Earlier this week, Elon Musk followed through on his promise to acquire Twitter, with the social media company announcing the acceptance of Musk’s $44 Billion offer.

By most measures, Twitter is not the most popular social media site. Metrics often have Twitter trailing other social platforms like Facebook and Instagram by considerable margins. That said, Twitter has become an integral platform within the games industry as both individual game developers and companies use the platform heavily to promote their work, their games, or share any and all thoughts they deem fit to tweet.

“Twitter is generally a great networking tool for developers — trending hashtags, asking for advice, the ability to retweet work or portfolios, and just casually replying to tweets has helped many folks connect with each other,” says Victoria Tran Community Director for Inner Sloth, the developers of Among Us.

Twitter is easily accessible to developers and instantly connects them with their players, content creators, and journalists, Tran says. And for corporations, there are advantages to Twitter that don’t exist on competing platforms.

“Twitter is also relatively low lift in terms of producing content — it focuses on words, while other platforms like Instagram and TikTok require more work with images or video,” Tran adds. “It’s a quicker way to connect, and unlike Facebook, you don’t necessarily have to friend request people in order to chat with them,” though this last part comes with its own problems of course.

But for the most part, game developers from indies to AAA find value in Twitter’s approach to social networks. Two AAA game developers currently employed at major studios who wished to remain anonymous said they got some of their first big game industry jobs through Twitter

But news of Musk’s acquisition of Twitter has caused a flurry of reactions across Twitter’s most prominent users, including those working in the video game industry. Musk, who is best known as the founder of the electric car company Tesla, is a prominent Twitter user himself who takes to his account to post musings about his many businesses, unsolicited advice on public transit, and sometimes memes. Can this person change Twitter, and if so, what will happen?

Musk describes himself as a “free speech absolutist” and has tweeted out ideas of what he would like to see changed about Twitter in the past. Musk has repeatedly espoused the virtues of “free speech” and has called Twitter a “digital town square,” including in his statement following the acquisition.

One area Musk could expand on this idea is by loosening rules around what users are and aren’t allowed to Tweet. Short of illegal content, Musk has said recently at a TED conference that he would let “gray area” Tweets exist which could give license to harassment and trolls.

This is the most concerning possibility after the Musk takeover for professionals who run Twitter accounts for some of the largest video game companies.

One Social Media Professional at a North American AAA studio tells IGN, “We can already see a very cautious response from the Twitter userbase, especially among those who are victims or witnesses of harassment and abuse on the platform.”

The employee, who wished to remain anonymous given that their company has yet to put out an official statement, adds that from a professional view, any loosening of standards could lead to a loss of audience.

“We spent months and years cultivating our audiences on this platform, we’re very concerned that they might choose to leave it behind in fear of even more abuse at the excuse of ‘free speech.’ The same goes for brands, as it’s still unclear what some of these features would mean for content moderation and reporting, which is already an issue today.”

Musk’s rhetoric has spooked social media professionals who already contend with changing algorithms and shifting trends on a daily basis. While Twitter is not perfect, the Musk acquisition threatens to put people who work with social media daily into unknown waters.

“Twitter has been the go-to platform for video game developers and publishers for a long time now and its ease of use and accessible audiences made this platform important to rely on,” says Colin Cummings, who runs Social Media and Community for Evolve PR. “If anything disrupts this, or makes this worse, then my role as a community and social media manager just got more important.”

To be clear, Musk’s takeover of Twitter has yet to be finalized and it’s unclear exactly what changes are coming to the service. So far, Musk has only promised to enhance Twitter with new features, including making the algorithm open source, defeating spambots, and “authenticating all humans.”

But for professionals who use Twitter for work, the concern is that there just aren’t viable alternatives to Twitter available right now. “There is no perfect replacement for Twitter and we’ll have to work extra hard to build our audiences, curate a community, and to establish our core communications like blog posts or newsletters,” says Cummings.

The concern is that “the gaming community that has been centralized on Twitter will fracture and spiral off into a dozen different places.”

“He bought Twitter for a lot of money and I feel like it is naive to say nothing is going to change. We just have to hope it’ll be for the better or just a lateral move.”

