EA Sports has revealed Team 1 of FC 26’s Ultimate Scream promo, featuring the likes of Vini Jr, Rafael Leao and Saeed Al Owairan.

Ultimate Scream is a spooky, fan-favourite promo which has been absent from the packed Ultimate Team promo calendar for a full 5 seasons, but in FC 26 it’s back with a bit more of a balanced twist.

When do FC 26 Ultimate Scream cards upgrade?

Whereas previous Ultimate Scream cards would transform, like a werewolf, into ridiculously OP cards at certain times of the year before reverting back to their original form, in FC 26, Ultimate Scream cards are already boosted versions of various players from around the world who will receive extra boosts on the next two full moons.

That means your Ultimate Scream cards will get boosts like stat boosts, upgraded roles and PlayStyles on Wednesday November 5th and Thursday December 4th, 2025.

Some truly terrifying cards from the past include the beastly Bayo Akinfenwa from FIFA 17 and the unstoppable behemoth that was the Marouane Fellaini from FIFA 19, both of which were physical monsters who, when the moon was full, got upgraded with otherworldly speed which made them capable of inhuman feats of athleticism.

Who is in FC 26 Ultimate Scream Team 1?

Who of the current crop of FC 26 Ultimate Scream cards stands out as likely to make some controllers go bump in the night as they’re thrown across the living room? Well, EA Sports seem to have taken the opposite approach to those classic cards with Team 1 and boosted some already rapid players with better PlayStyles and likely better physicals.

Vini Jr with 95 Pace, 92 Dribbling and Low Driven Shot+ looks OP already, but it’s Debinha who really looks like one to watch with how great female players have been in FC 26.

Rafael Leao isn’t quite as good in FC 26 as last year, but remember he’s a 5-star skiller naturally and that Finesse+ PlayStyle could really liven up his end product.

Finally, loads of the Heroes look extremely tasty, or at least like they will find eating opposing teams extremely tasty.

Toto Di Natale has got the wrong holiday and gone full Nightmare Before Christmas (his name means Tony Christmas in Italian) but the 90+ trio of Pace, Shooting and Dribbling is unquestionable, while Hamsik’s Ultimate Scream card pushes him into the fabled “Gullit Gang” with all face stats over 80.

If Crouchy gets 99 Pace in one of the upgrades, then he probably has the most potential to go down in history as a hilariously OP card. He’s got massively buffed dribbling as well as Technical+, while his height and unique body gives him a bit of aura in-game when shielding the ball.

But, no stranger to dressing up after his now-legendary FIFA 23 Marvel Hero card, Saeed Al Owairan is the lowest rated Hero in Ultimate Scream, so does that mean he might actually be somewhat obtainable? Probably not. But with his base position switched to Striker, he could be set to terrorise Weekend League once again!

Here’s the full list of players in FC 26’s Ultimate Scream Team 1:

• Vini Jr - 90 Rated - ST - Real Madrid
• Joshua Kimmich - 89 Rated - RB - Bayern
• Debinha - 89 Rated - RW - KC Current
• Sakina Karchaoui - 88 Rated - LB - PSG
• Bryan Mbeumo - 87 Rated - ST - Manchester United
• Rafael Leao - 86 Rated - ST - Milano FC (AC Milan)
• Thomas Muller - 86 Rated - ST - Vancouver Whitecaps
• Nathan Tella - 86 Rated - CAM - Leverkusen
• Juan Cabal - 85 Rated - CB - Juventus
• Alex Berenguer - 85 Rated - CAM - Bilbao
• Pablo Fornals - 85 Rated - CM - Betis
• Madison Haley - 85 Rated - RW - Brighton
• Danny Da Costa - 84 Rated - RB - Mainz
• Guela Doue - 84 Rated - CB - Strasbourg
• Antonio Di Natale - 89 Rated - LW - Hero
• Javier Mascherano - 89 Rated - CDM - Hero
• Marek Hamsik - 88 Rated - CM - Hero
• Jorge Campos - 88 Rated - ST - Hero
• Peter Crouch - 87 Rated - CAM - Hero
• Saeed Al Owairan - 86 Rated - ST - Hero

For more on FC 26, check out our list of the best cheap players in Ultimate Team. Or for the next Career Mode legends, here are the best FC 26 Wonderkids.

This latest Honkai: Star Rail Special Program is over, and it brought us a lot of details about the game’s next major update, Version 3.7. As Tomorrow Became Yesterday is the name of the update, and it’s going to be in our hands on November 5.

