Gaming Views Pod

The monster is scary. The game pretending to delete your save? That's personal. Dan P is back in the co-host chair for our Gaming Views Halloween special, and we're exploring eight horror games that mess with the person holding the controller. From P.T.'s hidden Lisa trick and Eternal Darkness's fake save deletion to Doki Doki Literature Club's file meddling and IMSCARED's...

BioWare is closing, and development on the next Mass Effect is ending. We discuss what the loss of the studio behind Mass Effect, Dragon Age and Knights of the Old Republic means for gaming, and why its legacy deserves more than a fight on social media. The rest of the news raises an uncomfortable question: what will we actually be playing, and owning, in a few years? We get into Liquid Swords’ ba...

Did your mate know how to unlock a secret character? Were you convinced something was hiding in the woods of GTA San Andreas? This week on Gaming Views, we revisit the hoaxes, urban legends and playground rumours that kept players guessing. From Polybius and Pokémon’s Lavender Town to Sheng Long, Mortal Kombat’s Ermac and the search for Bigfoot, we ask why these stories were so easy to believe. We...

Castlevania: Belmont's Curse and Gears of War: E-Day have us talking about what makes a great comeback. We share our impressions, debate whether consoles are becoming a luxury, and ask where AI belongs in game development after reports about Epic's Disney project. We also team up with Game Club Pod to discuss GTA 6, Shogun 2 Complete Edition's troubled launch, Big Walk skipping Xbox, i...

Eight games, eight very different ways to give a franchise new life. We revisit Resident Evil 4, God of War (2018), Doom (2016), Tomb Raider (2013), Assassin’s Creed Origins, Breath of the Wild, Monster Hunter: World, and Mortal Kombat (2011). Which change worked best, and which series needs a fresh start now? Find the podcast, community, and our game tracker at https://gamingviewspod.com

A used PS5 Pro for nearly $1,400? We react to reports of GameStop's US pricing, compare it with the UK and ask how expensive the build-up to GTA 6 can get. We team up with Game Club Pod this week to tackle Xbox's first-party growth claims, Project Helix, Xbox Pictures and the uncertainty around Ninja Theory. Then we get into Google Playground, the upcoming Unity Spark and where AI tools le...

Can one release change the future of a series? This week, we revisit games whose launch, design or reception had consequences beyond the game itself. Some series found a way back, others still leave us asking what might have been. We discuss Tomb Raider: The Angel of Darkness, Dead Space 3, Anthem, SimCity (2013), Star Wars Battlefront II, Sonic the Hedgehog (2006), Resident Evil 6 and Duke Nukem...

Xbox is bringing digital access to supported physical games, but what does that mean for the discs we already own? We dig into the Disc-to-Digital announcement, the limits of digital ownership, and whether this makes physical collections more useful or more complicated. We also discuss Xbox's response to sale rumours, the reported World's Edge cuts, the GTA VI collector's-edition conve...

Why do some games still look brilliant years later, while technically impressive games can date so quickly? This week we look at games where art direction did more lasting work than raw graphical power. We revisit The Legend of Zelda: The Wind Waker, Shadow of the Colossus, Journey, Ōkami, Limbo, Return of the Obra Dinn, Cuphead and Hades. From cel shading and ink brushwork to silhouettes, one-bit...

Xbox has announced another major reset: 268 roles are being cut, and a dedicated Activision team is set to develop the next Halo. Rare and World’s Edge are moving under Activision, Obsidian under Bethesda, and Ninja Theory faces consultation on a proposed closure. We discuss the people affected and what these changes could mean for Xbox’s games. We also look at Microsoft’s patent application for c...

Which gaming decision was the biggest blunder? This week, we revisit the launches, policies and business calls that left players asking what the companies were thinking. From the PlayStation 3’s $599 launch model and the Xbox One’s original online and used-game plans to the Wii U’s muddled reveal, we ask whether these were bad ideas, bad timing or bad communication. We also debate Nintendo stickin...

Two studios face uncertain futures, while comments about crunch and hiring have us asking hard questions about work in games. We discuss the latest around Build a Rocket Boy and Heart Machine, then look at the response to Bulkhead’s hiring comments. We also get into Riot’s thoughts on paid games, the future of Cities: Skylines, a rumour about day-one releases on Game Pass, Roblox, draft EU rules f...