For others, social media is such a chaotic field, to begin with, that Musk’s takeover of Twitter is just the latest sea change impacting a vital job the uninformed believe is done by interns.

“Social media sites come and go,” says Tran. “Facebook was the place to be, now its organic reach is almost gone. TikTok is the hot new thing. Vine is dead. Just another billion-dollar corporation — or person, in this case — duking it out while everyone else gets tossed in the waves. Just another Monday.”

Matt T.M. Kim is IGN's News Editor. You can reach him @lawoftd.

Facebook's parent company Meta has announced a new virtual reality headset more powerful than the Meta (previously Oculus) Quest 2 - but it's for work, not games.

Founder and CEO Mark Zuckerberg revealed Project Cambria in the company's latest earnings call before going into more detail in a Facebook post spotted by PC Gamer.

"Later this year we'll release a higher-end headset [than the Oculus Quest 2], codenamed Project Cambria, which will be more focused on work use cases and eventually replacing your laptop or work setup," Zuckerberg said.

"This premium device will have improved ergonomics and full colour passthrough mixed reality to seamlessly blend virtual reality with the physical world," he continued.

"We're also building in eye tracking and face tracking so that your avatar can make eye contact and facial expressions, which dramatically improves your sense of presence."

Zuckerberg promised that more details on Project Cambria would be revealed in the coming months, but made clear that this is a point of entry for the company's current focus: the metaverse.

Various companies, including Fortnite developer Epic Games, have declared interest in the metaverse but the concept is still in its very early stages with different investors having different ideas.

Meta's version appears to be a complete digital existence, with Zuckerberg hinting that customers' entire workspace will now be within a virtual, or at least augmented, version of reality.

While Project Cambria isn't about gaming, last week's Meta Quest Gaming Showcase made clear the company is still pursuing a more traditional gaming route.

Ghostbusters VR and Resident Evil 4 - The Mercenaries VR were both announced for the platform alongside new virtual reality games based on Among Us, The Walking Dead, and the NFL.

It's not all about the digital space though, as Meta's first retail store, set in the real world (specifically in Burlingame, California) will open next month.

Ryan Dinsdale is an IGN freelancer who occasionally remembers to tweet @thelastdinsdale. He'll talk about The Witcher all day.

Ex-Nintendo of America president Reggie Fils-Aimé is a big believer in blockchain technology.

But blockchain, which is used to trade and record cryptocurrency and NFTs, can't just be used by developers as a money making scheme, Fils-Aimé said. Instead it should be player-focused.

Speaking at last month's SXSW event in Texas, as spotted by Nintendo Life, Fils-Aimé said "I'm a believer in blockchain, I think it's a really compelling technology."

"I'm also a believer in the concept of 'play to own' within video games," he continued. "And I say this as a player where I may have invested 50 hours in a game, 100 hours in a game, and there are some games I've invested 300 hours in" he continued. "When I'm ready to move on to something else, wouldn't it be great to monetise what I've built?

"I bet I'd have some takers here today if I wanted to sell my Animal Crossing island from the latest Nintendo Switch version. I'd like to be able to monetise that."

Blockchain would allow that to happen, Fils-Aimé said, but he later clarified that it needs to make sense for the player above all else.

"It can't just be an approach by the developer [who thinks] that it's interesting or it's a way for them to make more money. In the end it's got to be good for the player. But I see an opportunity."

Blockchain, cryptocurrency, and the metaverse have been widely growing and controversial topics within the games industry in the last year.

Companies including Worms developer Team17 have announced NFT projects before backtracking completely following fan and staff backlash, while a Ubisoft executive said simply that "gamers don't get it".

While a number of companies have also invested in the Metaverse, Fortnite developer Epic Games seems to lead the charge in the gaming sphere with Sony and LEGO's parent company KIRKBI investing $1 billion each earlier this month.

Ryan Dinsdale is an IGN freelancer who occasionally remembers to tweet @thelastdinsdale. He'll talk about The Witcher all day.

Sony has seemingly disabled the ability to redeem PlayStation Plus codes from third-party retailers, or via the PlayStation Store.