The final chapter of the Amphoreous saga is upon us in Version 3.7, with the Astral Express crew having now joined with the Chrysos Heirs to confront Irontomb. The finale will give rise to a new Cosmic Alliance, one that will see everyone travel to the Ruins of Time, a new realm arriving with the update.

In gameplay terms, that means the Honkai: Star Rail roster will be expanded with new allies. Cyrene, who’s technically not a new character, becomes playable as part of this chapter.

Cyrene is a 5-Star Ice-Type, Path of the Remembrance character. Having her as part of your team increases everyone’s damage. Her active Skill further plays into that boost. When that Zone is deployed, any damage dealt by allies will trigger an added instance of True DMG.

Even when you’re not controlling her directly, every action taken by a party member adds stacks of Recollection for Cyrene. When that is full, she can unleash her Ultimate. There’s an even more powerful bonus the team gets the first time she activates her Ultimate: all of her teammates' Ultimates will go off, too, and the aforementioned Zone becomes permanently active.

That ultra-empowered state allows her to summon her memosprite form, a version of the character that can further enhance any teammate you like. If that teammate is a Chrysos Heir, they’ll get an extra special effect.

Version 3.7’s big gameplay addition is the new Currency Wars mode, where anyone can form teams of up to ten characters. Your team must effectively be split into active (On-field) and substitute (Off-field) characters.

In something of an EA FC Ultimate Team twist, if characters of the same combat type or faction fight side-by-side, they’re going to trigger unique Bond effects that boost their power. This mode is a permanent addition to the game, and will support 61 of the game’s characters at launch.

And if you don’t happen to have many (or all) of them, don’t worry, because all 61 will have a free trials available. Currency Wars has its own challenge rewards, as well as a reward system inspired by Divergent Universe where rewards will regularly rotate.

What is going to be available only for a limited time, of course, is the new Snack Dash event. This one is a bit on the light side, where you get to see Madam Ruan Mei's creations race across obstacle courses.

Finally, Topaz fans will be pleased to learn that she and her warp trotter companion Numby are joining the Exchange Shop roster, meaning that you'll no longer need to wait for her banner re-runs to obtain her or her Eidolons. It's also been announced that anyone logging in between Version 3.7 and Version 4.0 will receive a Golden Companion Spirit token that can be exchanged for a free copy of Luocha, Ruan Mei, or the aforementioned Topaz & Numby. Good news for F2P players looking to expand their teams!

Battlefield 6 is turning off full progression on Portal Custom Experiences, removing bots from Verified Experiences

Battlefield Studios is once again addressing Battlefield 6 Portal's bot XP farm problem, this time in the most aggressive way yet.

Most of us in the Battlefield community have been looking forward to the Season 1 reveal for Battlefield 6 all week, while everyone else has been dreading the arrival of some new rules for Portal, the mode where community-created content can be found.

Portal has been having a rough go of it, and most of it through faults of the main game. Namely: how slow weapon progression has been. BF6 players’ response was to create servers with inflated tickets and a lot of bots to make it easier for players to farm kills and XP very quickly.

That trend lasted for about a week before Battlefield Studios started cracking down on those servers, but the developer also boosted XP earn rates in the core game to compensate - even if many felt it didn’t go far enough.

Now, the developer is instituting more restrictive rules on what types of Portal servers can earn full XP. In a new blog post, BF Studios said that only Verified Experiences without bots will continue to grant full XP. In other words, if the experience has bots, it won’t earn the full suite of XP across account, weapons and so on.

You can still create Custom Experiences that include bots, but you’ll then have to contend with a reduced rate of progression. The same is also true for all other Custom Experiences, even if they do not include bots. These changes have been rolling out over the past several days, and the developer said in the post that it’s already seen a reduction in the number of PvE servers.

Bots may return in the future, but not before BF Studios explores “potential solutions that address current issues.” This leaves Verified Experience as the only type of Portal servers where you can earn full progression.

Verified Experiences alter some gameplay parameters without making major changes to the experience. Examples of that include infantry-only variants of Breakthrough, Hardcore versions of various game modes, and servers with exclusive rotations of certain maps and modes.

Those created by EA will have BFPortalOfficial, and BattlefieldOfficial listed as the creator of the experience.

What these changes don’t address, of course, are lingering frustrations about Battlefield 6’s progression system, particularly when it comes to challenges, many of which cannot be reasonably done in regular gameplay.

