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By now it’s almost become rote to say that Finnish developer Remedy is a specialist in narrative-focused games. After all, the studio is best known for Alan Wake, Max Payne, and Quantum Break, games where narrative was squarely at the forefront (even down to the episodic nature of its most recent title). So it was somewhat of a surprise during this year’s E3 when Remedy revealed Control as its next big game. While seemingly still embracing some of the time and environmental manipulation mechanics of its previous titles, Control is apparently moving away from the strong linear narratives Remedy is best known for to instead be a more open-ended, free-flowing story experience.

That’s not to say, however, that Control won’t have a cohesive story. Rather, as Remedy creative director Sam Lake told us during a recent interview, the story won’t be told in a strictly linear way, with players interacting with the plot depending on how (and where) they move through the game’s strange environments. Control is also eschewing a simple, easily digestible narrative, according to Lake. Rather, this sci-fi story is aiming to emulate the uncertainty and doubt of films like Annihilation and shows like Legion. In the below interview, Lake talks to GameSpot about what experience Remedy wants players to come away with while playing Control, what the main influences for the game were, and Alan Wake’s move to the small screen in the form of a brand-new TV show.

In previous interviews you’ve used the genre term “new weird” to describe what you’re doing with Control. Can you tell us more about that?

If we look at many science fiction and fantasy things, they give you a relatively safe world where there is an answer and there is a chosen one and it’s simplified. But new weird, even though it uses the same elements, approaches them more from real-world perspective where maybe there is no answer. Maybe there is a mystery. Maybe we are dealing with unexplainable forces that go beyond current human understanding. Maybe there is a theory for what this is. Maybe there is a competing theory. Maybe they both make sense. There can be answers, I think. But you still need to make up your own mind and do your own interpretation and piece these things together.

One inspiration for us going into this was Jeff Vandermeer’s Annihilation, and the book especially. The movie came out and it’s definitely cool as well. Other sources of inspiration for me for maybe this fragmented, hallucinatory, trippy storytelling world are Legion as a show, and Mr. Robot in some ways. Mr. Robot especially does interesting things with the voice of narration. And always for me, Twin Peaks.

How big a risk do you think it is for you guys to try to break away from the stuff you’ve done before and experiment in this more free form, different approaches type of narrative?

It’s a challenge, certainly; but we always want to try out new things with every project. We also had the perspective that we’ve now done a couple of games that were very linear, structured episodically, and it feels like the right time to break away from that, to try creating a deeper world where the player can keep coming back to and find new things and keep on playing. So that was a starting point for me and Mikael Kasurinen, who is our game director. A challenge? Yes, but you need to have that. You need to keep it interesting.

Is Control the size or style of game that you see Remedy focusing on in future projects?

We definitely strive to learn from every project. And I feel that we are always taking a step back and looking critically at the idea of, what is a Remedy game? And what are the ingredients we feel are working really well for us? And what are maybe some things that we would put into a lesser role and come up with something new at the same time? There are definitely new elements here that we feel excited and positive about, and I can see them being elements in our future games as well. But it’s always also game-specific and project-specific. This is Control and this is the style for that. For something else, we’ll see.

That’s an interesting question that you just brought up. What is a Remedy game? We’ve talked a lot about the new things you’re trying in Control, but do you see any through lines from all your previous projects into this one?

They have all been, in some ways, the model of a hero’s journey. Which I like a lot and I think it works, especially well in this loose framework for an action game. It’s a very strange, weird dream-like hero’s journey, but it’s one nonetheless. [There’s also the] idea of a family in some ways, and a family that has been broken. We have those ideas and themes in Control as well.

Are there any nods to your previous games in this? Is there a chance of having a fully-connected Remedy games universe at all?

Well, if you are familiar with our games, there always are nods [to other games], such as Easter eggs or other things. To me, that’s always been a natural way somehow to approach this, and it doesn’t go any further than that. I think that’s part of the mystery to be discovered in this game.

Recently there was news about an Alan Wake television show moving forward. What’s your involvement with that?

Alan Wake is important to us, and important to me, so we want to be involved because it didn’t make any sense to just sell the rights and see it go. It just felt like there are interesting ideas that we could pursue of how to have a dialogue between the game and the show. And it also feels like, through the years, there is so much Alan Wake lore that’s up here that is really good potential material for the show. So yeah, definitely we’ll be involved. I guess the official role is executive producer, which is a very kind of crude, loose term but yeah, Peter Calloway, who is the showrunner, we have a dialogue going on. And we are sitting down together and brainstorming on this.

Are you interested in telling the story of the game again or do you want to start from a different path?

