Almost exactly five years since the longest actor's strike in US history came to a close, video game voice actors are in the spotlight once again. Back in 2017, it was about voice actors refusing to work with publishers like Activision and Take-Two over fair payment concerns. Now, a fiery controversy surrounding Nintendo and Platinum's upcoming Bayonetta 3 has reignited the debate over fair pay for voice actors in the video game industry.

It all started over a week ago, when former Bayonetta voice actor Hellena Taylor released a thread of videos on Twitter claiming she was offered only $4,000 in total to reprise the role for Platinum and Nintendo's upcoming Bayonetta 3. In addition, Taylor asked fans to boycott the game and instead donate the money they would have spent on it to charity.

In the middle of the ensuing social media firestorm, a conversation surrounding voice actor wages in the video game industry started to develop, with some actors sharing their accounts of how much they were paid for taking on certain roles.

Then, the story took a new turn. On Tuesday, a report from Bloomberg (and later corroborated by VGC) revealed that Platinum allegedly attempted to hire Taylor for five four-hour sessions at a rate between $3,000 and $4,000 apiece. This would have put Taylor's total compensation for Bayonetta 3 at $15,000, much higher than the amount she claimed she was offered. Taylor has since released a new statement, saying she was in fact offered $15,000 for the role.

Through all of the drama and changes to the story, though, there's still a very real discussion to be had surrounding pay and workload in the voice actor industry. So, IGN sought out to learn the following: what is the standard rate for a voice actor, and what is the workload like? IGN spoke to three people in the voice actor industry to find out.

What Voice Actors Get Paid, and How Much Work it Takes

As with any industry, a voice actor's compensation greatly fluctuates depending on the scope of a project and the resources from a studio. We spoke to one voice actor with experience on multiple AAA titles who chose to remain anonymous. It's worth noting that we spoke to this actor before the Bloomberg report changed the discourse surrounding the Bayonetta situation, when $4,000 was still the primary number being thrown around.

"[Four-thousand dollars] is slightly more than I got paid for being a supporting character in a fighting game," the actor said. "I had like three sessions, and it was a union game… It was a lot of work. It was ‘efforts’, which is getting hit, attacking, and all that. [It was] the story mode, the arcade mode, and it was a lot of work. And I'm a supporting character, I'm not even a main character."

The actor mentioned it was a union job, which is a huge factor in determining how much these performers get paid. The union that represents voice actor talent in the video game industry is SAG-AFTRA, and the actor we spoke to is a member of that union. In a document from SAG-AFTRA detailing the minimum wages their members will work for, it shows that one day has a going rate of somewhere between $900 and $1000.

We also spoke with Sean Chiplock, the actor who voiced Revali in both The Legend of Zelda: Breath of the Wild and its spinoff, Hyrule Warriors: Age of Calamity, in addition to Teba and The Great Deku Tree. On Twitter, Chiplock revealed he was paid between $2,000 and $3,000 per game, which was higher than normal because he was voicing three separate characters.

I was paid approx $2,000-$3000 overall because it was based on the total number of hours in the studio (which was higher because of voicing 3 characters in a single game).

I made MORE from voicing Spade/Dail in Freedom Planet 1 because *that* generously gave me sales royalties. https://t.co/37tDNdshOU

— Sean Chiplock @ Anime Texas (Woodlands, TX) (@sonicmega) October 15, 2022

Chiplock had two offscreen lines in the Detective Pikachu movie, and the actor said he earned more from those two lines alone than he did for the entirety of Breath of the Wild and Age of Calamity. This is because actors earn royalties for film/television, with Chiplock adding he still gets checks from his work on Detective Pikachu.

Speaking to IGN, Chiplock said the general sentiment is "the cost of living — and corporate profits — continues to increase, but none of that is reflected in the payments made to those who help these games see success". The actor is a big proponent of royalties or residuals for voice talent, adding "the major concern is that despite the video game industry reaching literal billions in profits for companies each year, video games do not currently offer royalties to any members who work on them nor is there any precedent."

The actor pointed out the 2016 SAG-AFTRA strike as a turning point for gaming contracts in some regards, but that the union did not manage to get royalties/residuals added as part of those adjustments.