The blog post doesn’t offer solutions there, except promising that teams “are actively working on updates for challenges,” with details to arrive when they are available. Until then, you should probably make peace with the fact that you’ll have to grind XP in normal multiplayer.

Catch up on our latest Battlefield 6 coverage, such as the top meta weapons and builds so far, and our recommendations for the best vehicle loadouts.

When HoYoverse announced Petit Planet back in September, its Animal Crossing-like cozy life sim adventure, the studio kicked off sign-ups for the game’s upcoming beta. At the time, it didn’t say when we can expect it to kick off.

This changes today, however, as we now finally have a solid date for the Coziness Test.

The Petit Planet closed beta will kick off November 7, available on both PC and iOS. The even better news is that anyone who missed it initially can still sign up for the Coziness Test on the game’s website.

You’ll have to complete a survey before you can throw your name in the hat, and there’s no guarantee you’ll be picked, but it’s currently the only way to access the game. HoYoverse said it’s going to keep sign-ups open until further notice, too.

Petit Planet is the company’s first entry into the life sim genre. As seen in the initial reveal, the game blends elements from The Sims, and Animal Crossing to create a cozy game at a scale we haven’t seen before.

Players are entrusted with taking care of their own planet, taking part in all kinds of activities you might be familiar with from similar games in the genre. You’ll be making connections with your neighbors and benefit from their companionship in narrative, and gameplay-relevant ways.

You can also embark on adventures that take you beyond your own planet, called Starsea Voyages, which allow you to explore Islets using a unique vehicle. Petit Planet, of course, builds on the studio’s extensive experience with live service games to deliver some major social and multiplayer features, such as the Galactic Bazaar social hub - which will be available in the upcoming beta test.

Petit Planet does not yet have a release date, but it is in development for PC and iOS.

Watch the Battlefield 6 Season 1 trailer here for a look at the first new map coming to the game next week

If you can believe it, we're less than one week away from the launch of Battlefield 6's first season.

Battlefield Studios is officially unveiling the first post-launch season for Battlefield 6 today. We’re getting a trailer for Season 1, which we’ve technically known a few things about for a while.

Today, however, will bring us a first look at one of the new maps arriving with the new season.

Season 1 is set to launch on October 28 in Battlefield 6. The season is split into three stages, the first of which - Rogue Ops - is the one that will be hitting the game next week. Each release will bring new content to the game on somewhat of a monthly basis, with every season seemingly unfolding over different phases.

The biggest-ticket item of that first stage is, of course, the new Blackwell Fields map, which is what today’s trailer will show off for the first time - if you don’t count the Battlefield Labs leaks, because the map has been part of Labs testing for a while now.

Blackwell Fields is a large-scale map that includes land, and air vehicles. It takes place in an airbase in California, where large sections of the map are - true to the state’s nature - on fire.

Rogue Ops will also add a new mode seemingly inspired by Counter-Strike / Search and Destroy from Call of Duty. It’s called Strikepoint, and it’s a 4v4, single-life affair. Outside of maps and modes, BF6 is also getting a new Carbine - the SOR-300, a new Sniper Rifle - the Mini Fix, as well as a new Sidearm - the GGH-22, as part of the new season.

There’s also a new APC that will join the game’s existing roster of vehicles. Finally, you can look forward to two new attachments in that initial phase: the Rail Cover, and the Low Powered Variable Optic (LPVO).

The Season 1 reveal trailer will go live today at 8am PT, 11am ET, 4pm UK.

Arc Raiders server slam Steam numbers prove the extraction shooter is gonna be October's other major game

Arc Raiders has shown yet again that it's going to be one of the biggest games of the month, even in the face of giants like Battlefield 6.

Just a couple of hours ago, Arc Raiders servers went offline after a weekend of testing. The game hosted a three-day server slam event that included very limited content, and was mainly designed to push servers to their limits and test the game’s infrastructure.

At least in terms of raw player numbers, the event has been a success, attracting more players than the extraction shooter has ever seen with any of its previous tests.

Of course, all previous tests were, to varying degrees, closed or invite-only, which limited the number of people who could access them. The server slam, on the other hand, was open to everyone across all platforms.

Considering the anticipation the game has in the shooter space, especially from players looking for an accessible, polished extraction shooter, it’s no surprise that the test was as popular as it was. According to SteamDB, the server slam attracted 189,668 concurrent players at its peak on Friday.

This is well beyond what the May tech test managed to attract, though with the obvious caveat that it was invite-only.

