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The Pokémon Company has revealed yet another new Mega 'mon arriving in the Pokémon Legends: Z-A Mega Dimension DLC, but more than that, it has revealed a whole new type of Mega Evolution. Mega Lucario Z is the latest Fighting- and Steel-type Mega Evolution to join the line-up, boasting a swanky blue and yellow look as well as some particularly fetching fringe work. This marks the debut appearance of Z Mega Evolution — a new take on the mechanic that sees Pokémon able to fire off their moves quicker, but also burn through their Mega Power at a faster rate. Pokémon that undergo a Z Mega Evolution might not be best suited for long battles, then, but they'll likely pose a good way for wrapping up fights with a decisive victory. Here's the official rundown of Mega Lucario Z and a handful of snaps from The Pokémon Company: Images: Nintendo Mega Lucario Z will arrive with the other new Megas in the Legends: Z-A DLC on 10th December. View full article

As a part of today's Mega Dimension DLC news, The Pokémon Company revealed Legends: Z-A's next Mystery Gift Code event, and it's not one to be missed. The event is live in-game right now. All that you need to do is head to the 'Mystery Gift' menu and select 'Receive via Internet' to get involved. Right off the bat, you'll be rewarded with special Mewtwonite X & Y Mega Stones, and you'll also unlock the new 'Project M' side mission, which sets you on the path to catch — you guessed it — Mewtwo! You need to have rolled credits to access the gift, but no end date has been revealed for the event at the time of writing, so you've got plenty of time to get there if you're still exploring Lumiose at your leisure. And yes, while the news was broken in today's Mega Dimension dump, the event is available for everyone with the base game. View full article

Counter-Strike may be a quarter of a century old, but it remains one of Valve's biggest money-spinners on Steam. Counter-Strike 2 – the latest iteration of the free-to-play team-based shooter – makes its money from chests, which cost around $2.50 to open. Incredibly, some of the skins found inside said chests can fetch over a million dollars online – so it's little wonder that, on average, players pay real-world money to open around 70,000,000 chests every month. That's over $175,000,000 of revenue coming in every 30 days – so you'd expect the person who created the game to be utterly minted, right? Wrong. Speaking to EDGE magazine, Counter-Strike creator Minh Le reveals that he effectively gave up what would become a billion-dollar money-making machine when he joined Valve back in 2000. In fact, when it came to selling up, Le readily admits he had no idea why Valve thought the game, which began life as a Half-Life mod, was worth anything: Le also reveals that he was happy to take any amount of cash at the time, as his own situation was somewhat precarious: Le has never revealed what Valve paid him for Counter-Strike, but admits that it wasn't enough cash to retire there and then. In fact, as part of the arrangement, he became a Valve employee, which was something he could only have dreamed about prior to Counter-Strike being made. In 2006, Le left Valve and has since worked on the likes of Rust and Black Desert Online. He's now working on a new tactical FPS of his own creation, Alpha Response, at Ultimo Ratio Games. While he's continuing to chart his own path in game development, Le admits there are things he wishes had gone differently. "I do have some regrets," he tells EDGE. "A lot of the people who I still keep in touch with at Valve, I kind of notice that they're really well off financially." View full article

A full Trophy list for Rune Factory: Guardians of Azuma has been uncovered, suggesting that the highly rated RPG is ready for release on PS5. Guardians of Azuma is the latest instalment in Marvelous' Rune Factory series, having launched for Switch 2, Switch, and PC back in June of this year. Funnily enough, the game was actually age rated for Sony's current-gen system before it had even released, leading many to believe that its Nintendo-focused exclusivity was timed. Of course, six months of that supposed exclusivity will be up this week — so we could be seeing an official announcement before the year is out. If you're wondering what kind of RPG Guardians of Azuma is, it's got a flashy action combat system built on top of town-building and farming elements. There's also a heavy focus on forging bonds with a colourful cast of characters. Again, it received very positive reviews from both critics and players, with our pals at Nintendo Life giving it an 'excellent' 9/10 in their Switch 2 review. Are you interested in playing Guardians of Azuma on PS5? Daydream about your ideal anime-styled spouse in the comments section below. View full article

Work on the movie adaptation of a smash hit co-op shooter Helldivers is now well underway. Justin Lin of Fast & Furious fame will direct the film, based on a script written by horror movie veteran Gary Dauberman. He’s best known for writing the screenplays for It and Annabelle. As you’d expect, the film will be released by Sony Pictures Entertainment, with PlayStation subsidiary PS Productions overseeing the project. Additional organisations involved will include Lin’s own Perfect Storm Entertainment. While we don’t know much about the plot itself, Starship Troopers will likely be a massive inspiration, as Helldivers is effectively a video game adaptation of the 90s hit. We’d expect a blend of comedy and action, although Dauberman’s involvement does potentially hint at some horror elements as well. Lin is not a gamer, and he apparently leaned into that with his pitch for the project. According to the Hollywood Reporter, his goal is to flesh out the overall fiction of the franchise and “find the humanity” in the characters. Of course, he already has an existing relationship with Sony, as he’s also been hired to direct the live action adaptation of anime One Punch Man. There’s no word on any casting decisions or a target release date just yet, but it sounds like this project is moving along pretty quickly, so don’t be surprised if we get a lot more news soon. View full article

