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51
 
 

There are 40 karts total in Mario Kart World. You’ll start with 11, and you’ll need to unlock the remaining 29 by playing the game.

While these vehicles don’t have the customization that we saw in Mario Kart 8, they do still have individual stats, so it’s not all about just glitz and glam when it comes to picking a vehicle to drive. (Though, yes, some vehicles are just cuter and better than the others, trust me.)

Below we explain how to unlock all the vehicles in Mario Kart World, along with their stats.

How to unlock more karts/vehicles

As you play, you’ll unlock more karts for every 100 coins you collect. Unfortunately, the order in which you unlock the karts is random, so if you’re really burning for the Dolphin Dasher motorcycle, you may end up unlocking a bunch of other karts first.

If you’re playing a single-player mode, like completing Grand Prix, you’ll see a notice pop-up on the main menu screen after the match ends, noting that you got enough coins to unlock a kart.

If you’re playing in online multiplayer, the kart will unlock for you right away with no notice (which you can see when you opt to change your character by pressing the Plus button).

We found this little coin-dropping buggy looping around the DK Pass area in the Free Roam-like multiplayer lobby that we followed around to collect coins quickly:

Mario Kart World kart/vehicle list

Below, you can see a list of all the vehicles in Mario Kart World, along with their stats:

Standard Pipe (default)Rally Kart (default)Standard Bike (default)Rally Bike (default)Plushbuggy (default)Baby Blooper (default)Cute Scoot (default)Mach Rocket (default)Zoom Buggy (default)Chargin’ Truck (default)Hyper PipeFunky Dorrie (default)Hot RodRibbit RevsterTune ThumperJunkyard HogRoadster RoyaleB DasherW-Twin ChopperLobster RollerBiddybuggyTiny TitanDread SledStellar SledReel RacerBumble VFin TwinR.O.B. H.O.G.Carpet FlyerCloud 9Dolphin DasherBlastronaut IIIBig HornLi’l DumpyLoco MotoMecha TrikePipe FrameBilldozerRallygatorBowser Bruiser

Did you just get a Nintendo Switch 2? Are you trying to unlock every character and outfit in Mario Kart World? Or maybe you’re trying out The Legend of Zelda: The Wind Waker for the first time and you need a walkthrough for those pesky stoplights in the Forsaken Fortress? Either way, we have your back when it comes to helping you sort stuff out.

We have guides explaining how to set up your console (moving data from your original Switch to your Switch 2) as well as guides for things like getting external storage sorted out.


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Two Lego bricks walk across a metal platform in Lego Voyagers

Light Brick Studio and Annapurna Interactive showed off a new Lego co-op multiplayer game during Summer Game Fest 2025 called Lego Voyagers, and it’s basically a cozy take on Hazelight’s It Takes Two and Split Fiction. Lego Voyagers has you and another player become tiny Lego bricks trying to reach space, working together to solve puzzles and figure out how to navigate a lush Lego brick world. Even climbing a step is tough when you’re just a lil’ brick.

The debut Lego Voyagers trailer showed the blocky duo traveling through jungles, across industrial scrapyards, and down lazy, rambling rivers, piecing together inventive solutions that range from tram cars to rickety-looking rocket ships. Light Brick didn’t say how players will communicate with each other or provide many details about how cooperation will work in-game. However, the studio did say that Lego Voyagers will come with a Friend Pass that, like Split Fiction and It Takes Two, lets a friend join you, even if they don’t own the game. Lego Voyagers will support local, online, and split-screen play.

While Traveler’s Tales maintained a steady stream of Lego games based on popular franchises such as The Lord of the Rings and Star Wars over the last two decades or so, the Lego Company has taken steps to try changing what a Lego game can be recently. The group teamed up with Epic Games on Lego Fortnite, a survival-crafting game inside Fortnite that’s made entirely of Lego bricks, and Guerrilla Games licensed Lego for its Horizon Zero Dawn spinoff, Lego Horizon Adventures, in 2024. Lego Group CEO Niels Christiansen told the Financial Times that Lego is exploring the possibility of creating its own in-house development studio.

“We can definitely say as long as we’re under the Lego brand we can cover experiences for kids of all ages, digital or physical. [Games development in-house] is something we’re building up,” Christiansen said.

Light Brick doesn’t have a Lego Voyagers release date yet, but when it does launch, it’ll be available on PlayStation 5, PlayStation 4, Nintendo Switch, Xbox Series X|S, and PC.


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Without an E3 to preview new games and premiere trailers, Geoff Keighley’s annual video game event, Summer Game Fest, returns for 2025 with the usual batch of world premiere-exclusive game reveals, special guest appearances, and other surprises. (Not a surprise, though: Hideo Kojima will be there.)

For every big announcement at Summer Game Fest 2025, including new trailers and major game announcements, check out Polygon’s StoryStream below. You can also watch Summer Game Fest 2025 live right here.

Summer games fest 2025 schedule: All conference dates and timesUbisoft teasing a big Splinter Cell announcement ahead of Summer Game Fest


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USA/Syfy’s Resident Alienstarted as a quirky mashup of Northern Exposure and Invader Zim, a fish-out-of-water comedy where Harry Vanderspeigle (Alan Tudyk of Firefly, Rogue One, and Andor), the new doctor in the small town of Patience, Colorado, is actually an alien who wants to take over Earth. Harry’s secret was originally only known to Max Hawthorne (Judah Prehn) — a kid with the rare genetic ability to see through alien disguises, who devotes himself to trying to stop Harry’s plans — and health-clinic worker Asta Twelvetrees (Sara Tomko), who teaches Harry the value of humanity.

Though the series’ protagonist is an alien, the show’s science fiction elements were relatively subtle in the early seasons. Harry spends as much time investigating the murder of the town’s last doctor as he does trying to fix his ship and get his mission back on track. The locals write off his weirdness because they’re dealing with their own challenges: Asta confronting her abusive ex, her best friend D’arcy Bloom (Alice Wetterlund) dealing with opioid addiction, Max’s parents Ben (Levi Fiehler) and Kate (Meredith Garretson) winding up on opposites sides of a debate about bringing a fancy ski resort to Patience.

“I think it was a nice way to be introduced to the sci-fi world for people who don’t normally like [the genre],” Tomko told Polygon in a video interview.

But as the series went on, more characters wound up uncovering the show’s secrets. Deputy Sheriff Liv Baker (Elizabeth Bowen) began looking for unconventional explanations for the odd crimes Patience experienced. Ben and Kate were abducted by aliens who stole their baby. Asta shared Harry’s true identity with D’arcy so she could stop lying about it. Even skeptical Sheriff Mike Thompson (Corey Reynolds) had a close encounter with an extraterrestrial. The science fiction elements are fully on display in season 4, which premieres on June 6.

“What I love about our show is there’s Harry’s world, which is the world of aliens, and there’s people in town who haven’t know about that, and you care about them because the writing is so strong that everyone is really well developed,” Garretson told Polygon in a video interview. “What’s cool about season 4 is that more and more of Harry’s world is bleeding into the town, so I think it’s an opportunity for the characters to become even more three-dimensional. When are people going to find out what’s going on, and then how do they handle that?”

D’arcy was quick to embrace the chance to help Harry, who is now focused on saving humanity from other aliens. She’s gone on several dangerous missions, including sneaking into the home of a human-alien hybrid and infiltrating a gray alien base on the moon, where she rescued the Hawthornes’ daughter. This season, she even travels back in time with Harry to recover alien technology. Wetterlund, who’s also the co-host of the “Treks and the City” Star Trek: The Next Generation podcast, is very enthusiastic about the way Resident Alien has evolved.

“I think that science fiction is a perfect slate on which to examine the human experience, because it removes the historical context that humanity is in and puts it in this imagined world,” she told Polygon in a video interview. “How would these humans in a small town deal with the exploding of their worldview? That is exciting for me. I’ve always wanted to be part of a sci-fi project like this. The more I can run around on spaceships, the better.”

Reynolds said he grew up watching the Aliensfranchise and RoboCop,and he’s excited about the chance to get more involved in Resident Alien’s science fiction elements.

“I’m proudly a nerd, so this fits my wheelhouse perfectly,” he told Polygon.

Acknowledging the existence of aliens has fundamentally shifted the dynamics in Patience’s sheriff’s office, where Mike has often been dismissive of Liv’s ideas. Now they’re working together to uncover a dangerous conspiracy and help an alien tracking cyborg played by Lost’s Peter Bach.

“I think we’ve really stepped into the realm of them being partners, and out of the shadow of the subordinate aspect of things,” Reynolds said. “Mike understands Liv was right. You don’t earn any more credibility in Mike’s world faster than being right. She was right the whole time. That dynamic fused with what they’ve been through personally has created a bond that is everything.”

Scenes involving alien spaceships and time portals cost a lot more than ones set in Patience’s bar or city hall, and showrunner Chris Sheridan has had to get creative as the show’s science fiction elements have expanded — especially since the series had its budget significantly cut going into season 4. One of the main ways the show is saving time and money is by having the gray aliens remove Harry’s ability to transform into his alien form.

“That saves us Alan getting in and out of makeup,” Sheridan told Polygon. “Whenever he walks by a mirror, we see a reflection, and that takes time and money animating him.”

Among all the ideas Sheridan had for hiding the budget cuts, that one stuck with him because it fit so well with the show’s themes and plot, where Harry has slowly gained more emotional awareness and attachments as he’s come to appreciate humans.

“What if he’s in this place where he’s just human for a while?” Sheridan asked. “What does that do to the character? There’s a challenge every year to try to mix things up and add something new, so we were looking to bring out something new in Harry.”

Resident Alien season 4 premieres on Syfy and USA at 11 p.m. ET on Friday, June 6. Episodes will be available to stream on Peacock one week later.


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Scott Pilgrim, all his friends, and the many of the creators who have brought his world to life over the years, are all back for a new game set for release in 2026.

As revealed at Summer Game Fest on Friday, Scott Pilgrim EX is a “time-warped brawling adventure” that sends Scott, Ramona Flowers, and five other playable characters battling across a Toronto ravaged by robots and demons. The new title comes from Tribute Games, the retro-minded studio formed by members of the original Scott Pilgrim vs. The World: The Game team, and comic creator Bryan Lee O’Malley, who worked closely on crafting the new story. The chiptune group Anamanaguchi also returns for the soundtrack.