All that interest also helped push Arc Raiders into Steam’s global top sellers list, where the game currently occupies the number three spot, just behind Counter-Strike 2 and Battlefield 6. It’s also worth noting that the game’s standard edition is the one charting so highly, which, considering the list is sorted by revenue, is a big deal. In essence, achieving such a high spot with a $40 price tag means that it has sold more copies than a $60 or $70 game in a comparable spot.

This all bodes very well for the game’s launch, which has a chance to beat those figures, as we’ve recently seen with Battlefield 6 beating its own beta records at launch, despite one being free and the other paid.

Not too long left now. Arc Raiders arrives October 30 on PC, PS5, and Xbox Series X/S.

After a successful first showcase in April earlier this year, Galaxies is back with its premier autumn showcase, promising to bring new info on a wealth of new games, with exclusive announcements, world premiers, and much more besides. If you're interested in smaller games with unique and interesting angles, you should do yourself a favour and tune into next week's showcase.

If you're keen to learn more about what the Galaxies team has been cooking up - with new announcements from the likes of Nacon, Saber Interactive, Team17, and more - here's what you need to know.

How to Watch

You can tune in on Twitch or YouTube, on 23rd October at 8pm GMT/ 9pm CEST / 12pm PST / 3pm EST to see what's due to arrive in the coming weeks, months and years. The event will be hosted once again by friend of VG247, Jane Douglas, returning after her stellar work in the showcase earlier this year. If you'd rather stay on VG247, you'll be able to watch the showcase on the homepage.

What to Expect

The biggest surprise of the presentation will be a trio of reveals of some anticipated games: there's an open-world survival/crafting title from Unifiq, PlaySide Studios will show off a new Dumb Ways to Die game for PC and Console (a series which has been confined to mobile and Meta Quest), and we'll get a first look at MOUSE: PI For Hire (an animated FPS that brings the world of crime noir to '30's cartoons - it looks really great).

Elsewhere, Team 17 is showing up with three indie titles and Nacon has a release date reveal for Cthulhu: The Cosmic Abyss, and a new look at Edge of Memories (which we enjoyed when we played it at Gamescom). Horror experts Blumhouse Games will also be at the event to talk about its games and show off a new trailer for Sleep Awake.

Speaking of horror, if you're a Dead by Daylight player, Behaviour Interactive will have exclusive Twitch Drops available to all Galaxies Showcase viewers, focused on the game's newest update, Sinister Grace.

Also expect announcements from Secret Mode, Fireshine, Owlcat Games, Noodle Cat Games, Big Fan Games (coming in with more Boltgun 2 info,) and ESDigital Games and Far Far Games present a brand-new trailer for Bylina, a skill-based action-RPG based on Slavic legends.

VG247 is a Galaxies media partner.

Battlefield 6 reverts Conquest ticket change one day after implementing it, so get ready for 45-minute matches

Battlefield Studios has changed Conquest ticket values for the different maps once again, this time doing the opposite of what it did last time.

Battlefield 6’s core gamemode, Conquest, is getting some adjustments yet again. One day after Battlefield Studios reduced the ticket count across all Conquest maps in order to improve the flow of matches, and prevent them from ending at the time limit rather than with one team winning.

The change wasn’t too drastic, but it was certainly impactful on the largest maps in the game. It doesn’t sound like players liked it, however, so it’s being reverted.

Moments ago, the developer announced on Twitter that it’s going to be increasing ticket counts across all maps in Conquest, bringing the total number of tickets to 1,000 on all maps. The 45-minute round timer is returning, too. Having been the two maps that saw the largest cut to tickets, Operation Firestorm, and Mirak Valley matches will now last longer than they did after the change. This is something the developer warned about in its message.

It’s not clear when, exactly, these changes will be implemented, but considering the initial change arrived in a server-side update, this one could be in the game at some point today or over the weekend.

One change that’s thankfully not being reverted, though, is the out of bounds timer on Manhattan Bridge (Conquest and Escalation) going up to ten seconds, which was another change that rolled out alongside the aforementioned ticket reduction.

On the subject of changes based on player feedback, Battlefield Studios also today responded to the overwhelming feedback about the excruciatingly slow process of unlocking weapon attachments, and climbing up the career ranks. The developer is increasing XP earn rates, and reducing career rank requirements for certain Challenges. These changes should arrive in the game at some point next week.

In other news, EA announced that Battlefield 6 has achieved the series biggest-ever launch, selling over 7 million copies in three days. For more relevant gameplay tips, be sure to hit up our recently-published top BF6 meta weapons guide - and our favourite loadouts for each.

