Xbox’s online network went down worldwide on the morning of 12 June 2026, locking players out of sign-ins across consoles, cloud gaming, mobile and web for several hours. Microsoft acknowledged the problem quickly, put its engineers on it, and restored normal service by around 12:45pm BST, when players were able to log back in.

What the Xbox Outage Affected

The outage was unusually broad, knocking out sign-in across nearly every Xbox surface at once. Microsoft listed the affected services as:

• Xbox Series X|S and Xbox One
• Xbox 360 and backward compatibility
• Xbox Cloud Gaming
• Xbox on Windows (PC)
• Android and Apple devices
• Xbox web services

Because the failure was in sign-in itself, the knock-on effects were wide. The Xbox Status page warned that players “may not be able to sign-in to your Xbox profile, may be disconnected while signed in, or have other related problems,” and that “features that require sign-in like most games, apps and social activity won’t be available.” Players reported losing access to online play and cloud saves during the downtime, and one said their game crashed mid-session in Forza Horizon 6.

Microsoft’s Response and Timeline

Reports began surfacing around 9am BST, with players across the world flagging the same sign-in errors at once. Xbox Support acknowledged the problem shortly after on social media: “We are aware that some users are encountering errors when attempting to log onto the Xbox network,” the team posted, thanking users “for your patience while our engineers investigate this issue.” By 10:35am BST, Microsoft said its engineers were actively investigating.

The fix landed a little over three hours after the first reports. At 12:45pm BST, Xbox Support confirmed the all-clear: “Users should once again be able to sign in to the Xbox network without issue. Thank you for your patience while we addressed this issue.” Microsoft did not say what caused the outage, and gave no figure for how many players were locked out while it lasted.

Users should once again be able to sign in to the Xbox network without issue. Thank you for your patience while we addressed this issue. https://t.co/QNeQ70JJIl

— XBOX Support (@XBOXSupport) June 12, 2026

The post Xbox Network Outage Hits Sign-Ins Worldwide on 12 June, Now Resolved appeared first on Shane the Gamer.

Xbox is rolling out fixes for the bug that has been corrupting or wiping Forza Horizon 6 save files, with a Series X|S system update targeting a rollout starting 12 June 2026. The fix is already live on PC through the Gaming Services client, and Forza’s support team has paired the news with detailed guidance for players who have lost progress and steps everyone can take to reduce the risk.

What the Forza Horizon 6 Save Fix Covers

The issue, which surfaced at the start of June, can leave some players with game progress that is lost or reset entirely. In an update posted at 11:00 PM PT on 11 June, the Forza Support team confirmed platform fixes are on the way. “The XBOX team is actively developing platform updates for XBOX Series X|S and PC to help improve these issues, so please ensure your devices are up to date,” the notice reads. “On Windows PC platforms, these fixes have already been rolled out via the Gaming Services client. For players on XBOX Series X|S consoles, we are planning to release a system update that is targeting a rollout starting tomorrow, June 12.” PC players, including those on Steam, should make sure Gaming Services is running version 37.114.10001.0 or higher.

How to Get the Console Update

Xbox Series X|S players who want the update as soon as it goes live can trigger it manually rather than wait for it to install automatically:

1. Make sure your console is connected to the internet, then press the Xbox button to open the guide.
2. Select Profile & system, then Settings, then System, then Updates.
3. Under Updates, select “Console update available” to begin, or you will see “No console update available” if your console is already up to date.

If Your Save Is Already Affected

For players who have already lost progress, Forza Support advises acting immediately. Open a ticket on the Forza Support website as soon as the issue occurs, ideally the same day, so the team can investigate and attempt to recover the profile by reverting to an earlier save. In the meantime, the advice is to avoid starting new play sessions or creating new saves until Forza Support has reviewed the case, to protect the recoverable data.

How to Reduce the Risk of Save Loss

Forza Support also shared general guidance to lower the chance of losing progress, which is worth following even once the update lands:

• Keep the Gaming Services app on PC or Xbox Series X|S fully up to date.
• On Xbox Series X|S, disable Quick Resume for Forza Horizon 6 (highlight the game, press Menu, then Manage game and add-ons, then Quick Resume settings, then Disable Quick Resume).
• Make sure you are online when quitting the game, and give the save time to sync to the cloud before powering off or switching devices.
• Do not force quit during save screens, and do not power off the device during gameplay.
• If you get an “Out of space” pop-up with a game crash, check your storage and restart the console.

Players who regularly move between consoles, PCs, Steam and Cloud Gaming should take extra care, quitting fully and waiting a few minutes for the cloud sync to finish before closing down. Forza Support says it will continue to share updates once the issue is fully resolved across platforms.

The post Xbox Rolls Out Forza Horizon 6 Save-Loss Fix – Console Update Starts 12 June appeared first on Shane the Gamer.

Xbox Chief Strategy Officer Mathew Ball has confirmed that demand for Xbox Series X and Series S consoles is outpacing what Microsoft can manufacture, with the company pointing to an AI-driven memory chip shortage as the root cause. Speaking in early June 2026, Ball admitted he had underestimated how severe the component crisis would become and warned the acute effects may last two to two and a half years. The CSO also confirmed Microsoft is rethinking the entire design brief for Project Helix, the codename for Xbox’s next-generation console, to keep the platform affordable in a hardware market reshaped by AI data-centre investment.

Demand for Xbox consoles is currently outstripping supply

Matthew Ball – “We are producing them as quickly as possible. These is a severe limitation to how quickly we can do that, but it’s not a question of appetite. That is a prilvege as a company. It is a challenge for us to… pic.twitter.com/McSMSO8nh3

— Wario64 (@Wario64) June 8, 2026

Ball’s comments, surfacing in the run-up to 10 June 2026, also exposed a separate financial pressure point. Xbox Game Pass lost millions of subscribers following last year’s tier price hikes, with the CSO disclosing the churn publicly for the first time.

What Ball Said About Xbox Supply

The Xbox boss framed the shortage in blunt terms. “We are producing them as quickly as possible. There is a severe limitation to how quickly we can do that, but it’s not a question of appetite,” Ball said. The constraint is not consumer demand or Microsoft’s willingness to manufacture more units. It is the availability of components, particularly memory chips and storage, which are being absorbed by the AI sector at a pace that has left console makers competing for what is left.