“In a way it’s kind of natural, and the genesis of Tribute, to go back to that IP,” Tribute marketing and publishing manager Eric Lafontaine told Polygon at a press briefing before the SGF stream. “It’s in our DNA in a way, and it’s just coming back through those roots and doing a great different game. It’s just natural.”

Tribute’s “games that play like you remember them” philosophy worked wonders for Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles: Shredder’s Revenge, and the studio’s upcoming Marvel Cosmic Invasion, set for later this year, looks just as promising. And while Scott Pilgrim EX shares some creative energy with those games — detailed pixel art, high-impact combat — producer Remi Lavoie says Scott Pilgrim EX is slightly different than those more straightforward brawlers thanks to a non-linear play style.

“This game happens in a really big world of interconnected areas, which you’ll explore at your own pace,” he said. The map, which is fully unlocked when players begin the game, is inspired by the classic NES beat-’em-up River City Ransom, which broke ground with an “open-world” approach to staging. While the quests in Scott Pilgrim EX will have linear progression, players will be able to jump around and get right down to business, as all of their moves and combos will be available from the get go too.

Scott Pilgrim is really more of an adventure game where you progress through the world and complete quests, [while] Marvel Cosmic Invasion is a bit more similar to the traditional beat-’em-ups with completing stage after stage,” Lavoie said. “So they’re both very different, even in the combat mechanics: [Scott Pilgrim EX] features a lot of weapons, everyday objects that you can pick up and use as weapons.”

Lavoie said the team really leaned in on the chaos of the experience for Scott Pilgrim EX, which also counts Scott Pilgrim Takes Off writer BenDavid Grabinski as a creative partner and is technically set after the events of the anime. “Part of it is embracing that wacky timeline,” he said. “It’s a story written with Bryan and it’s really its own thing, but technically it happens after the events of the animated series.” And the loopy quality of the story is reflected in the art and play; the stages in EX are overflowing with classic game references while the number of objects that can be deployed as weapons should make the game’s four-player co-op (in person or online) a total circus.

Both Lavoie and Lafontaine agreed that there were very few hurdles that Tribute had to clear to make their dream version of Scott Pilgrim EX. The history of Scott Pilgrim vs. The World: The Game isn’t just a legacy, but a foundation on how to produce a top-quality installment of this unlikely franchise.

“The fact that the team is so small and we’re so close with Bryan and Universal, it’s such a quick environment for us to be creative, balance ideas, get things approved, make things happen,” Lafontaine said.

Scott Pilgrim EX is currently on track for a 2026 release on Nintendo Switch, PlayStation platforms, Windows PC, and Xbox platforms.


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Mario Kart 8 Deluxe’s beloved LAN Mode feature is available in Mario Kart World for Nintendo Switch 2, bringing 16-24 player mayhem to one household. Polygon can confirm that players must hold L+R (NOT ZL+ ZR) and then click the left joystick, to transform the wireless play option into LAN Mode.

In this mode, players connect the consoles to the same access point via ethernet connection to get a complete 24-player LAN Party. This option differs from the wireless play’s room max of 8 players. So, if you want to, MKW can easily be used in an awesome LAN tournament.

LAN tournaments/parties were popularized in the late 1990s and went strong into the 2000s. These events saw players bring over their computers or consoles to their homie’s houses (or established venues) to game together. The tournaments and parties required players to wire their consoles together on a shared network, reducing latency in whatever competitive game they were playing, like Halo, for example.

So, who knows, with the LAN Mode returning as a feature, we may see some wacky Mario Kart World local parties with chaotic 24-player Knockout Tour competitions. Ah, the possibilities.

Mario Kart World was released on June 5 alongside the Nintendo Switch 2. Be sure to read more on how to unlock characters and their dope outfits across the site — to get you ready for those hypothetical LAN parties, of course.

A picture of Mario in Mario Kart World using wireless play. A picture of Mario in Mario Kart World using LAN Mode. A picture of Mario in Mario Kart World using LAN Mode.


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Lies of P: Overture is available now, after a new trailer was showcased during the 2025 Summer Game Fest.

The new trailer shows P using new weapons the DLC introduces, like his Wolverine-like claws. We see more new locations as well and the enemies they’ll bring, like a giant crocodile boss P will go up against.

Lies of P: Overture is a prequel that sends protagonist P back in time to before Puppet Frenzy overtook Krat. It includes new weapons, additional enemy types, and 15-20 hours worth of content to the main game.

A patch for all players is on the way as well that adds in new difficulty options, allowing Lies of P to be easier while opening it up to those who were put off by the difficulty of the Soulslike. Also added is a new boss rush mode, Death March, and a mode to replay boss fights, Battle Memories.

Overture is out now across PlayStation 4, PlayStation 5, Windows PC, Xbox One, and Xbox Series X. The original Lies of P was released in fall 2023 and was a hit with fans and critics alike; our review said it “breath[ed] new life into an overcrowded genre by allowing you to fabricate your own truth with the characters you meet, shaping the world with your choices.”


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With Mario Kart World as the flagship launch game for Switch 2 this year, it’s an unusual time for Sega to be working on its own kart racer starring its iconic blue blur. But Takashi Iyazuka, head of the Sonic Team at Sega, not only acknowledged the elephant in the room during this year’s Summer Game Fest — he also tried flexing on the Nintendo franchise.

Following a trailer featuring new characters for Sonic Racing: CrossWorlds, Iyazuka took the SGF stage to highlight one major difference between his game and Mario Kart World.

“Unlike the another kart racing game, this game will have online cross-platform matchmaking so you can race against all your friends across all of the platforms,” Iyazuka said amid a roaring cheer. As fans know, Mario Kart is a first-party Nintendo franchise that’s exclusive on the Japanese publisher’s own console, so there’s no way to enjoy it with people who own other modern consoles. Sonic Racing: CrossWorlds, on the other hand, will be on all major platforms when it releases on September 25 — including, ironically enough, the Nintendo Switch.

In addition to unveiling Sega-owned characters like Persona 5’s Joker, the latest trailer for Sonic Racing also revealed that the game will see none other than Minecraft Steve as a playable racer. That’s a major get for Sega, and also highlights another difference between the two racing games. Where Mario Kart only includes major Nintendo characters, Sonic Racing features some rad crossovers, like Hatsune Miku.

Not Iyazuka reviving the beef between Sega and Nintendo. It’s all in good fun, of course.


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Lakitu replacing Waluigi on a course following an accident in Mario Kart World

Mario Kart World‘s rewind feature is quietly one of the racing game’s most useful features for learning how its new tricks, jumps, and grinds work. The Nintendo Switch 2 launch game sets you loose to discover rewind on your own, though, with no tutorial or anything explaining how the tool works or when you might want to use it.

Below, we explain how to rewind in Mario Kart World, which modes let you do it, and when you’re better off just taking a mistake on the chin.

How to rewind in Mario Kart World

A Cheep-Cheep rewinding time to avoid an obstacle in Mario Kart World’s battle mode

Press “down” on the direction pad to rewind the previous five seconds and start again. Rewind is useful if you’re trying to learn how to time a jump correctly so you can drive along the wall, if you miss a shortcut, or if you just make a big mistake and would rather not lose eight places after crashing into a wall. It’s handy for evading an incoming obstacle in Battle Mode, too.

GiantBomb’s Jeff Grubb discovered you can even use rewind to escape a blue shell. If you rewind right before the shell makes contact, it’ll explode even without you there to suffer from it.

Bear in mind that rewind doesn’t affect the timer if you’re completing a Free Roam challenge or mode or activity with a timer, such as Time Trials. You’ll start in your previous position, but the timer won’t rewind, and you’ll probably fail the challenge. The better option for fixing a mistake in Free Roam mission scenarios is opening the pause menu and choosing the “retry” option.

Rewind also has no effect on computer-controlled characters, whose positions won’t rewind to match yours. Still, for learning tough courses such as Rainbow Road, it’s worth rewinding and coming in last if only to get the hang of difficult curves without having to start an entire cup over again.

What modes can you use rewind in?

Waluigi driving off the edge of a cliff in Mario Kart World

Rewind is only usable in single-player modes and Free Roam, though you can use it in a multiplayer lobby as well – just not in a multiplayer race. The list of modes that let you use rewind is:

Grand PrixBattle ModeVs RaceKnockout TourTime Trials

Did you just get a Nintendo Switch 2? Are you trying to unlock every character and outfit in Mario Kart World? Or maybe you’re trying out The Legend of Zelda: The Wind Waker for the first time and you need a walkthrough for those pesky stoplights in the Forsaken Fortress? Either way, we have your back when it comes to helping you sort stuff out.

We have guides explaining how to set up your console (moving data from your original Switch to your Switch 2) as well as guides for things like getting external storage sorted out.


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The nightmare was real, the situation was not.

Revenge of the Savage Planet, an adventure spread across a number of distant — and quite savage! — planets, invites nonlinear exploration. To complete its missions and discover all of its secrets, you must leap into an unknown where the otherworldly flora, fauna, and even the inorganic material are primed to kill you. So, shortly after assembling an underwater scooter that allowed my robot sidekick to whisk me through the depths of alien oceans, I descended into a series of caverns under the Zenithian Rift to see what was going on down there. The specters of death I encountered below weren’t even designed to haunt me.

In Raccoon Logic’s sequel to Journey to the Savage Planet, players are tasked with scanning every object in every nook and cranny to assemble an exhaustive log of materials located on each planet. At first, the task is a walk in the (overgrown killer) park: find a tree, scan a tree. Find a slobbering beastie, scan a slobbering beastie. But a counter on the map charting your scannables becomes the most daunting subtask — can I really find every single micro scannable? I found myself longing after completing the core missions. To really 100% this, there was even more reason to venture into the most uninviting spaces, including a dark underwater cave on Zenithian Rift that absolutely did not look like it contained any scannable items. But I couldn’t not go in there.

