You wouldn't know just from looking at it--with its vivid, comic book-esque art style and irreverent punk-rock tone--but Redacted (officially styled as [REDACTED]) actually takes place in the same sci-fi universe as 2022's The Callisto Protocol. While that was a third-person survival-horror game trying to capture the same magic that Dead Space bottled up over a decade and a half ago, Striking Distance Studios has taken a wildly different approach with this spin-off, repurposing various elements from its debut game to create an isometric roguelike dungeon crawler.It's a drastic shift for the young series, ditching the grisly melodrama and Rock 'Em Sock 'Em combat of The Callisto Protocol by pivoting to referential humor and twin-stick shooting. It still feels immediately familiar thanks to how loudly it wears its Hades inspiration on its sleeve--even the title is seemingly a nod to Supergiant Games' seminal roguelike. This isn't inherently negative, and Redacted has some impactful ideas of its own. Yet, looking past the game's derivative design can often be difficult when it struggles to reach the same heights as its primary influence.Much like The Callisto Protocol, Redacted takes place within the icey, industrial walls of Black Iron Prison. With mutated biophages running amok--turning prisoners and staff into hostile, zombie-like creatures--you're cast as a modest prison guard attempting to reach the penitentiary's final escape pod and get the hell out of dodge. Unfortunately for you, other survivors--made up of coworkers and inmates called Rivals--are trying to do the same thing, forcing you into conflict with biophages and humans alike.Continue Reading at GameSpotInfo from Gamespot.com

Dancing is a fun way to show your personality and flair in Fortnite, but if you do it in certain locations with the game's newest update, you could pay a serious price. Fortnite's new Chapter 6, Season 1 update brings back "No Emoting" signs, and anyone who breaks the rule near the sign will get eliminated.Fortnite had these signs in the game before, but previously they didn't do anything (via TheGamer) and were part of mission objectives. As you can see in the video below, however, the rules have changed. Reddit user S4HAND whipped out their trombone and began to dance when they were catapulted off a cliff to their death. Remember, rules are rules!This particular sign is located near Foxy Floodgates, and it's surrounded cones informing players they are entering a restricted space.Continue Reading at GameSpotInfo from Gamespot.com

There's an argument to be made that speed is what makes Call of Duty multiplayer feel so good. As a franchise, the CoD games are great about getting you into the action as quickly as possible. When you shoot opponents, they tend to go down fast; when you die, you can be back in the fight in about a second. With Call of Duty: Black Ops 6, Treyarch leans into the speed of the franchise in just about every respect, starting with some meaningful adjustments to movement systems and ending with map designs that make sure you're never far from your next hail of bullets. Most of the time, those fast and intense battles are a lot of fun--but the design changes also result in Black Ops 6 feeling limited in the kinds of fights you're likely to face.The major adjustment Black Ops 6 brings to the series is the Omni-movement system, and at least in terms of how the game feels to play, it's an excellent one. Omni-movement does away with the pesky natural limitations of a pair of human legs. You can run, sprint, slide, and dive in any direction, regardless of where you're facing or where your momentum would take you. It's kind of akin to the freedom a tank turret has from the vehicle beneath it, able to turn in any direction to address threats, but much faster and much cooler.Omni-movement creates a really high degree of fluidity. The ability to move at full speed in any direction at any time makes it easy to quickly navigate maps and turn to address threats. The game never holds you back when it comes to movement, and paired with how fast you might gun down an enemy if you react quickly enough, or the speed with which they can shut you down, Omni-movement is an excellent improvement to your overall reactivity. This is a game that's about twitch reactions and sharp aim, and Omni-movement amplifies that twitchiness by giving you more freedom of motion in all cases.Continue Reading at GameSpotInfo from Gamespot.com