Yes and no. It doesn’t make sense to me to tack them to a show just because they were part of the game. I think that we want the show and we want certain core ideas but first and foremost, it needs to be a great show. But also at the same time, I think it will give us opportunities where we had certain ideas in the game that we didn’t have an opportunity to really explore or go deep into. And I’m looking forward to the idea that in the show, we can actually expand and go a lot deeper into certain things that were important, or I felt were important, but we couldn’t really do a lot with them.

Will this get us to an Alan Wake sequel?

Yeah, I hope so. I would love to do more Alan Wake, but yeah, nothing to tell you about that.

Crunchyroll has announced that Funimation has decided to break off the two anime streaming services’ partnership. Both Crunchyroll and Funimation have been partnered for the past two years, but the two will officially split on November 9.

While partnered, the websites have been working together to simulcast certain anime in both Japanese and English, so that viewers can choose to watch popular series–like My Hero Academia and Attack on Titan–in either language on the same day. Prior to the partnership, most anime released in Japanese with English subtitles first, and anyone who wanted to watch the series in English would have to wait weeks for it to be dubbed.

Crunchyroll has confirmed that all currently-airing “simulcasts and series that premiered during the partnership will continue to be available on Crunchyroll” and “all home video releases will be released as scheduled and all pre-orders will be fulfilled.” However, after November 9, Funimation will no longer be offered as a part of the VRV bundle–a service which allows you to subscribe to dozens of animation streaming services such as Crunchyroll, Rooster Teeth, and Machinima.com for a discounted price. Also, certain series will be dropped from Crunchyoll and Funimation.

Although an official partnership with Crunchyroll hasn’t been announced, Hidive is joining the VRV family. Smaller than both Crunchyroll and Funimation, Hidive has made a name for itself by streaming some of the best anime exclusives from the past two years–and the website shares series in both Japanese and English. 2017’s Princess Principal and Land of the Lustrous are especially memorable, and the currently airing Bloom Into You is one of the most gorgeous anime series we’ve ever seen. The streaming service is owned by Sentai Filmworks so it also shares anime licensed by the company, like the critically acclaimed zombie ecchi Highschool of the Dead and award-winning Made in Abyss.

Although we reached out, Crunchyroll declined to comment on whether Hidive’s induction into VRV would mean the two websites would start sharing their exclusives. Crunchyroll also declined to comment on whether Hidive would start dubbing some of Crunchyroll’s shows. However, the streaming service did tease that more announcements will be shared prior to the end of 2018.

If you’re looking for anime to watch on Crunchyroll, Funimation, and Hidive, check out our Fall 2018 anime watch guide. It includes every anime debuting on the three websites, as well as Netflix and Amazon, and lists the seven series that you should add to your queue.

Microsoft has announced four Xbox One backwards compatible games have been X-enhanced. This means that these Xbox 360 titles run at a higher resolution and nine times the original pixel count on an Xbox One X.

All four games–Portal: Still Alive, Half-Life 2: The Orange Box, Left 4 Dead, and Left 4 Dead 2–are developed by Valve. When all is said and done, it’s technically five games, as Half Life 2: The Orange Box is a combined collection of Half-Life 2, Portal: Still Alive, and Team Fortress 2. You can buy the games digitally from the Xbox Store or use the original Xbox 360 discs. The addition of these four games brings the number of Xbox One backwards compatible X-enhanced titles to 21, a list that also includes games like Red Dead Redemption and Skate 3.

First releasing in 2007–as part of Valve’s The Orange Box bundle–Portal: Still Alive is a 3D puzzle platformer that focuses on a battle of wits between the silent protagonist Chell and the psychopathic A.I. antagonist GLaDOS. Half-Life 2 and Team Fortress 2 have had long-standing effects on the video game industry, such as the former playing a huge part in the success of Steam’s launch and the latter inspiring titles like Overwatch. The Left 4 Dead series temporarily revitalized interest in zombie video games with campaigns centered around teamwork-based first-person shooter combat and a multiplayer horde mode.

All of these games have received near perfect scores on GameSpot for their impressive gameplay and well written stories. In our Portal: Still Alive review, we gave the game a 9/10. In our Half-Life 2 review, we gave the game a 9.2/10. In our Team Fortress 2 review, we gave the game an 8/10. In our reviews for Left 4 Dead and Left 4 Dead 2, we gave the former an 8.5/10 and the latter a 9/10.

In Update 2.0.4, the most recent patch for Destiny 2, data miners discovered evidence that Thunderlord, an Exotic machine gun from the original Destiny, could be returning. Not only that, but players might be adventuring to the Cosmodrome, the opening area of the first game, to earn the weapon.