Some users have tried to extend their PlayStation Plus membership after news broke that those with simultaneous PS Plus and PS Now subscriptions will get upgraded to PS Plus Premium in June, with the length of the new subscription being equal to their longest current memberships.

But, after purchasing a PS Plus code, users then reported the codes being rejected after an attempted redemption.

This is now a widespread issue, with some evidence that Sony support will also not accept the codes. Examples of this can also be found on ResetEra forums, with one user being told: "On this case right now you will be unable to add those codes to the account since we have disabled the option to redeem PS Plus codes." IGN was also contacted by a user who reported the exact same line being given to them by support.

Stacking a membership is where a user can use pre-paid cards to redeem an extension to their current membership. For example, a user with 12-months left of PlayStation Plus could previously buy another 12-months, stacking their membership to 2-years, even before the subscription expires. This is typically common practice when PlayStation Plus codes are discounted during sale events.

It is now believed by some in the PlayStation community that Sony has blocked this to prevent users from further taking advantage of making any savings on the revamped PlayStation Plus service. Sony has offered no official word, so IGN has reached out for comment.

Many users had already stacked PS Now memberships, after it was announced those with a PS Now account would be upgraded to PS Plus Premium at no extra cost. This loophole was also quickly shut down, and PS Now memberships are no longer available to purchase.

Robert Anderson is a deals expert and Commerce Editor for IGN. You can follow him @robertliam21 on Twitter.

A group of quality assurance testers working on Dragon Age 4 have filed an application to unionise.

The employees, who work directly with developer BioWare but as contractors of supporting company Keywords Studios, are attempting to unionize over issues of poor pay, a return to work mandate, and more.

An anonymous source told Kotaku that Keyword employees would have to return to their Alberta-based office on May 9 despite cases of COVID-19 slowly rising since the start of April.

Keyword employees would not be entitled to sick pay if they had to quarantine as a result of COVID-19, the source said, while BioWare employees are allowed to work from home completely.

The return to work ruling was seemingly the final straw for the 15-20 QA testers who allegedly are already subject to poor pay. The source said some employees are being paid $16.50 Canadian dollars per hour - $12.82 U.S. dollars - which is considerably less than identical roles carried out by full BioWare employees.

Other issues were raised including gender-pay discrimination, a lack of useful performance evaluations, and a hostile response to unionising efforts.

The union application was filed on April 20 and is currently being reviewed by the Alberta Labor Relations Board until May 3. A vote to unionise will be held within the next two weeks, and the result will be confirmed by the board within another two weeks.

The source said the group is "very confident" it would win the vote, having taken inspiration from the recent efforts of Raven Software QA employees to unionise, allowing them to have more influence over their workplace.

They became the first union within Activision Blizzard despite alleged attempts from the developer to stop them. The workers were left out of recent pay increases at the company however, with Activision Blizzard saying it was "due to legal obligations under the National Labor Relations Act."

Ryan Dinsdale is an IGN freelancer who occasionally remembers to tweet @thelastdinsdale. He'll talk about The Witcher all day.

Xbox and Bethesda have announced that a summer showcase will air on June 12 at 10am Pacific / 1pm Eastern / 6pm UK.

This showcase will include upcoming games coming to Xbox and PC, as well as Xbox Game Pass. Currently, the biggest game Xbox has a set release date this year is the highly anticipated Starfield for November 11. So there's a good chance we'll get some more information on it. Arkane's Redfall is also scheduled to launch sometime in 2022, so a release date for it might be revealed too.

Save the date!

Catch the Xbox & Bethesda Games Showcase on June 12: https://t.co/dmANSvXrbE | #XboxBethesda pic.twitter.com/AMFhrLhAtC

— Xbox (@Xbox) April 28, 2022

While Bethesda already announced The Elder Scrolls VI back in 2018, it might be a while until we hear anything else about it. Since it was annouced before Microsoft's acquisition of Bethesda, we could possibly receive confirmation of Xbox and PC exclusivity. MachineGames also announced last year that the studio was working on an Indiana Jones game, so more information about it could be shown as well.