Battlefield 6 devs are finally doing something about its dreadful XP and attachment unlock rates, but you can say goodbye to Portal bot farms

Battlefield Studios has finally addressed what's been everyone's biggest problem with Battlefield 6, but it's not all good news.

Having gotten access to Battlefield 6 ten days before the general public as part of the game’s review event, one thing stood out to me more than anything else in the game’s multiplayer sandbox: it takes too damn long to level up.

This is usually not a big issue, since everything you do in the game earns you career XP, so you’re bound to reach higher ranks sooner or later. The real problem, however, is how much slower weapon attachments are unlocked.

A week on from launch, Battlefield Studios is finally acknowledging that there's a problem.

In a new Community Update blog post, the developer went directly into player feedback about the slow speed of progression for career/characters, as well as how long it takes to unlock weapon attachments.

The developer is addressing these concerns in a number of ways. First, the XP earned by completing a match is going up by 10%, and the daily bonus XP is getting a 40% boost. For weapon XP, BF Studios is reducing the XP needed to unlock any weapon’s first 20 attachments. The developer said you can expect that process to be about twice as fast.

Battlefield 6 has assignments that unlock new class Training Paths, weapons, as well as gadgets. However, they do not become available to even progress until levels 20, 23, and 26. The developer is dropping those rank requirements to 10, 15, and 20, respectively.

While that’s certainly welcome, it doesn’t address the problem with some of the assignments themselves, including how situational many of them are, not to mention long and arduous the process is for others. Something is being done about that, but don’t hold your breath.

“We are aware of the frustrations regarding the challenges themselves and are actively working on reviewing them, but it will take more time to develop, test, and implement these changes,” the developer said.

As a response to Battlefield 6’s long and cumbersome XP earn situation, many players have taken to the game’s Portal mode to create what are essentially bot farms, which exist to help players kill a large number of AI enemies very quickly, or create perfect environments to make it easier to complete some of the more ridiculous weapon challenges.

Battlefield Studios obviously isn’t thrilled about that, and the developer revealed in the blog that “a large number” of Portal servers were created “primarily to earn XP, inflate player stats, and earn special accolades” which the developer says is what lead to servers reaching capacity faster than anticipated, preventing new players from being able to create their own Portal experiences.

That obviously defeats the purpose of Portal, so the developer is going to implement changes that re-focus the Community tab on exposing actually unique experiences. You can also expect some work on the backend to “diminish the number of XP farms taking up server space.”

BF Studios says we can expect all of those changes to arrive “within the next week,” if not sooner. As for the Portal side of things, the proposed changes will require maintenance that’s going to kill all currently active experiences - including Verified - forcing everyone to republish their work.

Other ongoing concerns, such as vehicles sometimes not spawning for certain teams on certain maps, player visibility, weapon bloom (spread), and more are also being looked at, though the post doesn’t offer much beyond that.

While we all wait for those XP adjustments to come in, you can have a look at our top meta weapons for every category so you can focus your precious time on the right builds.

Battlefield 6 has sold 7 million units in just three days, the biggest launch for any Battlefield game ever

Launch sales figures for Battlefield 6 have been officially announced, and they're about as impressive as everyone expected.

The highly-anticipated launch of Battlefield 6 has been a success, EA has confirmed. The publisher officially revealed some key numbers from the first-person shooter’s launch, and they all look very positive.

Battlefield 6 was very much a make-or-break game for EA, and the beleaguered Battlefield series, but it looks like the first hurdle has been surmounted. According to EA, the game had the “biggest opening ever” in franchise history.

In raw numbers, BF6 sold over 7 million copies in its first three days of launch. This is a new record for the series in terms of sales. As a result, BF6 also had the highest number of concurrent players for any Battlefield game, which is definitely in line with the game’s Steam statistics.

Of course, the writing has been on the wall since the release of the game’s open beta, which itself was the biggest thing ever for Battlefield on Steam. Indeed, launch numbers on the same platform have surpassed even that, which is impressive.

Over the launch period, over 172 million matches were played online. Battlefield 6’s performance on streaming platforms has amounted to over 15 million hours watched, which also isn’t surprising considering how consistently highly the game ranked on Twitch over the three-day launch period.

Battlefield 6’s first post-launch content update arrives in about ten days, kicking off the game’s first season, and bringing a new map and mode. More content will arrive in stages as part of the same season over the course of the remainder of this year.