Red Dead Redemption. Mass Effect 2. Fallout: New Vegas. God of War III. All in the SAME YEAR. This week on Gaming Views, we revisit eight games from 2010 and ask: were they really that good, or are our memories doing some heavy lifting? From John Marston’s journey and Commander Shepard’s loyalty missions to Kratos taking on Olympus and Just Cause 2 turning everything into an explosion, we’re looki...

Sony walks away from PHYSINT, Xbox steps in and the argument over whether you actually own your digital games gets even messier. This week on Gaming Views Pulse, we discuss Hideo Kojima’s next move, PlayStation’s digital ownership dispute and a packed week of Nintendo Direct and BlizzCon announcements. From Zelda nostalgia and Switch 2 scalpers to Blizzard’s returning favourites, there’s plenty to...

What if Sony never made the PlayStation? Would PC gaming look the same without Steam? And where would handheld gaming be without Nintendo? This week on Gaming Views, we explore the decisions that changed gaming forever — and the alternate timelines where those decisions never happened. Were they strokes of genius, a bit of luck, or simply being in the right place at the right time? From Sony going...

Gaming is getting more expensive, the industry is cutting jobs and Steam is becoming impossible to keep up with with 720 games launching in one week, EA has new owners, Xbox is cutting more jobs, Bungie is shrinking and The Switch 2 has gone up in price. This week on Gaming Views Pulse, we break down the stories that caught our attention. PLUS — what we’ve been playing, including Terminator 2D: NO...

What was the last genuinely NEW game mechanic that blew your mind? Struggling? That's kind of the problem. This week on Gaming Views we're looking back at eight games that introduced mechanics so clever, influential or downright satisfying that — years or even decades later — we're asking whether anybody has actually managed to beat them. -Portal and the Portal Gun -Left 4 Dead's i...

Gamescom 2026 is over — and somehow we’ve come away with even MORE games we need to find time to play. The Witcher 3 is getting a surprise remaster. Gears of War: E-Day finally looks like the Xbox game we’ve been waiting for. Metro 2039 is dragging us back underground. Remedy has made Control Resonant even stranger. Exodus might be the Mass Effect successor we’ve been looking for… and apparently D...

Crafting. Skill trees. Battle passes. Detective vision. Yellow paint. Parrying. Once you notice them, you start seeing them EVERYWHERE. Some game mechanics genuinely make games better. Others increasingly feel like they’ve been bolted on because somebody, somewhere, decided every modern game needs the same checklist of features. So this week on Gaming Views, we’re asking a simple question: Which g...

EA has completed its enormous $55 BILLION buyout — but just weeks later, staff are already talking about uncertainty, layoffs, AI and a workplace atmosphere that sounds increasingly grim. And hanging over all of it is a question neither of us particularly wants to ask: Could Mass Effect actually be at risk? Meanwhile, GTA 6 has suffered another major leak ahead of its next official showing, Sony s...

Some games get delayed. Some games disappear. And some get SO close to release that we're still wondering what might have been years later. This week on Gaming Views, we dig into 8 fascinating video games that were announced, developed, demonstrated — and then vanished. -StarCraft: Ghost — Blizzard's ambitious stealth-action StarCraft spin-off -Silent Hills / P.T. — Kojima, Guillermo del T...

GTA 6 fans are already choosing the $100 premium edition in huge numbers. Supermassive Games is facing its third round of layoffs in under three years. EA’s new owners have saddled the company with billions in debt. And one game studio CEO somehow ended up asking an AI chatbot who his own former employee was before publicly attacking her online. This week on Gaming Views Pulse, we dig into:-Superm...

Metroid is 40! We head back to 1986 to discover how one of Nintendo’s most important games helped create an entire genre, turned brutal hardware limitations into ground breaking ideas, borrowed more than a little inspiration from Ridley Scott’s Alien and delivered one of gaming’s greatest reveals with Samus Aran. Along the way we uncover the bizarre truth behind the legendary JUSTIN BAILEY passwor...

Roblox just lost $9 BILLION after changing its algorithm to move younger players away from heavily monetised games. EA has officially gone private — and the talk of massive cost cutting has already begun. Meanwhile, developers are speaking out about the state of the industry, Sony is doubling down on a digital future, and GTA 6 is getting a rather bizarre Netflix premiere. Yep. Just another comple...

Seven months down, five to go, and 2026 has delivered absolute masterpieces alongside total disasters! On this episode of Gaming Views, we break down our mid-year report card, debating whether Pragmata lived up to the hype, how Resident Evil 9: Requiem reinvigorated the survival horror franchise, and why Crimson Desert became an obsessive hundred-hour time sink. Plus, we get spicy with hot takes o...