The SAG-AFTRA union does impose limits on how long a "day" or "session" is in the industry. According to the union's wage sheet, one "session" is a maximum of a 4-hour day, and the anonymous actor we spoke to said there are limits imposed if a session is vocally stressful. This includes combat scenarios that would include a lot of screaming, grunting, or other "efforts", as they are called in the industry. The anonymous actor we spoke to shared their experience in a vocally stressful role, saying it's very taxing on the body.

"[One AAA game I worked on] was two sessions, and that was a ton of work… My voice was shredded after that. Because it's a lot of screaming, and getting thrown across the room, and now you're getting punched… That was two sessions, and was also union — that was less than $4,000, but it was a ton of work."

The Race to the Bottom: The Problems with Non-Union Voice Acting Gigs

Where things start to get murkier for voice actor pay is when actors take non-union jobs. This happens when a studio doesn't go through SAG-AFTRA to hire talent, but rather hires individual actors themselves. According to our source, the standard rate for non-union video game work is $250 dollars an hour. This number has been corroborated by many other voice actors, but as voice actor Ben Diskin pointed out on Twitter, this rate only stays steady if enough voice actors continue to demand it. In an ideal world, all studios would respect this going rate, but as you might expect, that's not always how things go down.

As our source put it, "If you're working non-union, there's really no oversight", and in some cases, the rulebook is thrown out the window. As in any creative industry, opportunity can outweigh compensation if it means another credit on your resume, or a shot at appearing in a desirable game or role. While $250 is the industry standard for non-union jobs, some actors will participate in a "race to the bottom" just to make sure they secure the role they want. According to our source, some studios are unwilling to meet that $250 benchmark, which leads to difficult decisions for voice actors.

"Six hours at $100 an hour is $600… Everyone wants $600 for doing what they love, right? But then it becomes easier and easier to take advantage of people who really want in… Because there are so many people who really want to do this. So it's a slippery slope. People who want these roles, if you do it for less than the industry standard it's going to end up hurting everyone. It's not healthy for the environment if you are kowtowing to people just to say, 'I really, really want to be in this, I'll do it for whatever', that hurts everyone. It's just not a good idea to do it… but people are still gonna do it. Because they really want to be in games… but it sucks and it hurts everyone, and I wish people would understand that."

This "race to the bottom" when negotiating non-union jobs is especially prevalent in the indie game space. We spoke to Eliana Zebro, who has experience as a voice director working on indie games. They told IGN they are consistent advocates of wage increases for voice actors working on indie games, and shared with us some of the low rates these voice actors just starting out will accept to get their foot in the door.

"So many indie projects especially have low, low VA rates — mere dollars per final line delivered, or worse, a flat rate for an entire project that means well under a dollar per line," Zebro said. "Two dollars per line in the indie space is incredibly common. Some projects pay even lower rates, or a low flat rate for tens or hundreds of lines. And some indie projects are completely unpaid, and sometimes that’s even if the final product will cost money!"

In union jobs, actors get paid per session, which doesn't necessarily count the time spent preparing for the role ahead of time, by either practicing the voice or reading over the lines. As a voice director, Zebro said they expected actors to come into the session with some prep work already completed before hitting record.

"The workload on a video game for a VA greatly varies based on the scope of the game, how big the VA’s character’s role is, if the game has full or partial voice acting, and many other factors. As for prep, as a voice director, I do expect the VA to have at least looked at the script — if not practiced lines as well — before our recording session."

A 'Desperate Attempt to Get Character Credits'

In many cases, an actor wants to take a role not for the paycheck, but for the valuable experience it will net them in the long run. Zebro told us that getting specific, named characters can go a long way in landing gigs in bigger titles. This can cause an actor to sign on to a project for less than what they're worth, just to get that credit in their portfolio.

"In my observation, the biggest aspect of VA that I’ve seen is a desperate attempt to get character credits," Zebro said. "Have characters, besides unnamed characters — Soldier A, Townsperson, roles of that ilk — and fandub characters, that a VA can point to and say, 'I voiced that.' And the process of getting those credits involves auditioning for even badly paid projects, because even if it pays poorly, a VA can still add that character credit to their resume… Most VAs want — need — character credits to advance in their career, and they have been exploited by folks wishing to take advantage of that fact."

Low pay for projects means many voice actors don't make enough to get by on these gigs alone. Zebro said many voice actors they know have a second source of income unrelated to the video game industry to make ends meet.