If you’d rather be in the present, we recently published our picks for the top meta weapons across all categories in Battlefield 6. If you’re after vehicle loadouts instead, we’ve got you covered there as well. Of course, if you haven’t already, these are the BF6 settings you should definitely change.

Battlefield 6 patch adjusts Conquest tickets so your Firestorm games don’t go to the time limit, and there's good news for Manhattan Bridge flyers

Server-side patches for Battlefield 6 continue to come in with small but impactful changes.

The latest Battlefield 6 patch is another backend, server-side affair, just like the most recent release that nerfed Sniper Rifles. The focus of this latest update is on Conquest. More specifically, how slow matches on certain maps could be.

The update also makes a crucial change to Manhattan Bridge to help out struggling pilots.

To start with, the update went live yesterday across all Battlefield 6 servers. The main point was to reduce the ticket count across all Conquest maps to allow matches to finish a little faster without having to reach the time limit.

This was an issue certain maps - the larger ones - suffered from more than others, and the new ticket counts reflect that. EA said the new ticket counts should improve the flow of the matches as a result. Here are the new values:

• Siege of Cairo from 1000 to 900.
• Empire State from 1000 to 900.
• Iberian Offensive from 1000 to 900.
• Liberation Peak From 1000 to 800.
• Manhattan Bridge From 1000 to 800.
• Operation Firestorm From 1000 to 700.
• New Sobek City from 1000 to 900.
• Mirak Valley from 1000 to 700.

It’s pretty telling that Operation Firestorm and Mirak Valley have seen the biggest cuts, which makes sense, given that they’re two of the largest maps in the game. Anecdotally, the Firestorm matches I played tended to reach this awkward stalemate that only ends when the round time limit is reached, so hopefully these new ticket values will prevent that from happening.

Speaking of maps with special circumstances, Battlefield Studios has also made a small change to Manhattan Bridge on Conquest and Escalation. The change increases the vehicle out of bounds timer to ten seconds, up from five, which should allow pilots a little bit more time to reposition and return to combat.

Out of bound limits on many maps are fairly tight, but they were a little extreme on Manhattan Bridge. Due to the urban jungle nature of the map, most pilots need to manoeuvre around the map’s many buildings, and that inevitably means going out of bounds.

For more Battlefield 6 coverage, be sure to hit up our guide for all the campaign dog tag collectibles, and definitely don’t sleep on these settings that will make your game immensely better.

The first thing I thought upon arriving in Lumiose City in Pokémon Legends: Z-A was, 'Yes. This definitely looks like a modern Pokémon game.' Bright colours, basic textures and oddly flat buildings. Seriously - realising that the balconies and window shutters lack any depth, instead being pasted onto the buildings like stickers, made my brain go strange for a bit. Yet despite this, Lumiose City feels far more rich in life compared to Paldea and the desolate Hisui.

People and Pokémon fill the streets, there's a café on nearly every corner and the largest amount of clothes shops any Pokémon game has ever seen. The true adventure doesn't lie on the streets though, it's found high in the sky. Climb up the right ladder and you'll find yourself running across the city's rooftops. Navigating from roof to roof, building to building and sometimes even across streets is a lot of fun. Mostly because it adds a navigation element Pokémon games have been sorely missing for a while (thankfully, it's not as complicated as the Seafoam Islands.) It's easy to get distracted by spotting a new Pokémon or item on an opposite rooftop and decide reaching that is your new mission.

Sadly, you can't spend all your time running about the Lumiose City rooftops. Mysterious events are afoot. For some reason, wild Pokémon are Mega Evolving - an act that typically requires a trainer and Mega Stone - and this threatens the city's redevelopment plan. Lumiose can't really become a city where people and Pokémon live in harmony if it's been burned down by a Rogue Mega Charizard X. Thankfully, Team MZ is on the case and you'll join their ranks for, as always, only children and teenagers can save the day in the Pokémon universe.

Z-A's plot honestly feels like it could be from a Pokémon movie and that's not a bad thing! It's a nice change from the typical 'Become the Pokémon Champion and complete the Pokédex while you're at it' affair the mainline games typically follow. Though the tutorial does drag, the storyline benefits from being well paced and not being afraid to introduce a wide cast. The writing also embraces the fact that the Pokémon universe is, quite often, ridiculous, giving the game quite a good sense of humour. It actually made me laugh out loud a couple of times, which I can't say any Pokémon game has done before. A nice added touch are certain returning elements from Pokémon X and Y. While I won't go into the details to avoid spoilers, if you've played either of these games then you might pick up on similar themes and remember Emma.

