Epic Games has announced the next Epic Games Store freebie, and it's none other than Hogwarts Legacy. The 2023 game from Avalanche Software was a huge hit, selling more than 30 million copies and finishing the year as the No. 1 best-selling game in the US, even beating Call of Duty.

You still have time to claim this week's free games, which are The Darkside Detective and The Jackbox Party Pack 4.

Hogwarts Legacy was a smash hit, but the same could not be said for the following Harry Potter game, Quidditch Champions, which hasn't found much of an audience. A Hogwarts Legacy sequel is now on the way, joining the multiple upcoming Harry Potter projects at Warner Bros., including a new live-action series.

Last week's announcement about the collaboration between J.J. Abrams' Bad Robot Games and Left 4 Dead designer Mike Booth was sparse on details. However, the first official look at 4: Loop debuted at The Game Awards. In the trailer below, this co-op game leaves players hopelessly outmatched against alien invaders. The one advantage that the humans have is that they can die over and over again like Tom Cruise in Edge of Tomorrow, and awaken in 3D-printed bodies with the knowledge they need to succeed.

The trailer reveals that Earth was conquered in minutes, and most of the human population was frozen in place by some kind of crystalline structure. The scientist narrating the trailer takes the blame for what happened, and also the credit for the potential solution. By using the scientist's 3D-flesh printer, players are effectively immune from permanent death. The game doesn't appear to have an actual time loop when players die, but the knowledge players gain carries over to the next attempt.

In an interview with PlayStation Blog, Booth revealed that 4:Loop is a significant step forward from Left 4 Dead. Players can actually pick up their fallen comrades and carry them to safety. And the world itself is more ripe for exploration:

A new trailer for Resident Evil Requiem has debuted at The Game Awards, confirming that Leon S. Kennedy will indeed make an appearance in the game.

Sony spoiled the surprise earlier this week, as new key art featuring Grace Ashcroft--the daughter of Resident Evil Outbreak's Alyssa Ashcroft--also included longtime Resident Evil star Leon and his classic '90s hairstyle.

The new trailer gives off serious Se7en vibes, starting with a wrinkly guy in goggles menacing Grace, before we get our first look at an older, more grizzled badass Leon Kennedy wielding an axe. We find him first checking out crime scenes, before he winds up doing some wetwork against an entire doctor's office with a chainsaw and meeting up with Grace.

After debuting at The Game Awards last year, Exodus--the space-opera RPG developed by Archetype Entertainment and published by Wizards of the Coast--returned to the awards show with a new gameplay trailer.

The trailer follows the hero, Jun, from humble beginnings and “salvaging scrap to survive” to becoming the fabled “Child of Orion.” We also see a few glimpses of Exodus’s third-person-shooter gameplay, as well as a few of the hulking brutes Jun will be facing off against throughout the adventure.

The video then hints at Jun’s ability to “wield Celestial tech” and mentions “the right ship and the right crew,” while the faces of some of Jun's apparent crewmates flash on screen. One companion, Salt, is “an octopus piloting a massive mech suit who specializes in stealth,” according to the dev team during a recent media briefing.

Today at The Game Awards, after a brief tease earlier in the week, The Witness developer Jonathan Blow and his team at Thekla, Inc. revealed their next game, Order of the Shining Star, which is set to launch in 2026.

Players will explore four distinct worlds in OSS, with a combined 1,000 puzzles to solve, according to the announcement trailer. Multiple characters will be encountered throughout the journey, including a queen, a knight, a wizard, and a talking boat.

It hasn't been an easy year for The Game Awards host Geoff Keighley. For his opening monologue, Keighley got candid and emotional talking about the death of his father, David Keighley, who was the first chief quality officer for Imax.

In addition, Keighley experienced the loss of his home because of a natural disaster to start the year. "I don't usually open up about personal things on stage, but 2025 tested me in ways I didn't expect," Keighley said. "In January, my home burned down to nothing but ashes here in the Los Angeles fires. And just a few months ago, I lost my dad, who quietly sat in this audience every single year--proud, supportive, always cheering us on.

"My mom's here tonight, and we've left an empty seat beside her in his honor. I miss you, dad."