On the other end of the spectrum, many of the most popular and high-profile voice actors without a second job rely on conventions for income. Appearing at comic-cons, streaming on Twitch, or otherwise promoting their own personal brand can be a huge chunk of a voice actor's income that can in some cases outperform what they may make for the voice work itself. For many voice actors Zebro knows, it seems that becoming famous enough to get invited to conventions is the goal not just because of the fame, but because of the essential revenue stream.

The sustainability of an industry can come into question when high-end voice talent has to rely on profiting off of their own brand to make a comfortable living. And now, the industry is looking forward, as the current SAG-AFTRA union contract is set to expire in two weeks. According to Stephen Totilo of Axios, there are currently ongoing negotiations that could result in a new contract, or an extension of the current deal. Whether it makes any meaningful changes to voice actors' pay remains to be seen.

Looking at the top of the industry, there aren't many publicized examples of how much a voice actor gets paid for playing the lead role in a AAA game. One notable instance dates all the way back to 2008, where Michael Hollick — who voiced Grand Theft Auto IV protagonist Niko Bellic — spoke out against Rockstar Games over his compensation. Bellic was apparently paid around $100,000 over the course of 15 months, with no residuals. At the time, Hollick said, "But it's tough, when you see Grand Theft Auto IV out there as the biggest thing going right now, when they're making hundreds of millions of dollars, and we don't see any of it."

Years later, on an episode of the Play, Watch, Listen podcast, popular voice actor Troy Baker voiced his opinion on Hollick's problems with Rockstar. Baker implied that $100,000 is a significant amount of money for a single role, and shared some issues with the call for residuals. While Baker said there should be some form of residuals for voice actors, the actor argued that it could work for actors working with top developers that ship financially lucrative games like Call of Duty, Grand Theft Auto, or Red Dead, but the system would fail for studios that aren't guaranteed that same financial success.

"What would end up happening is [smaller developers] would scope their game, and they would hire less actors, so less people would work, so it actually goes against what people actually wanted to do," Baker said.

On the same podcast, video game composer Austin Wintory argued that mandated residuals could also lead to legal departments requiring studios to only hire non-union actors to sidestep the requirement. They argued that with so many studios struggling to profit or break even on their games, making residuals was a tough and unlikely task.

But the bottom line is that right now, voice actor pay is widely different across the board, depending on if it's a union job or not, or if it's in the indie scene or on a AAA project. And, despite the constantly shifting narrative of the Bayonetta 3 controversy, the people we spoke to seemed grateful that this conversation is a byproduct of this past week’s industry drama. As Zebro put it, "there is so much more work to do in getting voice actors paid their worth."

Logan Plant is a freelance writer at IGN

Today is a sad day. Joe Skrebels is moving onto pastures new, but before he does, just had to come and tell everyone how good Marvel Snap is. He's joined by Cardy, Matt, and Dale as they talk through this years Call of Duty Modern Warfare 2 campaign, Resident Evil Village's DLC, Barbarian, and The Bear.

If you're into it, get tickets for our live show in London on December 2nd here: https://www.eventbrite.com/e/ign-uks-the-podcast-before-christmas-tickets-445286492887

Got a game for us to play or some feedback you'd like read out on the show? Why not email us: ign_ukfeedback@ign.com.

IGN UK Podcast #668: Goodbye Beef Boy Joe

• IGN UK Podcast #667: God of War Ragnarok Early Impressions
• IGN UK Podcast #666: Our Hidden Horror Picks
• IGN UK Podcast #665: Building Our Dream Video Game Adaptation Streaming Services
• IGN UK Podcast #664: Our Favourite First-Person Shooters
• IGN UK Podcast #663: Professor Layton and the Sludge-Guts of Doom

Today is a sad day. Joe Skrebels is moving onto pastures new, but before he does, just had to come and tell everyone how good Marvel Snap is. He's joined by Cardy, Matt, and Dale as they talk through this years Call of Duty Modern Warfare 2 campaign, Resident Evil Village's DLC, Barbarian, and The Bear.

If you're into it, get tickets for our live show in London on December 2nd here: https://www.eventbrite.com/e/ign-uks-the-podcast-before-christmas-tickets-445286492887

Got a game for us to play or some feedback you'd like read out on the show? Why not email us: ign_ukfeedback@ign.com.

