With the end-of-year rush on the horizon, we’re pausing to look back at the best games of 2019 so far. We’ve already covered the best games on each system — PS4, Xbox One, Switch, PC — but this list encompasses all platforms to provide a more complete look at this year’s top reviewed games. Below you’ll find all 35 games released in 2019 that received a review score of 8.5 or higher from IGN. Note that, despite their qualifying scores, expansions (e.g. Final Fantasy XIV: Shadowbringers) and ports (e.g. Cuphead and Unravel 2 on Switch) aren’t included. Remakes (e.g. Resident Evil 2) are, however, since they are effectively new games rather than remasters.
The Best Sky TV Deals and Packages Right Now
There are always great deals available to new and existing Sky customers. Whether you want to pick up a new Sky Q box with Sky Sports and Cinema, or you simply want to add something onto your existing package, we’ve got all the details.
New Sky customers will get the pick of the bunch, and the latest bundle deals usually offer the best prices. If you want to kick back and enjoy a movie, watch the new Premier League season, or simply explore everything Sky TV has to offer, there’s a deal for you.
Sky TV currently has a standard £22 per month package, that you can then add optional extras onto, such as Sky Cinema and Sky Sports. There are also other bundles that give you different benefits and discounts, which are updated regularly.
Dynasty Warriors Developer Koei Tecmo Teases New Game Reveal During PAX West
Koei Tecmo has teased a new game announcement for August 30, the same day PAX West opens its doors. The trailer doesn’t reveal any significant details, but all signs point to an enhanced version of 2018’s Warriors Orochi 4 being in development at Omega Force.
The sneak peek shows snippets of cutscenes from the most recent Warriors Orochi title, and Koei Tecmo is rather fond of re-releasing games in both the Warriors Orochi and Dynasty Warriors‘ series. A page on Amazon Japan that has since been removed lends further credence to these suspicions, with a listing for a PS4 version of Warriors Orochi 4 Ultimate appearing on the store. The product description mentioned a new story, new side scenarios, new game modes, and additional playable characters including Gaia and the return of earlier playable characters such as Joan of Arc, who was previously in Warriors Orochi 3.
We’ll know more on Friday when Koei Tecmo unveils its latest game.
Free Shiny Legendary Pokemon Announced For Ultra Sun And Moon
Pokemon Sword and Shield may be coming to Nintendo Switch in only a couple of months, but in the meantime, The Pokemon Company has one more freebie in store for 3DS players. This October, you’ll be able to get a free Shiny Legendary in either Pokemon Sun and Moon or Ultra Sun and Ultra Moon.
Beginning October 21, GameStop stores in the US will distribute a Shiny Solgaleo and Lunala for the 3DS Pokemon games. To claim the Legendaries, you’ll need to head to a participating location and use the Pokemon Pass mobile app to receive a download code–the same way you could acquire a Shiny Pikachu and Eevee code for the Let’s Go games earlier this year.
The Legendary you receive will be the opposite of which version you own, so if you’re playing Sun or Ultra Sun, you’ll receive a Shiny Lunala, while Moon and Ultra Moon players will get Shiny Solgaleo. Each Pokemon comes at level 60 and knows the following movesets:
Shiny Lunala
- Moongeist Beam
- Psyshock
- Moonblast
- Moonlight
Shiny Solgaleo
- Sunsteel Strike
- Zen Headbutt
- Noble Roar
- Morning Sun
Once you’ve received a download code for the Legendary, you’ll need to redeem it within the game using the Mystery Gift feature. Select Mystery Gift from the main menu, choose the option to receive a gift with a code/password, then input your code when prompted and the Legendary will be downloaded. You’ll then need to pick the Pokemon up from the deliveryman waiting inside any Pokemon Center.
The Shiny Solgaleo and Lunala distribution will run through November 10, just a few days before Sword and Shield launch on Switch. With the Gen 8 games on the horizon, this will presumably be the last distribution The Pokemon Company holds for Sun and Moon, so you don’t want to miss your chance to get the Shiny Legendaries.
There are still a couple of other freebies available for the Gen 7 games as well; you can download a pack of rare berries in the games until September 2, and Pokemon Bank subscribers can get a free Oranguru and Passimian until October 31. You can see all the free gifts still available for Ultra Sun and Ultra Moon in our roundup.
