Tides of Tomorrow is the first single-player game I've played that desperately wanted me to stalk other human-controlled characters, and that sentiment alone was a compelling enough gimmick for me to jump into its consequence-driven story. While that story stumbles in a few places, and the gameplay never quite rises to anything beyond serviceable, Tides of Tomorrow does a great job of incentivizing you to participate in its "we're all in this together" apocalyptic fantasy and care about the ramifications of your choices and actions beyond how they impact you. If you're looking for a game that makes you feel good about helping others and being helped by others, there aren't many options that hit that sense of community like Tides of Tomorrow.

In Tides of Tomorrow, you play as a Tidewalker, an individual who can see glimpses of the past. These visions always involve the actions of other Tidewalkers, creating a network of individuals who can all learn from each other. Fished from the ocean, you find yourself in a world that's been flooded, restricting civilization to makeshift island towns and repurposed oil rigs. A sickness is also worming its way through the population, slowly causing people to transform into plastic. You count yourself among the infected, quickly learning that only the regular consumption of a medicine known as ozen keeps you from turning completely into plastic and dying.

You play through the game in first-person as a largely silent individual who only speaks when prompted to with a dialogue option. Other than your supernatural sight, you move through the world simply--running, crouching, jumping. In certain locations, you can open your sight to see what a Tidewalker--who, like your Tidewalker, is also controlled by another human player--did there, allowing you to lean on the knowledge you glean to better move through the world. A bouncer who welcomed in a Tidewalker the previous day will allow you inside the club if you also offer up to them the same alias, for example, and seeing a Tidewalker hide some ozen in a grate lets you then nab it for yourself.

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The namesake of Resident Evil's Leon S. Kennedy has been revealed, and, as many fans suspected, he's named after director Luc Besson's 1994 French action film Leon: The Professional.

Resident Evil 2 director Kideki Kamiya recently took to X and casually confirmed the long-held fan theory in response to a fan pointing out the apparent references to the film in Resident Evil. He said Leon's name came about after talking with Resident Evil creator Shinji Mikami, who shot down several name ideas before Kamiya offered up another suggestion.

"Well, why don't we just take it from that movie I watched the other day," Kamiya said (via Google Translate), that movie being Leon: The Professional, starring Jean Reno, Gary Oldman, and a young Natalie Portman. Kamiya said Mikami said "Yeah, that works," and the rest is history.

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Last Flag, the multiplayer PvP game from Imagine Dragons singer Dan Reynolds and developer Night Street Games, will host free weekends every weekend for the foreseeable future.

Players can try the demo version of Last Flag each Friday through Monday until the game's summer patch arrives, though we don't know when that will be.

The demo version of Last Flag is the full game, and players will match up against other demo and non-demo players on Steam and the Epic Games Store. The demo version contains all nine characters and the game's two maps, Copper Falls and Snowfield. Players on the demo version can level up and earn free cosmetics, too.

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Twitch can be a wonderfully diverse place. My morning routine goes coffee, emails, then find a Twitch stream to have on my fourth monitor while I work. That can be anything from a standard game playthrough, to a live podcast, to someone just chatting about their life. Often, I will check out creators I'm less familiar with. Sometimes that can give me some unexpected results.

In the Just Chatting category recently, Twitch streamer Morgpie appears to be in full conversational flow before she presses a clicker twice and yells, "Place!" A PVC-clad person crawls from beneath her desk and on to what appears to be a pet bed, before Morgpie throws some treats in their direction. It's sparked conversation across social media, with many complaining that "fetishized" content like this shouldn't be shown on the streaming platform.

Further, a post on X, which was widely shared, claimed that Twitch CEO Dan Clancy said, “It doesn’t violate our TOS, and she wasn’t viewbotting. As far as I’m concerned, this also appears to be consensual. I admire the innovation streamers bring to the platform.” However, that post was unsourced and Clancy never made the statement.

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Peter Berg is signed on to direct the upcoming Call of Duty movie from writer Taylor Sheridan. It's now come to light that Berg said in 2013 that video games are "pathetic" and people should go outside and do something instead of playing games for hours on end.

He also shared some words for Call of Duty specifically, saying the only people who play the game that he gives a pass to around soldiers who play the game for entertainment while deployed.

GamesRadar did the digging and found that these quotes from an Esquire interview in 2013 when Berg promoting his war movie Lone Survivor. Berg, being a public advocate for "American manhood," as the interview put it, was asked for his take on video games.