Lego Star Wars: Darth Vader Helmet (834 Pieces) $49 (was $80) See at Walmart Lego Star Wars: Clone Commander Cody Helmet (766 Pieces) $48.79 (was $70) See at Target See at Best Buy Lego Star Wars: Captain Rex Helmet (854 Pieces) $56 (was $70) See at Amazon See at Target See at Best Buy Lego Star Wars: The Mandalorian Helmet (584 Pieces) $59 (was $70) See at Amazon See at Target See at Best Buy Walmart still has several of its best Cyber Monday Lego deals discounted to the same price, including the awesome 834-piece Darth Vader Helmet Lego model kit for only $49, which saves you $31 off its $80 list price. At this point, there's really no telling when this Star Wars Lego set deal will disappear. That said, most of Walmart's deals from Black Friday and Cyber Monday are sold out or expired as of December 4. Other notable Lego deals still available at Walmart include the Lego Technic Batcycle from The Batman for only $30 and Lego Minecraft's The Sword Outpost for $30. Meanwhile, you can save on three other Star Wars helmet Lego sets at Amazon, Target, and Best Buy. You can check out all of those Lego deals below.Lego Star Wars - Darth Vader Helmet (834 pieces) -- $49 ($80)Lego Technic - The Batman Batcycle (641 pieces) -- $30 ($50)Lego Minecraft - The Sword Outpost (427 pieces) -- $30 ($45)Lego Disney: Stitch Figure (730 pieces) -- $52 ($65)Lego City - Space Explorers 3-in-1 Super Pack (426 pieces) -- $20 ($32) See all Lego deals at Walmart Lego Star Wars: Darth Vader Helmet (834 Pieces) $49 (was $80) This Darth Vader Lego set recreates the Dark Lord of the Sith's iconic helmet out of 834 pieces. This is arguably the coolest helmet Lego has designed for the Star Wars franchise. Before the all-black armor is in place, you get to piece together Vader's life-support system. It is admittedly quite impressive that Vader can live without a body.Darth Vader Helmet (834 pieces) -- $49 ($80)The Darth Vader Helmet includes a display stand and nameplate. The completed build measures 8 x 5.5 x 5.5 inches.Clone Commander Cody Helmet (766 pieces) -- $48.79 ($70)Captain Rex Helmet (854 pieces) -- $56 ($70)The Mandalorian Helmet (584 pieces) -- $59 ($70) See at Walmart Lego Star Wars: Clone Commander Cody Helmet (766 Pieces) $48.79 (was $70) Three other Star Wars Helmet Lego model kits are on sale after Cyber Monday, albeit for not as substantial of discounts as Darth Vader. Clone Commander Cody from Clone Wars and Bad Batch is discounted practically the same price as Darth Vader at Target, but it normally retails for $70.Still, a $21 discount for this cool 766-piece set is still a great deal. Amazon is sold out, but you can still snag the Clone Commander Cody Lego set for $48.79 at Target. This deal is available at Best Buy as well, but only if you're a My Best Buy Plus/Total subscriber.The Clone Commander Cody Helmet measures 8 x 5 x 5.5 inches.Darth Vader Helmet (834 pieces) -- $50 ($70)Clone Commander Cody Helmet (766 pieces) -- $48.79 ($70)Captain Rex Helmet (854 pieces) -- $56 ($70)The Mandalorian Helmet (584 pieces) -- $59 ($70) See at Target See at Best Buy Lego Star Wars: Captain Rex Helmet (854 Pieces) $56 (was $70) Clone Wars fans Can also save on the replica Captain Rex Helmet. Normally $70, Captain Rex is discounted by 20% at multiple major retailers, including Amazon, Target, and Best Buy (for subscribers).Out of the four helmets on this list, the Captain Rex build has the highest piece count, with 20 more bricks than Darth Vader. With the display stand, Captain Rex's helmet is 8 x 5 x 5 inches. See at Amazon See at Target See at Best Buy Lego Star Wars: The Mandalorian Helmet (584 Pieces) $59 (was $70) The Mandalorian Helmet is on sale for $59 at Amazon, Target, and Best Buy. This helmet is a bit smaller than others both in terms of piece count, 584, and overall measurements, 7 x 4 x 4.5 inches. Lego did a great job recreating Mando's Beskar plate armor. See at Amazon See at Target See at Best Buy Continue Reading at GameSpotInfo from Gamespot.com