Ball acknowledged he had previously misjudged the scale of the disruption. He said he had underestimated how bad the situation might get, and that the most acute effects on console affordability and supply may persist for two to two and a half years from now. That timeline pushes the current Xbox Series generation’s hardware availability problems well into 2028 on his estimate.

The AI Memory Chip Squeeze Reshaping Console Economics

The crisis Ball described is driven by rampant investment in artificial-intelligence data centres, which are consuming DRAM and NAND flash supply at levels the consumer electronics industry was not planning for two years ago. Memory chip and storage component prices have climbed sharply as a result. Console makers, operating on the thin per-unit margins that have defined the home console business for two decades, are particularly exposed to that kind of input-cost volatility.

The component squeeze does not just affect what Microsoft can ship today. It also reshapes the bill of materials for any hardware Microsoft designs for release inside the AI build-out window, which is the central problem Ball flagged for Project Helix. The same dynamic explains why Xbox’s manufacturing capacity is not the constraint Ball pointed to. Microsoft can build the consoles; the bottleneck sits at the silicon supply chain, where memory makers are prioritising higher-margin AI-server allocations over consumer electronics customers.

Project Helix Faces An Affordability Rethink

Ball confirmed Microsoft is reworking its design assumptions for Project Helix in response to the component crisis. “We are working very hard to rethink everything that we can about Helix… to make sure it is affordable, to make sure that it’s flexible,” he said. The brief, in Ball’s framing, is no longer designing to a target spec sheet at a target price. It is designing for accessibility and sustainability inside a hardware market where memory and storage prices may not stabilise on the timeline Microsoft originally projected.

“Affordable” and “flexible” are the two anchors Ball returned to. Affordability speaks to the consumer-facing launch price, which is the variable most directly threatened by chip cost inflation. Flexibility hints at a hardware design that can absorb component substitutions or scale across multiple SKUs without a full re-engineering cycle, the kind of optionality that becomes critical when supplier pricing is volatile.

Why Microsoft Is Worried About Next-Gen Pricing

Console launches historically anchor to a psychologically important price point. Premium SKUs typically land at $499 USD and below, with accessible SKUs sitting in the $299 to $399 USD tier. Memory chip inflation threatens both. If DRAM and NAND remain elevated through 2027 and into 2028, as Ball’s two-and-a-half-year acute window suggests, the next Xbox’s bill of materials at launch could land hundreds of dollars above where Microsoft would historically want it. Rethinking the platform around that constraint, rather than absorbing the cost as a per-unit subsidy, is the more sustainable path Microsoft appears to be choosing.

Game Pass Subscriber Losses Pile On Financial Pressure

Alongside the hardware-side disclosure, Ball confirmed that Xbox Game Pass lost millions of subscribers in the wake of last year’s price increases. Microsoft raised Game Pass Ultimate and PC Game Pass tier prices through 2025, and the subscriber outflow Ball acknowledged represents the first time the company has publicly conceded the price hikes triggered material churn rather than the modest, recoverable dip Microsoft had projected internally.

The specific subscriber loss figure was not disclosed. Ball’s framing of “millions” places the impact in the range of at least the low single-digit millions of Game Pass accounts, against a service Microsoft was previously positioning as approaching the 35 million subscriber mark. The financial implication compounds the hardware story. Microsoft is squeezed on console margins and on the subscription-services revenue line that was meant to help subsidise the hardware business.

How The Next Two Years Reshape Xbox’s Hardware Roadmap

Ball’s two-to-two-and-a-half-year acute window for the component crisis lands the Xbox business inside a period where most observers had previously expected Microsoft to be ramping toward a Project Helix reveal and launch cadence. A 2027 or 2028 launch into a market where DRAM, NAND and supporting silicon are still elevated would force precisely the rethink Ball described. The plausible options are a higher launch price than Microsoft would prefer, a delayed launch, or a hardware design built around component substitutions that were not in the original brief.

None of those paths has been publicly committed to. Ball’s comments make clear only that the design team is working the problem actively rather than waiting for component prices to normalise on the schedule Microsoft had originally assumed. Sony, which faces the same memory and storage cost pressures for any PlayStation 6 development cycle, has not yet made comparable public statements about its own hardware planning.

The next concrete signals will come from Microsoft’s earnings cadence and any further Xbox business briefings through the second half of 2026, where any change to Game Pass pricing strategy or any indication of how the Project Helix rethink is shaping up would surface first. Ball’s public acknowledgement that the company is rethinking everything on Helix is, on its own, the most concrete admission Microsoft has made about its next-generation plans since Project Helix was first referenced internally, and it sets the tone for every Xbox hardware disclosure that follows over the next 24 months.

The post Xbox Console Demand Outstrips Supply Amid AI Chip Crisis, Project Helix Rethought appeared first on Shane the Gamer.

NBA The Run launched on PlayStation 5, Xbox Series X|S and PC via Steam on 9 June 2026 at 6:00 PM UTC, reviving the licensed arcade basketball lineage that has been dormant since the NBA Street era wound down in the mid-to-late 2000s. The 3v3 game ships with cross-play, rollback netcode and a 32-player NBA roster on day one, priced at $29.99 for the Standard Edition and $39.99 for the Deluxe. The developer has confirmed no microtransactions will appear in the game at any point.

The Run the World Tournament mode is live from day one, putting teams of three through a circuit of iconic streetball courts before a finals court championship closes out the run.

Cross-Play And Rollback Netcode Across All Three Platforms

NBA The Run runs cross-play across PS5, Xbox Series X|S and Steam from launch, with no platform partitioning of the player pool. Console and PC players queue into the same matchmaking lobbies, and parties can be formed across hardware boundaries without an opt-in toggle on either side.

The technical headline is rollback netcode, a feature long associated with the fighting-game scene and rarely seen in licensed sports releases. The implementation predicts inputs locally and reconciles silently when packets arrive, which matters in a 3v3 game where a single missed steal or contested rebound flips possession. The decision puts NBA The Run on roughly the same network footing as Street Fighter 6 and Guilty Gear Strive, rather than the delay-based netcode that defined the original NBA Street trilogy.

