The Verge’s entertainment section collects the latest news from the worlds of pop culture, music, movies, television, and video games. Whether you want to know what to watch on Netflix or how to make the most of your streaming service budget, the entertainment section acts a reliable source. There’s simply too much to read, watch, hear, and play. Let us be your tour guide.
Star Wars may be having a tough time at the box office right now, but maybe it’ll have some better luck in the world of strategy games. The XCOM-like Star Wars Zero Company is launching on August 27th on the PS5, Xbox, and PC.
1666 Amsterdam, the next game from Assassin’s Creed creator Patrice Désilets, is launching in early access later this year, and a free demo will be available today on PC and Steam. It looks pretty eerie, but at one point, there’s a playable cat!
It’s set to launch in 2027. If you want to see more than what was shown at Summer Game Fest Live, there will be a dedicated Crossroads showcase later today at 8PM ET.
Sorry, I mean Star Wars: Galactic Racer. A new trailer shows off what appears to be the game’s story mode. The conversations look a little stilted, but who cares — all I care about is the podracing. It’s coming out on October 6th.
An Eggstremely Hard Game casts you as one of two (or four) goose parents trying to carry their egg home without breaking it. Imagine the fights you could get into with your friends or partner! Just like Overcooked, except you really shouldn’t be cooking this egg.
I’m not entirely sure what’s going on in this co-op survival game, which is called Haex, but I’m down for the vibes — and the cubes. It launches in 2027.
Following its work on 2016’s Mutants in Manhattan, PlatinumGames will be developing Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles: The Last Ronin, a new AAA action-adventure game based on the graphic novels. The Last Ronin will be published by the newly announced Paramount Games Studio.
The next game from RGG Studio will be released on January 15th, 2027, and Tupac is in the game. Didn’t expect that casting.
Ueda, behind games like Ico, Shadow of the Colossus, and The Last Guardian, showed off his new title, a sci-fi shooter. There’s no details on when it will come out, but it will be available on PS5, Xbox Series X / S, and the Epic Games Store (Epic is publishing it).
The sequel to one of the scariest games I’ve ever played has been officially unveiled with a brief teaser for Alien Isolation 2. It’s coming to the PS5, Xbox, PC, and even the Switch 2, though there’s no release date yet.
Studio MDHR confirmed that it’s working on a follow-up to Cuphead, though it’s still early in development. Also in the works: an 8-bit platformer set in the same classic animation-inspired universe, which will even be released as Sega Master System cartridge, in addition to modern platforms.
Resident Evil: Veronica launches in 2027, and it’s coming to PS5, Xbox Series X / S, Steam, and Nintendo Switch 2.
After the fiasco surrounding everything Highguard, Geoff Keighley promises that the last Summer Game Fest Live announcement today will be a “single player, narrative game.” The show starts at 5PM ET, so we won’t have to wait too much longer for the big reveal.
What better way to spend a Friday night than with a deluge of video game trailers and reveals. Summer Game Fest Live kicks off at 5PM ET, and you can watch along live right here.
The Nintendo eShop listing for the game shows a September 29th release date and a price tag of $29.99, as shared by Wario64.
Perhaps this is a Summer Game Fest Live announcement that got pushed a little early; that event is set to kick off at 5PM ET. (We’ll be watching and covering the show, stay tuned!)
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Bjooks has published several coffee-table books exploring musical instrument design, the history of Roland, the world of guitar pedals, and more. Its latest covers the evolution of drum machines from 1959’s Wurlitzer Side Man to modern oddities from Erica Synths. There’s only two days left to back it on Kickstarter, though.
Paramount Games Studio puts all of Paramount and Skydance’s development teams under one brand. Weirdly, it will still be making two titles set in Disney universes: Marvel 1943: Rise of Hydra and an untitled Star Wars game, Variety reports.
There will also be a new AAA title announced at Summer Game Fest Live later today.