Best of all, however, is how neatly the story is interwoven with the gameplay; keeping you invested so no overwhelming sense of repetition ever sinks in as you flow from trainer battle to Rogue Mega Evolution outbreak. It helps too that Lumiose City is teeming with side missions and Pokémon to catch. While there are some living on the rooftops, wild Pokémon mainly make their homes in the Wild Zones - small pockets of the city where they're able to live peacefully. (And get beaten up by the local trainer community.) At times, a Wild Zone's small size can make venturing inside quite chaotic though - I had a near death experience with an Alpha Krookodile and mob of upset Ground-types…

The mention of Alpha Pokémon probably already reveals that the catch mechanics in Z-A are basically the same as Legends: Arceus. You can still sneak up on Pokémon, still catch them without engaging in battle, and still avoid Alpha Pokémon unless you're prepared for a tough fight. There's no need to catch the same Pokémon over and over again to complete the Pokédex though - we're back to the tried and tested 'One and done' Dex method here. While I personally loved the Arceus' Research Tasks, it's a change that makes sense. For, if Arceus was a game about catching Pokémon, Z-A is a game about battling and this is showcased best in its new innovation - real-time battles.

Well I say innovation, but you can still feel the roots of the traditional Pokémon battle mechanics holding firm at times. Moves and healing items may have cooldown timers, but it's often no different than having to simply wait for your turn. (Especially in the case of the latter.) The trick is to find the right moveset combination which ensures you're always - or close to - able to attack your opponent. Buckling them under the weight of your Pokémon's power! The main difference is the freedom you're given to move both yourself and your Pokémon as, unless preparing for an attack, they will always follow in your footsteps. It's a very useful feature for avoiding area-of-effect attacks like Whirlpool, because you can simply walk your Pokémon out of the damage zone. At times, you can even avoid attacks all together by running away or dodging behind scenery.

Yet, how fun or annoying the real-time battles are all depends on whether you're being affected by the mechanic's quirks. At times, you'll be having a great time unleashing attacks and dodging behind a car to avoid an enemy attack perfectly. During others, you'll be frantically button mashing because the target function has randomly disconnected again and it's impossible to attack without targeting an enemy. Worse of all, a move could be blocked by a piece of scenery you swear isn't in the way or because you don't have the height advantage on a small set of steps. (I swear, stairs are the true villain of Z-A.) The end result is a mechanic with a lovely crust, but, once you bite into it, you realise it was taken out of the oven too soon. What is baked to perfection, however, is Z-A's approach to Mega Evolution.

I've always been a little hit and miss when it comes to the ways Game Freak has tried to spice up the franchise's battle mechanics. Tera Types were my favourite part of Scarlet and Violet thanks to how they could completely flip the odds of a battle, but I never really used Mega Evolution in any of the games it appeared in. Outside of an initial experimentation in Pokémon Y, I never felt the need. Z-A has changed that. Not just because the expanded range of Mega Evolutions are great to play with, but due to how it's crucial for some battles. Namely the Rogue Mega Evolutions - the closest Pokémon will most likely ever get to a Soulslike.

Imagine it: Mega Victreebel towers above you. Its goofy smile may give its face a harmless look, but its bloated belly bulges as it bounces. You can't help but wonder what this sentient pitcher plant is digesting. Could you be next? The unwanted thought is cut off by Victreebel unleashing Bullet Seed. Each seed is the size of your body. You run, daring to hope your Pokémon is keeping pace, feeling the hard casing of a seed graze your back.

Thankfully, your Pokémon remains unharmed. They're your companion, your only weapon, and so tiny compared to Victreebel's weight. There's only one option: attack. To chip away at Victreebel's health and pray to Arceus it drops some Mega Power. Only that will allow you to Mega Evolve your own Pokémon, but to obtain it you must put yourself in Victreebel's path. Take too many hits and you'll faint just like the weakest of Pidgeys. Though, without Mega Evolution, how else will you bring a fiery end to this glorious monstrosity?

Rogue Mega Evolution battles are fast paced and intense. So much in fact, I occasionally found it a little hard to keep up with what was happening. This doesn't stop them from being my favourite part of Z-A despite the flaws in the real-time battle mechanics. Each one is a solid improvement over the Legends: Arceus' boss fights and, unlike Scarlet and Violet's Tera Raids, it's a battle I'd actually play online.