It took about two seconds for me to realize… I had made a horrible mistake. While the cave was easily accessible from the water, there were no enemy or collectible breadcrumbs to suggest this was a place the folks at Raccoon Logic intended for me to. I was lured in by curiosity, but the joy of discovery in Revenge of the Savage Planet got the best of me. Now I was stuck. I had stumbled into a graphical anomaly, an in-game black hole that had an entrance but no apparent exit.

In Revenge of the Savage Planet, you can’t beam back to starting locations on the fly or off yourself in order to respawn from your last save. In a clever but likely divisive design choice, the game forces you to navigate to transporters spread across the worlds in order to beam off to your next desired location, which forces traversal and new encounters. But it meant that while bumbling around in the dark, hoping to find a way out of my watery grave, I couldn’t simply die and move on. I was actually trapped, and in a scenario I haven’t experienced in quite some time, feeling IRL like I was actually trapped.

I already don’t do well with underwater levels out of an intense fear of drowning. Luckily for me, most games will throw me the lifeline of a visual countdown to illustrate oxygen levels, ensuring (1) I surface in time and (2) I don’t hyperventilate over the stress of surfacing in time. Revenge of the Savage Planet doesn’t need that because there’s no punishment for enjoying the waters; you’re already in a spacesuit and the challenges you encounter via underwater scooter require a bunch of time-intensive back and forth. Doing it all on limited air would simply not be fun. But that meant, stuck in this tight underwater cave, I would never die. I was in limbo. Or maybe I was in hell.

I spent far too long searching for a route out. Streaks of light bled in from a theoretical escape that I could never reach — any time I thought I was close, I bumped into a new rock and found myself jetting in the opposite direction. Not since I watched The Rescue, the riveting-yet-terrifying documentary about the team of divers who squeezed through cave passageways to free 12 trapped Thai soccer players, had my apparent claustrophobia had its way with my nerves. I can’t quite explain why I pushed myself over the edge to find an in-game solution to this unintentional challenge, except to say that I really wanted to do a good job at Revenge of the Savage Planet.

Most glitches are considered errors by programmers, annoyances by players, and occasionally shortcuts for the speedrunner crowd. Revenge of the Savage Planet’s death cave might fall into the first two categories, but it’s a harrowing experience I ultimately appreciated, a unique screw up that could only happen in a game. I have never felt truly trapped in a film, despite the best efforts of 3D stereoscopic effects and 4DX rumble seats. After finally rebooting Revenge of the Savage Planet, I had to give myself a few minutes to let my heart rate die down before I grabbed the controller. But I got right back to it. Sure, this was a glitch, but in a game where exploration is everything, leaping into a true unknown — one that the creators of the game clearly didn’t intend me to find — was its own form of success.

Revenge of the Savage Planetis currently available for PC, Playstation, and Xbox, and it’s currently on Game Pass.


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The tracks in Mario Kart Word are the real stars in the game and the shiniest one is the Rainbow Road track. The mesmerizingly colorful track is something out of this world — literally. Unlike all the other tracks in the game, Rainbow Road is a secret one, but luckily the path to find it is pretty straightforward.

Below, you find all you need to know to unlock the Rainbow Road in Mario Kart World.

How to unlock the Rainbow Road in Mario Kart World

A Mario Kart World screenshot showing the Rainbow Road track from above.

The Rainbow Road becomes available only after you have unlocked the Special Cup in the Grand Prix mode. It appears as an option for you after completing all the other seven cups. Here’s a list of all cups you need to finish:

Mushroom CupFlower CupStar CupShell CupBanana CupLeaf CupLightning Cup A Mario Kart World screenshot showing the seven trophies from the seven cups in Grand Prix mode

It doesn’t matter what CC you play the cup on, and it doesn’t matter if you even place in the race. You just need to play each cup.

Like the other cups, the Special Cup has four tracks: Acorn Heights, Mario Circuit, Peach Stadium, with Rainbow Road being the last one.

How to play Rainbow Road in Mario Kart World

A Mario Kart World screenshot showing the character Cow flying heading toward the Rainbow Road track.

Once you have raced through Rainbow Road once and beat the Special Cup, you might want to give the course another try. We have tested and can confirm that you can enjoy this track by replaying the Special Cup in the Grand Prix mode or selecting it in VS Race mode.

According to some Reddit users, Rainbow Road can also appear in online play if you’re lucky. In online races, you can vote for one between three tracks randomly selected by the game, or you can pick “random.” If Rainbow Road comes among the first options, you can just select that — but the track may not be picked, since the game chooses randomly from what the players voted for.

A Mario Kart World screenshot showing the track selection screen when playing multiplayer.

If you are really burning to race Rainbow Road in an online lobby, your best bet is to vote “random” if Rainbow Road doesn’t come up as an actual option, since this can roll maps that weren’t among the initial voting options.

Did you just get a Nintendo Switch 2? Are you trying to unlock every character and outfit in Mario Kart World? Or maybe you’re trying out The Legend of Zelda: The Wind Waker for the first time and you need a walkthrough for those pesky stoplights in the Forsaken Fortress? Either way, we have your back when it comes to helping you sort stuff out.We have guides explaining how to set up your console (moving data from your original Switch to your Switch 2) as well as guides for things like getting external storage sorted out.


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On June 6, A24 launched the promotional website Black Angel Tapes, meant as an artifact from the shared world of Danny and Michael Philippou’s horror movies Talk to Me and Bring Her Back. Both movies feature creepy artifacts that lead characters to communicate with otherworldly spiritual entities, and Black Angel Tapes is meant to be the website where the characters found those items.

In an interview with Polygon, the Philippous confirmed that Bring Her Back and Talk to Me take place in the same universe, and said they’re probably going to set all their horror movies there. (Though they are taking on unconnected projects: their next film is a documentary about deathmatch wrestling, due out later in 2025.)

“It’s a website you can visit where [Bring Her Back character] Laura purchased this tape from,” Danny Philippou told Polygon via video. “It’s sort of like a dark-web-feeling marketplace where they sell all these fucked-up occult items. That’s something we’re working on now, in between press stuff.”

The site is fairly simple — it’s mostly mock sale listings for items like “Trapped Soul,” or videotapes like “SLEEP WATCHING DEMON SLOWLY EATS GIRL,” with grainy images or short video clips. Some of these items have the kinds of comment threads you might see on a sales site, with people discussing the item, asking questions, arguing with each other, bidding, or complaining about scams. One buyer is looking for the possession-inducing plaster hand — supposedly the mummified hand of a medium — at the center of Talk to Me. (A24’s merch shop sells a version of the hand that doubles as a “smoking device.”) The Bring Her Back tapes, detailing a creepy occult ritual that figures into the movie’s plot, are listed as “Tari Resurrection Tapes,” and the listing includes footage seen in the movie.

Notably, you can’t actually buy any of these items through the site. Why? The site FAQ — by far the most detailed part of the website, laced with a straight-faced humor that makes it worth the visit — explains:

Because you’re too early — or exactly on time. The marketplace breathes in phases. Right now, it watches. The “make offer” links are placeholders. Empty doors. They will remain broken until certain signals align. We are not open for commerce. We are open for attention. Browse. Study. Obsess. The items are real. The energy is already leaking. When the system awakens, those who paid attention will be first through the gate. The offer is not yours to make — yet.

If you do visit the site, be sure to check out the listing for “Evil Blood.” Humor doesn’t play a huge part in the Philippous’ dark, grim, extremely gory movies, but the promise of blood from “the world’s worst” convicts “the bigger the offer the more evil the blood” — is pretty funny. If the Philippous intend to tie their future horror movies together through this website, here’s hoping the evil blood plays a part at some point.


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A nightclub singer in Stranger Than Heaven’s reveal trailer

Following the reveal of Project Century during The Game Awards 2024, Sega and Like A Dragon developer Ryu Ga Gotoku Studio showed up to Summer Game Fest 2025 with a new trailer, a new era, and a new name: Stranger Than Heaven. Where the initial trailer looked like early-20th century Judgment, where a detective wandered around a rain-soaked, 1914’s Japanese city, Stranger Than Heaven‘s latest trailer is more like RGG Studio’s take on L.A. Noire.

A detective named Mako Daito moodily searches for clues to an unknown mystery in a glitzy city filled with people lost in their pursuit of excess, glamorous nightclubs, rowdy street fights, seedy tenements, and neon-soaked high streets. It looks like RGG Studio is digging more into survival and simulation elements than usual as well. In one brief shot, Mako holds a cigarette as an on-screen tooltip pops up that reads “Draws immense hostility when smoking.” He has hunger and thirst meters, a first for the studio, and makes split-second decisions about what to do in fraught situations, like whether to show a dangerous opponent mercy.

The trailer ends as Mako meets up with an American who’s surprised to find that Mako is Japanese and ends with a dramatic declaration from the detective about how he’s lost sight of himself. The action and setting might be unusual for RGG Studio, but the Yakuza-like melodrama remains the same.

Given the Project Century codename and the fact that the new trailer jumped forward in time by three decades, it seems like a safe bet to assume the story unfolds across, well, the century. RGG had little else to say about Stranger Than Heaven and previously recommended that no one even try to figure out what the game is about.

Stranger Than Heaven is planned for launch in 2026.


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Summer Game Fest kicked off on Friday with a tw0-hour extravaganza, in the old-fashioned E3 style. Host Geoff Keighley brought out tons of game updates, new reveals, and a few surprises — including the long-awaited release date of some of gaming’s white whales. As promised, Summer Game Fest featured games like Mafia: The Old Country, Dying Light: The Beast, and Fortnite — but the surprises were BIG. A new Resident Evil. A new Scott Pilgrim game. And Deadpool VR?

If you couldn’t watch Summer Game Fest 2025 live, here’s a recap of all the game announcements, release dates, trailers, and other highlights from Keighley’s big games showcase.

Resident Evil Requiem

The next mainline Resident Evil game is a BIG shift for the franchise, and it’s coming in 2026. Resident Evil Requiem sends players back to Raccoon City when launches on Feb. 27, 2026 for PlayStation 5, Windows PC, and Xbox Series X.

