The upcoming third season of HBO's The Last of Us will feature a different actor playing Manny.

It's been confirmed by Variety that Danny Ramirez, who joined the show in Season 2, will not return for Season 3 due to scheduling conflicts, with the role to be recast. It remains to be seen what actor may take over the role, however.

Spoilers for The Last of Us follow below.

Manny is a supporting character in the overall story of The Last of Us. He is a former member of the Fireflies who later joined the Washington Liberation Front. He was part a small group aiding Abby (Kaitlyn Dever) in tracking down and killing Joel (Pedro Pascal) following Joel's massacre at a Firefly hospital where Abby's father was among those murdered.

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Through most of last year, IO Interactive assured players that its upcoming James Bond title, 007 First Light, was set for an early 2026 debut. The game had been scheduled to debut on March 27, but the release date has now been pushed back to May 27.

In a statement posted online late last month, IO Interactive's Hakan Abrak called 007 First Light the company's "most ambitious project to date" while mentioning the Bond staples included in the game like car chases, gadgets, and wild globe-trotting adventure. However, he went on to say that the decision to delay it "allows us to ensure the experience meets the level of quality you players deserve on day one."

"The game is progressing well and is fully playable from beginning to end," added Abrak. "So these two additional months will allow us to further polish and refine the experience, ensuring we deliver the strongest possible version at launch. We're confident this sets 007 First Light up for long-term success, and we sincerely appreciate the patience and continued support we've received ever since we first announced the game."

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Twitch Hype Train world records are a rare thing. The ultimate show of dedication from a creator's fanbase, these accumulative trains rely on a streamer's viewers donating subscriptions or Bits to the channel. Neuro-sama beat her own world record at the end of December 2024 and now, well, she's only gone and done it again. The hat trick of Hype Train world records belongs to the AI VTuber, her sister Evil Neuro, and their creator Vedal987.

For the uninitiated, or those outside of the "Swarm"--the name for Neuro's fanbase--Neuro is an AI VTuber created by Vedal who utilizes a large language model and a VTuber model to communicate with her Twitch chat, play games, and even go on adventures in VR thanks to the 3D version of her model. Neuro was originally created to play the rhythm game OSU on Twitch, but rapidly evolved to become a series of AI systems that work in harmony. Vedal created a program that takes its input from Twitch and voice, gives that input to the LLM, which is then sent to a text-to-speech system, resulting in the Neuro we know today. It's for that reason that Neuro is widely considered far from the "AI slop" that many people take issue with.

It's possibly a combination of the complexity of that system, the resulting effects, or the opinion that Neuro-Sama is the cutest little button, that has led Vedal to gain such a dedicated fanbase. On January 4, seemingly out of nowhere, Neuro once again began to see an impressive number of Bits and subscriptions donated to Vedal's channel. Vedal's friend and fellow VTuber Camila offered to commission a new outfit for Neuro if the Hype Train continued. She also promised to "show feet" but we won't talk about that. These incentives led the hype train to level 100 in a matter of a few hours, and it didn't stop there. Vedal wasn't present with Neuro on stream for this attempt, instead choosing to type in chat with sentiments such as "Realistically wtf is going on?" and "I was gonna join after the train, but it's getting a bit silly."

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Children of Time 3-Book Hardcover Box Set

$29 (was $90) | Releases January 6

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Children of Strife: Children of Time, Book 4 (Hardcover)

$28 (was $30) | Releases March 17

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Science fiction fans can save big on a box set edition of one of the most popular series of the past decade. The first three books in Adrian Tchaikovsky's Children of Time series have been reissued in hardcover, and Amazon has marked the price all the way down to $29 (was $90). The 68% discount is one of the largest we've seen for a brand-new book box set. The Children of Time Hardcover Box Set releases January 6.

Amazon's deal is especially noteworthy because Children of Time Books 1-3 were out of print in hardcover and sell for high prices on the reseller market. And with the fourth novel in the series slated for publication March 17, fans and new readers can now have matching editions of all four Children of Time novels. Even for new readers, the box set costs less than you'd spend on the paperback editions (roughly $39).

Children of Time 3-Book Hardcover Box Set $29 (was $90) | Releases January 6

Children of Time is a space opera chronicling humanity's migration from an uninhabitable Earth to a terraformed exoplanet. The only problem with this plan is that their new home has been occupied by genetically modified spiders for thousands of years. These arachnoids evolved and thrived with the help of an AI version of a human who worked on the terraforming project.

The 2015 novel won the Arthur C. Clarke Award. The 2019 sequel Children of Ruin won the BSFA Award for Best Novel. Children of Memory, the third book in the series, was published in 2023, the same year Children of Time received the Hugo Award for Best Series.

In addition to the strangely low price, there's another peculiar detail about the Children of Time Box Set: The advertised page count appears to be way underselling the length of the first three books.