IGN UK Podcast #668: Goodbye Beef Boy Joe

• IGN UK Podcast #667: God of War Ragnarok Early Impressions
• IGN UK Podcast #666: Our Hidden Horror Picks
• IGN UK Podcast #665: Building Our Dream Video Game Adaptation Streaming Services
• IGN UK Podcast #664: Our Favourite First-Person Shooters
• IGN UK Podcast #663: Professor Layton and the Sludge-Guts of Doom

Square Enix has explained the eight different magical parkour abilities in Forspoken that allow the player to speed, scale, and soar around the world of Athia.

Detailed in a PlayStation Blog post, the different skills won't all be unlocked from the beginning, but protagonist Frey will likely accrue them fairly quickly as developer Luminous Productions appears to be focusing greatly on traversal.

Flow is the most basic of the parkour abilities and seemingly the first that Frey will learn. It lets the player sprint through the map at great speeds, jumping over any objects that get in the way like small rocks or walls.

It does require stamina, however, but the Rush ability acts as a workaround here as it allows Frey to maintain her top speeds without draining her energy. Orange flames will occasionally appear around the character, and pressing Circle at this moment causes Frey to burst forward even faster without using stamina.

Chaining traversal abilities together like this is a key mechanic in Forspoken, and when mastered can be used to zip around the map regardless of the terrain. Players can also perform a low jump with the Shimmy ability, double-jump with Scale, and climb a cliff-face with Soar, for example.

When jumping from the top of those cliffs, the Float ability puts Frey in a water bubble that acts as a glider, and she also has what's essentially a grapple ability, called Zip, that can be used for traversal or as a dodging mechanic in combat.

Finally, for getting across bodies of water, Frey can essentially turn into Frozone from The Incredibles and create an icy surfboard to maintain her speed even across lakes and rivers.

Forspoken was first announced as Project Athia in 2020 but rebranded a year later, announcing boldly that it aimed to use its open world and Frey's magical abilities to create the "highest quality visuals ever". It was delayed in March this year and will now be released for PlayStation 5 and PC on January 24, 2023.

Ryan Dinsdale is an IGN freelancer. He'll talk about The Witcher all day.

Square Enix has explained the eight different magical parkour abilities in Forspoken that allow the player to speed, scale, and soar around the world of Athia.

Detailed in a PlayStation Blog post, the different skills won't all be unlocked from the beginning, but protagonist Frey will likely accrue them fairly quickly as developer Luminous Productions appears to be focusing greatly on traversal.

Flow is the most basic of the parkour abilities and seemingly the first that Frey will learn. It lets the player sprint through the map at great speeds, jumping over any objects that get in the way like small rocks or walls.

It does require stamina, however, but the Rush ability acts as a workaround here as it allows Frey to maintain her top speeds without draining her energy. Orange flames will occasionally appear around the character, and pressing Circle at this moment causes Frey to burst forward even faster without using stamina.

Chaining traversal abilities together like this is a key mechanic in Forspoken, and when mastered can be used to zip around the map regardless of the terrain. Players can also perform a low jump with the Shimmy ability, double-jump with Scale, and climb a cliff-face with Soar, for example.

When jumping from the top of those cliffs, the Float ability puts Frey in a water bubble that acts as a glider, and she also has what's essentially a grapple ability, called Zip, that can be used for traversal or as a dodging mechanic in combat.

Finally, for getting across bodies of water, Frey can essentially turn into Frozone from The Incredibles and create an icy surfboard to maintain her speed even across lakes and rivers.

Forspoken was first announced as Project Athia in 2020 but rebranded a year later, announcing boldly that it aimed to use its open world and Frey's magical abilities to create the "highest quality visuals ever". It was delayed in March this year and will now be released for PlayStation 5 and PC on January 24, 2023.

Ryan Dinsdale is an IGN freelancer. He'll talk about The Witcher all day.

Elon Musk has officially completed his $44 billion deal to take over Twitter, and he has already fired the social media company's CEO, CFO, its head of legal policy, trust, and safety, and its general counsel.

As reported by Bloomberg, this means Twitter is now a private company that is wholly owned by Musk now that he has completed the deal that saw him pay $54.20 per share in a cash transaction that totaled roughly $44 billion.