GreedFall: 13 Minutes of New Gameplay
GreedFall looks more and more intriguing every time we see it, and this latest video only makes that more true. Take a look at the 13-minute video above, featuring new gameplay (no spoilers!) from the upcoming fantasy RPG.
GreedFall is set in a fantastical 17th century, where colonialism is fueled by a need to cure a ravenous disease. It is being developed by Spiders, makers of Bound by Flame (here’s the IGN review).
GreedFall is due to be released on September 10.
Ryan McCaffrey is IGN’s Executive Editor of Previews. Follow him on Twitter at @DMC_Ryan, catch him on Unlocked, and drop-ship him Taylor Ham sandwiches from New Jersey whenever possible.
Netflix’s Altered Carbon: Every Actor & Character Confirmed for Season 2
Warning! Full SPOILERS for Altered Carbon Season 1 follow. For a refresher, be sure to check out our spoiler-free Season 1 review of Altered Carbon right here.
Premiering in 2020, Altered Carbon’s second season is adding some new faces to its imaginative cyberpunk world, as the story moves away from Earth to a planet called Harlan’s World.
Netflix recently announced the casting of Power’s Lela Loren, who will portray Danica Harlan, the current governor of Harlan’s World. In a press release, the streaming provider describes Lela as “charming and ambitious.” Loren will join Avengers: Endgame star Anthony Mackie, who replaced Joel Kinnaman as the new Takeshi Kovacs back in July 2018.
Telltale Games Is (Sort Of) Back From The Dead
Telltale Games, creators of the episodic The Walking Dead, Batman, and Game of Thrones games, shut down last year after a tumultuous timeline of events, but a company called LCG Entertainment is bringing the beloved studio’s name back from the dead. The new company plans to sell some of Telltale’s back-catalog and will work on new games based on Telltale-associated properties and new licences.
Jamie Ottilie and Brian Waddle are heading up the new Telltale. Ottilie has spent much of his career in mobile games and was previously the founder and CEO of Galaxy Pest Control, a studio known for its work on licenced games such as Duck Dynasty, Power Rangers Legends, and Hotel Transylvania 2. Waddle, meanwhile, ran sales and marketing for the Havok game engine at Intel and later Microsoft.
In an interview with Polygon, Ottilie said that some workers from the original Telltale Games will be offered freelance roles at the new Telltale, with full-time positions possible in the future–so this is very much Telltale in name only at this point. He also confirmed that the new company still has back-catalog rights to licenced properties like The Wolf Among Us and Batman, as well as full rights to original Telltale games such as Puzzle Agent.
Before Telltale closed its door last year, the company was working on a sequel to The Wolf Among Us, with an announcement in 2017 and a planned release window sometime in 2018. Obviously that never happened, but Ottilie says it’s possible the new Telltale will pick up some stories where they left off. “We’re still evaluating, but we definitely want to continue some of the stories,” he said. Whether The Wolf Among Us 2 is part of that equation remains to be seen, and it’s not likely to resemble the game the original team was working on. What we do know, however, is that The Walking Dead won’t be coming back. The licence is now owned by Skybound, the company that finished development on the last two episodes of The Walking Dead’s final season after Telltale shuttered.
Ottilie didn’t shed light on the status of other previous Telltale licences like Borderlands, Minecraft, and Guardians of the Galaxy, but he did say the rights for the Stranger Things game Telltale had announced have now gone back to Netflix.
Negotiations for Telltale’s rights began six months ago and were purchased from a company assigned by the creditors of the original Telltale. A purchase price has not been announced, but despite the “incredibly complex” negotiations, Ottilie proceeded with the deal because of his belief in the future of adventure games. “This is a viable business that went away due to market conditions and some scale choices [Telltale’s previous management] made,” he said. “I like games that tell stories and I think our industry should have a company that specializes in narrative-driven games.”
The new studio will be based in Malibu, California, with publisher Athlon Games handling storefront operations and distribution. A number of games industry figures are involved in financially backing the studio, too, including Lyle Hall (Heavy Iron Studios), Chris Kingsley (Rebellion), and Tobias Sjögren (formerly of Starbreeze).