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UFC 6 (PS5)

$70 | Releases June 19

Preorder at Amazon Preorder at Best Buy Preorder at GameStop

UFC 6 (Xbox Series X)

$70 | Releases June 19

Preorder at Amazon Preorder at Best Buy Preorder at GameStop

EA and Frostbite's UFC 6 is set to launch for PlayStation 5 and Xbox Series X|S on June 19, and you can preorder your copy now. $70 physical editions are available for PS5 and Xbox Series X, or if you prefer digital games instead, you can preorder the digital standard and Ultimate Editions on all platforms. All preorders include a bundle of in-game fighter skins as a bonus, and those who grab the Ultimate Edition will also get plenty of exclusive DLC and early access to the full game. Let's go over all the UFC 6 preorder information, including full breakdowns of each edition, preorder bonuses, and where to buy.

UFC 6 Preorder Bonuses

All UFC 6 preorders include a digital download voucher for the Iconic Moments Bundle, which comes with three exclusive Fighter Skins from across UFC's storied history.

Additionally, those who preorder the Ultimate Edition will also get early access to the game starting June 12.

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Although there is ambiguity around the launch timing of the Steam Machine, Valve is preparing to release one piece of new hardware soon: the Steam Controller. It officially launches on May 4.

Previously, Valve released a rather experimental take on a gaming controller. Now, the company has taken a big stride forward in the world of hardware through the Steam Deck, arguably the most popular PC-grade gaming handheld. The Steam Deck also further established the design principles for Valve's products--values that have carried through to its second crack at a controller.

We got some hands-on time with the new Steam Controller and put it through its paces. It may not surprise you to learn that, in many ways, it maintains continuity with the Steam Deck in terms of how it feels, alongside how it looks. The controller comes with a "puck" that both serves as a wireless transmitter and acts as a charger, with battery life lasting up to 35 hours or more.

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Diablo 4: Lord of Hatred will introduce a number of new features to Blizzard's ARPG when it officially launches globally April 28, and one of them just might be a secret players have been hunting for since 2023--the cow level.

Blizzard blew the doors off Lord of Hatred with a livestream last week, revealing all the new details players need to know going into the expansion. During that livestream, Blizzard explicitly stated there were new secrets to be uncovered in Lord of Hatred. In an interview with Diablo content creator Rhykker, associate game director Zaven Haroutunian said there is a new secret to be found specifically in the Pit, one of Diablo 4's endgame activities.

That alone doesn't mean the cow level is a certainty, but a few other details that have emerged do make for a compelling case. As spotlighted by another content creator, Raxxanterax, those who received early press copies of Lord of Hatred found two cow-related items in the expansion. One of them is an old cowbell that can be acquired through fishing, a new activity being added in the expansion. Another new item, the Crown of the Cow King, can also be seen in the game's transmog list.

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The Super Mario Galaxy Movie has finally been dethroned at the box office after finishing every weekend No. 1 since its release on April 1.

The hugely popular animated movie that has earned more than $830 million globally so far was finally beaten in the US this past weekend by the Michael Jackson biopic Michael. Jaafar Jackson, the nephew of Michael Jackson, plays the lead in the movie.

The Super Mario Galaxy Movie made another $21.2 million in the US for the April 24-26 weekend, its fourth in theaters. Michael, meanwhile, banked $97 million in the US for its opening weekend to land at No. 1, according to data from Hollywood news site Deadline.

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A former Naughty Dog developer who worked on the first The Last of Us and its sequel has discussed the controversial decision to kill off a major character in The Last of Us: Part II.

Major spoilers for The Last of Us: Part II and the franchise in general follow below.

Heather Cerlan, an environment and texture artist for both The Last of Us games, said on Kiwi Talkz that the studio was "pretty split" on the decision to kill off Joel. "It was controversially internally, too," she said, as reported by GamesRadar.

Joel's death leaked before The Last of Us: Part II was released, creating much hullabaloo online, as fans passionately weighed in on the shocking death of one of the franchise's core characters.

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The last couple of years have seen several new genres emerge, and this week, developers from across the world are looking to cement "Fake OS" games as the next big thing. These are the games that simulate operating systems, desktops, and mobile phones, using that digital canvas to tell engaging stories designed to thrill and mystify the user on the other end of the screen.

To get recognition for Fake OS games as a genre, more than 150 developers have teamed up to shine a spotlight on their games with a coordinated community push on Steam. All of these games will have the Fake OS tag during a week-long sale starting April 27 and running through May 4. A live showcase highlighting these games will be held on May 2 in the form of InterfaceX, and hosted by GameSpot's very own Lucy James and Kurt Indovina--they've always got you covered.

Fake OS Steam Sale

As for the sale that has just begun, nearly 100 games have been discounted. While this isn't an official Steam sale like Valve's other themed events, the core idea is a community-first approach designed to encourage players to tag these games on Steam and help define the genre from the ground up. There's precedent for this push as well, as back in 2024, Dwarf Fortress and Deep Rock Galactic developers managed to get Valve to greenlight a Dwarf Steam tag. To see how you can help, you can use the event's custom-built web app to help guide you through the tagging process.

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