What is up everybody? August is here and while it is sad that the summer is drawing to an end, there are a whole lot of video games here to help cheer you up. Here are August 2025’s biggest game releases. [Music] I say this every month. We do our best to make these videos as factually accurate and informative as possible. But as we get into the later and busier months of the year, it remains very possible that some video game release dates change last minute. Usually, they get delayed. Occasionally, they get surprise launch. And sometimes they just announce things a few minutes after we make these videos, which is always annoying. So for best results, check your local listings and take everything I say on any circumstances with a grain of salt. Anyway, on the first, you can use your words to beat the crap out of stuff in Wander Stars, an anime inspired turn-based RPG where the combat system has you combining words to create attacks. That’s on Switch and PC. On the fifth, if you would prefer a game based on an existing anime, there’s Demon Slayer, Ketsu No Yiba, the Hinukami Chronicles 2, another fighting action adventure game based on the hit series which is developed by Cyber Connect 2. That is the studio that gave us Dragon Ball Z Kakarat as well as several hundred Naruto games. You can play Hunami Chronicles 2 on everything. It’s not technically getting a dedicated Switch 2 version, but Switch 2 is backwards compatible. So, you you get the idea. A stupid amount of games are dropping on the 7th. If you want to play as a lighthouse keeper and live by the side of the sea and polish your lamp by the light of day so ships at night can find their way, you can do that while fending off arcane horrors in static dread. The lighthouse, which is described as Lovecraft meets Papers, Please. Hell yeah. That’s on PC. If you’d prefer light guns to lighouses or regular houses to lighouses or you’d rather just shoot zombies in the head, then deal with anything remotely lighthouse related, there is House of the Dead 2 remake on Switch and PC, which polishes up the classic Dreamcast era shooter that is coming to other consoles later on. If you’d like to shoot stuff while also being shot at in outer space, you can have a bullet hell of a good time in Gradius Origins, which collects a bunch of classic Konami schmups, but also adds a brand new one with Salamander 3. That’s on Switch, PS5, Xbox Series, and PC. If you would prefer to play some old games about shooting a bunch of stuff while stuff shoots at you from another point of view, there’s also Operation Night Strikers, which collects four classic title arcade games, including Operation Wolf, that is just on Switch and PC. A Thousand Deaths is a 3D platformer which has a cool throwback aesthetic, but even more interestingly, it lets you make decisions that apparently affect the game story and mechanics. That one’s on PC. And finally, there’s Tiny Bookshop, which is a cozy game about running a small business that sells these strange little three-sided boxes of paper. It seems like they would flop open all the time, but luckily, somebody thought to glue all the paper in there so it doesn’t fall out. What could these strange things be for? What is a bo anyway? Who is buying these bos? I want to play games. On August 8th, there’s a mafia, the old country, which takes the organized crime series back to turn of the century Sicily. It looks to have some cool truck chases and enough stealth sequences that it inspired the following bad puns in the post text thread that I’m on with IGN’s Brian Alano and our former colleague Mitch Dyer. Spaghetti Gear Solid, Pizza Walker, The Phantom Penet, Ground Orzos, Sons of Liberace, Papa Obs, Guns of the Bata, Tom Keianti’s Splinter Sauce, and finally Farfell Cry Bolognia Dragon. Anyway, that’s on Xbox Series, PS5, and PC. And I’m sorry. On August 11th, anyone who sprung for the Deluxe Edition or MVP bundle gets access to Madden NFL 26 on PS5, Xbox Series, Switch 2, and PC. Anyone who bought the regular version will have to be patient and wait for the 14th to play the latest entry in the longunning series about running short distances and then stopping and standing around for a bit before running some more. I believe a pointy ball is involved somehow. But if you want to find out how, you have to play the game or just know about football, whichever. Still on the 11th is Whisper Mountain Outbreak, an isometric survival horror game that can be played with up to three friends and which features some escape room style puzzles. Technically, any room is an escape room if you want to leave. Think about it. There’s got to be a way out. Look, here’s something. Safe. I wonder what that means. It’s funny. It’s spelled just like the word escape. Let’s go. If you and three friends would rather shoot stuff together from a firstp person perspective, a day later, there’s Abyssus, a rogike FPS, which calls itself brine punk, which I guess is sort of like steampunk, but with a more grimy, nautical vibe. On August 12th, Senua Saga: Hellblade 2 Enhanced Edition drops as a brand new PS5 game, but also as a free update to the existing Xbox Series and PC versions. This adds a bunch of enhancements like 60fps performance mode, developer commentary, and new photo mode features, which is nice because this is a very good-looking game. If you’ve ever wanted to play a VR game about shooting zombies, well, good news because there are plenty of options out there. But now you have another one with World War Z VR, which is coming to PC and MetaQuest on that same day. On August 14th, Switch 2 gets another exclusive with Dragon Drive. Though I don’t know if anyone’s going to go bananas over this one. It is a threeon-ree robot wheelchair basketball game that you play while using the Joy-Con’s mouse functionality, except I guess you use both hands and also motion controls. Kind of looks like a miniame that fell out of a Wii Sportslike, but hey, Rocket League sounded underwhelming at first, so who knows, maybe this is the next big esport. That day also sees the release of Lord Amber Maze on PC. It’s a cute looking RPG with turn-based combat and time manipulation. Though I guess technically turn-based combat is sort of time manipulation