Z-A's focus on battling is also portrayed in the Z-A Battle Royale where the majority of the game's trainer battles take place. Every night a portion of the city will be cornered off and, within these fences, you'll sneak up on your opponents. While you can just rush in, a little stealth is far more rewarding as you'll be granted not only the first but an extra hit. Be seen? Well that useful bonus goes to your foe. After winning enough battles, you'll unlock a Promotional Match. These are essentially Z-A's Gym Leader battles and, as is tradition, each one is more difficult than the last. Eventually, you'll reach the point where your opponent also uses Mega Evolution.

It's here, however, that a nasty little command delay slips in. You see, certain trainers will Mega Evolve their last Pokémon the moment it enters the field. This, of course, leads to an unskippable cutscene which is followed by an equally unskippable line of dialogue about how your opponent is about to thrash you. The problem? If your own Pokemon is currently not Mega Evolved and you wish to change this fact, then there will be a delay in your ability to execute this command. During these few vital seconds, your opponent has the chance to get at least one free hit in. I experienced the odd moment of lag when playing Z-A on the Nintendo Switch 2 - the occasional frame rate drop here, stuttered Fletchling wing flapping here - but none had a more damaging impact on my experience than this. It's a shame modern Pokémon games are still experiencing these small, but frustrating, technical issues.

Outside of this, the Z-A Royale offers a nice shake up to the traditional 'Walk down Route' aspect of Pokémon battling. Sadly, even the location changing on a nightly basis doesn't prevent it from becoming slightly repetitive at times though. This is in part because it's the best way to EXP grind - so you'll be doing it a lot - alongside both the locations and trainers repeating. I swear I've fought the same 'Only Magikarp for some reason' guy five times. No hate on Magikarp, but, like, evolve one dude. Come on.. Did you spend £500 on these carps?

The Legends series appears to be turning into Game Freak's way of experimenting with the Pokémon franchise. In this way Z-A is mostly a success in how it brings Mega Evolution to the forefront again, returns longtime players to an old region and almost achieves its goal of changing up the battle mechanics. What lets it down is the Achilles' heel of all modern Pokémon games, the graphics and performance. The cracks are present even in the Switch 2 version and, for a franchise entering its thirtieth year in 2026, you'd expect Z-A to be far more polished. It undercuts the obvious effort put into development, especially when it comes to the Rogue Mega Evolution fights. Thankfully, these flaws don't stop Z-A from being an incredibly fun game with a great atmosphere Pokémon fans will enjoy sinking into.

Hopefully Game Freak will continue using the Legends series as a playground (maybe a return to pixel graphics, just a suggestion), but, for now, Lumiose City has been a treat to revisit.

Battlefield 6 is in its first week post-launch now, and things are going fairly smoothly. As it is often the case with major launches, of course, a few issues are starting to bubble up to the surface.

Battlefield Studios hasn’t directly addressed any of them just yet, but the developer just released a small server-side patch.

The patch, being server-side, doesn’t require a download. All Battlefield 6 players will simply be able to see the changes the next time they log into the game and join a match. The list of changes is pretty small, and a bit puzzling.

It seems the focus is on reducing the power of Sniper Rifles. More specifically, the starting M2010 ESR, as well as the late unlock PSR. The M2010 ESR has had its muzzle velocity reduced from 900 m/s to 800. The PSR has also seen its muzzle velocity cut to 720 m/s, from 750.

Muzzle velocity affects the accuracy at range, and a reduction to that stat means players using these weapons would have to lead targets more at longer ranges. Bullet velocity changes are pretty standard when it comes to balance, especially where Sniper Rifles are concerned.

The change to the PSR, however, has players puzzled. For one, unlocking the PSR takes an unreasonable amount of time, thanks to its associated unlock challenge being lengthy, and its requirement situational. The PSR, as a result, is not likely to be a weapon you see many players using. The nerf itself is only a 30 m/s reduction, too, which is so small that most won’t notice it.

The same server-side patch also brought something of a nerf to shotguns. Shotgun projectiles will now take drag into account, which makes them less effective at range. Finally, the ticket count for certain maps on Rush has been increased to 100 from 75.

That’s about it for this patch, but you may have noticed that the game also received a tiny update on Sunday that fixed a bug causing jump momentum to be interrupted when performing a jump with a knife equipped.

For more Battlefield 6 coverage, catch up on our crucial gameplay tips, and make sure to change these settings in your game, if you haven’t already.