One of the big reveals at The Game Awards today was the debut game from Bruce Straley's Wildflower Interactive, called Coven of the Chicken Foot. A single-player adventure about an elderly witch named Gertie and a peculiar creature, the game sees the two build a bond as they learn to work together to fulfill an oath. The big draw is the creature's technology, which will react dynamically to your actions, observing how you play and evolving its abilities to assist you.

Set in a stylized fantasy world where all the dungeons have been plundered, monsters have been slain, and heroes have moved on, Coven of the Chicken Foot will see players venture into deadly dungeons and dangerous forests. Gertie doesn't swing a sword to stay out of danger, but the creature can adapt to assist her. Wildflower Interactive says that Coven of the Chicken Foot will be a wordless game, as the story will be pieced together by paying attention to your environment and the small choices you make along the way.

Wildflower Interactive was formed in 2021 by Bruce Straley. The veteran game director and artist cut his teeth working on titles like X-Men and Gex: Enter the Gecko in the '90s, and after a stint at Crystal Dynamics, he joined Naughty Dog in 1999. Straley worked on several of the studio's big games during the 2000s, and he served as game director on blockbusters like Uncharted 2: Among Thieves, The Last of Us, and Uncharted 4: A Thief's End.

Announced via a cinematic trailer during The Game Awards 2025, Star Wars: Fate of the Old Republic is an upcoming single-player RPG. We know next to nothing about the game save for the time period it's taking place in--the same as the original Knights of the Old Republic games--but it certainly looks cool.

Fate is being developed by Arcanaut Studios with a team being helmed by Casey Hudson (yes, the same guy who was the game director of the first Star Wars: Knights of the Old Republic and then later, the first three Mass Effect games). The game is being described as a spiritual successor to the original KOTOR games, but it's unclear if that means it will reboot part of the story or simply be the sequel we never got. Only time will tell.

"Working on Star Wars: Knights of the Old Republic was one of the defining experiences of my career," Hudson said in a press release. "With Star Wars: Fate of the Old Republic, we're telling a completely new and different story with everything we've learned since--crafting an adventure about choice, destiny, and the timeless struggle between light and dark. It's a dream come true to once again collaborate with Lucasfilm Games."

During The Game Awards' Opening Act, the 30-minute pre-show before the show-show begins, developer Day 4 Night unveiled a quirky little trailer for a super-nostalgic 3D platformer with a cute little badger trying to save his home. Move over, Mario and Donkey Kong, because there's a new jumpman in town ... or the woods--wherever badgers live.

Bradley the Badger is an upcoming action-adventure platform that, according to its Steam Store page, is a "love letter to games." More specifically, the game is this hodgepodge of game-development ideas and faux pas. There are unfinished game worlds you'll have to put back together, "under review" cathedrals you'll have to explore, and copious enemies to find as you do it all.

As the trailer continues, they are fascinating worlds with funny names: Badgerborne, Cyberbadger, The Last Badger, and the like, all based on tropey game concepts. It's a little reminiscent of Hazelight Studios' Split Fiction.

Clair Obscur: Expedition 33 is one of the most talked-about nominees for this year's top honor at The Game Awards, along with many other nominations. The team at Sandfall Interactive showed up in numbers, but just in case, it made sure they were very visible with a style choice as well.

As seen early in the show when accepting an award for Best Indie Game, the team is all wearing red berets--not unlike some characters in the game itself. GameSpot's own Lucy James captured an overhead shot showing that it wasn't just a one-off gag.

spot the Expedition 33 team

[image or embed]

It's an impressive display, made more impressive by reporting by Kotaku that Sandfall had to pay for many of those tickets itself to allow the team to attend. But you can't argue with results, and the red berets speak for themselves. That's French solidarity, baby.

The Game Awards 2025 are once again playing host to the year-end celebration of gaming's past, present, and future, and for this year's show, it opened with a very powerful performance featuring some of the beloved music from Clair Obscur: Expedition 33, the most nominated game in the history of The Game Awards.

Players who enjoyed Expedition 33 often spoke highly of the music, so it's a great fit to kick off the show even before you start counting up all 12 of the game's nominations. You can watch the full performance below, which features the vocalists from the Game of the Year nominee.