One last possible reveal could be Deathloop's inclusion into Xbox Game Pass in this Fall when its timed-exclusivity period on PlayStation 5 expires.

George Yang is a freelance writer for IGN. You can follow him on Twitter @yinyangfooey

Always getting stuck on point-and-click adventure games? Return to Monkey Island has a solution.

During an interview with Ars Technica, creator Ron Gilbert confirmed that the game will have an easy mode, as well as a hint system.

“[One thing] that people really want in games today are built-in hint systems,” he explained. “If [players] don't have a built-in hint system, they're just going to jump over to the web and read a walkthrough.” Encouraging players not to do that, Return to Monkey Island will use a hint system that has been designed to make sense in-game.

It will be “more than just a walkthrough,” he added.

Of course, getting stuck is part of the fun of point-and-click adventures.

Back when The Secret of Monkey Island was released in 1990, I spent hours upon hours clicking around looking for ways to solve puzzles and growing increasingly frustrated when I couldn’t solve them.

But what you always remember is the satisfaction when it finally clicks.

"[There was] a lot of stuff that we did back then and didn't think much about—a lot of very obscure puzzles,” said Gilbert. “Hiding a piece of information somewhere with no clues about where to find it—that kind of thing just wouldn't fly today... Having hint systems means that if you make the puzzle just completely weird and obscure, people just go to the hint system.”

Of course, everyone knew what to do with a rubber chicken with a pulley in the middle. Right?

Thankfully, there’s also a new easy mode – borrowed from Gilbert’s recent Thimbleweed Park.

This new feature, called “casual mode” in Return to Monkey Island, is designed for “people [for whom] this is their first adventure game, or they haven't played adventure games in a long time, or maybe they have lives and kids now,” explained Gilbert. “They can play the casual mode, which is just a lot of simplification of the puzzles. That is our main way to get people into playing a point-and-click game if they haven't done it before.”

Return to Monkey Island sees Gilbert return to the legendary point-and-click series and is expected to be released later this year.

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

Nobody asked Zetamasterx to devote a year and a half of their life to capturing Legendary Pokémon with slightly different colour variants to their regular counterparts, but once they started, it became an obsession. For the vast majority of trainers, capturing a Legendary at all is triumph enough – but there are a select few who strive for a prize much, much rarer than that.

In the Pokémon community, these toiling prospectors are known as shiny hunters – a narrow demographic of players who regularly invest hundreds, if not thousands of hours into honing their trade long after the rest of the fanbase have moved onto the inevitable next generation. What this entails is simple: In Gen 8, the most recent generation of mainline Pokémon games, every ‘mon has a 1/4,096 chance to be a different colour to the rest of its species. These odds can be increased to almost 1/100, but even those chances make it a slow process.

If you haven’t already guessed, the objective of shiny hunting is to locate and catch these extremely rare Pokémon. That’s not taking into account that Legendary Pokémon are far rarer than almost any other, meaning shiny versions are very hard to come by.

Zetamasterx collected every single shiny Legendary available in Gen 8.

It’s important to establish the sheer level of busywork here. For Zetamasterx to catch shiny Regirock, they had to soft-reset the game – meaning they saved before the battle, instigated the fight, and then reset their Switch when they realised the Pokémon they were hunting wasn’t shiny – a whopping 18,000 times. And that was after failing their first shiny chance when Regirock struggled to death after 4,000 encounters. Imagine the frustration…

For shiny Palkia, meanwhile, the player embarked on 612 unique Dynamax Adventures, the roguelike minigame introduced in Pokémon Sword & Shield’s’s Crown Tundra expansion. Both the Regirock and Palkia hunts took an entire month to complete, but at time of writing, Zetamasterx is chasing shiny Cresselia in Pokémon Brilliant Diamond and is starting to worry that they’ll break that record once more – which certainly isn't helped by the fact they failed to catch their first one of those, too.

These are the most extreme examples of Zetamasterx’s hard work, but there was much more to do than just those – catching every shiny Legendary in Sword & Shield required roughly 18 months of regular play.