The best part of any Call of Duty game's Zombies mode is how it facilitates panic. The longer you play the round-based horde mode, in which the undead stream toward you from all directions, the tougher it becomes, and before long, you're sprinting around the map, trying desperately to stay alive as crowds of corpses shamble after you. Your only chance is to stop and fire away to thin out the approaching wave of undeath, hoping you don't run into any huge mutated monstrosity while your back is turned. Black Ops 6 is great at these moments.Zombies in Black Ops 6 is a return to the best-known and best-enjoyed form of the four-player cooperative mode, which developer Treyarch originated back in Call of Duty: World at War and has been iterating on ever since. Gone is the approach from last year's Modern Warfare 3, a messy take that bolted Zombies mechanics onto elements of CoD's battle royale game, Warzone. What Black Ops 6 offers feels like classic Zombies but enhanced, with a bunch of small elements old and new added together to build out the experience in fun, engaging, and challenging ways.The most notable change, and the one that works best with Zombies, is Omni-movement, Black Ops 6's adjustment to how you get around in the game. Omni-movement lets you move at the same speed in any direction, including sprinting, diving, and sliding, so you're able to change direction on a dime without losing momentum. It's a great addition to Zombies, where you will inevitably find yourself kiting a horde around the map as you fight to stay alive, only to suddenly realize that the path you're backpedaling down isn't as clear as you thought.Continue Reading at GameSpotInfo from Gamespot.com

Although he stepped down from his position as Chairman of Sony Interactive Entertainment in 2019, Shawn Layden hasn't been shy about sharing his views about the future of the gaming industry. And the former PlayStation boss believes that that the ongoing conflict of rival consoles between Sony and Microsoft should come to a close.During an interview with Eurogamer, Layden likens the PlayStation and Xbox competition to the format wars between VHS and Sony's Betamax decades earlier, which was won by the former before both formats became obsolete."With Xbox versus PlayStation, the Ali versus Frazier fight... Frankly, we have to start interrogating what the purpose is of a proprietary console, and whether that can continue to be true," said Layden. "When you have competing formats, competing platforms, competing technologies, there comes a time when we all declare the war is over... But the real competition will be on its content. And content should be the competition for publishers, not which hardware you get behind. I think we're at a point where the console becomes irrelevant in the next... if not the next generation then the next next generation definitely."Continue Reading at GameSpotInfo from Gamespot.com

SaGa stands as one of Square Enix's longest-running series, but it's also had a rough time outside of Japan. If you pick up a random SaGa game, you'll probably understand why: SaGa games are JRPGs that don't do things in the way most overseas players would expect. SaGa tends to focus more on complex, interweaving systems of combat, character growth, and questing. And that's supplemented by narratives that tend to act more as connective tissue that link locations and objectives together instead of the sprawling, character-driven stories the genre has become known for. Wandering around blindly and piecing out what to do and how things work in a SaGa game can be incredibly compelling, but some entries in the franchise lean toward immensely frustrating. Romancing SaGa 2 is more the former than the latter, but its earlier releases were still an acquired taste.Romancing SaGa 2: Revenge of the Seven is a full-on remake of a game many fans consider the series' apex--if not among the greatest RPGs of all time. If there's any game in the series that could reach out and capture a new audience in a way no other SaGa game has before, this is the one that could do it.Romancing SaGa 2's story begins ages prior to the modern day, when seven heroes fought to rid the land of evil forces. Their deeds have become the subject of myth and legend, and as times have grown ever more troubled, the people have yearned for their return. In the recent past, Emperor Leon and his two sons hear rumblings of the heroes' revival, but soon learn the horrible truth--the heroes have themselves become agents of evil, and they slay both Leon and his son Victor in a vicious attack. Despite this loss, there is still hope: Inheritance Magic, which allows an Emperor to pass memories, abilities, and strength down to an appointed successor, beginning with young prince Gerard.Continue Reading at GameSpotInfo from Gamespot.com

Stalker 2: Heart of Chornobyl--the long-awaited sequel to developer GSC Game World's 2007 classic--was delayed several times during development, with an initial announcement in 2010 and a launch date planned for 2012. 14 years after its announcement, the sequel is finally here, and although the game has sold well, its condition at launch wasn't exactly perfect. Now, GSC Game Worlds CEO Ievgen Grygorovych wants players to know why."You're so tired that you would just die if you say, 'Let's run an additional [development] marathon,'" Grygorovych said in a recent interview. "We didn't have a chance to say, 'Let's do it more.' We just had a chance of, 'Let's do until this moment--the release date--as much as we can.'" Grygorovych added that additional patches (and potentially story expansions) could always be implemented in the future, but the team decided it was best to stick to the 2024 release date. The decision was influenced in part by the sheer level of exhaustion experienced by the game's developers, who endured multiple "marathon" crunch sessions to make sure the game was the best it could be, without resorting to another delay.Continue Reading at GameSpotInfo from Gamespot.com