Stranger Than Heaven

Like A Dragon and Virtua Fighter developer Ryu Ga Gotoku Studio announced the title of its next game, which was previously teased as Project Century. It’s called Stranger Than Heaven now, and it’s set in the early 20th century.

Scott Pilgrim EX

Scott Pilgrim is back, in video game form, in a new project from Tribute Games, the developer behind beloved beat-’em-up Scott Pilgrim vs. The World. Scott Pilgrim EX will be out in 2026.

Mina the Hollower

Shovel Knight developer Yacht Club Games revealed the release date for its next big adventure: Mina the Hollower will be out Oct. 31.

Lego Voyagers

From publisher Annapurna Interactive comes Lego Voyagers, a new 2-player co-op adventure “that’s all about building spaceships, excitement and friendships.”

Onimusha: Way of the Sword

Capcom dropped a new look at next year’s Onimusha sequel, Onimusha: Way of the Sword.

Mafia: The Old Country

Here’s a new look at Mafia: The Old Country, specifically it’s story. Spoiler alert!

Lies of P: Overture

Soulslike Lies of P gets new DLC Overture… today!

Dying Light: The Beast

Check out the first gameplay footage for Dying Light: The Beast, which arrives Aug. 22 on PS5, Windows PC, and Xbox Series X.

Code Vein 2

Bandai Namco has a sequel to Code Vein in the works, and this one looks slightly less vampiric.

Mortal Shell 2

A sequel to 2020’s action role-playing game Mortal Shell is coming, and it looks metal AF. Mortal Shell 2 is coming in 2026.

Atomic Heart 2

Developer Mundfish revealed a sequel to its sci-fi first-person shooter Atomic Heart. Atomic Heart 2 will feature a “living world rich with possibilities and places a heavy emphasis on story, role-playing elements, and player freedom. The story unfolds in an alternate-history world, with events now expanding to a global scale,” the developer says.“

The Cube

Mundfish ALSO has a separate “MMO RPG shooter” set in the Atomic Heart universe, called The Cube.

ILL

One of the more… intense games to show up at Summer Game Fest was Ill, a story-driven survival horror game that promises “intense body horror, grotesque monsters, [and] relentless fear.” Sure looks like it!

Sonic Racing CrossWorlds

Sonic the Hedgehog’s next kart-racing game is getting some cross-world guests, including Ichiban Kasuga from the Like A Dragon series, Joker from Persona 5, and Steve from Minecraft. Sonic Racing CrossWorlds will have crossplay when it launches on Sept. 25.

Nicktoons and the Dice of Destiny

SpongeBob Squarepants is about to get medieval in Nicktoons & The Dice of Destiny, a “universe-spanning mashup that brings iconic Nickelodeon heroes into a world of fantasy-style tropes and real-time RPG action.”

End of Abyss

End of Abyss is a new sci-fi action-RPG from Section 9 Interactive. End of Abyss is set to launch in 2026 for PlayStation 5, Windows PC, and Xbox Series X.

Marvel Cosmic Invasion

She-Hulk and Rocket Raccoon join the roster of Tribute Games’ Marvel superhero-themed beat-’em-up, Marvel Cosmic Invasion.

Wu-Tang: Rise of the Deceiver

To save their home of Shaolin, the Wu-Tang Clan must pass on their fantastical powers to a new generation of warriors, developer Brass Lion Entertainment says of its debut title, Wu-Tang: Rise of the Deceiver.

Chrono Odyssey

Here’s a new look at Chrono Odyssey, Kakao Games’ action-packed MMORPG.

Felt That Boxing

Muppets-inspired boxing? Hell yes. One of the cooler looking games at Summer Game Fest finally pays off Geoff Keighley’s love of puppets.

Out of Words

Another cool looking game is Out of Words, a co-op platformer adventure “about the doubt and confusion that comes with communicating first-time love,” according to its creators. Out of Words is coming to PS5, Windows PC via the Epic Games Store, and Xbox Series in 2026.

Infinitesimals

In this Grounded-scale adventure, you’ll join Captain Awkney in his search for a new home for his people in Infinitesimals from Cubit Studios. It’s coming to PS5, Xbox Series X, and PC via the Epic Game Store in 2026.

Casino Royale’s LeChiffre comes to Hitman

Mads Mikkelsen reprises his role as James Bond villain LeChiffre as a new elusive target in Hitman: World of Assassination.

Wildgate

Dreamhaven and developer Moonshot Games announced that the crew-based space FPS, Wildgate, will launch on July 22.

ARC Raiders

Embark Studios’ long-awaited ARC Raiders is almost here. It’s coming out Oct. 30.

Deadpool VR

Yep, Deadpool is getting his own virtual reality game, with Neil Patrick Harris taking on the role of Wade Wilson himself.

Killer Inn

Square Enix and Tactic Studios announced a new social deduction game called Killer Inn.


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A dilapidated mansion from Resident Evil Requiem, AKA RE9

Capcom revealed the next installment in the Resident Evil franchise, Resident Evil Requiem, on Friday at Summer Game Fest as the livestream’s closing announcement, following a swerve by the dev team earlier in the show.

The game follows Grace Ashcroft (related to Alyssa Ashcroft from Resident Evil Outbreak) also as an FBI agent tasked to look into an incident at a hotel where her mother was previously murdered (although Alyssa is mentioned, there’s no telling if she’s Grace’s mom). In the game’s trailer, Grace’s boss says it’s time for her to confront her past before the scene cuts to her bound upside down in a dark room.

A screenshot of Grace, a blond woman with glasses, sitting in front of a messy office cubicle

From there we see corridors familiar to the Raccoon City mansion before getting ominous words from a shadowy figure in a chair insisting Grace is special, a “chosen one.” We also see the remnants of Raccoon City with the bomb mark that took it out and a destroyed Raccoon City police department. Needless to say, although the franchise will continue its long-running story, this title looks to be very much a return to form for RE’s survival horror origins.

Survival horror fans have been anticipating news on the next Resident Evil for a while now. The most recent new mainline Resident Evil entry was 2021’s Resident Evil Village, a direct sequel to 2017’s Resident Evil 7 biohazard. Shifting further into action, Village emphasized combat against relentless waves of undead creatures. Since then, Capcom has released its ambitious remake of Resident Evil 4.

Similar to the rumor mill reports, Requiem looks to be a reimagining of the series with an evolution of concepts first introduced in the original Resident Evil, with more focus on horror over action. Rumors also suggest it will serve as both a conclusion to current story arcs and a fresh starting point for the franchise’s future, and the teaser certainly enforces this notion.

Resident Evil Requiem is slated for a February 27, 2026 release date, with more info to be revealed the closer we get to the launch date.


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Each week on Polygon, we round up the most notable new releases to streaming and VOD, highlighting the biggest and best new movies for you to watch at home.

This week, you can invite Ryan Coogler’s sexy horror movie Sinners into your home for the first time through VOD demand services. Also available for rent is The Surfer, a psychological thriller where Nicolas Cage loses his mind while trying to surf with his son. Preydirector Dan Trachtenberg continues sending aliens to hunt people across time in the animated film Predator: Killer of Killers, which premieres on Hulu. The streaming service is also launching Steven Soderbergh’s haunted house film Presence, following its January theatrical release.

Here’s everything new that’s available to watch this weekend!

New on Netflix

K.O.

Genre: Martial arts dramaRun time: 1h 26mDirector: Antoine BlossierCast: Ciryl Gane, Maleaume Paquin, Alice Belaïdi

In this brawl-packed French movie, a disgraced MMA fighter who accidentally killed his opponent in a match gets a chance at redemption when the dead man’s widow asks for his help tracking down her missing teenage son. He teams up with a young cop to take on a Marseille gang.

Straw

Genre: ThrillerRun time: 1h 48mDirector: Tyler PerryCast: Taraji P. Henson, Sherri Shepherd, Teyana Taylor

A single mother played by Golden Globe winner Taraji P. Henson (Empire, Hidden Figures) is having a really bad day after being evicted and robbed. She just needs to cash a check to get medicine for her daughter, but winds up being accused of holding up a bank in this thriller written and directed by Tyler Perry, and exploring the impact of social inequity.

New on AMC+

Neighborhood Watch

Genre: Crime thrillerRun time: 1h 32mDirector: Duncan SkilesCast: Jack Quaid, Jeffrey Dean Morgan, Malin Akerman

A man (The Boys Jack Quaid) with a history of mental illness sees a woman get abducted. When authorities won’t believe him, he turns to his cranky retired security-guard neighbor (Jeffrey Dean Morgan of The Walking Dead) for help investigating. They team up for a fast-paced mystery driven by a strong dynamic between the duo.

New on HBO Max

The Alto Knights

Genre: Crime dramaRun time: 2hDirector: Barry LevinsonCast: Robert De Niro, Debra Messing, Kathrine Narducci

Robert De Niro has played plenty of mob bosses, in films like The Godfather and The Untouchables. Now he’s playing two in the same movie: Frank Costello and Vito Genovese, who are fighting for control of New York. Academy Award winner Barry Levinson (Rain Man, Wag the Dog) directs with a script from Goodfellas and Casino writer Nicholas Pileggi.

Mountainhead

Genre: SatireRun time: 1h 49Director: Jesse ArmstrongCast: Steve Carell, Jason Schwartzman, Cory Michael Smith

Successioncreator Jesse Armstrong takes another spin at skewering the ultra-rich in Mountainhead, where a group of tech bros played by Steve Carell, Jason Schwartzman, Cory Michael Smith, and Ramy Youssef have gathered to flaunt their success and go skiing. But when the combination of AI and social media leads to global turmoil, their ulterior motives and long-simmering tensions come to the forefront.

Parthenope

Genre: Coming-of-age dramaRun time: 2h 17mDirector: Paolo SorrentinoCast: Celeste Dalla Porta, Stefania Sandrelli, Gary Oldman

Parthenope (Celeste Dalla Porta) seduces everyone who encounters her, including a writer played by Gary Oldman, in this sultry A24 film from Oscar-winner Paolo Sorrentino (The Great Beauty, The Hand of God). Spread over the decades from Parthenope’s Venus-like birth in the waters of Naples to her work as an anthropologist, the film is filled with sex and luscious scenery.