Run The World Tournament Mode At Launch

Run the World is the headline mode on day one, sending three-player teams across a circuit of iconic streetball courts before culminating in a finals court championship. The mode is structured as a global tour, with each court representing a real-world location and the run ending at the finals stage rather than looping endlessly into a ladder grind.

The tournament structure is designed for both solo-queue trios and pre-made squads, with the cross-play infrastructure feeding teams of three from any combination of platforms into the same bracket. The full list of courts on the Run the World circuit has not been published in detail, with the developer framing the route as a tour through globally recognised outdoor venues rather than naming each stop individually.

32 NBA Stars In The Launch Roster With More To Come

NBA The Run ships with 32 NBA players in the playable roster on day one. The developer has signalled that additional names will arrive ahead of the 2026-27 NBA season, though no specific roster expansion date has been attached to that commitment.

The Deluxe Edition adds rookie variants for Stephen Curry, Luka Doncic and Kevin Durant to the base lineup, alongside 1,000 CRED, the in-game currency. The roster scale sits between the small named cast of NBA Jam, which built each release around a handful of two-player teams, and the deeper benches of NBA Street Vol. 3, which carried hundreds of pros across multiple tiers. The 3v3 format keeps any single match focused on six players on the court, with the larger pool feeding team selection and unlock progression rather than match-time complexity.

Standard And Deluxe Edition Pricing

Two editions are available from launch, both built around the same base game and the same competitive feature set.

The $29.99 entry price undercuts the $69.99 to $79.99 ceiling that has become standard for current full-priced console releases, sitting closer to the digital-only revival bracket occupied by Windjammers 2 and remastered arcade compilations. The Deluxe upcharge is held to $10 rather than the $20 to $30 premium typical of annual sports releases, with no Ultimate, Champions or MVP tier above it.

First Major NBA Arcade Revival Since The NBA Street Era

The release ends a 19-year gap in the flagship licensed NBA arcade subgenre. The NBA Street series wound down in the late 2000s, with EA Sports BIG sunsetting the brand soon after, and no subsequent licensed release has tried to occupy the same open-floor, signature-dunk space at full retail scale. NBA Jam returned in 2010 and 2011 under EA, but those releases sat closer to the original Midway two-on-two lineage than the street-basketball formula NBA The Run is targeting.

NBA The Run inherits the visual shorthand of the genre, with bold colour palettes, exaggerated player models and signature finishes, and pairs it with cross-play and rollback netcode, neither of which existed in any meaningful form when the NBA Street series shipped its last entries. The arcade basketball category has effectively been holding ground through smaller indie releases rather than a flagship licensed line, with the new game positioned as the first proper revival on the licensed side.

No Microtransactions Confirmed By The Developer

The developer has confirmed no microtransactions will appear in NBA The Run, a commitment that covers both currency top-ups and cosmetic store layers. CRED, the in-game currency bundled with the Deluxe Edition, is earned through play rather than sold in additional packs after launch.

The position sets NBA The Run apart from the dominant sports-game monetisation pattern, where annual NBA, NFL and FIFA releases lean heavily on Ultimate Team-style card economies and seasonal battle passes that compound across multiple paid tiers. The $29.99 Standard and the one-time $10 Deluxe upgrade are the only paid touchpoints the developer has acknowledged, and the no-microtransactions commitment is being used as a launch-week selling point alongside the rollback netcode line.

What Comes Next For NBA The Run

The next milestone for the game lands ahead of the 2026-27 NBA season, when the developer plans to expand the playable roster beyond the 32 stars available at launch. No date has been attached to that update, and no post-launch roadmap covering new courts, modes or seasonal tournaments has been published. The Run the World finals court remains the highest-stakes content in the game until that roster expansion arrives.

The post NBA The Run Launches – First Licensed Arcade Basketball Game in 19 Years, $29.99 appeared first on Shane the Gamer.

Microsoft have unveiled the Xbox Series X25 Limited Edition, a translucent OG Green Series X console with an illuminated green X on the front that lights up in a direct callback to the original 2001 Xbox startup sequence. The hardware ships alongside a matching Xbox Wireless Controller X25 Special Edition, whose translucent shell carries the black and white bumpers as a nod to the original Xbox Duke controller, and the pair launches as a bundle in select markets in November 2026 to mark the platform’s 25th anniversary.

The console is the centrepiece of Xbox’s 25th Anniversary celebration, announced by Microsoft on 7 June 2026 ahead of the Xbox Games Showcase 2026. Pricing has not been disclosed and will be set by individual retailers closer to the November release window, with the controller also sold separately for buyers who want the anniversary pad without the full console bundle.

Translucent OG Green Design Nods To The Original Xbox

The Series X25 chassis carries a translucent shell finished in OG Green, the muted greyish-green that defined the original 2001 console and its launch-era marketing. The translucent treatment exposes the internal cooling shroud and the X-shaped vent layout that has become a signature of the Series X tower, framing the hardware as a celebration piece rather than a straight repaint.

The X logo on the front face glows green when the console is powered on. The animation cue mirrors the original Xbox boot sequence, which opened on a glowing green X swirling up through black before resolving into the platform’s wordmark. The 25th Anniversary logo is embossed on the front of the console, sitting on the chassis face alongside the illuminated X to anchor the unit as a commemorative SKU rather than a standard Series X.

The translucent shell is exclusive to this Limited Edition run. Microsoft have not indicated whether the design will roll over to standard Series X SKUs after the November 2026 launch, and previous Limited Edition Xbox hardware, including the Halo Infinite Series X bundle, was never restocked once initial inventory cleared the channel. Storage and internal specifications are unchanged from the standard Series X, with the 1TB custom NVMe SSD, 12 teraflops of GPU performance, and 4K target resolution carried over from the model that launched in November 2020.

The X25 is the first time Microsoft have built an illuminated front-face logo into a Series X chassis. The standard Series X carries a static white Xbox logo on the power button only, and the glowing front X on the anniversary unit is a hardware-level change to the front panel rather than a software lighting effect, according to the design language used in the announcement copy.