Store pages at Amazon, Barnes & Noble, and several other retailers list the page count for the box set as 1,136. This is almost certainly a typo, because the total page count for the hardcover editions of Books 1-3 is 1,664. Children of Time is 608 pages; Children of Ruin is 576 pages; and Children of Memory is 480 pages. It's possible that the new hardcover editions aren't exactly the same as the originals, but the books appear to be roughly the same length and width, so the total page count should be somewhere around 1,700.

Paperback Editions

1. Children of Time -- $12 ($20)
2. Children of Ruin -- $13.66 ($20)
3. Children of Memory -- $12.89 ($20)

See at Amazon See at Barnes and Noble Children of Strife: Children of Time, Book 4 (Hardcover) $28 (was $30) | Releases March 17

Children of Strife, the fourth entry in the series, is available to preorder for $28 (was $30) in hardcover. The 496-page novel will also be available in ebook and audiobook formats at launch.

If you'd like to listen to the audiobook versions of the first three novels, it's worth noting that Children of Time Book 1 is exclusive to Audible.

Preorder at Amazon More fiction by Adrian Tchaikovsky

Children of Time isn't Tchaikovsky's only ongoing fantasy series. The fourth novel in the prolific British author's dark fantasy series The Tyrant Philosophers will be published March 10, just one week before the fourth novel in Children of Time.

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Quick-time events, despite everyone's best efforts to spice them up, remain pretty meh.

When you first begin Dispatch, the new episodic superhero adventure game from AdHoc Studio, you're asked if you want to enable quick-time event prompts as an optional game mechanic. It says something that these QTE prompts only really appear in the first and last episode of Dispatch's eight-episode run. But if you're worried the only input you'll have in Dispatch is pressing a button at the right time, or picking the different narrative choices that affect the game's story, you should know AdHoc has a more compelling, non-optional gameplay hook that deserves as much attention as the game's charming storytelling. And it's in the title of the game itself.

Set in a fictional version of Los Angeles, California where superheroes are real, Dispatch centers on Robert Robertson III, a former hero turned dispatcher for SDN. It's a private security and service company, except instead of sending paramedics out, SDN (or Superhero Dispatch Network) sends out caped heroes to tackle clients' problems big and small. This serves as the basis for Dispatch's core minigame, and it's one that could honestly be a standalone game in and of itself.

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Lego Ninjago Legacy: Character Display (447 Pieces)

$45 | 15th Anniversary Limited Edition

See at Amazon Sold out at Lego Store Sold out at Best Buy Sold out at Target Sold out at Walmart

Lego Ninjago Legacy: Four Weapons Blacksmith (1,259 Pieces)

$100 | 15th Anniversary Limited Edition

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Lego Ninjago Legacy: The Old Town (4,851 Pieces)

$300 | 15th Anniversary Limited Edition

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Lego's new Ninjago Legacy 15th Anniversary building sets are selling out fast at major retailers. Launched January 1 alongside a bunch of other Lego Ninjago playsets, the trio of commemorative models are limited edition and range in price from $45 to $300. The $45 Lego Ninjago Legacy Character Display is proving to be the most challenging to find in stock. At the time of writing, Amazon is the only retailer with the 447-piece Character Display in stock. The set features all seven members of the original Ninjago team as minifigures and an exclusive Master of Lightning minifigure with a collectible stand.

Lego Ninjago Legacy Character Display Restocks:

• Amazon - In stock
• Lego Store - Sold out
• Best Buy - Sold out
• Target - Sold out
• Walmart - Sold out

Lego Ninjago Legacy: Character Display (71866)

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mClassic Graphics Upscaler - Retro Edition

$45.15 (was $100)

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Retro gamers can save over 50% on Marseille's mClassic Graphics Upscaler. Normally $100, the mClassic Retro Edition is on sale for only $45.15, the all-time best price for the HDMI accessory. The Retro Edition is designed for gamers who want to improve the visual experience of older games originally designed for 4:3 aspect ratio displays when playing on modern HD and 4K TVs.

The Retro Edition is one of three different models of the mClassic manufactured by Marseille. It launched in 2025 alongside the mClassic Switch Edition, which is discounted to $74.25 (was $100). The mClassic Switch Edition is tailored around upscaling the visuals on Switch and other widescreen platforms like Steam Deck, Wii, Xbox 360, and PS3. The Retro and Switch Editions have one of the enhancement modes found in the mClassic Original Edition, which is currently priced at $89 (was $100), while also offering two new visual modes geared toward retro gaming or Switch/Steam Deck, depending on which model you pick.

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Note: MASSIVE spoilers for the final section of Donkey Kong Bananza. Read on at your own risk!

All throughout Donkey Kong Bananza, DK and Pauline are battling Void Company and its leader Void Kong. However, with each new level, there's a reptilian presence permeating the experience.

Some enemies bear a striking resemblance to the Kremlings of DK adventures past, hidden treasure chests are green and bear what look like crocodile teeth, even the Banandium Root--Void Company's main goal in digging through the planet--has a certain familiarity to it I just can't put my finger on.

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