New on Hulu

Predator: Killer of Killers

Genre: Animated science fictionRun time: 1h 30mDirector: Dan Trachtenberg and Joshua WassungCast: Lindsay LaVanchy, Louis Ozawa Changchien, Rick Gonzalez

Predators hunt a Viking family bent on revenge, a ninja battling his samurai brother, and a World War II pilot in this era-hopping animated film from Prey director Dan Trachtenberg. While the disparate plots aren’t created equal, the animated action is impressive, and the film builds on series lore in a way that might invite a series return for Arnold Schwarzenegger. Trachtenberg presumably plans to further flesh out his lore expansions in Predator: Badlandslater this year.

Presence

Genre: Supernatural horrorRun time: 1h 25mDirector: Steven SoderberghCast: Lucy Liu, Julia Fox, Chris Sullivan

Ocean’s Eleven and Contagion director Steven Soderbergh plays with the found-footage horror genre with a tale of a fractured family who become convinced something is lurking in their new suburban home. It’s a far sleeker experience than The Blair Witch Project, eschewing shaky camera footage while providing the feeling of an alien perspective intruding on the family’s most intimate moments.

From our review:

Soderbergh’s approach taps into the found-footage horror idea of a story being experienced by whoever’s behind the camera, except in this case, the question of who’s behind the camera is part of the horror. From the start, Soderbergh and screenwriter David Koepp (who also wrote Soderbergh’s simple, efficient 2022 action-thriller Kimi) imply that the presence is a ghost — but until the action fully plays out, the audience is left to wonder whether it’s something else entirely, along with what it wants and how and whether it will eventually make its needs known. The filmmakers inevitably build in a few small jump scares, but for the most part, Presence is about low-key, slow-burn curiosity rather than lurking terror.

New on MUBI

Magic Farm

Genre: Absurdist comedyRun time: 1h 33mDirector: Amalia UlmanCast: Chloë Sevigny, Alex Wolff, Joe Apollonio

The crew of a documentary show looking to profile a musician winds up in the wrong country in South America in Magic Farm, which premiered at the Sundance Film Festival in January. Trying to make the best of the situation, the team — including Golden Globe winner Chloë Sevigny (Boys Don’t Cry, Big Love) — tries to find new subjects in rural Argentina while grappling with the exploitative nature of their work.

New on Peacock

The Ballad of Wallis Island

Genre: Comedy-dramaRun time: 1h 39mDirector: James GriffithsCast: Tom Basden, Tim Key, Carey Mulligan

A widower who won the lottery twice hatches a plan to reunite his favorite folk duo by hiring them for a concert on his private island, where he turns out to be the only audience. The scheme pushes the musicians, played by Oscar nominee Carey Mulligan (An Education, Promising Young Woman), and Tom Basden, to confront their shared professional and romantic history and decide how to move forward.

New on Prime

The Accountant 2

Genre: Crime thrillerRun time: 2h 4mDirector: Gavin O’ConnorCast: Ben Affleck, Jon Bernthal, Cynthia Addai-Robinson

The sequel to Gavin O’Connor’s 2016 action movie The Accountant, which became a cult classic in spite of its unimpressive box office performance, sees Ben Affleck’s brilliant criminal bookkeeper teaming up with his estranged assassin brother, played by The Punisher’s Jon Bernthal. A third film in the series involving lots of gunfights and financial crimes is already in the works.

New to rent

Hurry Up Tomorrow

Genre: Psychological thrillerRun time: 1h 56mDirector: Trey Edward ShultsCast: Abel Tesfaye, Jenna Ortega, Barry Keoghan

A companion piece to Abel “the Weeknd” Tesfaye’s 2025 album of the same name, the thriller written and directed by Trey Edwards Shults (It Comes at Night, Waves) follows a fictional version of Tesfaye as he struggles with insomnia and depression. Things get increasingly surreal when he encounters an obsessive fan played by Wednesdayand Beetlejuice Beetlejuice star Jen Ortega.

Sinners

Genre: Supernatural horrorRun time: 2h 18mDirector: Ryan CooglerCast: Michael B. Jordan, Hailee Steinfeld, Miles Caton

Black Pantherand Creed director Ryan Coogler reunites with Michael B. Jordan, who plays identical twin gangsters Smoke and Stack. Set in 1932, the movie follows the brothers as they return home to Mississippi with the goal of using their ill-gotten money and booze to open a juke joint. But more is waiting for them than old flames and the Ku Klux Klan. Their blues music attracts the attention of dark creatures, and the partygoers have to fight to survive until dawn.

From our review:

Coogler’s last three films have been part of major franchises — after the indie biopic Fruitvale Station, he directed the seventh Rocky movie, Creed, and the two Black Panthers. Here, though, he pivots toward a wholly original piece of pop-horror, with B-movie influences befitting of grindhouse cinemas (and with one particularly amusing nod to John Carpenter’s The Thing). It’s a spiritual splatter film, with intimate dilemmas concerning greed and temptation giving way to spurts of practical, orange-brown blood, the kind you’d likely find in a George Romero film. Sinners is a vampire movie, but it’s practically structured like a zombie feature, with a compact cast of characters trying to survive the night as ghouls overtly embodying deep societal malaise creep toward them.

The Surfer

Genre: Psychological thrillerRun time: 1h 39mDirector: Lorcan FinneganCast: Nicolas Cage, Julian McMahon, Finn LittleYet another film where Nicolas Cage portrays a character whose grasp on sanity is tenuous at best, The Surfer sees the Face/Off  and Longlegsstar playing a man who returns to his childhood home in Australia and finds his simple desire to go surfing with his son stymied by a group of locals who consider him an interloper. Unwilling to accept defeat, the surfer refuses to leave and loses almost everything.


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On top of being the upgraded version of the Nintendo Switch, the Switch 2 might be the best way to experience some of the previous generation’s most critically acclaimed titles.

Both Breath of the Wild and Tears of the Kingdom already stole our hearts with their scale, presentation, and gameplay when they were released in 2017 and 2023, respectively. Whether it’s your first time playing or your 50th, the Switch 2 editions of these titles are an absolute dream experience. Nintendo’s modern masterpieces didn’t suffer despite relatively low resolution and frame rates and slow loading times — one of the most common gripes with the games when they were released. But the Switch 2 Edition of each game feels like the upgrade the titles deserve, especially when it comes to reduced loading times. And I mean significantly reduced.

During our testing, we ran five different test cases five times, then calculated an average for each of the five trials. For the original versions of the games, we used a Switch OLED. For the Switch 2 editions of the games, we used a Switch 2.

We tested the time it takes to boot up the game from the Switch 2 home screen, a load a save file from the title screen, reload a save file, fast travel across the map, and enter a shrine. I picked these test cases because they are actions you repeat many times in a given play session, and those load times add up.

Here are the results:

TestBoTW SwitchBoTW Switch 2 EditionToTK SwitchToTK Switch 2 EditionBooting up the game13.15s7.26s18.26s8.51sLoading a save file from the title screen23.40s14.14s11.04s8.19sReloading a save file14.78s9.11s16.31s9.49sFast travel22.62s14.47s12.04s5.08sEntering a shrine9.21s6.87s8.58s4.68s

To no one’s surprise, the Switch 2 dominates the performance of the Nintendo Switch. The Switch 2 takes the load times of both Breath of the Wild and Tears of the Kingdom and cuts them roughly in half. In some cases, the load time has been reduced by more than half, specifically in Tears of the Kingdom. Overall, Tears of the Kingdom saw bigger performance increases on average compared to Breath of the Wild, probably because the game is just better optimized.

The Nintendo Switch 2, paired with the Switch 2 Edition of each title, offers a significant improvement to the modern Zelda experience. You can also play the original versions on Switch 2, in theory, though we have yet to test those load times.

Nonetheless, the Switch 2 editions feel more fluid and responsive. If you have yet to lose yourself in the most recent iteration of Hyrule Kingdom, there’s no better time than now — that is, if you’re willing to pay the extra $10 per game, or for a Nintendo Switch Online + Expansion membership, to upgrade to the Switch 2 Edition, which is only available on Switch 2.


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Dan Trachtenberg and Joshua Wassung’s animated movie Predator: Killer of Killers introduces many new elements to the decades-old science fiction franchise, just like Trachtenberg’s Prey did back in 2022. There are dramatic new Predator designs and places Predator-vs.-human fights in eras where we’ve never seen them before. Most startlingly, it brings in some inspiration from Christopher Guest’s dog-pageant comedy Best In Show.

But for Predator fans, the real revelation comes right at the end of the story, with a final reveal that opens up all kinds of Predator sequel possibilities. For one, it suggests a perfect return path for Dutch, Arnold Schwarzenegger’s character from the 1987 movie that kicked off the entire series.

Obviously, we had to ask Trachtenberg whether he’s planning a Killer of Killers sequel, whether he wants to see Dutch back in action, and more questions about that big reveal. Just as obviously, we had to put his answers after a spoiler break.

[Ed. note: Spoilers ahead about one small detail from the end of Predator: Killer of Killers.]

In the movie, three humans from far-flung eras — a Viking raider, a Japanese ninja, and a World War II pilot — each face a Predator… and survive. All three are then captured and cryogenically preserved by other Predators, who eventually thaw them out, dump them in an arena with explosive collars around their necks, and order them to fight to the death. The survivor is expected to face a massive leader credited as “Warlord Predator.”

The end of the film spends a few short moments traveling through a facility where other captives are being kept on ice. including Naru, Amber Midthunder’s protagonist from Prey. The implication is that anyone who kills a Predator is collected for further battles — a huge change to existing Predator lore, and also a major opportunity for Trachtenberg, Wassung, and anyone else playing around in this canon to bring back any Predator-movie survivor, including Dutch.

“So the movie was made under the code name Warehouse, as that end moment was in the original idea pitch to the studio, and it felt like the end of Raiders of the Lost Ark,” Trachtenberg told Polygon in a video interview. “Certainly Arnold, like many others, was a survivor of his story, and one could easily imagine him up there in cryo, along with any other Earth champion or champion from other planets.”