Xbox Wireless Controller X25 Carries The Duke’s Black-And-White Bumpers

The matching Xbox Wireless Controller X25 Special Edition uses the same translucent OG Green shell, with the bumpers swapped to black and white as a direct reference to the original Xbox Duke controller’s two large auxiliary face buttons. The Duke shipped with the 2001 console and was famous for its oversized footprint and its black and white inputs, which sat below the standard A, B, X, and Y face buttons before being dropped from the Xbox 360 generation onward.

The pad uses the modern Xbox Wireless Controller body, retaining the share button, hybrid d-pad, and textured grip surfaces introduced with the Series X generation. The cosmetic Duke callback is the headline change, and the controller carries no functional differences from the standard model based on the official announcement copy, with no separate haptic profile, button remap, or accompanying software theme listed.

Microsoft are releasing the controller as both a bundle pack-in alongside the console and as a standalone SKU. The standalone release gives players on Series S, Series X, or PC a route to the translucent shell without committing to the full console purchase, and follows the pattern set by the 20th Anniversary Xbox Wireless Controller in 2021, which also released as a standalone celebration item.

November 2026 Launch In Select Markets

The bundle and the standalone controller are confirmed for select markets in November 2026. Microsoft have not published the full territory list, and the official announcement defers retail pricing to individual storefronts rather than fixing a global MSRP, mirroring how previous Limited Edition Xbox hardware released in tiered regional drops rather than a simultaneous global launch.

New Zealand availability has not been confirmed in the announcement copy, and the official Xbox Wire post directs prospective buyers to monitor local retailers for pricing and stock confirmation in the months leading up to November. Inventory on previous anniversary-grade Xbox hardware has historically sold through in the first wave of pre-order opening, with the 20th Anniversary controllers in 2021 hitting back-order status within days of going live at major retailers.

Pre-order timing has not been announced. Microsoft typically open hardware reservations four to six weeks ahead of release for first-party SKUs, which would put the X25 pre-order window in late September or early October if the publisher follows the standard cadence. The Xbox Wire post confirms only that retail pricing will be communicated by partnered storefronts and lists no separate digital or PC bundle SKUs for the anniversary controller and console release.

How The X25 Fits Into Xbox’s 25th Anniversary Year

The original Xbox launched on 15 November 2001 in North America, putting the 25th anniversary milestone in November 2026 to the day. Microsoft entered the console market with the Duke controller, a built-in 8GB hard drive, and the Halo: Combat Evolved launch lineup, and the platform held the runner-up position behind PlayStation 2 through the rest of its generation before transitioning to the Xbox 360 in late 2005.

The Series X25 Limited Edition is the first anniversary-themed Xbox hardware release built around a full home console. Microsoft’s previous celebration hardware, the 20th Anniversary Xbox Wireless Controller and the 20th Anniversary Xbox Elite Wireless Controller Series 2, both released in November 2021 as controller-only items without an accompanying console SKU. The X25 elevates the format to a full hardware bundle for the quarter-century milestone.

The translucent finish itself draws on a strand of Xbox enthusiast hardware that traces back to the see-through Crystal Xbox variant Microsoft released for the original console in 2004 and to the limited translucent green controllers issued through later Xbox Live promotions. Reviving the OG Green translucent treatment on the current-generation tower stitches together the visual cues across the platform’s full history.

What Comes Next For Xbox’s Anniversary Slate

The Xbox Games Showcase 2026, which the anniversary console headlined, sits alongside the wider 25th Anniversary celebration Microsoft are running through the rest of the year. The showcase covered the publisher’s first-party slate and provides the backdrop for follow-on anniversary reveals expected through the second half of 2026 in the runup to the November launch window.

Confirmation of the territory list, retail pricing, and pre-order timing will follow from Microsoft and partnered retailers in the months ahead of the November 2026 release, with the next major checkpoint being the Xbox Wire updates that traditionally accompany pre-order opening for first-party hardware.

The post Xbox Series X25 Limited Edition Launches November – Translucent OG Green With Illuminated X appeared first on Shane the Gamer.

Gameplay Group International have pushed the launch of Avatar Legends: The Fighting Game from 2 July to 23 July 2026, citing unplanned new content as the reason for the three-week delay. The studio confirmed a cross-play closed beta running 2 to 5 July for players who pre-order on PlayStation 5, Xbox Series X|S, and PC via Steam, replacing what would have been the original launch weekend with a hands-on test of the 2D fighter. The announcement was issued on 3 June 2026, less than a month out from the original release date.

To our Avatar community: To ensure AVATAR LEGENDS™: The Fighting Game delivers the best possible experience at launch, we wanted to let you know that we’re taking a little extra time to cook up an exceptional Avatar adventure, including brand new content previously unplanned!… pic.twitter.com/3hMwbFgu0D

— Avatar Legends: The Fighting Game (@avatar_fighters) June 3, 2026

The decision keeps the hand-drawn fighter inside its original July release month, with the four-day closed beta now serving as the public preview ahead of the final release.

The New Release Date And Beta Window

Avatar Legends: The Fighting Game now ships on 23 July 2026 across PlayStation 5, Xbox Series X|S, and PC via Steam. The 21-day slip is short by industry standards but lines up directly with the originally scheduled launch weekend, with the closed beta filling the 2 to 5 July gap. The schedule keeps the title from sliding into August or beyond, where it would have collided with the late-summer release window already crowded with established franchises.

Cross-play between PS5, Xbox Series X|S, and Steam during the beta confirms the netcode supports the full platform set before launch, which is the harder technical lift for a fighting game. PS5 players will be matched into the same queue as Steam and Xbox opponents across the four-day window, with no platform partitioning announced.

Gameplay Group International’s Statement

The studio framed the delay as content-driven rather than a fix-the-bugs slip. In its 3 June statement, Gameplay Group International told the community: “To our Avatar community: To ensure AVATAR LEGENDS: The Fighting Game delivers the best possible experience at launch, we wanted to let you know that we’re taking a little extra time to cook up an exceptional Avatar adventure, including brand new content previously unplanned!”

The phrasing carries two key markers. The “brand new content previously unplanned” line signals the studio added scope mid-development rather than cut back to ship on time. The “exceptional Avatar adventure” framing centres the single-player story mode rather than competitive depth, suggesting the unplanned additions sit in story or character content rather than gameplay systems.