Telemundo’s live feed on Peacock will apparently be the first commercial deployment of the efficient Dolby AC-4 codec by a streaming platform, promising immersive stadium sound that shouldn’t overload the network. Peacock will also be streaming the World Cup in 4K and 1080p HDR, according to Dolby spokesperson Andrea Villarreal.
Update and correction: Peacock will stream the games in 4K and 1080p HDR, but won’t offer personalized audio controls as previously stated.
Quilty claims to predict box office success.
The streaming service’s new multiplayer FIFA title — part of its burgeoning library of TV games — launches on June 11th, coincidentally the same day the World Cup kicks off. Netflix also has the US rights for the next two women’s World Cups starting in 2027.
The Book of Life director Jorge Gutierrez cancelled an AI animation collaboration with Amazon last week following massive backlash. A new project by two Pixar alums, premiering at Tribeca Film Festival this weekend, shows that not every use of the tech is about fast, cheap slop.
The company just raised $250 million in November against a $2.45 billion valuation — already a staggering jump from its roughly $500 million valuation in 2024. Now it’s more than doubled its valuation to $5.4 billion in just over six months, suggesting that investors haven’t been scared off by looming lawsuits.
The original lightsabers in Star Wars were hacked together from antique camera parts, so it’s fitting that folks are still going back to basics to build new ones. As lightsaber home-build videos are exploding right now on TikTok, it’s fun to see Home Depot embrace it. Sure, you can still buy something fancy directly from Disney, but the best lightsabers in the world have always been built by fans.
Young people do hate AI. “Creatively, I get no enjoyment from using those tools. It defeats the purpose entirely for me,” 20-year-old director of A24’s horror hit Backrooms told The Australian. “To me, generative AI feels less like innovation than a symptom of a broader cultural and economic rot.” Read more about Backrooms on The Verge:
The previous boss, Gabriel Aul, announced his retirement in February with Saxs Persson, once the EVP of the Fortnite ecosystem at Epic, taking over, Business Insider reports.
[Business Insider]
According to the Steam page for Tomb Raider: Legacy of Atlantis:
AI-assisted tools were used during development to support some early exploration and temporary development content. Any AI-assisted assets were either replaced or refined by humans in order to maintain the creative and artistic vision of the development team.
Crystal Dynamics tells Eurogamer that “we leverage AI tools to help our teams iterate on ideas faster and more efficiently, while ensuring that all finished content in the final product is human-crafted.”
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PlayerUnknown Productions is restructuring to a “smaller team” and stopping work on Prologue: Go Wayback, the survival roguelike launched in early access last year.
The studio plans to release one more update and then bring the game out of early access and make it free. It’s “investigating” refunds for people who already bought it.
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Netflix’s next animated series, Dealies, sounds like a weirdo version of Superstore. But it’s especially interesting as its co-creator Joe Bennett was behind both Scavengers Reign and Common Side Effects. No word on when it’ll start streaming.
The idea of a pedal with swappable, console-style effects cards isn’t new. But they don’t normally use actual video game console carts. There’s even a synth cart that you control with an N64 controller. Sadly, the base unit is currently sold out on the Console Pedals Etsy shop.
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Along with announcing when Pokémon Champions will arrive on iOS and Android, The Pokémon Company revealed the signature abilities of Mega Raichu X and Y, which will become playable in Champions after receiving free in-game rewards.
According to Variety, “Amazon execs were concerned that [Martin] Gero’s take on the series would not have broad appeal beyond the franchise’s already dedicated fanbase.” Gero formerly wrote, produced, and directed episodes of all three of the original Stargate series and was set to lead Amazon’s reboot as writer and showrunner.
It was great to see how motion capture was used by the cast of the upcoming God of War Laufey game in Sony’s behind-the-scenes video. Jack Quaid was especially in character for his portrayal of Phranque, a sentient gelatinous cube. 10/10, no notes.