What a beautiful performance of "Une vie à t'aimer" from Clair Obscur: Expedition 33! Fun Fact: the game is the most-nominated game in the history of #TheGameAwards. @lornebalfe @expedition33 @sandfallgames @kepler_interact pic.twitter.com/4EFgK0hRj4

After having won GameSpot's very own 2025 Game of the Year award, Clair Obscur is expected to win many awards during the show, and is considered the front-runner for the show's ultimate prize. Here's the full list of nominations it's up for at The Game Awards 2025:

This year's Game Awards didn't waste any time before dropping some news. Capcom's upcoming sci-fi title, Pragmata, finally has a release date: April 24, 2026. But if you want to get your hands on the game early, the Pragmata demo is available right now on Steam.

In addition to PlayStation 5, Xbox Series X|S, and PC, Pragmata will also be available on Nintendo Switch 2. Pragmata was originally announced in 2020, and it was subsequently delayed before it was dropped from Capcom's release calendar.

The game puts players in the role of Hugh, an astronaut in the near future who is accompanied by Diana, an android who appears as a little girl. The unlikely pair needs to work together as they attempt to survive on a lunar research station. While players primarily control Hugh, there will be times when Diana comes to the forefront.

Decrepit, a new dark fantasy game, has been unveiled at The Game Awards. Inspired by souls-like games, the first-person dungeon-crawler doesn't have a final release date yet, but it is in development for PC and is aiming to launch in 2026.

Like several other souls-likes, Decrepit is built around stamina-based combat. Developer Jämmerdal Games says players will need to master the space around them to overcome the monsters that stand in their way, and while hidden secrets can provide permanent bonuses, they are no substitute for knowledge and the perfect execution of moves. Each weapon in Decrepit has distinct attack patterns, and spells can be used to deal heavy damage when a window of opportunity opens up.

Games like Hexen and Eye of the Beholder are some of the influences cited by the developer, but with a modern souls-like inspiration at its core, you'll need to study enemy attack patterns and strike quickly at the right time. Every death drags you back to the starting dungeons--and stripped of all equipment--so knowledge truly is power in this game. Players can choose from several equipment-based classes--Mage, Warrior, Rogue, or Shaman--and finding the right gear to match your archetype will unlock set bonuses and unique abilities.

Time Magazine named AI's architects as Person of the Year for 2025, but if these "thinking computers" are exemplified by the artificial intelligence used by Amazon Prime Video, then they aren't really thinking at all. Prime Video posted an AI recap video for Fallout Season 1 that's so egregious and wrong that it almost played like a parody--at least until it was pulled.

Until earlier today, Prime Video subscribers were able to witness it for themselves by visiting Fallout Season 2's page and clicking on Fallout - Season 1 recap. However, the video has since been pulled. The AI tones of the narrator's voice were a dead giveaway about the video's origin. But it soon became clear that the video wasn't even proofed by anyone connected to the show. The most glaring example of that was the video's description of the flashback scenes, which it states are the 1950s instead of the retro future of 2077.

The video was also cut and edited in a haphazard way that almost seemed random. Near the end of the video, the narration even implied that the Ghoul threatened to kill Lucy to coerce her to go to New Vegas with him. This video has trouble getting even the basic facts correct, and it could almost be believable as a brilliant joke if the show had more in-universe AI-related material to work with.

In 2023, Final Fantasy Final Fantasy XVI producer Naoki Yoshida indicated his distaste for the term JRPG, saying that Square Enix doesn't go into its games trying to make a JRPG. "We go into them thinking we're going to create RPGs," he explained.

Before this, Nintendo producer Hitoshi Yamagami, who worked with MonolithSoft on Xenoblade Chronicles X, echoed similar sentiments, saying, "I feel like we just make RPGs, I don't need anyone to add the 'J', personally."

In these two instances, there is both a direct and an implied acknowledgement that although there can be positive connotations attached to the label, "JRPG" can also feel limiting and discriminatory.

Another great Xbox exclusive, South of Midnight, is heading to rival platforms. Developer Compulsion Games has announced that the action-adventure game is coming to PS5 and Switch 2 in Spring 2026.

South of Midnight launched in April for PC and Xbox Series X|S, meaning it'll be coming to different systems after about a period of a year, depending on when exactly it hits PS5 and Switch 2.

South of Midnight is set in the American Deep South. The game follows the character Hazel, who, along with her mother, are preparing for a huge hurricane.