As for the firings, first up is Twitter CEO Parag Agrawal, who took on the role back in November 2021 after co-founder Jack Dorsey resigned from the position. Agrawal has been with Twitter for over a decade, and he previously held the position of Chief Technology Officer.

The writing appeared to be on the wall for Agrawal as Musk had previously said that he doesn't "have confidence in management" in an early filing about the deal. The two have also had some public feuds on Twitter itself, including one where Musk replied to a Tweet by Agrawal about "defending the company’s user metrics by tweeting back a poop emoji."

Texts were also revealed during the deal process that showed more conflict between the two.

"You are free to tweet ‘is twitter dying?’ or anything else about Twitter,” Agrawal wrote to Musk on April 9, “but it’s my responsibility to tell you that it’s not helping me make Twitter better in the current context.”

Musk responded by saying "What did you get done this week," and then he said, "i'm not joining the board this is a waste of time." He also questioned his decision to go to Hawaii for a vacation during negotiations for the deal.

"Shouldn't [Agrawal] be in the war room right now?!?" Musk's friend and investor Jason Calacanis said.

"Does doing occasional zoom calls while drinking fruity cocktails at the Four Seasons count?" Musk responded.

While the move may be a bit of a shock, Agrawal will still walk away with 100% of his unvested equity awards, meaning he will make an estimated $42 million.

Vijae Gadde, Twitter's head of legal, policy, and trust, was in charge of enforcing and creating the rules for the platform, and it looks like some of those plans may be up for some revision.

Musk has previously said he was planning on making it a "less-restrictive platform for free speech," in a move that he deems is "essential to a functioning democracy." Some believe these words may mean some users who were blocked from the platform for dangerous and or offensive content, including Donald Trump, may be reinstated under Musk's regime.

Chief financial officer Ned Segal is another one of the top executives who has officially been cut from the company, and he has been with Twitter since 2017. Lastly, general counsel Sean Edgett is also out, and he had been with the company since 2012. These four likely won't be the last as Musk is reportedly planning on cutting 5,500 jobs, or 75% of Twitter's workforce, in the future.

After making the initial $44 billion deal to purchase Twitter, Musk terminated the deal after, among other things, Musk claimed a breach of contract after he said Twitter wasn't doing enough to reveal how many spam bots and fake accounts were on the platform. He was sued for this termination and was set to go to court if he didn't complete the deal by October 28, but he made it so just under the wire.

Have a tip for us? Want to discuss a possible story? Please send an email to newstips@ign.com.

Adam Bankhurst is a news writer for IGN. You can follow him on Twitter @AdamBankhurst and on Twitch.

The upcoming Yellowstone prequel series, 1923, will debut later this year.

Paramount+ has announced that 1923 will head to the online streaming service on December 18 in the US and Canada, premiering on December 19 in the UK and Europe.

1923 is said to introduce a “new generation” of the Dutton family – owners of the largest ranch in Montana and the family at the heart of Yellowstone.

The show will star Harrison Ford as Jacob Dutton along with Helen Mirren as his wife, Cara.

1923 will explore how “pandemics, historic drought, the end of Prohibition, and the Great Depression all plague the mountain west and the Duttons who call it home.”

Additionally, Timothy Dalton will play a major villain in the upcoming show. Dalton will star as Donald Whitfield – a “powerful, self-confident man who reeks of wealth and the lack of empathy it requires to attain it.” He’s said to be “intimidating and nefarious and is used to getting what he wants.”

1923 was originally titled 1932 before the setting was later changed to follow the Dutton family throughout the fallout of World War I and into the Great Depression.

“1923 focuses on the Dutton family’s next two generations as they struggle to survive historic drought, lawlessness, and prohibition,” said the official synopsis. “And an epidemic of cattle theft; all battled beneath the cloud of Montana’s great depression, which preceded the nation by almost a decade.”

Meanwhile, the fifth season of Yellowstone is due to debut on Paramount Network on November 13 with a special two-hour event.

1923 will star Harrison Ford, Helen Mirren, Brandon Sklenar, Darren Mann, Michelle Randolph, James Badge Dale, Marley Shelton, Brian Geraghty, Aminah Nieves, Julia Schlaepfer, and Jerome Flynn.

Taylor Sheridan created both Yellowstone and 1923 and is on board as executive producer alongside John Linson, Art Linson, David C. Glasser, Ron Burkle, David Hutkin, Bob Yari, and Ben Richardson.

