Gaming News Roundup: GTA 6 Is Too Big for Any One Rockstar Dev, Final Fantasy Resonance Reviews, Cyberpunk 2077 Update 2.5 & More (Oct 20, 2026)

Grand Theft Auto VI (image via IGN / Rockstar Games)

GTA 6 is a month away, and today's lead comes from Jason Schreier's latest look inside Rockstar: the game is so big that no single developer knows everything in it. Also on Tuesday: reviews are in for Final Fantasy Resonance and Nintendo Switch Sports Resort, Cyberpunk 2077 gets update 2.5 alongside Edgerunners 2, Star Wars Battlefront 3 rumors pick up steam, Helldivers 2 switches anti-cheat, and PEGI starts re-rating loot box games to 16. Plus: GTA 6's latest preorder numbers, a Black Ops developer's case for royalties, how Kratos almost got a pizza-chain name, sad news about Clannad writer Jun Maeda, Arc Raiders' PvE decision timeline, Subnautica 2's next big update, Destiny 2's unvaulting plans, Ace Combat 8's bug-fix patch, and Intel's XeSS coming to Proton. Here's the Lanbrew gaming roundup for October 20, 2026.

Grand Theft Auto VI (image via GamesRadar+ / Rockstar Games)

GTA 6 is so big that nobody at Rockstar knows everything in it, says Jason Schreier's new video

Bloomberg's Jason Schreier has posted a new YouTube video with more notes from his visit to Rockstar North in Edinburgh, and it's full of fun behind-the-scenes details. The headline quote comes from Rockstar's Aaron Garbut: "There's no one person that has this whole thing in their head." Developers have the freedom to add things simply because they think they're cool. Garbut's example is Red Dead Redemption 2's famous horse anatomy that reacts to cold weather. It was never on a feature list. Someone just decided to make it because they had the time. In other words, expect GTA 6 players to keep finding surprises for years.

There's more in the video. Roads in GTA 6 are "significantly narrower" than in GTA 5, so you feel the traffic more. Eurogamer reports that GTA 6's art production team has about 65 people, compared with five or six on GTA 5, and that some artists have been on the game for 11 years. Rockstar also spent "months, if not years" trying to replace the weapon wheel before going back to it. GamesRadar+ highlights another story: the RDR2 system that lets you greet or antagonize NPCs, which GTA 6 builds on, began as a prototype by animation VP Mark Tennant around 2014–15. A tech lead didn't want to show it to studio boss Rob Nelson because of how much work it would create. Nelson's reaction when he did see it: "This will revolutionize the way our games and our worlds work." GTA 6 launches November 19 on PS5 and Xbox Series X|S.

Source: Eurogamer; IGN; GamesRadar+; video: Jason Schreier (YouTube)

Final Fantasy Resonance (image via Push Square / Square Enix)

Reviews are in for Final Fantasy Resonance and Nintendo Switch Sports Resort

Two big Thursday releases had review embargoes lift this morning. Final Fantasy Resonance is Square Enix's first HD-2D Final Fantasy. It's rebuilt from the shut-down mobile game Brave Exvius, with the gacha systems stripped out and turn-based combat built around "Visions" of classic Final Fantasy heroes. It sits at 85 on Metacritic (PS5). Game Informer gave it a 9/10, IGN and Push Square 8/10, GamesRadar+ 4/5 and GameSpot 7/10. Critics broadly love the combat and the presentation, but many find the story and cast thin: Eurogamer and VGC each gave it 3/5, and Polygon called it "a huge missed opportunity." It launches October 22 on PS5, Xbox Series X|S, Switch 2, Switch and PC.

Nintendo Switch Sports Resort brings back Wuhu Island with 12 sports, including the new Thumb Wrestling and Skateboarding. It's at 79 on Metacritic. Nintendo Life and GameSpot gave it 9/10, VGC and Eurogamer 4/5, Game Informer 8/10 and IGN 7/10, and Polygon called it a masterpiece. The common praise is that it's the most complete entry in the series, with better motion controls and real single-player content. The main complaints are a few missing sports and some events that are weaker than others. It's out October 22, exclusively on Switch 2.