According to Polygon, the data miners have discovered Feeding Frenzy, one of Thunderlord’s original perks, in Destiny 2’s database. The perk isn’t currently attached to any weapon in the game, which matches up with an earlier pattern established by Destiny 2’s Whisper of the Worm, an Exotic sniper rifle. Whisper of the Worm is a renamed variation of Destiny’s Black Spindle, a gun with an original perk called White Nail. The White Nail perk appeared in the data of Destiny 2’s Warmind expansion prior to Whisper of the Worm being added to the game.

The data miners also found audio files that suggest a future Destiny 2 update might send players back to the Cosmodrome, further hinting Thunderlord is on its way to Destiny 2. Thunderlord is the first Destiny Exotic weapon ever revealed to the world, shown off during Destiny’s E3 2013 gameplay reveal demo. When Destiny launched, the mission was tweaked so that players wouldn’t earn such a powerful weapon right at the game’s start. However, these data mine leaks could be hinting that Destiny 2 will allow us to replay that mission as it happened back in 2013, and we’ll earn Thunderlord just like the Guardians did in that first demo.

Bungie has not revealed whether or not any of this is true, although some players believe that if the Cosmodrome mission and Thunderlord weapon are coming to Destiny 2, it will be a part of the Festival of the Lost, a limited-time Halloween-themed event currently going on right now. As part of the event, on October 30, you’ll have access to a new quest line where you can track down Master Ives’ killers. Bungie has remained rather coy on what these quests are, simply stating in a blog post that there will be “powerful” rewards.

Destiny 2 is available on Xbox One, PS4, and PC. Festival of the Lost continues until November 6 at 10 AM PST / 1 PM EST / 6 PM BST.

Square Enix has announced that you’ll be able to replay The Quiet Man–a game about a protagonist who’s deaf–on a second playthrough with sound. The choice to do so is optional, according to Gematsu, but Square Enix’s decision to add the feature is slightly puzzling, as it appears to undermine the whole point of the game.

On The Quiet Man’s Steam page, Square Enix writes you “play as a deaf character, Dane, and experience the world as the character does–with very little distinct audio and no subtitles: it’s up to you to make up your own interpretation of the story as your search for the masked man unfolds.” The developer also adds that one of the game’s key features is its soundless world. Experiencing what it’s like for someone who’s deaf to interact with the world seems to be the selling point of The Quiet Man, so it’s a little odd that there’s an option to replay the game with sound.

The Quiet Man made waves at E3 2018 with a reveal trailer that blended together live action cutscenes and animated gameplay. Despite the excitement, Square Enix didn’t announce any further details about the game until early October, when a gameplay trailer revealed The Quiet Man’s release date was a month away.

The gameplay trailer showcases Dane moving through a noiseless Manhattan, using his quick reaction time to respond to threats. Dane appears to have above-average strength, easily flipping around and delivering devastating beat downs on the enemies he encounters. The trailer also reveals the hooded man who serves as the game’s primary antagonist. This mysterious villain kidnaps a songstress that Dane seems smitten with and desperately wants to save.

The Quiet Man launches on November 1 for PS4 and PC, and will release as a digital-only title. Square Enix advertised the game as an “immersive story-driven cinematic action experience” that can be completed in one sitting.

EA has announced that four of the voice actors from Star Wars: The Clone Wars animated series will be reprising their roles in Battlefront 2. Each of the four Hero characters will be rolling out separately over the next several months, starting this October.

In a blog post on Battlefront 2’s website, EA DICE editorial writer Daniel Steinholtz revealed Matthew Wood, James Arnold Taylor, Corey Burton, and Matt Lanter will return to voice General Grievous, Obi-Wan Kenobi, Count Dooku, and Anakin Skywalker respectfully. Grievous comes to Battlefront 2 on October 30, while the remaining three Hero characters don’t have exact release dates. As of right now, Obi-Wan is scheduled for November 2018, Dooku for January 2019, and Anakin for February 2019.

EA recently revealed its process for how new Star Wars Hero characters are chosen for Battlefront 2. For the developer, every “hero must counter a villain, and vice versa” so after deciding to add Obi-Wan and Anakin to the game, Grievous and Dooku–villains that share a “natural rivalry” with the two Jedi–were also chosen.

Grievous, Obi-Wan, Dooku, and Anakin are part of a Clone Wars DLC road map scheduled for Battlefront 2. The updates started in August, first focusing on adding a wider variety of cosmetic appearances for the Republic Army, such as Yoda’s 41st Elite Corps and Windu’s 91st Mobile Reconnaissance Corps. A Prequel Era playlist was also added to the game, which limits multiplayer matches to Galactic Assault on Clone Wars era maps. More multiplayer locations, like Geonosis, are scheduled for future updates.