The series is produced by MTV Entertainment Studios, 101 Studios, and Bosque Ranch Productions.

Want to read more? Check out IGN’s top 25 westerns of all time.

Ryan Leston is an entertainment journalist and film critic for IGN. You can follow him on Twitter.

Steam’s Big Picture mode on PC will now adopt the specially designed Steam Deck UI.

Valve has announced that its newest update to Big Picture mode will bring the Steam Deck’s UI to PC and is available now for testing.

“We are preparing to update Big Picture mode with the new interface we designed for Steam Deck, and today we’re making it available for testing,” they revealed. “This update has been a long time coming, and we’re very excited to start gathering community feedback.”

The controller-first interface was designed especially for the Steam Deck, but its integration into Steam makes sense – providing greater brand recognition between the Steam Deck and the Steam library on PC.

And it happens to be a pretty decent interface, too.

“This controller-first interface was designed for Steam Deck in handheld and docked mode, and is perfect for all the scenarios Big Picture mode currently handles,” they confirmed.

The new Big Picture mode includes:

• New Home Screen that highlights recent games and what’s news in your library.
• New Universal Search that lets you search through your Library, Store, and Friends list.
• New Controller Configurator that’s designed to let you choose new configurations and layouts with ease.
• Optimised Stead Store for controller navigation.
• Updated in-game overlay giving access to achievements and guides.
• New System menu for quick navigation to different parts of the new UI.
• New Quick Access Menu that lets you access notifications. Friends list, quick settings, and more.

According to Valve, the team is “still polishing rough edges” so the new version of Big Picture is currently offered through Steam’s beta program.

Instructions for trying out the new Big Picture mode can be found here.

IGN’S Steam Deck review gave it 7/10 and said: “When the Steam Deck is living up to its promises, it's absolutely incredible. Playing GTA 5, God of War, and other modern games on the go is an absolute joy, and the hardware and controls feel good to hold even though it’s a big chubby boy of a handheld. It seriously impressed me with how nice some demanding modern games look on its 7-inch screen. But those dizzying highs are all too often snapped away by insurmountable compatibility issues with SteamOS and installing Windows to get around those comes with its own set of problems. I’ve lost count of how often I’ve been left frustrated and annoyed to have to troubleshoot issues when trying to play a game for the first time.”

Want to read more about the Steam Deck? Check out the record-breaking number of Steam users last weekend as well as how to skip the Steam Deck’s opening movie.

Ryan Leston is an entertainment journalist and film critic for IGN. You can follow him on Twitter.

You want games? Good news. Today, we got new looks at an absolute deluge of games via the MIX Next event, combined with a Publisher Spotlight event and Black Voices in Gaming. Between the three, we saw somewhere close to 100 games - if you haven't seen the entire presentation, give it a look, as there's likely something in there to appeal to every taste, genre, and fanbase.

For our part, there were ten games that really stood out between the three presentations, and we opted to highlight them below. If you're just looking for a quick, broad look at some of the truly standout stuff from the last few hours, look no further. Here are our ten favorite games from MIX Next 2022:

Paper Cut Mansion

One of the most instantaneously striking games from this entire showcase was Paper Cut Mansion, a haunted house roguelite. You play as a detective named Toby exploring the house to gather evidence to solve a mystery, fighting off enemies in top-down combat with permadeath and solving logic puzzles as you go. Paper Cut Mansion looks to be visually stunning, with the entire world - you, your enemies, the house, all the furniture, everything - made of paper, looking like highly detailed paper dolls and models. I want to play this just for the aesthetic vibes alone, and considering it's out today on Xbox and PC via Steam, Epic, and GOG, this might be the perfect haunted Halloween adventure.

Wavetale

One of my favorite genres of post-apocalyptic game is "the world was destroyed and all that's left are sky islands," but I didn't realize until I saw Wavetale how few versions of that actually involve a giant ocean instead of the sky. Wind Waker? Sea of Solitude maybe? That might be it.

Anyway, the trailer's slowly rolling motions of skating across ocean waves to soothing music immediately drew me into this 3D adventure and platformer (its other trailers are no slouches either). I want to become that beautiful waverunner, Sigrid, who armed with a net must defeat "an old nemesis" to save the citizens of her archipelago.