There's newfound hope the Splinter Cell Remake will one day release, as the project's first game director has rejoined development on the title three years after his departure. David Grivel posted to his LinkedIn profile one week ago that he was "very happy to announce that I'm rejoining Ubisoft Toronto as Game Director on the Splinter Cell Remake! A very special team and project to me." Drivel served as game director on the Splinter Cell Remake project up until 2022, at which point he left to work on Battlefield 6 at EA. He then went back to Ubisoft Toronto to work on an unannounced game in May 2024, then left again late last year to join a developer named Worlds Untold, which was quickly shut down. Drivel now finds himself back on the Splinter Cell Remake three years later. Officially confirmed in December 2021, the remake of the first Splinter Cell title has not been seen outside of the most minor updates. The return of David Grivel may boost development efforts, however. View full article

The new upgrade for Red Dead Redemption is out today on all platforms, and while the game is now live and playable on Xbox Series X|S, the upgrade path from the old Xbox 360 version isn't working for lots of players - and there's some confusion as to why at the moment. When the team at Rockstar announced this new version of RDR last month, they said that "current owners on PS4, Nintendo Switch, or the digital backward compatible version on Xbox One will be able to upgrade digitally for free". However, right now, lots existing owners of Red Dead on 360/Xbox One are being asked to pay the team's introductory 50% off discount for the new version. To be clear, Rockstar's initial wording on this (as you can see up above) suggests that the back compat version will get a free upgrade. However, after doing a little digging, we're noticing that people who bought this RDR/RDR2 bundle from 2023 (when the PS4 version of RDR came out) are getting free access - whilst owners who bought the 360 version on its own years ago (like yours truly) are being asked to pay up. Heading over to the game's subreddit only leads to even more confusion. This post, where a fan asks Rockstar Support about the issue, shows the developer saying that the new upgrade is not free for 360 owners - even though on a technical level, the only version of Red Dead Redemption on Xbox prior to this upgrade was indeed the 360 game. It's worth noting that this is just one Rockstar Support response and may not be accurate. There's a whole discussion further into that thread about what's going on here, with lots of different suggestions and interpretations. One responder shows evidence of their 2023 bundle purchase working for the free upgrade, which again adds to the theory that it's this specific bundle that's providing free access on Xbox Series X|S for now. So, this could all be one big glitch and older 360 owners will soon get free access - or this whole upgrade path may only apply to newer purchases of Red Dead 1, syncing up with the PS4 and Switch releases from 2023 onwards. Honestly, we're just about as confused as anyone right now, but the long and short of it is that if you can't get in for free just yet and you own the old 360 version, it's worth waiting to see if Rockstar comes out to clarify the situation. View full article

Ahead of launch later this week, Xbox and Activision have given us a closer look at the multiplayer maps coming to Black Ops 7 Season 01 - with four new levels coming to the Game Pass FPS later this week. The maps in question are Fate, Odysseus, Utopia and Standoff; the latter being a returning classic from 2012's Black Ops 2. You can take a look at the four new additions in action up above, and we'll chuck some descriptions for them down below as well: These four multiplayer maps arrive alongside some new Zombies levels, weapons, operators and progression improvements; which we've detailed elsewhere at Pure Xbox in our broader Season 01 overview. We'll throw the team's full Season 01 roadmap down below anyway, so you can get a quick glimpse at what's arriving both later this week and during the mid-season update. Black Ops 7 Season 01 begins on December 4th, free for existing owners and Game Pass Ultimate subscribers across Xbox One, Xbox Series X|S and PC. View full article

Nintendo has been releasing all sorts of software and firmware updates recently, and it's now rolled out an update for its Nintendo Today! mobile application. The app, which provides daily updates from the world of Nintendo, has today been updated to Version 2.2.0. It's currently live on iOS, with the App Store page also revealing "what's new". This includes a new Donkey Kong theme (seemingly inspired by the recent release Donkey Kong Bananza). Along with this, the app is now also avaialble in Thailand, Malaysia, Philippines and Singapore. Image: OatmealDome (via social media) If you haven't already downloaded this app, once again it offers regular updates on "all things Nintendo" including Switch 2 news, game information, videos, comics and even some Nintendo trivia and history. It's also got a built-in event schedule, marking significant Nintendo events including releases, special occasions and in-game events. In case you missed it, Nintendo recently released an update for its Switch and Switch 2 mobile app adding some new features. You can find out more in our previous story. View full article