Source: Final Fantasy Resonance: Metacritic, Game Informer, IGN, Push Square, GamesRadar+, GameSpot, Eurogamer, VGC, Polygon; Switch Sports Resort: Metacritic, Nintendo Life, GameSpot, Polygon, VGC, Eurogamer, IGN

Cyberpunk 2077 update 2.5 key art (image via GamesRadar+ / CD Projekt Red)

Cyberpunk 2077 update 2.5 lands October 22 with Edgerunners 2 content and dual-wielding

Six years after launch, Cyberpunk 2077 is still getting updates. CD Projekt Red has announced version 2.5 for October 22 on PC, PS5 and Xbox Series X|S, with a Switch 2 version "shortly" after. The update is timed to Cyberpunk: Edgerunners 2, which is now streaming on Netflix, and adds items and features inspired by the new season. Its key art shows V alongside Weak Kingsley, one of the show's four new leads.

Details are thin for now. CDPR's post only teases "cyberware customization" and "a new dual-wielding playstyle." A REDstreams broadcast on Wednesday, October 21, at 10am CT (8am PT) will show more, on YouTube and Twitch. The first Edgerunners season brought a big free update to the game, along with a sales boost, and Cyberpunk 2077 passed 40 million copies sold earlier this year.

Source: GamesRadar+; Eurogamer; Gematsu; Push Square

Star Wars Battlefront 2 (image via GamesRadar+ / EA)

Update: Star Wars Battlefront 3 rumors grow as Wardogs' CEO says DICE and Respawn are on it

What's new: Yesterday's rumor came from Electronic Gaming Monthly's revived "Quartermann" gossip column (via Jeff Grubb). It said Lucasfilm was looking for a Battlefront 3 partner, with DICE and Bungie interested. Now Joe Brammer, CEO of Wardogs studio Bulkhead, has weighed in on X: "DICE and from what I've heard Respawn are working on Battlefront 3. Not sure what that means for Battlefield." That swaps Bungie for the Apex Legends and Star Wars Jedi studio.

None of this is confirmed, and Lucasfilm, EA and the studios haven't commented. IGN thinks a project at this stage is more likely pre-production or pitching than full development. VGC adds some context: the EGM column ran in a Kickstarter-funded "final" issue that was apparently written a while ago, and a couple of its other rumors have since come true, including Bill Skarsgård, of John Wick 4, starring in Kojima's Physint. The last entry, Star Wars Battlefront 2, came out in 2017.

Source: GamesRadar+; IGN; VGC

Helldivers 2 (image via Rock Paper Shotgun / Arrowhead Game Studios)

Helldivers 2 drops GameGuard for Easy Anti-Cheat, and some mods will break

Arrowhead is switching Helldivers 2's anti-cheat. In a Steam post, the studio admitted that "the implementation of GameGuard for Helldivers 2 wasn't as effective as it could have been," so the game is moving to Epic's Easy Anti-Cheat, which is used in more than 200 games, including Elden Ring, Fortnite and Gears of War: E-Day. Arrowhead says it will also add extra security tools on top.

Mods will feel the change. Arrowhead says it's fine with cosmetic and non-gameplay mods, but mods that give unfair advantages or affect other players' games may stop working, and some harmless cosmetic mods will need updates from their creators. If you think a harmless mod is being blocked, Arrowhead asks you to contact support through Zendesk. Separately, the game is still missing from Steam in the UK, an issue Sony says it's working through with Valve.

Source: Eurogamer; Rock Paper Shotgun

An Ultimate Team pack opening (image via Eurogamer / EA)

PEGI begins re-rating digital games with loot boxes to 16, including EA Sports FC

Europe's age-rating system is starting to apply its stricter loot box rules to games that are already out. Connor Hinde of the Games Rating Authority, which runs PEGI in the UK, says existing digital-only games rated PEGI 3, 7 or 12 that include paid random items, like loot boxes, will be moved to PEGI 16 with a "Paid random items" label. New submissions have been judged under the expanded criteria since June. Re-rating existing games started this week and will run through October.