Third-person action game Slitterhead often presents a pretty compelling front. At first, it sounds like an out-there horror game with an inventive approach to gameplay. You play as a formless spirit that can possess humans, hunting vicious monsters capable of imitating normal people. Those creatures explode from the heads of their human bodies to reveal their true forms when discovered.As cool as all those words clearly are, Slitterhead never reaches the promise of its premise, apart from a few gorgeous cutscenes where a human twists and mutates into a disgusting, multi-armed abomination. Instead, it's usually frustrating and repetitive, with its interesting ideas turning to gimmicks that wear themselves thin after the first few hours.Those gimmicks feel like they have potential, at least at first. Slitterhead opens with you taking on the role of the Hyoki: a floating spirit that can zip into the brains of random humans populating the dense city of Kowlong, briefly taking control of their bodies. The Hyoki can't remember anything about itself or what it's doing, until it encounters its first slitterhead--which, after eating the brains of an unsuspecting victim, bursts from the skull of its host and chases you down alleys as you zap from one hapless soul to another to stay just ahead of it. The concept is weird, changing the way you think about characterization and physical gameplay space, and slitterheads are scary--it's a great way to start the game.Continue Reading at GameSpotInfo from Gamespot.com

Marvel Rivals won't ever charge for access to its huge roster of playable superheroes and villains, developer NetEase reaffirmed, as it detailed what players can expect from the game's monetization systems.NetEase outlined how it is approaching monetization for the upcoming free-to-play hero shooter in a new "Dev Talk" blog post. In short: Only cosmetics will be for sale, which can be bought with the game's premium currency, Latice, or a free currency, Units. Various cosmetic bundles will be offered, and while players can buy individual costumes for specific characters, bundles including costumes as well as MVP animations, emotes, a spray, and nameplate will be offered at discounted rates. "The team has poured immense effort into designing and crafting these in-game cosmetics, many of which draw inspiration from Marvel's iconic comics, films, and other works," NetEase said. "These items are not only a tribute to Marvel's artistic legacy but also a way for us to reinterpret and capture different facets of the Marvel universe."Continue Reading at GameSpotInfo from Gamespot.com

The Mario & Luigi RPG series started on the Game Boy Advance, and even many years and a few iterations later, it has always reflected a connection to those roots. The two-button Game Boy Advance was the impetus for the series' central hook: Each brother is assigned to a face button and you control them both at once. Even as the series has progressed to platforms with more face buttons, the core concept has remained defined by its initial limitations. Now brought to the Switch, Mario & Luigi: Brothership feels like a conscious effort to escape those limitations, resulting in a lengthy RPG that can't quite sustain its own weight.In Brothership, several denizens of the Mushroom Kingdom are magically swept into the new setting of Concordia--a vast sea dotted with islands that used to be part of one contiguous land mass. A world tree of sorts, the Uni-Tree served as the tether that held all of the islands together, but it suddenly wilted and the islands drifted apart. With the help of a young researcher, you pilot a ship that houses a new Uni-Tree sapling, connecting islands and the Great Lighthouses that amplify its power to bring them all back together. So your ship comes to resemble a tugboat, with several islands tethered and pulled behind it.It's a concept that allows for lots of different kinds of environments and stories on self-contained little islands. One might be modeled like a desert, while another is a multi-story corporate headquarters. The Great Lighthouses serve as major dungeons, so each of the acts consists of the smaller stories on each island, the larger story arc of the region, and then the Great Lighthouse dungeon as its resolution.Continue Reading at GameSpotInfo from Gamespot.com