What is it that motivates players like Zetamasterx to commit to a time investment of that magnitude?

Danners99, a relatively green practitioner, recently completed their second shiny hunt. Prior to Sun & Moon, their interest in Pokémon was next to non-existent – but after stumbling across some well-known hunters on YouTube, that interest was instantly piqued.

“One [hunt] only took a few hours, but the second spun over two days,” Danners99 says. “As for if I have been enjoying it, I’d say yes – however, I have taken long breaks between hunts because I’m not accustomed to long grinds just yet.”

For some, however, shiny hunting is even more interesting than the base games themselves:

“I got into Pokémon because of shiny hunting,” Late_Experience_1990 says. “I would see YouTubers hunt for them and thought, ‘I want to give this a try!’

“I’ve only been shiny hunting for about a year. As of now, I’m more casual about it – I have school and other games I’m interested in. But it’s pretty rewarding, because most of the time you have to work quite hard for them. It’s like a trophy after a long hunt.”

YouTube is also responsible for FR00DA87’s gravitation to hunting, although their entry point was slightly different. Instead of watching streamers chasing shinies, they got into hardcore Nuzlocke runs, which revolve around a highly specific, self-imposed ruleset: You can only catch the first Pokémon you encounter on each route; if a Pokémon faints, it’s dead; and if you white out, it’s game over. This served as a gateway to shiny hunting, which FR00DA87 soon developed a passion for.

“I think people do it for the satisfaction of the final product,” FR00DA87 says. “That moment when you see the different colour ‘mon with the sparkles after hunting for ages – it feels like pure ecstasy." FR00DA87 is quick to lambast people who pay hackers to artificially generate their shinies, which they see as missing the point.

It's easy to see where they're coming from. FR00DA87 once spent six hours a day, for a week straight, chasing a single, elusive shiny Giratina, which made their reward a whole lot more special than if they'd just bought it off a cloning site for $5.

FR00DA87 is very aware that this isn’t something everyone would be into: “It’s an excessive and boring process for barely anything of worth. If you enjoy feeling great satisfaction after a long deal of non-enjoyable activity, then it’s for you. But if you don't have much spare time or much patience, absolutely not. I just shut my brain off and do a monotonous task for hours on end, so the adrenaline at the end is worth it for me.”

It's no surprise, then, that the single sentiment echoed by all of our interviewees is that the drive to chase shinies boils down to one specific feeling: it’s less the thrill of the hunt itself than the rush of having finished it, with a reward so few other players will have.

This is perhaps best articulated by our most enthusiastic interviewee – a Redditor who goes by the handle Warcraft101.

“I've been into Pokemon for as long as I can remember,” Warcraft101 says. “The hype was unlike anything I'll ever experience again. The cards exploded in popularity – everyone was trading them at school. If you had a holo Charizard, you were Arceus [the name of a Pokémon God].” Just like those shiny cards, the game’s own shinies offer a similar mixture of personal pride and envy from others:

“I believe shiny hunting is popular because of the reward that comes from it. As with most things in life, it’s the journey you remember. Anyone can go out, catch a Pokémon in a minute, and forget all about that moment. When you've spent 20 hours hunting, you feel all types of emotions – and when that sparkle finally appears, it’s absolutely exhilarating.

“We do it because we're dedicated masochists.”

Warcraft101 isn't being hyperbolic when they mention masochism. They're currently 140 runs into their hunt for shiny Ho-oh – whom they affectionately refer to as their "sparkly silver birb" – and it took them an astronomical 1,822 eggs to hatch shiny Pichu, whose very existence they questioned on multiple occasions.

"I started shiny hunting thinking, 'I just want Ho-Oh & Eevee'," they explain. "Boy was I wrong. I still have yet to get my own shiny Ho-Oh, and after I got that first hatched Eevee in 441 eggs, I thought, 'Okay, well maybe I'll just do the Eeveelutions'. Nope. I keep finding random reasons from childhood that inspire me to hunt more.

"Hunts can be very time consuming depending on your method of choice, but [they’re] more rewarding than anything I've ever experienced in a game."