Think every little secret about Street Fighter II has been discovered? Well, you'd be wrong, as a new debug menu has been found in the 'Turbo' version of the game. TurboAnnihilate is the one who made the discovery, unearthing a debug menu for sprite scaling and rotation. To access this menu, TurboAnnihilate says: This begs the question – were there ever any plans to add sprite scaling to the game? This effect is seen in titles like Art of Fighting and Fatal Fury, so it would be interesting to know if Capcom was experimenting with a similar approach for Street Fighter II. View full article

To celebrate the recent launch of Kirby Air Riders on the Switch 2, Nintendo has announced a new event for its Switch Online battle royale game Tetris 99. This event will take place between 4th December and 8th December 2025, and allows players to unlock a special design inspired by Kirby's new game. This also happens to mark the 50th Maximus Cup event! In some other Switch Online news, Nintendo has also released some new Animal Crossing: New Horizons icons for Switch Online members this week. View full article

Nightdive is still rolling out regular updates for its Switch eShop versions of Turok and Turok 2, and to kick off December, it has released two new patches. In Turok, you can expect all sorts of enhancements and improvements as well as a Switch-specific update. And in Turok 2, the team has added a bunch of improvements including cross-play multiplayer. It also shared some details about issues it's aware of in Turok 2. Here are the full details courtesy of the Nightdive website: Turok (2015) Patch 3 - 1st December 2025Turok has been updated on all platforms! PATCH NOTES Added Atari intro video. Updated KEX and Nightdive videos. Removed Acclaim intro cutscene. Save menu will now update the save slot text when all save slots are used. Fixed cheat text localization when entering in a cheat code. Added a much-requested gameplay option to toggle respawning enemies off. Added a gameplay option for enemies to always drop items no matter what the difficulty is set to. Crosshair now scales with the size of the screen. Trails: are smoother, no longer disappear when the enemies change animations, and their performance has been improved. When firing the Rocket Launcher the trails no longer stop spawning smoke particles. Crawling now uses the weapons walk animation instead of the run animation. Particles now fade in correctly with the intended alpha values. Sounds pause and resume when opening and closing menus. Lowered volume of explosion sounds during the end game escape cutscene. Maximum active sounds increased from 64 to 128. When the music changes there’s a quick fade out. Fixed issues with some enemies showing the wrong blood colors. Sandworms can no longer be shot when they have died and are under the floor. Knife makes metal impact sounds when hitting metal enemies. The arrow head on the Bow now flashes briefly for a better indicator of the Bow’s super shot timing. After beating the Longhunter and the dam opens, water sounds now play. Removed shadow flags on 2 of the dam doors. Removed unused switch sectors from beta version only seen on the automap. In Level 5 a shortcut from the beta version was added in, going from the outside area with the key to back inside to the catacomb hallways. The unique model used for the shortcut entrance was never correctly modeled, and it has now been fixed up. Added in the missing startup elevator sound for tech platforms. Sky speed now changes based on the sector properties. In Level 7, for example, the sky moves a little faster than the other levels. Fixed walk speed value when moving diagonally. Fixed enemies not respawning when they’re in water. Interpolation fixes. Minor model geometry fixes. (Switch) You can now select up to an FOV of 120 on Nintendo Switch. (PC) Rendering fixes when window focuses/unfocuses. (PC) Using mods no longer prevents achievements which was the original remaster behavior. (PC) Modding additions and improvements. Turok 2: Seeds of Evil - Patch 2.2Turok 2: Seeds of Evil has been updated on all platforms! Improvements: Updated KEX engine version for latest support and features. Updated rendering defaults. Smoother shadows, optimized light scattering, and improved ambient occlusion. Extended singleplayer weapon models for ultrawide resolutions. Improved localization across the game. Added subtitles for all cinematics. Cross-play multiplayer is now functional. Current Issues: We are currently aware that some players are encountering graphical and visual glitches in the Turok 2: Seeds of Evil “Next-Gen” update. We are currently working on these issues and will be addressing them in a future update slated for release before the end of the year. We want to ensure that this release is simultaneous on all platforms, so we ask to please wait a little longer for these updates to go live. Thank you for understanding. View full article

IO Interactive has confirmed that it's hosting a gameplay-focused livestream later this week, where it will share more on its upcoming PS5 title 007 First Light. Having been the star of a recent State of Play showcase, the James Bond game will next appear in a Beyond the Light livestream this Wednesday, 3rd December 2025. Gameplay director Andreas Krogh and senior level designer Thomas Pulluelo will "pull back the curtain on all things gameplay" from 8am PT / 11am ET / 4pm GMT on Wednesday. It'll be livestreamed on Twitch. One of the biggest releases for the first half of 2026, the game is slated to arrive for PS5 on 27th March. Will you be tuning in to the show, or have you already seen enough? Let us know in the comments below. View full article