Ubisoft has confirmed it’s suspended two of its most senior games creatives as part of an ongoing investigation into sexual misconduct allegations. Executives Tommy Francois andMaxime Bélandhave been put on administrative leave, along with several other employees,Bloombergreports. AnUbisoftspokesperson told the publication: “These are under investigation, so we are not commenting further at this time.” Francois and Béland are two of the most senior creatives within theAssassin’s Creedpublisher, holding leadership roles inits editorial team, the influential group which steers the direction of all its games....

UK retailers including Game, Argos and ShopTo have shipped Final Fantasy VII Remake pre-orders a week before its official release date. According to various customer reports, physical copies of thePS4exclusive began arriving as early as Wednesday this week. GameandArgosare still accepting pre-orders for the title, although it’s not clear if they will also be shipped ahead of the official release date on Friday, April 10.ShopToclaims it will not receive moreFinal Fantasy VII Remakestock until April 8....

Vampire: The Masquerade – Bloodlines 2 has been delayed out of 2021 and development pulled from studio Hardsuit Labs, publisher Paradox Interactive has announced. Sharing the news during its latest financial results,Paradoxconfirmed it had chosen to delay the release forthe second time in six monthsdue to disruptions on development caused by the coronavirus pandemic. The game will no longer release this year, it said. “We have also decided thatHardsuit Labswill no longer be leading the development of Bloodlines 2, and we have started a collaboration with a new studio partner to finish work on the game,” Paradox confirmed....

Our next VGC Live stream will be taking place later today, as we take on Cruis’n Blast. Blast is the sequel to such ’90s racers as Cruis’n USA, Cruis’n World and Cruis’n Exotica, but is infinitely more over-the-top than those games were. We haven’t enjoyed an arcade-style racing game like this for a long time, and our live stream should hopefully show you why Cruis’n Blast is… well, a blast....

Infinity Ward has said it’s “investigating” server issues that have recently marred the gameplay experience for some Warzone 2 and Modern Warfare 2 players. As noted byDextero, console andPCplayers have been complaining about bullet registration issues, delayed actions, and significant frame drops since Season 3 launched on April 12. After a number of high-profile members of the Call of Duty community drew attention to the issues over the past week or so, theModern Warfarestudio finally acknowledged them on April 20....

Call of Duty Warzone developer Raven Software has finally confirmed it will rebalance some of the weapons currently dominating the battle royale game’s meta. Warzonereceived significant criticism from its player community over Christmas, since several bugs and balance issues were introduced withits integration with Black Ops Cold War. The DRM 14, a tactical rifle added fromTreyarch’s premium CoD title, is currently dominating the Warzone meta to the point where virtually every player is using it, thanks to its minimal recoil, devastating range and lack of sniper glare....

The latest update for eFootball has added a new retro-inspired mode. To celebrate 30 years of the Winning Eleven / Pro Evolution Soccer series (now known aseFootball), the game has received a new mode called Time Leap Trials. The mode features visuals based on the first game in the series, the PS1 game World Soccer Winning Eleven, which was released in the West under the title Goal Storm. In this limited-time mode, players have to score a goal as quickly as possible against an AI opponent, with rewards offered for doing it within certain times....

New Xbox studio The Initiative has officially announced its Perfect Dark reboot for Xbox Series X/S and PC. The release will mark theRareshooter series’ first instalment since 2005’sPerfect DarkZero, which launched alongside theXbox 360. In a statement,The Initiativestudio head Darrell Gallagher said the new game will bea secret agent thriller set in a near-future world. “We have built the Perfect Dark team at The Initiative by bringing in some of the most talented game makers from around the industry who all share a passion for storytelling, world-building and creating memorable game experiences,” he wrote....

Xbox has kicked off its big holiday season marketing campaign with a new live action trailer titled ‘Wake Up and Dream’. Viewable below, the trailer will debut today in the US during Thursday Night Football on Prime Video and air globally over the coming months. According toMicrosoft, it’s “an immersive adventure story, inspired by gamers and their dreams – going beyond imagination, and capturing the fun, joy, community and love we all share for our favorite games and epic gaming moments experienced with friends”....

A fan project aimed at decompiling The Legend of Zelda: Ocarina of Time’s game code is nearing completion, people behind the efforts have claimed. The community-ledZelda Reverse Engineering Team(ZRET) has been working for more than 18 months to reverse engineer theN64classic into parsable C code, which is similar to how fans were ableto fully convert Super Mario 64after a two-year effort. This week, ZRET updated its website to claim that the project was now 91% finished, putting it well on track to be completed before the end of the year....

We spend all week writing words for you, our dear readers, so it’s only fair that we read the words you write back at us. Comments of the Week is our weekly round-up in which we look at our favourite: To qualify for Comments of the Week, a comment doesn’t have to necessarily be amusing (though it certainly helps its chances). It can be a good point, an interesting observation or, on occasion, something so ridiculous it has to be called out....

One of theworst-kept secretsin gaming, Armored Core VI: Fires of Rubicon wasfinally announcedduring The Game Awards 2022 as one of the biggest ‘world premieres’ of the night. It had pride of place, just before the big Game of the Year award itself was handed out, going toFrom Software’s all-destroyingElden Ring. It will be ten years between Armored Core titles by the time it is released next year and a lot has changed – not only to the gaming landscape – but to From Software themselves in that time....

There’s little doubt we’re currently enjoying a golden age of fighting games. In 2023 alone, Street Fighter 6 and Mortal Kombat 1 were both released to massive acclaim. OurreviewsaidStreet Fighter 6is “an incredibly confident and joyous fighting game. The roster is varied and vibrant, and the changes to the fighting engine make for a game that epitomises the ‘easy to learn, difficult to master’ adage.” Later in the year, we said thatMortal Kombat 1was “the bestMortal Kombatgame to date,” praising its visuals, gameplay and story mode....