Ninja Scroll $16.89 (was $25) See at Amazon Anyone growing up on anime imports in the '90s will be very familiar with Ninja Scroll, and if you're a fan of what is considered to be one of the greatest anime action films of all time, you can grab a new Blu-ray of it soon.While there was a steelbook release of Ninja Scroll in October, it sold out very quickly and there's no word yet if a new run will be produced. The good news is that this regular Blu-ray version will be available starting January 28, 2025, and it's available to preorder for only $16.89 (was $25) at Amazon. Prior to the steelbook's release, Ninja Scroll's last physical release was back in 2012, so it's nice to see this classic anime back in print. Ninja Scroll $16.89 (was $25) A cult-classic film that's is still incredibly entertaining decades after its original release in 1993, Ninja Scroll keeps its story simple and goes all out on its supernatural brawls. In a nutshell, the movie follows sword-for-hire Jubei as he takes on a gang of powerful ninjas--and a ghost from his past--who are determined to overthrow the Japanese government.Each scene is an excuse to show off exquisitely animated action, and with a digestible runtime of around 90 minutes, it's a fun and ridiculously violent film to watch. The film also comes with a full-length audio commentary with director Yoshiaki Kawajiri and character designer Yukata Minowa. See at Amazon Another cult-classic anime you can check out is Samurai Champloo, a hip-hop adventure set in alternate Edo-era Japan. The original series was recently re-released on Blu-ray, and this limited-edition version has a cool slipcase and six art cards. All 26 episodes are included on three Blu-ray discs, and it's priced at $67.50. There's also a no-frills version available for $32.49 (was $50) at AmazonContinue Reading at GameSpotInfo from Gamespot.com

There's always been something endearing about Metal Slug. While its contemporaries like Contra ratcheted up the aliens and body horror, Metal Slug instead leaned hard into comedy, mixing its signature run-and-gun action with comically overbuilt machines, cartoonish villains, and a silly cast of action-hero cliches.While there have been a few spin-offs over the years, Metal Slug Tactics is the series' first foray into turn-based strategy, and it comes with a roguelike twist. It's a mostly successful mission thanks to clever gameplay and maintaining the silly charm the series is known for, though some outdated tropes and too much of your success being outside of your tactical control keep this operation from being a total victory.Tactics moves the long-running sidescroller onto an isometric grid, and the pixel art-inspired models do a great job capturing the look and feel the series is known for. Everything from the iconic POWs to the titular Metal Slug tanks themselves feel exactly like the original series translated to 3D. The isometric battlegrounds are littered with varied terrain, buildings, foliage, and other scenic elements that feel right at home, and bosses are exactly the kind of over-engineered machinery you would expect.Continue Reading at GameSpotInfo from Gamespot.com

After a nearly 10-year gap between games, Dragon Age: The Veilguard finally arrived at the end of October. While the previous game, Dragon Age: Inquisition, is now regarded as a classic in the genre, The Veilguard's reception has been considerably colder from some. That's something that the developers behind The Veilguard have already come to terms with."It's been a decade since the last Dragon Age game came out, and a lot of people have spent that decade imagining various versions of what this game was going to be," said Dragon Age creative director John Epler during an interview with Eurogamer. "The reality was whatever we came out with, it was never going to match the Dragon Age 4 in people's minds and people's imaginations."The long development of The Veilguard included a period where the sequel was re-envisioned as a live-service game before it transitioned back to a single-player experience. Given everything that went into the game, director Corinne Busche shared her satisfaction with The Veilguard in its final form.Continue Reading at GameSpotInfo from Gamespot.com

My first inclination is to figure out who everyone is, from the inmates lined up outside to the prison guards inspecting the now-empty cells. Some first names are uttered in dialogue or scribbled on the side of the cell block in graffiti. Surnames can be found in formal letters and employee logs. Now it's a matter of putting names to faces, repeating conversations I've already had or looking through my notes to see who's talking to or about who, perusing an obscured note in the boss's office, and rummaging through all of the inmate's belongings. Once I know who everyone is and in which cell each prisoner resides, I just have to figure out how one of them masterminded a daring escape.Much like its predecessor, The Rise of the Golden Idol presents you with what is essentially a diorama of a moment in time--typically taken at the precise second, or in the immediate aftermath, of a crime. It's up to you to deduce what exactly happened by pointing and clicking through all of the available evidence to figure out--among other things--who was involved, which items are incriminating, and what the exact sequence of events was. Whereas 2022's The Case of the Golden Idol revolved around a slew of murders related to the eponymous Idol, the kill count in this sequel is decidedly lower. There are still more than a few dead bodies amongst its 20 cases, but you're also tasked with unraveling the events behind prison escapes, experimental lab tests, and the backstage chaos of a talent show gone awry.Rise of the Golden Idol picks up 200 years after the events of the first game, as the grisly history of the Golden Idol follows the artifact from the 18th century to the semi-modern setting of the 1970s. Once again, you're cast as an observer of these strange cases; an omnipresent force given license to freely explore each tableau at your own pace, burrowing into people's pockets, opening any door, and using logic to piece together the lurid events of its interconnected story.Continue Reading at GameSpotInfo from Gamespot.com