Ocean skating aside, I'm also really into the surge of games in this showcase more generally that are reexploring what 3D platforming might look like now that we have better technology and everything doesn't have to look like Banjo-Kazooie. Wavetale is coming out on December 12 on Switch, PS5, PS4, Xbox, and PC via Steam. There's a demo available on Steam now too, if you like.

Farewell North

No longer content to ask if we can pet the dog, Farewell North is instead asking the question, "Can you play as the dog?" Obviously, you can and do. Specifically, you're a collie traveling with its human through a series of Scotland-inspired islands that have been deprived of their color, which you'll restore as you go. It's full of perspective puzzles and hidden objects, with puzzles you'll have to solve using your unique canine abilities while your human interacts with the world using their own, very human tools.

Peaceful as it looks, Farewell North is a story about grief and how people deal with loss. You'll be restoring the human's memories and returning color to a black and white world, but you're also seeing it all through the eyes of a dog as it helps the person it loves learn to say goodbye. I'm here for the cute dog, but I anticipate staying for the emotional catharsis. Farewell North doesn't have a release date currently, but there's a demo on Steam right now.

Shumi Come Home

When I mentioned Wavetale above, I talked about how excited I was to see more games hearkening back to the good old classic 3D platforming era without necessarily leaning into their visual and level structure. Shumi Come Home, on the other hand, absolutely does that. It's a cute, nature-filled platformer about a little dude (Shumi, a sentient mushroom) trying to find its way home through a world that's far too big for it. It's immediately charming, with a very straightforward retroness to it that makes me immediately nostalgic for Donkey Kong's Fungi Forest — but how I remember it looking, not how it actually looked. Charming, whimsical, perfect for autumn (even though it's not out until the spring).

Specifically, Shumi Come Home is planned for release in spring 2023 on PC and Switch.

Schim

I've actually played a few minutes of Schim already, in a demo at Play Days earlier this year. But every time I see it, I am drawn in again by the wonderful puzzling concept of playing a funny little shadow frog that can only move within the shadows of objects, jumping from one to the next as he tries to track down the person he is the shadow of. It immediately lends itself to a distinctive visual style, and forces an uncommon perspective on otherwise mundane settings like a street corner, or a park.

The latest Schim trailer announces that it's "feature complete," with the team now focused on designing more levels. One feature this presentation showed off was the ability to change a level's color palette, acting as an accessibility feature for colorblind players as well as a fun way to customize levels as you play. You can take a look at the tool now at a website, too: schim.art

Schim is coming to PlayStation and PC via itch.io and Steam, and you can request access to a playtest via Steam right now.

Moonstone Island

Sure, I'm a sucker for cute, cozy games, but nothing grabbed me as strongly in the MIX showcase as Moonstone Island. It's a darling little life sim following an alchemist who, per their village tradition, must spend a year away from home to train their alchemy. While on Moonstone Island, they'll tame nature spirits, make friends, explore, and build a home as they restore the island. And es, there's romance and farming too!

But apart from just the cute critters, Moonstone Island is also a deckbuilding RPG of sorts with turn-based battles pitting your befriended spirits against enemies. The battle shown in the trailer was both adorable and had a somewhat Earthbound-y feel to it, given that the player was fighting using spirits of a lamp and a coffee cup on their team.

A lot was packed into the short trailer, and I'm curious to see how all Moonstone Island's systems end up interlocking and working together to make a full adventure. It's planned for release next year on Switch and PC.

My Work Is Not Yet Done

Trailer CW: Suicide, disturbing imagery

Hey, uh, what the heck??? What did I just watch?

My Work Is Not Yet Done was, of all the trailers in this showcase, the one that told me the least about what was actually going on in the game it represented. It also was the one that most made me want to learn more. Per its Steam page, I've figured out that it's a narrative-driven investigative horror game following a person named Avery. As the last member of an expedition to a remote wilderness, she tries to track down the source of a weird transmission as the landscape and reality shift around her. I'm not sure if there's any relation to the Thomas Ligotti short story collection of the same name about corporate workplaces, but given they're both horror-related, it's probable there's some throughline.

Again per its Steam page, My Work Is Not Yet Done is about "exploring the imbrication and dissolution of human identities/meanings within uncanny wilderness." I don't fully know what that means! That entire trailer was deeply upsetting! I also want to play this game! It's coming to PC via Steam at an unannounced later date.