Sure, one could imagine that, just as one could imagine the 77-year-old Schwarzenegger voicing an animated version of Dutch who’s fresh from the fight in the 1987 movie, instead of getting called back into battle as a septuagenarian. The animation medium and the cryo-storage facility both seem like a perfect way to bring back old characters without considering the actors’ ages, or their ability to perform the kinds of acrobatic, dramatic action sequences seen throughout Killer of Killers.

But the actual question is whether Trachtenberg himself is actively planning a sequel. His response? “Yeah, certainly. The cool [part] of this movie is that it opens up the door to tell these kinds of stories in different eras, in different places, in different planets — but also, the further adventures of these heroes that we bonded with in a very unique way.”

But he wouldn’t confirm or deny whether he or 20th Century Studios have reached out to Schwarzenegger about the possibility. For one thing, the actor has repeatedly turned down chances to return to the role of Dutch. According to Den of Geek, talks to feature him in 1990’s Predator 2 fell apart over money, with the added factor that James Cameron wanted to preserve Schwarzenegger’s sequel mystique for Terminator 2. The actor turned down a cameo in 2010’s Predators because he was serving as governor of California at the time, and rejected a cameo in 2018’s The Predator because he didn’t like the script or the minor role. So his possible involvement in a Killer of Killers sequel might depend on a lot of factors besides Trachtenberg’s interest, or fans’ fantasies about seeing Dutch in action again.

For the moment, Trachtenberg says it’s true that his Predator projects — including the live-action movie Predator: Badlands, coming to theaters in November — may suggest the possibility of sequel stories, even before any follow-up projects have been green-lit. He points to the closing credits of Prey, where a single animated frame foreshadows a battle to come, as a group of Predator ships emerge from the clouds above Naru’s village.

An animated shot from the closing credits of Prey, with a stylized Native woman and her dog looking up at the clouds as a spaceship emerges

When Prey came out, that shot felt like a promise that Prey 2 was on the way. Now, it looks like a teaser for Killer of Killers, with the understanding that those ships were arriving to abduct Naru. In the same way, that final shot of her in Killer of Killers could tease a future animated or live-action animated story with her. But Trachtenberg says he can’t plan around sequel projects just yet.

“Certainly [each of my movies] are being made as if this was my only shot,” Trachtenberg told Polygon. “Everything was thrown into it. Should we be able to do more… Certainly Killer of Killers seizes something, and Badlands [does too]. Hopefully there will be something more, but they don’t rely on the something more. Hopefully they are both cool within their own merits.”

Predator: Killer of Killers is on Hulu now.


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Microsoft’s annual Xbox Games Showcase is a double header this year: It’s directly followed by the Outer Worlds 2 Direct, a livestream focused on Obsidian Entertainment’s forthcoming space-faring RPG.

Here’s everything we know about the two events, including where to watch Xbox Games Showcase 2025 (and the Outer Worlds 2 Direct), what time the shows start, and what to expect from the streams.

Xbox Showcase 2025 and Outer Worlds 2 Direct start times

As announced on Xbox Wire, the show will begin on June 8 at 1 p.m. ET. Translated to different time zones, here’s when the livestream starts:

10 a.m. PDT for the West Coast of North America1 p.m. EDT for the East Coast of North America6 p.m. BST for the U.K.7 p.m. CEST for western mainland Europe2 a.m. JST in Japan (June 9)

Where to watch Xbox Games Showcase 2025

You can watch the Xbox Showcase livestream on the official Xbox YouTube, Twitch, and Facebook channels, or via the YouTube embed at the top of this post. Note that the Xbox Showcase is immediately followed by an Outer Worlds 2 showcase, so if you’re fond of outer space adventures, you might want to stay tuned for that one.

A countdown timer will likely start shortly before the show. No worries if you miss it though; you can always watch the archived stream after the event, or catch up with all of the biggest announcements on Polygon after the show.

What to expect from Xbox Games Showcase 2025

The Xbox Games Showcase, befitting the name, will largely focus on with previews of upcoming games from Xbox Game Studios.

It’s hard to predict which games you will see, but since they’re set to release in the upcoming months, it’s a good bet Ninja Gaiden 4 and Gears of War: Reloaded will appear in some capacity. It would also make sense to get another update on Perfect Dark, which got a gameplay reveal in 2024’s Xbox Games Showcase and is now scheduled for a 2026 release. Fable, which was recently delayed to 2026, could also get a showing.

Many of you will undoubtedly hope for an update on The Elder Scrolls 6 too — given the renewed focus on the series in light of April 2025’s surprise release of the Oblivion Remake — but besides “it’s been a while,” we don’t have any evidence that points to an Xbox Showcase appearance this year.

The one thing that has been confirmed is a deep dive into The Outer Worlds 2, the sequel to Obsidian’s sci-fi RPG The Outer Worlds.

For more big events, here’s the full Summer Game Fest 2025 and not-E3 schedule!


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Netflix’s live-action One Piece and Lego collaboration is finally available for pre-order, and it features four classic settings from season 1 and the East Blue saga alongside a treasure trove of Easter eggs. These locations include the Straw Hat’s Going Merry ship, Buggy the Clown’s Circus Tent, a hut from Luffy’s hometown, Windmill Village, the Baratie Floating Restaurant, where Luffy meets Sanji, and Arlong Park, where the season reached its climax.

The Going Merry contains 1,376 pieces, including four wanted posters, as the set consists of several interior locations like the crew’s cabin, kitchen, storage, and an accessory workshop. But it also contains the five members of the Straw Hat Pirates, like Luffy sitting on the sheep figurehead in front of the ship; followed by Zoro training on the deck; Nami controlling the rudder at the rear near her tangerines; Usopp keeping watch from the crow’s nest; and Sanji headed downstairs to the kitchen.

Buggy’s Circus Tent comes with minifigures of Luffy, Zoro, Nami, and Captain Buggy himself, alongside two wanted posters. The tent flips open into a larger play area with Buggy’s throne, three escape contraptions (a water tank, hanging cage, and spinning table), and buildable mini Buggy pieces hidden in barrels.

The roof and walls of Windmill Village’s hut can be removed to reveal accessories made for the store and its customers. Upstairs are four treasure chests, and on the walls are places to hang wanted posters from other sets. There’s a countertop inside, a palm tree and surfboard on the sides of the hut, and outside, there’s a pirate boat toy attached to the jetty by a chain. The set includes minifigures of Luffy (and the Gum Gum Fruit), Shanks, and Makino.

The Baratie is a massive ship with 3,402 pieces and many accessible rooms inside, like a kitchen, dining areas, Zeff’s quarters, and a treasure room. Luffy, Zoro, Nami, Usopp, Sanji, Zeff, Garp, Helmeppo, Koby, and Mihawk minifigures are included alongside five wanted posters and several accessories like food, drinks, a transponder snail, and Mihawk’s ominous boat.

Arlong Park includes minifigures of Luffy (with stretch arm parts), Usopp, Arlong, and Chu. The model collapses to recreate Luffy’s final blow and features a shooting gallery with stud shooters, a shack, a forest area, and a throne room. It also comes with three wanted posters and accessories like Usopp’s ketchup bottle.

Although his looks were just announced for the upcoming season, we can’t wait to see minifigures of Tony Tony Chopper in the future.

Straw Hat’s Going Merry sells for $139.99. Buggy the Clown’s Circus Tent costs $54.99. Windmill Village is $29.99. The Baratie Floating Restaurant is priced at $329.99. And Arlong Park is priced at $79.99.

All five Lego sets are now available for pre-order and are set to ship on Aug. 1.


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The anime summer season is close — and there will be lots of big names for us to look forward to. In such a packed season, Gachiakuta is one of the most anticipated and Crunchyroll just dropped a new trailer for the show which is airing next month July 6, 2025, alongside some details on the voice actors we are going to see giving life to important characters.

The show is an adaptation of the manga written by Kei Urana and it has been published by Kodansha in their Weekly Shonen Magazine since 2022. Gachiakuta is Urana’s first series after her two one-shots – Nokase (2018) and Shikido (2019) – and this year the show is receiving the anime treatment by the hands of studio Bones Films, the one responsible for Vigilante: Boku no Hero Academia ILLEGALS.

In this new trailer, we learn more about the world of Gachiakuta, which we have only seen some flashes of in the announcement trailer. This second trailer gives us an idea of why Rudo, the show’s protagonist, ends up in the Pit. Other key concepts of the manga are introduced as well, such as Gachiakuta’s power system that works around people called Givers who draw out power from objects they give life.

Image from the Gachiakuta second trailer showing a character wtih dreads smiling.

While the trailer brings the energy you expect to see in a show like Gachiakuta – a few intense action scenes with the show’s opening song “HUGs” by Japanese band Paledusk –, it doesn’t fail to make it clear that Gachiakuta has a central social commentary on how society segregates people, throwing them away like garbage.

Alongside the trailer, Crunchyroll also shared with us the names of two voice actors that will be in the Gachiakuta. Regot, the man who raises Rudo in the show, is voiced by Toshiyuki Morikawa, present in other important recent shows such as Ranma ½. Morikawa was also the Japanese voice of Sephiroth in Final Fantasy VII Remake and Rebirth. Yuki Shin is the other name and he is coming to Gachiakuta to voice Jabber. The artist has voiced secondary characters in shows like Attack on Titan, Given, and My Hero Academia.


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If you picked up Mario Kart World alongside a Nintendo Switch 2, then you may be wondering where to even start. The game is massive and more chaotic than ever with more racers in each round and the super-fun Knockout Mode, which treats the game like a battle royale.

Below, you’ll find a list of tips and tricks that will help you get started in Mario Kart World. Whether this is your first Mario Kart game or if you’re just a veteran who hasn’t played in a while, you’re bound to find something helpful.

  1. Check your kart stats before choosing a main. Karts with low acceleration take longer to reach their max speed, and low handling means you’ll have to slow down more when you turn. You don’t want to learn which stats your kart struggles with in the middle of a race.

  2. Tricks matter more than ever in Mario Kart World. Courses are built with the expectation that you’ll take as many opportunities for drifts, rail grinds, jumps, and other special moves as much as possible, so make sure you’re getting those boosts!