Interestingly, despite some fans’ love for the grind, more recent Pokémon games have taken it upon themselves to streamline the process of shiny hunting. Pokémon Let’s Go Eevee & Pikachu introduced shiny chains, which increase your shiny odds for every Pokémon of the same species you consecutively catch. Pokémon Legends: Arceus, meanwhile, implemented a revised mass outbreak mechanic (a spruced-up version of the similarly named phenomenon from Pokémon Diamond & Pearl) that also heightens your chances. In both of these cases, shinies are visible in the overworld, meaning you don’t have to waste time instigating battles to check your luck.

But the real king – or curse, depending on your preference – of shiny hunting is mobile game Pokémon Go, where your odds and encounter rates can skew higher than any traditional Pokémon game. Alongside Let’s Go and Legends: Arceus, Go is something a lot of shiny hunters feel pretty ambivalent towards.

“I've noticed there are mixed opinions throughout the games,” says Warcraft101. “I personally love most shinies the same, regardless of acquisition. The only ones I'm slightly less fond of are from Go. A lot of people tend to dislike the Pokémon Go shinies because they are easy to get at 1/500 without any extra effort. I've seen some say full odds shinies are the only way.”

Danners99 reckons Arceus’ odds specifically are a little too high. Another interviewee, Whiskey_Rain_, agrees – they believe shiny hunting was too difficult in early games, but was made too easy in Legends: Arceus. In their eyes, Sword & Shield marked the point where Game Freak struck a good balance between the two.

The rest of our shiny hunter interviewees are less worried about the modern trend towards making shiny hunting less approachable.

“I don’t think making shiny hunts easier is a bad thing, because to be honest the 1/4,000 odds are just tedious and monotonous,” says FR00DA87. “Nobody does it for the experience of hunting, so easier odds are never bad. But not stupidly easy like Arceus seems to be, or the Max Lair, which can seem excessive at times when you get two in a row.”

“I think it depends on the game,” another hunter, shiniki, counters. “For example, Dynamax raids feel pretty appropriate for Sword & Shield since that's the mechanic for this gen. I'm not as familiar with Pokémon Go, but I do really enjoy shiny hunting in [Legends: Arceus] – if you complete all the tasks in a Pokémon's ‘Dex entry, you have a higher chance of encountering a shiny. You have to work for it, but the reward is worth it, and you can choose which Pokémon you would prefer to hunt first.

“I know Dynamax wasn't as popular as it could have been due to the NPC AI not being very intelligent, but I would love to see more co-op modes with shiny hunting.”

So what about the future of the series – where do these hunters want their niche pursuit to go in the upcoming Pokémon Scarlet and Violet?

Whiskey_Rain_ is hoping for an additional, ultra-rare shiny variant – particularly for ‘mons like Gengar, whose shiny sprite is barely distinguishable from its ordinary one. Some might point to the even rarer “square shinies” introduced in Gen 8, which are only differentiated by a slightly altered sparkle animation – but fans tend to prefer the idea of all-new colour schemes. For Late_Experience_1990, meanwhile, the current odds in the mainline games are fine. Their main concern about the practice becoming more streamlined is that easier shiny hunting will lead to less valuable shinies.

“I’d like there to be similar odds, because the 1/100ish with the Shiny Charm isn’t awful, but also for each Pokémon to have equal methods of hunting,” FR00DA87 says, referring to how some Pokémon types aren’t affected by the Shiny Charm. “I’ve seen some hunts go into stupid numbers just because of luck, so a hard cap would be nice.”

“I look forward to seeing the new shinies for Gen 9 for sure,” says a more enthusiastic Warcraft101. “I could wish for a ‘complete game’, but I know with the current market in gaming we'll probably be getting a DLC-type deal. I'd love for a returning mechanic such as Mega Evolutions over a new gimmick like Dynamaxing. I've always flirted with the idea of half-shiny distorted-type Pokémon as well.

With all of the above accounts, it’s safe to say that the future of shiny hunting is unclear even for those who devote hundreds of hours to it. After all, with shiny hunting important to such a small sub-set of players, it’s unlikely to be a headline announcement for any new Generation – but that only increases the anticipation for fans when they first get to try out the new games.