Star Wars: Battlefront 2 is available on Xbox One, PS4, and PC. The Clone Wars animated series, once believed to be cancelled for good, is returning with a seventh season that sees Anakin and Obi-Wan once again teaming up with Ahsoka Tano to aid in the Siege of Mandalore.

The annual Haunted Hallows has returned to Rocket League. This limited-time Halloween-themed event adds a new currency to Psyonix’s game that allows you to buy special cosmetic items for your battle cars.

During Haunted Hallows, playing in and completing online matches allows you to earn Candy Corn currency. Candy Corn can be redeemed for Halloween-themed battle car decals, toppers, wheels, and other cosmetic items. One of the limited items, called a Golden Pumpkin, unlocks one random battle car customization from the Nitro, Turbo, or Player’s Choice crates.

Haunted Hallows continues until November 5 at 2:00 PM PST / 5:00 PM EST / 10:00 PM BST. Even if you can no longer earn Candy Corn once the event ends, you’ll still be able to spend any leftovers you might have for a limited time. You’ll have until November 8 at 2:00 PM PST / 5:00 PM EST / 10:00 PM BST to spend your leftover Candy Corn before they’re gone for good.

We think Rocket League is superb. In our Rocket League review, Miguel Concepcion gave the game a 9/10, writing, “The joy of Rocket League rests on the countless plans that are conceived and discarded every other second in any given match. Trying to predict where and how the ball will bounce next is a game within the game. Despite the use of cars, Rocket League emulates the emotional surges typical of The Beautiful Game, such as the rush of an unexpected fast break or a well-timed header into a goal. With Rocket League, the promising concept of combining two wonderful things–cars and soccer–is equally magnificent in execution.”

Rocket League is available on Xbox One, PS4, PC, and Nintendo Switch. The game supports cross-play between Xbox One, PC, and Switch.

With the Witcher trilogy, developer CD Projekt Red established that it’s capable of making compelling role-playing games with tough decisions, hearty combat, and engrossing lore. In Thronebreaker: The Witcher Tales, all but one of these aspects has persisted. This prequel is as captivating narratively as some of the Witcher series’ best tales, filled with gut-wrenching decisions that have far-reaching consequences. The only difference is that instead of fighting with a sword, you battle with cards. Thronebreaker is an intelligent spin on the collectible card game Gwent and manages to transform its simple premise into an enthralling tale of family, loyalty, and hardship.

You play as Queen Meve, ruler of the lands known as Lyria and Rivia, on the eve of the great Nilfgaardian invasion. These ruthless imperials sweep across the land like a plague, decimating villages and their citizens and using underhanded tactics to wrestle control of kingdoms away from their rulers. Meve and her forces, returning home after another lengthy war, get caught in the middle of the invasion. With traitors around every corner and spies lurking in the shadows, you’ll have to make difficult decisions about who to let into your party and who to cut ties with permanently as you rally together a guerrilla army to snuff out the Nilfgaardian invasion and rally support for a full-blown counterattack.

Thronebreaker’s tale involves an entirely new cast of characters (with some notable cameos here and there) which is fully voiced throughout the 25-hour campaign. The interplay between Queen Meve and her trusted subjects is notably strong, with exceptional writing bringing each character’s motivations and principles to life. Meve isn’t as blank a slate for you to project upon as Geralt is, but Thronebreaker gives you room to work in her decision-making. The choices you make are painted with the same grey brush that The Witcher is known for, with no one choice promising a better outcome than the rest. Leading a dwindling army into battles with impossible odds puts an incredible amount of responsibly on your shoulders, and choosing when to be empathetic and when to be ruthless has some fascinating repercussions–both immediately and far further into the story.

You command Meve through multiple large open areas, each bearing a distinctive visual aesthetic and characters to interact with. These areas look like pages ripped from a concept art book, with stunning watercolors and brush strokes bringing sun-kissed pastures and bubbling swamps to life with impressive detail. The cel-shading on Meve and supporting characters helps define them against the background while giving them all distinctive appearances, but it can be slightly jarring when brought into focus during serious conversations. Thronebreaker is a tour around some of The Witcher’s most engrossing landscapes, and it’s a treat to see them from a different view.

Each area plays host to the many story battles you’ll need to undertake to progress, but also numerous side missions and collectible content. Side quests can be as simple as making decisions to solve petty quarrels or as involved as hunting down dragons in dark caverns at the request of terrified villagers. Each quest has a story to tell, which can either affect the mood of your troops, bestow you with important rewards such as gold and wood, or introduce new special characters into your ranks. Skipping them can have consequences too, with characters reacting to the people you help and the bounties you choose to take. It makes Thronebreaker’s world feel incredibly reactive to your choices, compelling you to take care with how you handle each of them.