The statement did not detail what the new content covers. Roster additions, extra story chapters, additional stages, and new modes are all live possibilities, and the studio has not narrowed the list. The community-direct format of the statement, addressed to “our Avatar community” rather than press, signals the studio is treating the fighting-game audience as the primary stakeholder rather than the wider Avatar franchise viewership.

How To Access The 2-5 July Beta

Beta access is gated to pre-orderers across PlayStation 5, Xbox Series X|S, and PC via Steam. Players who place a pre-order on any of the three platforms before the beta window opens on 2 July receive entry for the four-day test, which closes on 5 July 2026. Cross-play is enabled across all three platforms, so a PS5 pre-orderer can queue into matches against an Xbox or Steam opponent without restriction.

Pre-orders are now live on PC via Steam, with PlayStation Store and Microsoft Store listings expected to mirror availability. The studio has not yet announced whether the beta will operate on a single global server or region-locked queues, nor has it published the beta hours or downtime windows for the 2 to 5 July run.

Image Credit: Gameplay Group International

The studio has also not specified which characters, stages, or modes will appear in the beta build. Typical pre-launch closed beta windows for 2D fighters surface a slice of the roster, one or two stages, and online ranked or casual matchmaking, but Gameplay Group International has not confirmed the scope.

What’s In Avatar Legends: The Fighting Game

The game is a 2D fighter with a single-player story mode and online PvP. The hand-drawn art style is built to mirror the original Avatar: The Last Airbender animated series, with stage backdrops and character animations carrying the same colour palette and frame cadence as the show.

Confirmed characters include Aang, Korra, and Zuko, with the full launch roster not yet disclosed. The three named fighters span both Avatar: The Last Airbender and The Legend of Korra, signalling the studio is drawing on the full animated continuity rather than a single show. Zuko represents the Fire Nation arc from the original series, Aang the founding Avatar narrative, and Korra the next-generation continuation.

The combination of story mode and online PvP positions the title as a dual-audience fighter. The single-player content targets Avatar series fans drawn by the animation style and character roster, while the cross-play netcode and online PvP target the competitive 2D fighting-game community. The hand-drawn aesthetic puts the project closer to Guilty Gear Strive and Skullgirls in production direction than to a 3D Tekken or Mortal Kombat lineage.

Deluxe Edition Contents

The Deluxe Edition bundles three extras above the standard release:

• A curated digital artbook
• A One-Year Pass covering five additional playable characters
• The original soundtrack

The One-Year Pass is the structural anchor of the bundle, indicating Gameplay Group International is planning post-launch character drops across the first 12 months of support. The five Deluxe characters sit outside the base launch roster and arrive as season content rather than day-one fighters, mirroring the post-launch DLC cadence common to modern fighting games.

Regional pricing for the Standard and Deluxe Editions has not been confirmed for New Zealand at the time of writing. The Steam listing currently shows pre-order availability without a confirmed retail figure, and PlayStation Store and Microsoft Store pricing has also not been published.

What Comes Next

The 2 to 5 July beta is the next public touchpoint for Avatar Legends: The Fighting Game, and the first opportunity for the fighting-game community to assess the netcode, the hand-drawn animation in motion, and the depth of the combat system. Pre-orders on PS5, Xbox Series X|S, and Steam between now and 2 July are the only route into the test window, and the studio has not announced whether the beta entitlement carries over to a wider open beta or a launch-day demo.

Final launch follows on 23 July 2026 across PS5, Xbox Series X|S, and PC via Steam.

The post Avatar Legends Fighting Game Delayed to 23 July – Cross-Play Beta 2-5 July appeared first on Shane the Gamer.

Ubisoft has pulled back the curtain on Assassin’s Creed Black Flag Resynced, with hands-on previews published on 21 May 2026 detailing four new story chapters, an expanded Caribbean, recruitable crew officers, and naval combat rebuilt on the studio’s modern Anvil engine. The remake of the 2013 pirate adventure has been in development at Ubisoft Singapore for around three years, and the previews from a closed Ubisoft showcase confirm it reaches well beyond a visual touch-up. Black Flag Resynced launches on 9 July for PS5, Xbox Series X|S, and PC, returning Edward Kenway and the Jackdaw to a Caribbean that now stretches as far as the tip of Florida.

A Three-Year Rebuild Around One Question

Black Flag Resynced has been in active development since 2023. Director Richard Knight told GameReactor in an interview at Ubisoft Singapore’s showcase that the team is still finishing the project, putting the timeline at “around three years now.” The brief was never a straight remaster. It started as a question the studio had carried since the original shipped.

“We always had this dream, what if it were today; what if we had the latest Anvil; what if we had some of the gameplay from Shadows or Mirage? What if we put all of these things together, what can we get?” Knight said. He framed the work as part preservation, part reinvention, explaining that the team wanted “to preserve Edward’s story and flavour” while still giving themselves room to “dream a little too.”

Knight said the studio kept returning to what defines the game: a strong central character, the Caribbean setting, and the fantasy of being both a pirate and an assassin. Those pillars stayed fixed while the systems around them were rebuilt. The table below sets the remake against the 2013 original.

Four New Story Chapters Replace the Modern-Day Sections

The most structural change is the removal of the original game’s modern-day sequences. The 2013 release split its time between Edward’s 18th-century career and first-person sections inside Abstergo Entertainment, and Resynced cuts those present-day segments entirely. In their place sit four new story chapters set within Edward’s own era.

Those chapters carry ten new quests built around the crew officers players can recruit for the Jackdaw. The content is woven through the campaign rather than bolted on as optional side activity, broadening the story without displacing the beats that made the original land. Replacing the much-criticised Abstergo material with playable pirate-era content also keeps the player at sea and in character for longer stretches.

The change answers one of the most common complaints about the 2013 game, where the modern-day interludes pulled players out of the Caribbean. With ten quests attached to the officers, the four chapters also give the remake a meaningfully larger campaign than a straight remaster would offer, and they keep the focus on Edward throughout.

Crew Officers Unlock New Ship Abilities

Recruitable officers sit at the centre of the new content. Each officer joins Edward’s crew through their own questline, and once aboard, unlocks a distinct ability for the Jackdaw. Knight pointed to Lucy Baldwin as one example, an officer whose recruitment opens up a new ship capability that was not available in the original.