“We’re going to stay small over the next six months and we will work for more of a distributed development pipeline than Telltale was known for,” Ottilie explained. “We’ll focus on tools, technology and design in-house. Some things like animation and motion capture will be done with the right partnerships externally.” Ottilie also wants to evolve Telltake’s episodic model. “We will probably keep the concept of episodes but with different pacing. This is a different world, from a media consumption standpoint. We need to look at how people like to entertain themselves. I like the idea of binge-watching.
“[Telltale] brought me some of my favorite stories to play and they did an amazing job building a company. It’s unfortunate the way that it ended. Certainly we’re working very hard not to make similar mistakes.”
Aladdin And The Lion King ’90s Classics Receive HD Remasters
Update: The earlier leak has now been confirmed, along with some new details, as distributor Nighthawk Interactive and developer Digital Eclipse have announced Disney Classic Games: Aladdin and The Lion King for PlayStation 4, Xbox One, Nintendo Switch, and PC, set to release sometime this fall for $29.99.
The remastered collection includes the Sega Genesis, Game Boy, and Super Game Boy versions of Virgin Games’ Aladdin, and the SNES version of The Lion King. As the leak suggested, players will be able to rewind any of the games and play them in 1080p with updated visual effects and enhancements. Aladdin also features new difficulty adjustments, camera refinements, bug fixes, and promises some additional surprises. The collection also adds the ability to save anywhere at any time.
You can watch the announce trailer below. In the meantime, the bundle is up for pre-order at Best Buy.
See Disney Classic Games bundle at Best Buy
The original story continues.
A leak from the latest GameStop conference has revealed that HD remasters of the ’90s Aladdin and The Lion King SNES and Sega Genesis/Mega Drive games could be on their way to PlayStation 4, Xbox One, and Nintendo Switch later this year.
The leak was first reported by Twitter user Wolverinefactor, who says the remasters will include the original soundtracks and contain both the SNES and Genesis versions of the games. A follow-up tweet says they’ll each be available to pre-order from GameStop “tomorrow morning”, so they might appear sometime today if this leak is correct.
Aladdin and Lion King game remakes hitting October – all systems – just announced at GameStop con @Wario64
— W (@wolverinefactor) August 27, 2019
Another source corroborated the information with Gematsu, reporting that both games will be playable in their original resolutions or in 1080p. There will also be new features that allow players to fast-forward and rewind to any point in the game, and they’ll even include the option to let the game take over to show players how to clear a stage. These sound like welcome additions after a childhood spent falling off the heads of giraffes.
GameXplain substantiated the leak even further by supplying an image that looks like it was taken from the event, showing physical copies of the game for all consoles with a fall release window.
There’s no sign of a PC version yet, though Disney did previously release Aladdin, The Lion King, and The Jungle Book on PC via GOG in 2016.
The products discussed here were independently chosen by our editors. GameSpot may get a share of the revenue if you buy anything featured on our site.
Disney Classic Games: Aladdin and The Lion King Is Up for Preorder
Disney Classic Games: Aladdin and The Lion King is set to release for PS4, Xbox One, Nintendo Switch, and PC on October 29. Made by Digital Eclipse, the company behind Mega Man Legacy Collection and Street Fighter 30th Anniversary Collection, it contains various versions of two games in the title.
It will have the SNES, Sega Genesis, and Game Boy versions of The Lion King, as well as the Genesis and Game Boy versions of Aladdin, among other tidbits. On top of that, it will also include things like quick saves, 15-second rewind, watch mode, display options, art gallery, and a music player with the full game soundtracks.
If you’re ready to secure a copy of this retro collection for yourself, you can do so right now at the following retailers.
Get an Adorable R2-D2 Sphero App-Enabled Droid for Its Lowest Price Ever
Sphero makes some pretty cool stuff, but among the coolest gizmos it produces are its line of Star Wars droids. These app-enabled droids are miniature versions of the droids we know and love from the Star Wars saga, controlled with a smartphone and capable of more than just a few directional tricks.
Lowest Price Ever on Sphero R2-D2
This R2-D2 can be ordered for $35.99 right now, even thought it’s out of stock. You’re basically just reserving one at this price, and Amazon will fulfill the order when they get more. I’ve bought a few items in this same situation and in my experience, the wait is never as long as Amazon estimates. This is the lowest price Amazon has ever offered on the Sphero app-enabled R2-D2, so it’s definitely worth the wait.