  3. Mario Kart World has dozens of character costumes to unlock, but don’t stress yourself out too much with unlocking them all at once. Most will unlock from naturally playing the game, anyway.

  4. Speaking of costumes, don’t go too out of your way to grab food during a race unless the drive-thru is empty. It’s easier to unlock costumes in Free Roam mode, so don’t throw a race just to get an outfit.

  1. Be aware of your surroundings! Mario Kart World has so many shortcuts, spots for jump boosts and rail grinding, or ways to mess up your opponents (like detonating bomb cars). It’s easy to miss them if you aren’t looking around.

  2. Some cars even drop coins and food, so definitely keep your eyes peeled.

  3. Practice makes perfect. Take your time learning the tracks. Each track has its own secrets and it’s going to take a while to learn them all, so don’t be surprised if after a dozen runs you’re still finding new ways to get around.

  4. Don’t hold on to items for too long. Spend the ones you have so you can keep getting more. More shells and coins are better than just quietly holding on to one!

  1. Drafting is back in Mario Kart World, so if you’re lagging behind an opponent, stay directly behind them for a few seconds to get a little speed boost.

  2. Drift boosting has several levels. The final, strongest one happens after you hold the second-stage blue drift for a few seconds, so hold out as long as you can before boosting.

  3. Those mushrooms are valuable, as you will need a speed boosting item (mushrooms or takeout food) to get through some of those secret paths around the courses.

  4. Turn that smart steering off! It’s on by default, but you won’t want to keep it on for long, as it’ll prevent you from exploring the courses.

  5. Yes, take the time to explore Free Roam for unlockables. Some of the stickers can only be unlocked via Free Roam, so if you want to catch them all, you’ll need to explore the whole map.

  6. Speaking of, you can open the map in Free Roam to both fast travel and have the game tell you how many costumes you’re missing.

  1. You can also hover over locations to see how many question mark tiles you’re missing in that area!

  2. Those P-Switch missions aren’t just easy-peasy “drive through rings.” Some of them are tough and working on them will help improve your skills when it comes from jumping from obstacle to obstacle and aiming.

  3. Don’t forget that you can rewind! Rewind your position by pressing Down on the d-pad if you made a mistake, though know that if you do this in a race, the people will continue passing you by. This is super useful for grabbing those collectables you just miss in Free Roam.

  4. Remember there are other game modes! While Knockout Mode and Free Roam are heavily featured, you can play traditional three-lap races if you choose the VS Mode.

Did you just get a Nintendo Switch 2? Are you trying to unlock every character and outfit in Mario Kart World? Or maybe you’re trying out The Legend of Zelda: The Wind Waker for the first time and you need a walkthrough for those pesky stoplights in the Forsaken Fortress? Either way, we have your back when it comes to helping you sort stuff out.

We have guides explaining how to set up your console (moving data from your original Switch to your Switch 2) as well as guides for things like getting external storage sorted out.


From Polygon via this RSS feed

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When Duolingo launched in 2012, the language-learning app became the poster child of gamification. The app is shameless and magnificent in its efforts to get users hooked on lessons with streaks, leaderboards, and timed challenges.

Many users — including me and my 1300-plus day streak — fell for Duolingo’s cartoon mascots and bizarre social media posts. The company has never been afraid to be belligerent in tone; Duo the owl is cute, but Duolingo has adopted a successful strategy of not coddling its users. The app regularly sends me push notifications from my own boyfriend begging me not to let us “break up” (our friend streak). Look, it doesn’t not work.

But this spring, Duolingo had a huge messaging misfire over AI adoption, and brought a lot more users close to ending things.

In April, Duolingo CEO Luis von Ahn announced to employees that Duolingo would be going all-in on AI. The company would look for AI expertise in future hires, and AI usage would be evaluated in employee performance reviews. It would also move to replace contract workers with AI where possible. It was this statement that stuck in the craw of many users, and honestly surprised me when I read it. I’m cynically certain that plenty of companies would love to replace expensive human workers with machines. Admitting it is another thing.

The memo was a called shot: Duolingo’s leadership sees AI as a paradigm shift, similar to the adoption of mobile phones in the 2010s. At the time, common wisdom would have dictated that a language-learning program should prioritize widely adopted platforms like PCs. Instead, the company went “mobile-first.” That bet certainly paid off. Duolingo saw 103 million users a month in 2024. Now, it wants to go “AI-first.”

It’s too soon to tell what the long-term effects of the decision will be. But in the short term, fallout has been loud and angry across social media. Longtime users are deleting the app, destroying 1000+ day streaks. The announcement has been painted as a failure in multiple publications. The Duolingo subreddit melted down so thoroughly that mods placed a moratorium on posts about AI.

Meanwhile, Duolingo stock prices have soared to over $500 (as of June 2, 2025), indicating that whatever users may feel about AI, the big boys who shovel money around think it’s here to stay.

Von Ahn later made a second statement, not walking back the “AI-first” shift, but couching it in gentler language.

“I do not see AI as replacing what our employees do,” he wrote. “I see it as a tool to accelerate what we do, at the same or better level of quality. And the sooner we learn how to use it, and use it responsibly, the better off we will be in the long run.”

Duolingo isn’t the only company doing this. Across the tech industry, workers are being evaluated on their AI usage, encouraged to experiment with AI tools in the service of supposed future productivity, and asked to train their own replacements.

It’s not being framed this way. Rather, executives are speaking about their AI initiatives like Luis von Ahn did: as tools to help people, rather than replace them.

Duolingo’s AI shift has been brewing for years

Of course, Duolingo has been inching towards “AI-first” for years. In 2023, it used OpenAI’s GPT-4 to create AI features that are only available in Duolingo Max, the highest subscription tier on the app.

One of these is “Explain My Answer,” which ostensibly tells users why their response to an exercise is wrong. In general, Duolingo will give you the correct answer if you get something wrong, but it won’t explain why you were wrong. When it comes to typos or misspellings, the error can be obvious. But it doesn’t help users if they’re fundamentally misunderstanding, say, a grammatical concept.

Previously, Duolingo hosted a forum where users could see explanations from other users and native speakers directly in the app. This was removed in 2022.

Now, the Duolingo subreddit is awash with users looking for answers to their questions. And many of them are blaming AI for their confusion. It’s is the scapegoat for nonsensical conversations, translation errors, and just plain awkward exercises.

Without confirmation from Duolingo, it’s impossible to say which of these issues is actually caused by Duolingo’s implementation of AI. In some cases, users are genuinely encountering software bugs rather than AI-created lessons.

But elsewhere, AI has genuinely changed Duolingo’s lessons for the worse. In Aftermath, Riley MacCleod writes that the Irish course he was pursuing has been ruined by AI voices that don’t pronounce Irish words correctly — a dire situation for a language that is literally endangered.

I spoke to Callie R., a former Duolingo user who is learning Japanese. They noticed that there was a mismatch between how words were pronounced by the robotic voiceover in word banks, versus how those same words were pronounced in exercises.

“This is just an aspect of how Japanese is written, that it isn’t possible in general to tell how a kanji is supposed to be pronounced when you see it in isolation,” Callie said. “It makes sense that an automated content generation process would make this kind of mistake, but a human team actively developing the course with learning outcomes in mind would not do this.”

They also pointed to observations from other users that Duolingo’s robotic voice isn’t capable of correctly speaking a Japanese pitch-accent, a crucial aspect of the language, and one that a native English speaker can’t easily pick up on.

“It wasn’t worth literally learning the language wrong on purpose,” they said.

After two years, Callie R. deleted the app and nuked their 700+ day streak.

AI should be good at this

The thing is, language learning is a field where AI large language models can actually be useful. These LLMs aren’t reliable truth-tellers, but they can be functional conversation partners.

Duolingo has long been criticized for not effectively teaching users how to speak — the app naturally focuses more on reading and listening, and the “speaking” lessons are more about pronunciation than they are about actively recalling words from memory. The latter is critical for genuine fluency in another language.

Duolingo is trying to address that flaw with two more Max-exclusive AI features that let users have conversations with Duolingo’s cartoon mascots. The most impactful of these is Video Call, where users can have a brief “phone call” with Lily, Duolingo’s resident depressed goth girl.

I had some conversations with Lily during a Duolingo Max free trial earlier this year. In each, she would ask me a question, repeat back to me what she had understood from my response, and then ask a simple follow-up. We talked about things like what animals or fruits I liked, or how my vacation was going. It forced me to recall Italian vocabulary on the fly, without a word bank to help me out.

A screenshot of the Duolingo Video Call feature, with Lily the purple-loving emo teen.

This is an area where LLMs excel: generating human language based on speech patterns.

Unfortunately, LLMs fail in exactly the areas Duolingo is trying to disrupt. In his Blood in the Machine newsletter, journalist Brian Merchant spoke with a former Duolingo employee whose job had gone from writing lessons, to training AI how to write lessons, to non-existent.

“We had been working with their AI tool for a while, and it was absolutely not at the point of being capable of writing lessons without humans,” this employee told Merchant.

For Duolingo’s leadership, the flaws in the system are the cost of what they see as the cutting edge. Duolingo’s lessons are not supposed to be good.

“We can’t wait until the technology is 100% perfect,” von Ahn wrote in his email to Duolingo employees. “We’d rather move with urgency and take occasional small hits on quality than move slowly and miss the moment.”

The users who remain tapped into these conversations are suffering no small amount of confusion. A recent study showed that admitting to AI usage can cause people to trust you less. This is the situation that seems to be playing out on the Duolingo subreddit, where users are in a constant battle to figure out what is AI and what isn’t.

Some are deleting the app like Callie R. did. But there is a bubbling fear that a silent majority may simply not care or even be aware of any of these issues. The Duolingo subreddit has over 508,000 members — that’s less than 5% of Duolingo’s reported 116 million monthly users. And the subreddit itself isn’t entirely anti-AI. Plenty of users accept it, or simply don’t think there’s any point in fighting the tide.