Eurogamer notes that the EA Sports FC series, previously PEGI 3, is affected, and Zenless Zone Zero has gone from 12 to 16. The change only covers digital-only products, and it follows PEGI's March announcement that it would update how it rates loot boxes, certain engagement mechanics and unmoderated online chat.

Source: Eurogamer

Jason and Lucia, Grand Theft Auto VI (image via GameSpot / Rockstar Games)

Update: GTA 6 preorders are pacing 148% ahead of Modern Warfare 2's

What's new: When we last looked at Sensor Tower's GTA 6 tracker, it estimated 6.08 million preorders through October 13. The latest figure is more than 6.45 million copies and over $630 million. Sensor Tower has also compared GTA 6 with some of the biggest launches of the past six years: Call of Duty: Modern Warfare 2 (2022), Diablo 4, Hogwarts Legacy and Insomniac's 2023 Spider-Man game. GTA 6 is ahead of all of them. Modern Warfare 2 had the biggest digital preorders of that group, and GTA 6 is pacing 148% ahead of it over a comparable stretch before launch.

There are caveats. These are US digital preorders only, as reported by GamesIndustry.biz. The platform split is unchanged at roughly 74% PS5 and 26% Xbox Series X|S. Sensor Tower still expects most preorders to arrive in the final week and thinks total prepurchases could reach 25 million, which would mean more than $2 billion before launch day on November 19.

Source: GameSpot (via GamesIndustry.biz)

Call of Duty: Black Ops 2 (image via VGC / Activision)

A Black Ops 1 and 2 developer says original creators deserve a cut of the PS5 ports' success

Activision's surprise PS4 and PS5 ports of Call of Duty: Black Ops and Black Ops 2 from July were a big hit. Black Ops 2 was the best-selling game in the US for July per Circana, and Alinea Analytics estimates the two sold about 11.2 million copies combined that month, worth around $435 million. Gavin Goslin, a former Treyarch level designer who worked on both, says that success is "bittersweet."

In a LinkedIn post, Goslin pointed out that the ports are $40 digital re-releases with no new features, and that Activision and Microsoft are "printing money off of work completed over a decade ago." He wrote that it's "hard to watch the suits rake in giant financial windfalls from our old code while the actual creators don't see a dime of it," and argued that legacy revenue should come with royalties for the developers who built the games. Activision hasn't responded publicly.

Source: VGC

Kratos, God of War Ragnarök: Valhalla (image via IGN / Sony Santa Monica)

Kratos was almost called Dominus, until the Domino's Pizza jokes started

God of War director David Jaffe has told the full story of how Kratos got his name. The hero was originally called "Dominus," which Jaffe liked because it sounded dominant. The team didn't agree. "Every single time someone said Dominus, someone inevitably would yell out, '30 minutes or free,'" Jaffe said. "After about the 50th time, the writing was on the wall."

Someone printed a list of Ancient Greek baby names, and Jaffe highlighted the ones he liked. He admits his picks, like Julius and Parthenius, weren't great. Marketing lead Susan Panico eventually pitched Kratos. Years later, Jaffe found that old list and saw that Kratos had been on it all along, unhighlighted: "We had Sony's biggest franchise hero in our hands the entire time and we didn't even know it." The next game, God of War: Laufey, is due on PS5 in February 2027.

Source: IGN

Air (image via Kotaku / Key, Visual Arts)

Clannad and Air writer Jun Maeda enters palliative care

Some sad news for visual novel and anime fans. Publisher Visual Arts says Jun Maeda, the writer and composer behind Kanon, Air and Clannad and the creator of Angel Beats!, has been diagnosed with throat cancer. He has chosen palliative care instead of chemotherapy so he can "conserve his strength and devote himself to his creative work."

Maeda has been writing for the RPG Heaven Burns Red, with his work finished through chapter six, and had an unannounced music project in progress. Visual Arts says he is in the hospital but "strongly determined to devote himself to creative work through to the very end," and it has shared a contact address for fans who want to send messages of support. We're sending ours.

