Gaming News Roundup: Yakuza Creator's Studio Shuts Down, Pokémon's Mystery Countdown, Bloodborne Still Selling Big & More (Nov 2, 2026)
Gang of Dragon (image via Polygon / Nagoshi Studio)
The Yakuza creator's new studio is officially gone, and with it Gang of Dragon. Sony has another PS5 firmware out that GTA 6 reportedly needs, Phantom Blade Zero has real sales numbers, and The Pokémon Company is counting down to something. Plus Bloodborne keeps selling, DirectX's big ray tracing upgrade, Google's Ocarina of Time Easter egg, Suda51 teasing Travis Touchdown's return, a Mario world record and more. Here's the Lanbrew gaming roundup for November 2, 2026.
Gang of Dragon (image via VGC / Nagoshi Studio)
Yakuza creator Toshihiro Nagoshi's studio has officially shut down, taking Gang of Dragon with it
It's official: Nagoshi Studio is gone. The Tokyo team founded by Yakuza creator Toshihiro Nagoshi was dissolved by a shareholders' resolution on October 31, according to a listing in Japan's government gazette Kanpo, IGN, VGC and Polygon report. That means its debut game, the gritty crime drama Gang of Dragon, is almost certainly dead too.
Gang of Dragon only got its big reveal at The Game Awards last December, starring Train to Busan actor Ma Dong-seok. But Bloomberg reported back in March that backer NetEase planned to pull its funding after learning the game needed at least another ¥7 billion (about $44 million) to finish. Nagoshi reportedly couldn't find new investors to buy the studio out. It's the latest closure as NetEase keeps pulling back from studios it funded outside China.
PlayStation 5 (image via IGN / Sony)
Update: Sony drops PS5 firmware 14.22, and GTA 6 reportedly needs it to run
What's new: Back on October 21 we covered PS5 firmware 14.20 as Sony and hackers raced to stay ahead of each other before GTA 6. Now Sony has pushed out another update, 26.07-14.22.00, released today, November 2. It's a 1.267GB download, and this time the patch notes confirm it's security related, IGN reports. It landed just 11 days after 14.20.
Better yet for Sony, PS Store data tracker PlayStation Game Size says GTA 6 will require firmware 14.22 to play, Push Square reports. That's up from the 14.10 requirement that was floating around at the start of October. The point is simple: if the game needs firmware that hasn't been jailbroken, it's much harder to pirate. GTA 6 launches November 19, and Sony could still ship more updates before then.
Source: IGN; Push Square
Phantom Blade Zero (image via Eurogamer / S-Game)
Update: Phantom Blade Zero sells 4 million copies in 72 hours
What's new: Last week we had estimates of about a million pre-launch sales and a Steam peak in the 700,000s. Now S-Game has real numbers. Phantom Blade Zero sold 4 million copies in its first 72 hours, the studio announced on X, IGN, Eurogamer and GamesRadar+ report. That count covers Steam, PS5 and China's WeGame launcher, with no per-platform split.
Steam players kept piling in over the weekend too. IGN says concurrents peaked Sunday at 833,921, which Eurogamer calls the biggest Steam launch of the year so far. It's still a ways off Black Myth: Wukong's 10 million in three days, but for a debut from a new studio, that's a monster start.
Source: IGN; Eurogamer; GamesRadar+
Pokémon countdown post (image via Kotaku / The Pokémon Company)
The Pokémon Company is quietly counting down to November 30
Something Pokémon is happening at the end of the month. The Pokémon Company's Japanese social accounts have been posting 30th anniversary images with a number underneath: 1,025 on October 18, 843 on October 26 and 676 today. Serebii's Joe Merrick noticed the numbers drop by exactly the hours between posts, which points to a countdown ending at 9 a.m. ET on November 30, Kotaku and Nintendo Life report.
Today's post also revealed its full caption, which translates to "Continue with Pokémon." Nobody knows what's at the end yet. It could be more 30th anniversary stuff, but Kotaku thinks it's a strong hint at a proper look at Pokémon Wind and Waves, which is due in 2027.
Source: Kotaku; Nintendo Life
Bloodborne (image via Eurogamer / FromSoftware)
Bloodborne reportedly sold another 251,000 copies this year, more than a decade after launch
Bloodborne just won't quit. The PS4 classic has sold more than 251,000 copies so far in 2026, according to Alinea Analytics' Rhys Elliott, Eurogamer reports. That would push its lifetime total to about 10.4 million copies and roughly $317 million in revenue.
Elliott also says more than half a million people played it through PS Plus in October alone, and plenty of them bounced between other FromSoftware games like Elden Ring, Dark Souls 3 and Sekiro. Still no PS5 remaster or PC port, though. Fans keep asking, and it still hasn't happened.
Source: Eurogamer
(image via PC Gamer)
Microsoft's 'most significant' DirectX ray tracing update could cut RT memory use by up to 90%
Ray tracing could get a lot lighter on your GPU's memory. Microsoft is previewing two new DirectX Raytracing features, Clustered Geometry and Partitioned TLAS, and calls them the most significant DXR update since it launched in 2018, PC Gamer reports. Microsoft's own testing suggests they can cut ray tracing memory use by as much as 90%.
The short version: it works a lot like Nvidia's RTX Mega Geometry, but for every GPU maker. Detailed models get chopped into small clusters of 256 triangles or fewer, and scenes get split into regions, so the GPU only has to update the parts that changed instead of rebuilding everything each frame. That could be a big deal for older cards with less VRAM, once games actually use it.
