't about "damage output." It also made clear the server will re-open "regardless of the outcome," but that it felt like its feedback through "legitimate" channels were being ignored. 

The server then proceeded to list what it viewed as wrong with various ability changes for each Shaman specialization. It additionally called attention to what it called the "hybrid spell power issue," where spell power and intellect gear seems to be better for not only Elemental but also Enhancement, muddying the identity between the two specializations. 

https://youtu.be/Cb8r05IXiyI?si=BU3xZyfqeSL1qEb3

Blizzard has previously said it doesn't want "hybrid" classes that can deal damage and heal, like Shamans, to deal more damage than dedicated DPS classes. Players in the WoW community refer to this idea as the "hybrid tax," something those running the Shaman Discord said they are fine with if it means Shaman class design is improved.

"Truthfully, hybrid tax us all you want if the result is a cohesive class with strong class fantasy elements that are actually represented in our playstyles," it said. 

This isn't the first time a WoW class Discord shut down in protest of how class changes. As pointed out by Wowhead, back in August 2025, the modern WoW Paladin Discord was partially closed in protest of the Retribution specialization's raid performance. In that case, only Retribution-specific channels were locked, and the entire protest lasted less than 24 hours. Blizzard did announce Retribution Paladin buffs shortly after, though it's unclear if those changes came at least in part due to the server protest or not.

How long the WoW Classic Shaman Discord remains in lockdown remains to be seen, but Forever launches November 4. Blizzard recently said it doesn't expect to make any more major class changes for at least another month.

World of Warcraft: Forever is gearing up for launch with some major class balance changes, but don't expect any more for at least a month.

As detailed in Forever's launch patch notes, Blizzard is making some dramatic class changes, including major reworks to Rogue and Paladin talents, in time for release that will result in a big spike in player power. Blizzard said it has used all the data from the game's month-long beta to "get everything tuned to a reasonable place."

However, don't expect additional changes in the near future. Blizzard said it won't be making significant balance changes until sometime next month.

"With the exception of bugs and serious outliers, we don't plan on making big tuning changes between now and the opening of the raids next month," Blizzard wrote in its patch notes. "Once we have sufficient data from players leveling past 30 and engaging in a wide range of content, we expect that we will do a large tuning pass based on our data."

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=n2Wg46fwmb0&t

Forever's three launch raids will open December 9, meaning there will be a little over a month without class changes. But launch and its subsequent months will just be the beginning, Blizzard said.

"This is all merely a starting point for the classes in Forever, which will continue over the course of the months and years ahead just as they did following the original launch in 2004," Blizzard said. 

Blizzard is in it for the long haul with Forever, telling GameSpot in an interview it hopes the game will continue to receive updates for the next 10-20 years (or potentially forever). It recently announced its plans to release major Forever content updates every four months, as well as teased how its controller support will eventually lead to players being able to play the MMORPG on "whatever you want." 

WoW: Forever launches November 4, but you can make your character now. In other Forever news, Blizzards revealed it will be making major improvements to the game's divisive layering system, how it's avoiding the problem of "dead" servers, and announced big changes to racial abilities alongside its newly announced class changes.