Fortnite has drawn upon some of the most iconic characters from the world of fiction, which recently led to a massive crossover. Now, the game is apparently expanding its roster to reality TV stars, as Kim Kardashian is slated to make her Fortnite debut on December 13. The influencer, model, and part-time actress has had her own hit mobile game, but this is her first appearance in an existing game.

Kardashian's appearance in the game is also a collaboration with her clothing line SKIMS. So far, dataminers have determined that Kardashian will have at least three main skins, eight alternate outfits, and various hairstyles to choose from. Via Vice, the potential pricing for these items is reproduced below.

• Kim Kardashian (Fur Coat): 1,500 V-Bucks
• Kim Kardashian (SKIMS Suit): 1,500 V-Bucks
• Kim Kardashian (Leather Suit): 1,500 V-Bucks
• Kim Kardashian Purse (Pickaxe): 800 V-Bucks
• Emote (Paper Magazine Pose): 500 V-Bucks
• Makeup Backpack (Back Bling): 400 V-Bucks
• Ring Light and Phone (Back Bling): 400 V-Bucks
• Jet (Glider): 1,200 V-Bucks

FULL KIM KARDASHIAN SET AND STYLES! pic.twitter.com/YTMXpX2mnT

The pricing for the Kim Kardashian bundle and its full contents have yet to be shared. Additionally, there will be a Kim Kardashian Pickaxe that players can purchase in the Fortnite store and wield in battle.

In 2012, programmer Chris Oberth passed away after a career that spanned from the dawn of video games in the late '70s to the PlayStation 2 era. Now, one of Oberth's unfinished games, Xcavator 2025, has been completed and it's slated for a physical release on the console it was originally intended for: the NES.

The Video Game History Foundation--with the permission and support of Oberth's family--found the source code for Xcavator 2025 in Oberth's development archives. It was originally developed by Incredible Technologies Inc., the company behind the Golden Tee Golf and Big Buck Hunter arcade games. However, it was rejected by publishers in 1991, and it was never seen again until now.

To finish the game, the VGHF teamed up with Mega Cat Studios, which was guided by the remaining materials to recapture the spirit of Oberth's original vision. Towards that end, Mega Cat Studios' development team only used the tools and environments that would have been available at the time. A standalone trailer for Xcavator 2025 isn't available yet, but the first footage was screened during the Day of the Devs: The Game Awards Edition at the 1 hour 43:31 mark below.

The Game Awards are set to kick off on December 11 at 4:30 PM PT / 7:30 PM ET, and it's sure to come with some surprise announcements and premieres that we may or may not have predicted well. With the nominations and the snubs revealed, here's a rundown on where you can stream Geoff Keighley's annual show.

• When does The Game Awards start?
• Where to watch The Game Awards?

As aforementioned, The Game Awards starts at 4:30 PM PT / 7:30 PM ET on Thursday, December 11 with a 30-minute pre-show that'll likely include the typical fare: announcements, smaller awards, trailers, and the like. Below is a more detailed breakdown of the showcase's start time for various other regions:

• 4:30 PM PT
• 6:30 PM CT
• 7:30 PM ET
• 9:30 PM BST
• 12:30 AM GMT
• 5:00 AM IST
• 8:30 AM CST

We'll have a stream available right here for you to watch, so you can either bookmark this post or return to GameSpot to read some articles and catch the show.

With work on Death Stranding 2: On the Beach complete, all eyes are on the next game from Kojima Productions, OD. Also known as Overdose, OD is one of several games from Hideo Kojima and his team at Kojima Productions that we know about, and it's being made in partnership with Xbox Game Studios. Kojima has kept most details on OD under wraps, allowing the brief reveal trailer to do the talking for him and get fans of his work speculating on what he's cooking up right now. A few other details on the game have been revealed since it was first announced during the 2023 edition of The Game Awards. Here's a closer look at everything we know about OD so far.

A release date for OD hasn't been revealed yet, and we're expecting this game to be in incubation for a few more years before it sees the light of day. Kojima, who is now in his 60s, is keenly aware that he can only remain active in game development for as long as his body and mind holds out, but the veteran developer has promised to stay creative for as long as he is physically able to do so.

The most substantial glimpse of the game was shared during a Kojima Productions live-stream in September 2025. In the new teaser trailer, OD’s backstory is shared in glimpses of redacted text that raise more questions than answers. From there, the video follows Sophia Lillis’ character as the events unfold from her first-person perspective.