You’ll also need to gather resources in the vein of gold, wood, and requisitioned troops to better establish your fighting force. Constructing new attachments for your base camp can help you grow your deck of Gwent cards with new characters and abilities, ranging from simple Lyrian forces to noble dwarves and stealthy elves. Thronebreaker doesn’t make you feel the need to scour each corner of the map for resources, instead giving you more than enough on the critical path alone. But seeing your small army grow with each passing area is rewarding, as are the effects it has on your abilities to fight with your chosen cards.

Thronebreaker interweaves Gwent into its story in smart ways that keep it from feeling like an intrusive method for resolving combat situations, helping you learn its intricate systems while engaging in unique quests and rulesets.

Units have a variety of abilities that can be triggered in a number of ways, many of which can be chained up with other units to create devastating combos during a single turn. Since Gwent isn’t just about dolling out damage and more about field control, striking a balance between cards that damage your opponent and ones more adept at raising your personal score is paramount. Thronebreaker’s shifting priorities in combat prevent the flurry of battles from wearing thin, with only a few resting on the basic rules of Gwent alone. Some standout fights had me chipping away at individual cards that made up the body of a dragon, with each piece having its own attributes that either damaged my cards or healed others. Thronebreaker contextualizes the rules of each of its encounters to fit the purpose of the story in clever ways. This makes playing Gwent consistently rewarding and helps avoid the potentially deflating transition from a rousing ride into battle to a simple game of cards on a table.

Playing Gwent in Thronebreaker can often feel like a reintroduction to the game with its new rules and stipulations, and that comes with the cost of some quests that feel too easy. On the default difficulty, most core quests won’t trouble you enough to make meaningful decisions about the composition of your deck, which saps some life out of the overarching metagame of having to use resources to acquire better cards. Optional puzzle encounters make up for this though, giving you a specific deck to work with in uniquely tailored challenges. These encounters are the best learning tools Thronebreaker has to offer, exposing you to complex card combinations as a requirement to win. Often these challenges lead to card unlocks for Gwent’s online component, so you’re encouraged to take them up as often as they present themselves.

Don’t be tricked into thinking Thronebreaker is simply a lengthy tutorial for what is to come when Gwent opens its multiplayer. Its tale is mandatory if you’re looking for more Witcher lore to chew on and manages to engage you with a strong cast of well-written characters and a suitably dark plot that challenges your morals every chance it can. Thronebreaker interweaves Gwent into its story in smart ways that keep it from feeling like an intrusive method for resolving combat situations, helping you learn its intricate systems while engaging in unique quests and rulesets. Gwent was a side attraction in The Witcher 3, but through Thronebreaker, it’s blossomed into something new that stands on its own as a proud member of the Witcher family.

Call of Duty’s Black Market, an in-game shop for cosmetic items, has returned in Black Ops 4, and there are already dozens of unlockables to earn. Many of these items are for Blackout, Black Ops 4’s battle royale mode, and you’ll earn them by simply playing the game.

In Black Market, the Contraband Stream tracks your progression towards each new item. The available items are swapped out for new ones with each seasonal change, which takes place approximately every two months. Operation First Strike, the first collection of items, is going on right now, and it includes new Blackout calling cards, emotes, signature weapons, Specialist skins, and tags.

The entire assortment of cosmetics included in Operation First Strike are listed in the following gallery. Click through to see everything you can earn.

The Black Market will also experience limited-time events, which offer opportunities for unlocking special cosmetic items. The first event starts on October 20 for PS4 and on October 27 for Xbox One and PC. It will allow you to earn Halloween-themed gear and skins. In November, the Black Market will update to support real-money purchases.

We think Black Ops 4 is great. In our Call of Duty: Black Ops 4 review, GameSpot reviews editor Kallie Plagge gave the game an 8/10, writing, “Black Ops 4 isn’t short on content, and its three main modes are substantial. Multiplayer introduces more tactical mechanics without forcing you into them, and it largely strikes a good balance. Zombies has multiple deep, secret-filled maps to explore, though its returning characters don’t hold up and prove distracting. Finally, Blackout pushes Call of Duty in an entirely new direction, making use of aspects from both multiplayer and Zombies for a take on the battle royale genre that stands on its own. Sure, there isn’t a traditional single-player campaign, but with the depth and breadth of what is there, Black Ops 4 doesn’t need it.”

Call of Duty: Black Ops 4 is available for Xbox One, PS4, and PC.