Spiderheck

Now for something completely different. Spiderheck is a party game, a physics-based brawler where everyone is a spider with a lazer sword. That sentence alone sounds, to me, extremely cool, and the gameplay seems to bear that out. It's a bit reminscent of Heave-Ho in terms of the ways the spiders seem to move and swing about their environment, but instead of leapin over your friends to get to the finish line, you're pummeling them with lazer weapons, both melee and guns. It's the kind of silly party game that seems prone to devolve into a lot of drunken, good-natured yelling with the right crowd, good for local couch play or online hangouts over Discord. It's out now on Switch, PlayStation, Xbox, and PC via Epic Games Store and Steam.

Sucker for Love: First Date

This hilarious dating sim had me with the spot-on classic anime opening trailer, complete with "(Excited eldritch noises)". But the gameplay afterward looks like a blast — it's a visual novel, sure, but aside from chatting up your Lovecraftian hunnies, you're also performing dark rituals to summon them in the first place and keep them happy: closing the curtains, lighting the candles, saying the right words to bring them forth from the dark and make their ancient and precocious whims come true.

At the moment, there are three tentacled evil ladies to spend time with across three chapters, as the game's been out since January, but there's a sequel on the way called Date to Die For coming up soon, possibly even this year.

One Beat Min

Every time I think I've seen it all with rhythm games, something comes along and blows me away again. This time, it was One Beat Min, a rhythm game about beatboxing where players battle one another by challenging them to copy their beats back. The result is a fast-paced back and forth of four-button combos (at least in the trailer we just saw) where one player challenges, the other copies, then challenges back, and so forth. It combines typical rhythm game components like button matching and, you know, rhythm, with creativity in making something your opponent won't copy, and reading that same opponent and reacting quickly to them. Unfortunately, there aren't a lot of details out about One Beat Min just yet, so we don't know what platforms to expect it on or when it might be out. Hopefully we get to see more soon.

Rebekah Valentine is a news reporter for IGN. You can find her on Twitter @duckvalentine.

Alec Baldwin and his fellow Rust producers could face charges following an investigation into the death of cinematographer, Halyna Hutchins.

Although filming is due to resume in January 2023, the Santa Fe Sheriff’s Office has today submitted its investigation to prosecutors for consideration.

“[The DA’s office] will now begin a thorough review of the information and evidence to make a thoughtful, timely decision about whether to bring charges,” said a spokesperson for District Attorney Mary Carmack-Altwies in a statement (via Variety).

Halyna died on October 21, 2021, while filming Rust as the result of an on-set firearms incident.

According to initial reports, a prop Colt .45 was accidentally loaded with live ammunition – a fatal mistake when the gun discharged, killing Hutchins and injuring the film’s director, Joel Souza.

Shortly after the incident, it was revealed that Baldwin had been in possession of the firearm when it was discharged. However, Baldwin has since claimed that he did not pull the trigger.

Santa Fe investigators have reportedly focused on Hannah Gutierrez-Reed – the film’s armorer, who seems to have loaded the weapon with the live round.

The District Attorney has since applied for funding for up to four criminal trials in this case.

Additionally, the DA’s office issued a statement last Friday, on the anniversary of Hutchins’ death, stating that she “remains committed to pursuing justice for the victims, and getting answers for the community.”

Baldwin insists that he “didn’t pull the trigger” of the firearm that killed Hutchins.

“No no no, I would never point a gun at anyone and pull the trigger at them, never," Baldwin told ABC's George Stephanopoulos when asked whether he'd pulled the trigger. “Someone put a live bullet in a gun, a bullet that wasn't even supposed to be on the property.”

He also shared that he has been told that it’s unlikely he will face charges for the incident.

“No one is above the law and every victim deserves justice,” said spokesperson, Heather Brewer from the office of DA Carmack-Altwies.

Rust is a western set in 1880s Kansas, written by Baldwin himself. It tells the story of an outlaw, Harland Rust (Baldwin), who becomes a fugitive along with his thirteen-year-old grandson (Brady Noon) after rescuing him from being hanged after he’s sentenced to death for murder.

Over a year after the incident, this is the first sign that local law enforcement will bring charges.

Ryan Leston is an entertainment journalist and film critic for IGN. You can follow him on Twitter.