The system turns crew management into a progression layer. In the 2013 game the Jackdaw’s sailors were background colour with no story role, but Resynced gives them quests, names, and mechanical payoffs. Building out the roster of officers becomes a reason to explore the expanded map and take on the new chapters, rather than a cosmetic afterthought.

Each officer’s ability ties back into naval combat, which means the choice of who to recruit and prioritise shapes how the Jackdaw performs in a fight. The officer questlines and the new ship abilities are designed to feed one another, linking the on-foot content directly to time spent at sea.

The Jackdaw’s Reworked Naval Arsenal

Naval combat gains a layer of alternate-fire weapons for the Jackdaw. Where the 2013 ship ran a largely fixed loadout, Resynced lets players equip specialised armaments and switch up their approach from one engagement to the next. The previews listed a handful of the new options:

• Heated shots that set enemy vessels alight
• Shrapnel barrels that can be dropped in the water behind the Jackdaw
• A concentrated mortar fire mode for sustained bombardment
• Swivel guns with manual aim for precision fire

Knight singled out the concentrated mortar fire and the swivel guns among the additions designed to give the Jackdaw more tactical range. Naval combat was the standout of the original Black Flag, and Resynced treats it as the system with the most room to grow. Together with the officer abilities, the new weapons turn each fight at sea into a question of loadout and timing rather than a straight trade of broadsides.

Melee Combat Rebuilt From Shadows and Mirage

On foot, sword fighting has been rebuilt to bring it in line with modern Assassin’s Creed. PCGamesN reviewer Tom Hopkins, who spent three hours with the preview build, wrote that combat now centres on “parries, counters, and combos,” echoing recent entries such as Shadows and Mirage rather than the timing-based counter-kills of the 2013 game.

Enemies have changed alongside the player’s toolkit. The hands-on noted that opponents “now adapt to your playstyle,” punishing players who lean on the same approach across encounters. Hopkins reported that switching tactics from fight to fight became necessary rather than optional, a shift that asks more of players than the original ever did.

The reworked melee system is one of the clearest examples of Knight’s “what if it were today” brief in practice, taking a decade of combat design from later games and folding it back into Edward’s story. Hopkins’s verdict on the build was emphatic, calling Resynced “a brilliant update to one of the series’ most iconic games” on the strength of its new content and personalities.

An Expanded Caribbean and On-Demand Shanties

The Caribbean itself has grown. Knight confirmed Resynced runs on “one big open-world map” that has been expanded to take in the tip of Florida and Cuba, adding new coastline and territory to sail and explore. The seamless structure means players move between open sea, ports, and the new regions without loading breaks.

Sea shanties have also been reworked into an on-demand feature. Knight described a system where holding a button on the D-pad brings up what he called “a sort of visual iPod player,” letting players pick exactly which song the crew sings while sailing, rather than waiting for one to trigger at random. It is a small change, but it hands players direct control over a part of Black Flag that many remember fondly.

The visual leap drew the strongest reaction in the previews. Hopkins wrote that the upgrade “blew me away,” describing Resynced as “the brightest and most colourful game I’ve ever played,” with deep blue seas, white crashing waves, golden beaches, and lush green forests rendered with a paradise-like sheen on the modern Anvil engine.

When Black Flag Resynced Launches

Assassin’s Creed Black Flag Resynced launches on 9 July for PS5, Xbox Series X|S, and PC. The release lands roughly seven weeks after the May previews, and with Knight saying in May that the team was “still finishing it right now,” that window leaves a short runway to the launch.

The previews covered story structure, naval combat, melee, and the expanded map, but pricing, edition details, and any upgrade path for owners of the 2013 original remain unconfirmed. Those details are the next thing to watch before Edward Kenway and the Jackdaw set sail again on 9 July.

The post Assassin’s Creed Black Flag Resynced Preview – New Officers, Reworked Naval Combat and Shanties appeared first on Shane the Gamer.

Xbox has pulled back the curtain on the second half of April’s Game Pass drop, and it’s a mixed bag of cosy indies, a Vampire Survivors spin-off, a Don’t Nod sci-fi adventure, and a classic Final Fantasy landing on the service for the first time. Ten games are rolling in between 21 April and 5 May 2026, and another nine are heading out the door on 30 April.

Wave 2 isn’t quite the marquee lineup that kicked off the month with Hades 2 and Football Manager 26, but there are four Day One titles in here and a few genuinely interesting picks buried in the list. Here’s everything joining and leaving Xbox Game Pass for the rest of April 2026.

Every Game Coming To Xbox Game Pass In Late April 2026

The full wave spans Ultimate, PC Game Pass, and Premium, with a handful of titles available Day One. Two games, Little Rocket Lab and Sopa: Tale of the Stolen Potato, are already on the service but are now expanding down to the Premium tier.

The Day One Highlights Worth Paying Attention To

Four of this wave’s titles arrive on Game Pass the same day they launch, and they cover a pretty wide stretch of genres. If you’re trying to figure out where to spend your time first, these are the ones doing the heaviest lifting.

Vampire Crawlers: The Turbo Wildcard From Vampire Survivors

Vampire Crawlers is the big draw of the wave. Poncle’s follow-up to the 2022 roguelike phenomenon ditches the bullet-heaven format and turns the same chaotic, build-obsessed energy into a turn-based, deck-driven first-person dungeon crawler. You still build broken combos and explore familiar dungeons, but now it’s served up one turn at a time, either slowly and tactically or as fast as your fingers can mash buttons.

Kiln

Kiln is the one almost nobody saw coming. It’s a pottery game where you sculpt ceramics and then throw those exact creations into online arena battles as your fighter. The studio is pitching it as a celebration of creativity and destruction in equal measure, and it’s the kind of weird, hook-first indie that Game Pass tends to surface well.

Aphelion

Don’t Nod, the studio behind Jusant and Lost Records: Bloom & Rage, is back with a third-person sci-fi adventure built in collaboration with the European Space Agency. You play as astronaut Ariane after a crash landing on a frozen planet, controlling both her and her injured partner Thomas as they push through shifting realities and grounded real-world science. It’s easily the most prestige-leaning entry in the wave.

Heroes Of Might & Magic: Olden Era

This one lands in Game Preview on PC only, and it’s the official prequel to the turn-based strategy series that basically invented its own subgenre. Expect grand armies, devastating spells, and both solo and multiplayer campaigns. A must-look for HOMM veterans, even in its preview state.