Source: PC Gamer
Google's Ocarina of Time Easter egg (image via VGC / Google)
Google's Ocarina of Time Easter egg sends you back to 1998, and Nintendo plans a London midnight launch
The Ocarina of Time remake hits Switch 2 this Thursday, November 5, and Google is celebrating. Search "zelda" on Google and the Master Sword shows up in the corner. Click it, Link yells, and the results page warps back to what Google looked like in 1998, the year the N64 original came out, VGC and GamesRadar+ report. Plain blue links, no AI answers, and the old "I'm Feeling Lucky" button.
Nintendo is also throwing an official UK midnight launch on Wednesday night at its Nintendo store inside Argos on London's Tottenham Court Road, VGC reports. Buyers there get a free replica N64-style box built to hold the Switch 2 game, plus an Ocarina keyring while supplies last.
Source: VGC; GamesRadar+; VGC
No More Heroes (image via VGC / Grasshopper Manufacture)
Suda51 says Travis Touchdown "will definitely be back" for No More Heroes' 20th anniversary
No More Heroes turns 20 next year, and Suda51 has something planned. In an interview with Famitsu, the Grasshopper Manufacture boss said he and publisher Marvelous want to do something together for the anniversary, VGC reports. "We're planning to deliver something special, so please look forward to it," he said. "Travis Touchdown is definitely coming back!"
He didn't say whether that means a new game, a remaster or something else. That's a fun turn, since Suda called No More Heroes 3 "Travis's last battle" back in 2022. Grasshopper went independent from NetEase in September.
Source: VGC
Dave Bautista (image via IGN)
Dave Bautista says he's packed on 20 pounds of muscle to play Kratos
Kratos is bulking up. Dave Bautista posted an Instagram story reading "Gained 20 lbs for GOW" with a 250 sticker, his new weight, while wearing a God of War shirt, IGN reports. Back in September he said he had two months to get where he needed to be, and that time is up.
Bautista took over the role in Prime Video's God of War series in August after Ryan Hurst tore a bicep doing a stunt. The show follows the Norse era of the games, with Kratos and Atreus (Callum Vinson) on the journey to scatter Faye's ashes.
Source: IGN
Godzilla: Destroy All Monsters Melee Remastered (image via Nintendo Life / Atari)
Godzilla: Destroy All Monsters Melee Remastered reviews are starting to land
The GameCube kaiju brawler is back. Original developer Pipeworks and Atari have remade Godzilla: Destroy All Monsters Melee in Unreal Engine 5 with online multiplayer and some quality-of-life upgrades, and the first reviews are in. Nintendo Life gives the Switch 2 version a 7/10, calling it a fun but thin brawler.
Nintendo Life says it's still a blast to grab Gigan and throw him into a skyscraper across 12 kaiju, and it's simple enough for anyone to jump into. The story is barely there, though, and there isn't a ton of depth beyond the monster fights. It's a faithful, good-looking return for fans, just don't expect much more than that.
Source: Nintendo Life
Valve Steam Frame (image via PC Gamer / Valve)
Steam Frame jumps to sixth most popular VR headset on Steam
October was the Steam Frame's first full month in players' hands, and it shows. Valve's headset went from 0.41% of VR headsets in September's Steam Hardware Survey to 4.13% in October, PC Gamer reports. That was the biggest jump of the month, and it makes the Frame the sixth most used VR headset on Steam.
It has passed the PS VR2, Oculus Rift S, HTC Vive and Bigscreen Beyond, and sits just 0.37% behind the Pico 4. Catching Meta will be tough, though. The Quest 3 is still more than 24 points ahead, and lots of reservations are still waiting to ship.
Source: PC Gamer
Mass Effect (image via GamesRadar+ / BioWare)
Update: BioWare fans leave tombstones for shut-down studios outside EA's offices
What's new: Yesterday it was "Save Mass Effect" graffiti in Madrid. Now a fan has set up a Halloween graveyard outside an EA office, with tombstones for BioWare, Bullfrog, Pandemic, Visceral, Westwood, Origin and Maxis, Polygon, Insider Gaming and GamesRadar+ report. The creator said they ran out of time to make more.
Each stone has the studio's logo, its years, a quote and a big "RIP." BioWare's uses Mordin's line from Mass Effect 3: "Had to be me. Someone else might have gotten it wrong." GamesRadar+ says the graveyard is getting a much warmer reaction online than the graffiti did.
Source: Polygon; Insider Gaming; GamesRadar+
Niftski's record run (image via IGN)
A speedrunner dressed as Mario breaks the Super Mario Bros. world record, now two frames from perfect
Niftski broke his own Super Mario Bros. any% world record on a Halloween stream while dressed as Mario, IGN reports. The funny part: right before the run, still in character, he said "Hopefully I don't get this today because that would be very stupid." Then he did it.
The new time is 4:54.299, a third of a second faster than his last record. He's now just two frames, or 33 milliseconds, off the theoretical perfect run of 4:54.265, and he says he lost both of those frames early on.
Source: IGN
Arc Raiders (image via PC Gamer / Embark Studios)
Arc Raiders' soundtrack uses a sample library recorded from a piano found in Chernobyl
Here's a wild bit of trivia. Embark's audio team told Arc Raiders' YouTube channel that it bought a sample library made from an old piano someone found inside the Chernobyl exclusion zone, and used it in the game's music, PC Gamer reports. "Someone went there and made a sample library from that old piano. So we bought that one and used it," they said.
The team also shared that an early prototype had a playable trumpet that felt too silly to ship. It eventually turned into the lure grenade players use to pull arcs into traps.
Source: PC Gamer
Lanbrew rounds up the day's biggest gaming stories. Every story above links to the original reporting, so click through to support the outlets doing the work.
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