One thing is for sure though – shiny hunters will remain as obsessed with the practice as ever. While Zetamasterx has their fingers and toes crossed for a return to Dynamax Adventures, they’re still reeling from the 18-month odyssey they embarked on to complete their collection of shiny Legendaries.

“I’m not sure if I'll hunt them all again in future games,” they say. But the obsession is seemingly never far away. “Maybe I'll give it a try.”

Cian Maher is a freelance journalist. You can follow him on Twitter.

Andrew Garfield is taking a break from acting after appearing in a bunch of movies and TV in the last two years.

Speaking to Variety, Garfield said he's ready to relax and live a regular life for a while after appearing in three films last year (including Spider-Man: No Way Home and Tick, Tick... Boom!) and FX's new series Under the Banner of Heaven.

"I'm going to rest for a little bit. I need to recalibrate and reconsider what I want to do next and who I want to be, and just be a bit of a person for a while," he said. "I need to just be a bit ordinary for a while."

For his performance in Tick, Tick... Boom! Garfield was nominated for best actor in a leading role at the Oscars but eventually lost to Will Smith for his performance in King Richard.

He said the awards season, which he described as "a washing machine", alongside the intensity of filming Under the Banner of Heaven - where Garfield plays a Mormon detective investigating the murder of a mother and daughter by fundamentalist members of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints - contributed to him needing time off.

Especially during filming, "I think it was actually a necessity for us to have game nights and go into nature and hike, and you know, swim and dive and lakes and dance and eat good food, so that we could really come back and fully give ourselves." Garfield said. "We had to keep on taking care of ourselves so that we can take care of the story."

While IGN enjoyed Garfield's performance in Under the Banner of Heaven, we said it feels trapped under the exposition-centric story. In our 5/10 review of the first two episodes, we said: "Under the Banner of Heaven is a plodding adaptation that tries to tell too much and suffers under the weight of it all in its first two episodes."

Ryan Dinsdale is an IGN freelancer who occasionally remembers to tweet @thelastdinsdale. He'll talk about The Witcher all day.

Sony has revealed the PlayStation Plus games for May 2022 are FIFA 22 (PS5 & PS4), Tribes of Midgard (PS5 & PS4), and Curse of the Dead Gods (PS4).

Revealed on the PlayStation Blog, all three games will be made available at no extra cost to all PlayStation Plus subscribers on May 3.

FIFA 22 is the latest entry in EA's football series, which is now almost 'officially' the best football game on the market thanks to the pretty disastrous launch and subsequent updates to Konami's eFootball 2022.

Back to the freebie though, in IGN's 7/10 review, we said: "Microtransactions still loom large, but small iterative changes and the horsepower of new-gen consoles combine to make FIFA 22 feel like a worthwhile upgrade without needing anything revolutionary or terribly exciting from EA’s side."

Tribes of Midgard is a co-op survival game based on Norse mythology, and it's up to the player (or players) to resist the incoming invasion of Giants during Ragnarok. We also gave this one a 7/10 review, saying: "Tribes of Midgard is a hectic, exciting, Norse-flavoured action RPG that is best faced with a shield wall full of friends."

Perhaps saving the best for last, Curse of the Dead Gods is a roguelike action game with fast-paced combat and intense challenges. Players traverse procedurally generated dungeons from an isometric perspective as they build their arsenal before facing different enemies and bosses.

In our 9/10 review, IGN said: "Great action, smart strategy, and random curses carry Curse of the Dead Gods to top tier of the action-roguelite genre."

Players have until May 2 to download April's PlayStation Plus games and PS5 users have until May 11 to add Persona 5 to their library before it leaves the PS Plus Collection.

Sony is launching its "all new PlayStation Plus" in June with three separate tiers that offer different rewards including access to games from PlayStation's entire history.

Users who already have PlayStation Plus alongside PlayStation Now will get the highest Premium Tier at no extra cost for the remaining length of their subscription.

Ryan Dinsdale is an IGN freelancer who occasionally remembers to tweet @thelastdinsdale. He'll talk about The Witcher all day.