Read More: Xbox Game Pass April 2026 Reveals Hades II, Oblivion Remastered, and Every New Game This Month

Read More: Xbox CEO Admits Game Pass Is ‘Too Expensive’, Signals Pricing Overhaul

Read More: PS Plus Game Catalog April 2026 Lineup Confirmed Horizon Zero Dawn Remastered, The Crew Motorfest and Wild Arms 4 Headline Eight New Games

Final Fantasy V Finally Joins Game Pass On 5 May

The one non-Day One headliner is Final Fantasy V, landing on 5 May via the Pixel Remaster version. It’s the first time the game has been available on Game Pass, and it arrives across Ultimate, Premium, and PC Game Pass at once. FFV has long been the cult-favourite entry of the classic run, mostly thanks to its Job system, which a lot of fans still point to as the best iteration Square Enix ever put together.

The Rest Of The Wave: Cosy Builders, FPS Throwbacks, And Multiplayer Chaos

The non-Day One additions lean heavily into comfort food and variety.

Little Rocket Lab is a cosy machine-building RPG where you play an aspiring engineer helping your family finish a rocket.

Sopa: Tale of the Stolen Potato is a narrative adventure set across a magical-realist South America.

TerraTech Legion takes the block-based vehicle builder formula and drops it into a bullet-heaven roguelite.

Sledding Game is a proximity-chat snow sports hangout with yetis, ragdolls, and custom animal avatars.

Trepang2 is probably the wildcard for shooter fans. It’s a gory, fast, genuinely hardcore FPS that flew under a lot of radars on release, and getting it in front of Game Pass’s audience should give it a proper second wind.

Every Game Leaving Xbox Game Pass On 30 April

Nine games are cycling out at the end of the month, so if you’ve been putting any of these off, now’s the time. Xbox is offering up to 20% off if you want to keep any of them in your library permanently.

• Citizen Sleeper (Cloud, Console, PC)
• Creatures of Ava (Cloud, Console, PC)
• Dragon Ball Xenoverse 2 (Cloud, Console, PC)
• Endless Legend 2 (PC)
• Goat Simulator (Cloud, Console)
• Goat Simulator Remastered (Cloud, Console, PC)
• Hunt Showdown 1896 (Cloud, Console, PC)
• NHL 24 via EA Play (Cloud, Console)
• Revenge of the Savage Planet (Cloud, Console, PC)

Citizen Sleeper is the standout departure for anyone who hasn’t played it yet. It’s one of the most acclaimed narrative RPGs of the last few years and genuinely worth clearing a weekend for before it vanishes.

What Wave 2 Says About Game Pass Right Now

Wave 1 carried the month on name recognition. Wave 2 is doing something different, stacking indies, one cult-classic JRPG, and a couple of strategic Day One bets, and letting the catalogue breadth speak for itself. With the rumoured first-party cloud-gaming tier and ongoing conversation around pricing, how Game Pass handles smaller, weirder releases like Kiln and Vampire Crawlers is arguably more revealing than which AAA names it can grab on launch day.

The post Xbox Game Pass April 2026 Wave 2 – Vampire Crawlers, Aphelion, Final Fantasy V And Every New Game appeared first on Shane the Gamer.

Bandai Namco has officially confirmed Dragon Ball Xenoverse 3, ending months of speculation that started when the project was first teased as “Age 1000” earlier this year. The reveal headlined Dragon Ball Games Battle Hour 2026 in Los Angeles, where the publisher also dropped news on Sparking Zero, FighterZ, Xenoverse 2 and Gekishin Squadra.

The next Xenoverse is scheduled to launch in 2027 on PlayStation 5, Xbox Series X|S and PC via Steam, almost a full decade after Xenoverse 2 hit shelves in October 2016.

What Bandai Namco Revealed About Xenoverse 3

The announcement trailer runs nearly four minutes and sets the new game in an entirely fresh corner of the Dragon Ball universe. The story jumps to Age 1000, a timeline where West City has grown into a sprawling hub that serves as the central setting for the adventure.

Players are recruited into the ranks of the Great Saiyan Squad, fighting alongside both familiar and original allies. Bulma appears in the trailer with English voice acting, and a brief shot around the 30-second mark shows what looks like Piccolo’s cape from behind, hinting at returning faces beyond the new cast.

As with previous Xenoverse titles, character creation sits at the heart of the experience. The trailer leans into this with several stand-ins for custom characters, signalling the series will keep its trademark “make your own Saiyan” hook.

Akira Toriyama’s Final Contributions Are In The Game

Despite Akira Toriyama’s passing in 2024, Xenoverse 3 features original work from the Dragon Ball creator, including never-before-seen characters and key world-building elements. His name appears prominently early in the trailer.

Development on the project reportedly began in the late 2010s, with more than half a decade invested in building out the new world. That long runway explains how Toriyama was able to contribute so heavily before his death, and it puts Xenoverse 3 in rare company as one of the last games carrying his direct creative input.

How The Reveal Played Out Before The Confirmation

The road to this announcement was bumpy. The project first surfaced publicly in January as a mysterious “Age 1000” tease, leaving fans to guess what it actually was. A chunk of the community speculated it could be a successor to Dragon Ball Online, the 2010 MMORPG that never officially launched in the West.

That theory was dented in February when Bandai Namco’s Southeast Asian YouTube channel briefly published material that effectively leaked the game as a Xenoverse sequel. Battle Hour 2026 has now closed the loop with the full trailer and a confirmed 2027 release window.

Everything Else Bandai Namco Showed At Battle Hour 2026

Xenoverse 3 was the headline, but the two-day event packed in updates across the rest of the Dragon Ball games lineup. Here is how the other reveals stack up.

Xenoverse 2 Wraps Up With Future Saga Chapter 4

Xenoverse 2 is heading toward its endgame. Future Saga Chapter 4 was officially revealed as the final DLC for the title, launching in Summer 2026. The chapter is being framed as a climactic farewell to a story that has run for nearly a decade, with the trailer ending on the line “this summer, the last patrol begins.”