Duolingo’s AI policy calls the app’s mission into question

My own Duolingo usage has always been predicated on one assumption: it won’t hurt your language-learning. Plenty of ink has been spilled over the fact that Duolingo most likely can’t make you fluent in another language. Sure, I’ve always reasoned, I know that. But doing a 5-minute Italian exercise every day when I’m too lazy or cheap or unmotivated to seek out a tutor is better than nothing. I am still learning, even if I’m not exactly leaping and bounding towards fluency.

But the influx of AI content puts this justification at risk. After all, language students don’t know what they don’t know.

“I don’t really care that it’s AI as long as there’s oversight and someone willing to pull the plug if it’s not producing real Japanese,” Callie R. said. Instead of pulling the plug, the people in charge at Duolingo are actively enabling users to learn bad Japanese, in the hopes that someday the AI will teach good Japanese instead.

There’s no obvious road map is to get there. LLMs can be taught to speak a language — it’s not clear that they can be taught to teach.

Duo the owl surrounded by people at Duolingo’s IPO launch in Times Square.

Duolingo is facing a problem of scale: it wants to offer lots of language courses, and creating those courses takes time and money. It has turned to AI to fill the desperate gaps where humans might be right, but can never be fast enough.

What makes Duolingo’s AI creep even more nefarious is that it’s most likely to affect languages with smaller userbases — like Irish or Navajo, both endangered languages. The vast majority of the app’s users are studying English, French, or Spanish. These are the courses that see a real investment of resources.

Duolingo gets great press for creating lessons that purport to familiarize users with Navajo. But what will happen if AI is used to “scale up” the Navajo program, with seemingly few human guardrails to ensure that the exercises are correct?

“Without AI, it would take us decades to scale our content to more learners,” von Ahn wrote in his first statement. “We owe it to our learners to get them this content ASAP.”

My question is… why? Why do we need more content for users immediately, when that content might be wrong or of low quality? It’s here that Duolingo’s mission of making language accessible crashes headlong into its role as a publicly traded company. Lessons need to scale so that users stay on the app, so that the app can make money.

Actually learning a language — or even simply treading water in one — doesn’t have a part to play.


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If you have ever asked yourself why there is a “3” in the title of one of the most popular video games in recent years, Baldur’s Gate 3, this is your chance to find out. The predecessors to Larian’s 2023 Game of the Year have landed on the Xbox Game Pass, and whether you have played the Nine Hells out of BG3 or not, you should absolutely check out these two RPG masterpieces from a bygone era.

At first glance, you may struggle to connect Baldur’s Gate 1 and Baldur’s Gate 2 with the most recent iteration of the franchise. After all, the first game came out in 1998, which, I’m sorry to remind those who were alive at the time, was 27 years ago. Baldur’s Gate 2 followed in 2000, making it a nice quarter of the century since one of the most popular sagas in RPG history ended, apparently for good. But all things come to those who wait, so sayeth the wise Alaundo. (Probably… he said a lot of things.)

BioWare, the developer you may know from Mass Effect and Dragon Age, had its first real hit with Baldur’s Gate, before moving on to author the Neverwinter Nights series, still set in the world of the Forgotten Realms but which used a different graphics engine — now fully 3D — and the most recent, at the time, set of rules for Dungeons & Dragons, the 3rd edition. It was truly a new age, one made of polygonal models and an ascending Armor Class system (more on that later), but somehow, the Baldur’s Gate games remained unparalleled in the hearts and minds of fans.

Was it just the nostalgia pull of a time when things seemed simpler and better? Maybe, but the games kept getting love and new players over the years, including a popular Enhanced Edition series published by Beamdog, which made them accessible to a whole new generation of players. They were so popular, in fact, that Larian pitched to Wizards of the Coast a sequel in 2014, while they were still working on Divinity: Original Sin 2. The reason is simple: the first two Baldur’s Gate games aren’t just popular, they’re actually really good.

Why you should play Baldur’s Gate 1 and 2 on Game Pass

To modern players, these games will surely look far from today’s graphical standards. BioWare’s Infinity Engine was a 2D tool for games with an isometric perspective that created the illusion of 3D, far from BG3’s minutely rendered environments. The biggest obstacle, however, will probably be the gameplay. Apologies, fans of BG3, but you got it easy. The first two games were based on the rules for Dungeons & Dragons 2nd edition, just as Baldur’s Gate 3 uses a version of the 5th edition rules. D&D’s 2nd edition, however, was notorious for being overcomplicated. Just figuring out if your Fighter is going to hit with his sword requires complex math, and a familiarity with the THAC0 system.

The class system is also a lot more rigid. Forget about the free mix-and-mash that BG3 allows (and don’t even think about respecs). To begin with, only certain races are allowed to multiclass, and you have to progress both classes evenly, taking a big XP hit. Also, contrary to modern-day rules, class limitations apply to multiclass too. For example, your Druid may be allowed to wear heavy armor if you multiclass with Fighter, but you will lose the latter’s ability to use any weapon or to specialize in them.

The biggest difference, however, is the combat system. Baldur’s Gate 1 and 2 are not turn-based. They use a pausable real-time gameplay, meaning you can forget about Larian’s trademark tactics-heavy turn-based battles, planning every inch of movement or action for all your party. In BG1 and 2, every action, from attacks to spellcasting, requires a certain amount of in-game time, and that’s it. You can pause at any time to think or give instructions to your party, of course, but the feeling is very different: like in a real fight, anything can go wrong, and quickly.

Why should you play these games with antiquated graphics and complex rules, you might ask? For the same reasons why so many people love playing Baldur’s Gate 3: a rich, intriguing world, a compelling story, and an unforgettable cast of characters, each with their motivations and personal paths to follow, enhanced by a top-notch cast of voice actors. If you love Astarion, Edwin will drive you nuts. If you have a savior complex for Shadowheart, then you will reload as many times as it takes to get the Viconia romance right (yes, you can romance Shadowheart’s teacher in BG 2).

To me, despite hours and hours of potential gameplay, Baldur’s Gate 3’s story felt rushed at times. Some paths to take or dialogue choices were either forced or cliché, and some of the characters felt a little one-dimensional to me. There is no risk of this happening with BG1 and 2. The path of the Bhaalspawn, from humble beginnings running chores in Candlekeep to battling divine beings in the Throne of Bhaal expansion, ultimately boils down to one question: Are we just the pawns of destiny, pulled inevitably by our nature, or is free will what defines us?

To be fair, the gameplay is also pretty good, once you get over the initial barrier. Parsing through the ancient wikis and walkthroughs to understand some mechanics or find the best builds is a beautiful exercise in internet archeology that also rewards the effort. Oh, also, spells go up to level 9 in Baldur’s Gate 2 (BG3’s level cap means you can only get to 5), so you can literally stop time. While the turn-based system may be more tactical, the absurd number of spells in BG1 and BG2, along with the crazy effects some of them have, make battles very complex and entertaining.

Baldur’s Gate 1 and 2 aren’t for everyone. But if you have Xbox Game Pass, you should definitely give them a chance. These games are so well-made, their worlds so detailed and complex, that people still have fun playing (or re-playing from the 20th time, in my case) them, and occasionally finding out new things too. If you played Baldur’s Gate 3, these games will give you the familiar feeling of a character-driven story where the choices you make impact your companions and the world around you.


From Polygon via this RSS feed

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Two racers from Mario Kart World in karts on a dirt path

There are a few ways you can play with friends in Mario Kart World for the Nintendo Switch 2, but the main thing you may be asking is “Can I play Free Roam mode with my friends?” The answer to that is a little complex, but we get into it below.

Below we explain how Mario Kart World multiplayer works based on our experiences.

Is there multiplayer Free Roam in Mario Kart World?

Kind of? Once you lobby up with your friends online, you’ll be placed in a simplified Free Roam lobby, effectively. In this Free Roam lobby, you can still find golden tiles and Peach coins, but you cannot complete P-Switch challenges. So it is kind of multiplayer Free Roam with some restrictions, but it’s not an actual choice on the menu.

There is also no actual local multiplayer Free Roam, but if you make an online lobby, you can activate the pseudo-Free Roam mode mentioned above with a second local player.

The only reason why I’m using the phrase “pseudo” is because if you are playing with a second local player, you can’t actually freely roam too much. Once you and your local friend get too far away from each other, the game will relocate you back together, so you have to stay somewhat close to your second player. You can still play together, but there’s definitely a proximity limit.

You also cannot take screenshots when you have a local second player in the online Free Roam lobby with you.

How local multiplayer works in Mario Kart World

Using local split screen, you can play any of the single-player game modes with your friends, except Free Roam. This means you can take part in any Grand Prix cup, play Knockout Tour mode, race in regular VS Races, and knock heads in Battles.

All of these modes have the same functionality as the single-player versions, so there’s nothing too special or fancy here. This is just the run-of-the-mill co-op that you probably did with your friends and siblings, after fighting about who gets to use the good controller.

How online multiplayer works in Mario Kart World

First and foremost, you will need a Nintendo Switch Online subscription to use these features.

You can also play online with one local buddy, if you want. (The screen will just split in half, as it would if you did two-player local multiplayer.)

From there, you can opt to do the usual modes, just against random players online: regular races, a Knockout Tour, or Battles. Once you select the respective game mode, it’ll thrust you into a pseudo-Free Roam lobby while folks load in. Each of these modes also gives you a player score, which will go up as you win and down as you lose. As you race, you’ll be matched with people of similar score to you to try to keep things balanced.

You can also opt to play with friends from your Nintendo Switch friends list as well by selecting that option from the menu. One friend will need to make a lobby that others can then join.

The friend should appear on the page at the top, allowing you to join them by just selecting their tag, but if that doesn’t show up, you can join via the Room ID. You can get your room ID by pressing the Plus button and selecting “View Room Info,” which will put a code on your screen that your buds can input to join.

From here, you’ll again be placed into a pseudo-Free Roam with your buddies in the lobby.

Did you just get a Nintendo Switch 2? Are you trying to unlock every character and outfit in Mario Kart World? Or maybe you’re trying out The Legend of Zelda: The Wind Waker for the first time and you need a walkthrough for those pesky stoplights in the Forsaken Fortress? Either way, we have your back when it comes to helping you sort stuff out.

We have guides explaining how to set up your console (moving data from your original Switch to your Switch 2) as well as guides for things like getting external storage sorted out.


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