Source: Kotaku

Arc Raiders (image via Insider Gaming / Embark Studios)

Update: Arc Raiders' PvE test is over, and Embark will decide its future in November

What's new: On October 13 we covered the start of Arc Raiders' week-long PvE-only matchmaking test. It has now ended, and Embark says players ran more than 30 million PvE rounds during the test. The studio calls the mode "polarizing." It's going through the data now and will send a survey to a representative sample of players in the coming days. It says the decision on PvE's future will come in November. Update 2.2.0 is also out today with a batch of bug fixes.

The game is in a strong spot either way. Alinea Analytics estimates Arc Raiders peaked at about 1.7 million daily players across platforms on October 14, a six-month high, after the Frozen Trails update, a free weekend and a 50% discount. Embark's executive producer has said the studio isn't against splitting the game into separate PvE and PvP pools.

Source: Insider Gaming; Eurogamer

Subnautica 2 (image via PC Gamer / Unknown Worlds)

Subnautica 2's "Early Access 2.0" adds a new region its director calls one of its scariest ever

Subnautica 2 is heading for its biggest update since it entered early access last May. In the first of a new vlog series, creative director Anthony Gallegos said "EA 2" adds a full new playable region with several biomes, more story about the Cicada's colonists and the game's "other beings," and new creatures. And since it's October: "this is one of our scariest regions we've ever done." The Collector Leviathan is also being made "scarier than ever."

There are quality-of-life changes too. The Tadpole gets a new "frog chassis" with arms and legs, there are new gadgets and biomods, and dash is now built into your fins instead of taking up a biomod slot. As Gallegos put it, "you just take dash." No release date was given.

Source: PC Gamer

Destiny 2: The Final Shape (image via Eurogamer / Bungie)

Bungie will start explaining Destiny 2's "unvaulting" at the end of October

Last month Bungie surprised players by saying it will bring back Destiny 2 campaigns and other content it removed over the years, without saying how or when. Head of product Josh Deane now says Bungie will begin "talking about what our first step is going to look like with more clarity" at the end of October. "I know there are a lot of questions on the how, what, when of unvaulting," he wrote on X.

Don't expect a classic roadmap. Deane describes it as "a progress bar" that shows dev milestones and challenges as they happen, so that a release date comes with the right expectations. A Forbes report has said removed campaigns, raids and destinations are coming back, but not expired seasons, and that the work doesn't mean Destiny 2 is back in active development.

Source: Eurogamer

Ace Combat 8: Wings of Theve (image via Push Square / Bandai Namco)

Ace Combat 8's October 23 patch targets a long list of bugs

Bandai Namco Aces has posted the notes for Ace Combat 8: Wings of Theve's next patch, which goes live October 23. On the campaign side, it mostly fixes progression-blocking bugs across a number of missions. There are also a couple of balance tweaks: Mission 15's difficulty has been adjusted on the harder settings, and Mission 28 changes how many flares certain enemies carry.

Ace Combat Online gets its own set of fixes. The team says it's prioritizing improvements to the UI and menu controls based on player feedback, and those will roll out gradually in later updates. Ace Combat 8 has already sold a million copies, faster than any previous game in the series.

Source: Push Square

An Intel Arc-powered handheld (image via PC Gamer)

Intel wants its faster XeSS upscaler to work in Valve's Proton

Intel is working to make its handheld chips play nicer with Linux gaming. As spotted by Phoronix, Intel engineer Damian Tomczak has opened pull requests to add XeSS support to Proton, the compatibility layer that runs Windows games on Steam Deck and SteamOS. The change would let XeSS use the XMX cores in Intel's own GPUs, the faster version of the upscaler, instead of falling back to the slower path.

PC Gamer says it's a sign of Intel's growing interest in SteamOS for devices like the MSI Claw 8 EX AI+, which runs Intel's Arc G3 Extreme. Valve has improved SteamOS compatibility with recent AMD and Intel hardware this year, and better upscaling would make switching an Intel handheld from Windows to Linux more appealing.

Source: PC Gamer