Goku SS4 Daima Lands In FighterZ Next Week

Dragon Ball FighterZ gets its next Daima DLC fighter on 22 April, with Goku in his Super Saiyan 4 Daima form joining the roster.

His kit revolves around Wild Dash, a versatile move that branches into four follow-ups.

• Double Combination: a pressure strike that stays safe even when blocked
• Raging Strike: launches opponents upward and feeds into Super Dash combos
• Power Swing: a command throw that breaks guard but whiffs on crouching opponents
• Quick Move: an invincible advance designed to shut down counter attempts

Sparking Zero Adds GT Fighters And A Solo Mode

The Super Limit-Breaking NEO DLC for Sparking Zero brings Vegeta (GT) and Trunks (GT) into a Budokai Tenkaichi game for the first time, alongside a new costume and Super Attack for Goku (Z – End) tied to a fan-favourite moment. The update also introduces Limit Breaker Journey, a solo mode where players grind EXP through battles and events to power up unlocked characters outside of the main story.

Gekishin Squadra Gets A Crossover And A World Championship

The free-to-play Gekishin Squadra is leaning into both fan service and competition. A crossover with Xenoverse 2 will add new hero skins and emotes, with full details still to come. The bigger news is the game’s first offline World Championship, which will fly top players from different servers to Japan to crown a World No. 1. A Half-Year Anniversary campaign with new heroes, emotes and reward events is already live.

Where Xenoverse 3 Sits In The Wider Dragon Ball Pipeline

With Xenoverse 2 officially winding down, Sparking Zero still rolling out DLC and Gekishin Squadra building a competitive scene, Xenoverse 3 inherits the mantle as Bandai Namco’s next big console-scale Dragon Ball project. The 2027 window gives the publisher room to keep monetising the existing slate through 2026 before pivoting attention to the new title.

Wishlists are open now on PlayStation, Xbox and Steam, and Bandai Namco is expected to drip more details through the back half of 2026 as the marketing cycle builds toward launch.

The post Dragon Ball Xenoverse 3 Confirmed for 2027 on PS5, Xbox Series X|S and PC appeared first on Shane the Gamer.

Capcom’s brand-new sci-fi action game Pragmata has shifted over one million copies worldwide in just two days, the publisher confirmed in a press release on 20 April 2026. That is a strong opening for any title, but it lands harder when you remember Pragmata is a fresh IP with no franchise weight behind it, no familiar faces on the cover, and a development cycle that stretched four years past its original target.

The game launched on 17 April 2026 across PlayStation 5, Xbox Series X|S, PC, and Nintendo Switch 2, with the Switch 2 version arriving in Japan and the rest of Asia on 24 April. Capcom credited the early playable demo and its multi-platform rollout, particularly the day-one Switch 2 support, for getting Pragmata in front of a wider audience than a brand-new IP would normally reach.

Capcom Confirms The One Million Milestone

The official announcement came directly from Capcom’s investor relations channel, framing Pragmata as a deliberate test of the company’s ability to launch original properties without leaning on Resident Evil or Monster Hunter recognition. Capcom described the title as built primarily by a team of younger developers, with a gameplay loop that fuses third-person action with puzzle elements set in a near-future lunar world ruled by rogue AI.

In its statement, the development team said Pragmata “represents a new challenge for Capcom, built from the ground up with an original world and gameplay concept,” adding that the company would continue working to broaden the game’s audience.

A Launch Four Years Later Than Planned

Pragmata was first revealed in June 2020 with a 2022 release window, then pushed to 2023, then to “TBD,” before finally locking in its April 2026 date. The original reveal trailer leaned heavily on atmosphere, a ghostly cat, an astronaut, and a young android girl in what looked like New York but was actually the Moon, without showing any real gameplay. That mystery sustained interest through the delays, but it also meant Capcom had to do most of its actual marketing work in the final stretch before launch.

The two-day milestone suggests that gamble worked. Hitting one million units this quickly typically requires either an established fanbase or aggressive pre-launch hype, and Pragmata leaned almost entirely on the latter, supported by the demo that dropped ahead of release.

Read More: Street Fighter Trailer Drops And It Actually Looks Like the Game for Once

Read More: Resident Evil Requiem Sales Pass 6 Million, Fastest In Series History

Steam Reviews Push Pragmata Into Capcom’s All-Time Top Tier

On the review side, Pragmata is performing nearly as well as it is commercially. The Steam page sits at “Overwhelmingly Positive” with 97 percent of English-language reviews recommending it, and 93 percent positive when all languages are included. SteamDB rankings put Pragmata among Capcom’s best-rated Steam releases ever, sitting just three percentage points behind the Resident Evil 4 Remake, which holds the top spot at 96 percent.

Critic scores tell a similar story. Metacritic has the game at 90 user score, with platform critic averages landing in the 86 to 88 range. OpenCritic shows a top critic average of 87 with a 95 percent recommendation rate. Concurrent player counts on Steam peaked at around 68,000, which is modest compared to Capcom’s franchise blockbusters but solid for an unproven IP without multiplayer hooks.

How Pragmata Stacks Up Against Capcom’s Other 2026 Releases

Capcom has had an unusually strong year, and Pragmata is the third major hit in a row. Here is how it compares to the publisher’s other 2026 releases at the same early-window mark.

The headline difference is that Resident Evil Requiem and Monster Hunter releases come into launch with a built-in audience expecting a specific experience. Pragmata had to build that audience from scratch and is still keeping pace on review quality, even if the raw sales numbers are smaller.

What Pragmata’s Success Signals For Capcom’s New IP Strategy

Capcom has historically been cautious about original IPs, with Exoprimal serving as a recent reminder of how badly a new property can land when it does not click with players. Pragmata’s reception, both commercial and critical, gives the publisher a working template for future originals, namely a strong demo, a multi-platform launch including handheld, and enough development time to actually finish the game properly even if that means missing the original window by years.

The game’s commercial trajectory is worth watching over the next few weeks. One million in two days is a strong opening, but Capcom typically reports milestones in much larger increments for its established franchises. If Pragmata maintains pace, it could push the publisher to greenlight more original projects rather than defaulting to remakes and sequels.

The post Pragmata Hits 1 Million Sales in 2 Days as Capcom’s New IP Bet Pays Off appeared first on Shane the Gamer.