already. A wolf is not going to wait its turn to bite you. Think about it. Still on the 14th, there is the visual novel Iwaura Arya, which has some really gorgeous painterly artwork. But beware, there appears to be a murder mystery of foot. On the 15th, Off comes to Switch and PC as well. That’s a remastered version of a 2008 cult Belgian indie RPG, which was tonally very similar to Undertale already, but now it’s doubly so because this updated version features some new music from Undertale creator Toby Fox. August 19th, PS5 and PC owners can have a nice chill time zipping around on a flying sword in Sword of the Sea, which is the latest from Giant Squid, the studio behind Abzu and the Pathless. If that sounds too laid-back, PS5 and Xbox Series owners can go blow up in Delta Force, the free-to-play military FPS in which PC players have already been blowing up since December. On August 20th, Morbid Metal hits PC, which is a hacken slash rogue light where you can shapeshift into various deadly forms to murder endless waves of robots. If you’d rather shoot endless waves of robots, there’s also Void Breaker, which is another rogue light, which is an FPS, and that’s also on PC that same day. If you want to play a game that is not a rogue light involving robots, there’s also Black Myth Wukong, which is finally coming to Xbox Series. But hey, if you do want more rogue lights involving robots, I got you covered. On the 21st, there’s the Diesel Punk World War II Tactics Rogike Grit and Valor 1949, which gets a VR version that makes it look like you’re playing with a bunch of really cool little toys that is coming to all of the current virtual reality hats. Also that day is Inauma 11: Victory Road, the first mainline installment in the soccer flavored RPG series in over a decade. This is not the 11th game in the series, as the title would suggest, but rather the 16th, counting spin-offs, but not including the multiple anime shows, six feature films, and three separate manga series. I feel like I’m losing my mind because I’m just now hearing about this franchise. But clearly, it has a sizable fan base to necessitate such a deluge of media. Anyway, if you’re a big fan of the series or you just like soccer and JRPGs, the good news is that this new one is coming to everything except Xbox One. Still that day is Discounty, a cute little game about running a discount supermarket and also dealing with the drama of the towns folk. You can go do cleanup in Isisle 7 on Xbox Series, PS5, PC, and Switch. On August 22nd, there’s Dying Light: The Beast, which will have lots more parkour and zombie kicking action and features the return of the protagonist from the first game that is on Xbox Series, PS5, and PC. If you ever wish that Gears of War was about pizza chefs, well, somehow someone else did, too. And they decided to make a video game that fits that very description. Pizza Bandit is a gritty looking four-player co-op thirdp person shooter that’ll have you playing as an ex- mercenary who has to go do more mercenary stuff and kill things to fund his pizzeria that hits early access on the 25th. If you’d rather just play Gears of War without any pizza nonsense, well, Jeepers, you seem like a fun time. But also, you’re in luck because a day later, you can play a spruced up, juiced up version of Xbox’s iconic 2006 coverbased shooter, which is coming to Xbox Series, PC, wait for it, and in a shocking series first, PlayStation 5. That’s impossible. Search your feelings. You know it to be true. If you’re an Xbox dieard who’s had your fill of gears, but you still want to shoot stuff with your buds, you’re in luck because Hell Divers 2 drops out of orbit onto Series X and S that very same day. I just got three things to say. God bless our troops. God bless America and gentlemen. Start your engine. Space Adventure Cobra, the 1970s manga turned 1980s anime, is somehow also getting turned into a 2025 video game, which is totally fine by me, but also not something I was expecting. The game is a runand gun shooter that follows the titular Cobra, a dashing space pirate with a laser gun for an arm, and a sexy android sidekick, whose titular space adventures involves crossing paths with the likes of a dude made out of glass named Crystal Bowie, as well as the evil Lord Salamander, who spoilers is actually an energy projection being controlled by a mummified but still alive Adolf Hitler. They really don’t make them like they used to. That’s on PS5, Xbox Series, Switch, and PC. Any Switch 2 owners who didn’t think Shy Guy Bazaar in Mario Kart World was bizarre enough? Well, you can head to Bizarro World in Story of Seasons Grand Bazaar, a brand new agricultural life sim all about farming and normal not that bizarre stuff. And I realized there are two separate spellings for the word bizarre that mean totally different things. But work with me here because there are like 50 games on this list that is coming to Switch 2, Switch One, and PC on the 27th. Bizar. If you would like to play a grid-based tactics game in which iconic anime robots from totally unrelated media properties shoot each other with lasers and stuff, there’s Super Robot Wars Why. I’m guessing the Y is either short for why are Jet Jaguar or Battler Dunbine and the Wing Zero custom fighting or maybe why the hell not? That’s on PS5, Switch, and PC. Side note, if you’re unfamiliar, Aura Battler Dunbine is another Mecca anime from the creator of Mobile Suit Gundam, but it’s set in a fantasy universe with unicorns and fairies, and the robots are all like big humanoid stag beetles. It’s pretty cool, and I feel it’s important that more people are made aware of its existence because it’s wild. If you’d prefer something involving giant robots, it’s a little less out there, but still involves insects and magic, might I interest you in Metal Gear Solid Delta? This is a groundup remake of the beloved 2005 entry in the stealth action series, which features plenty of political intrigue and close quarters combat, but you can also make snakes spin around so fast that he throws up. And there’s a guy who commands swarms of bees with his mind. And there’s a river full of ghosts, and you climb a big ladder while a lady sings a cool song about snakes. And man, I can’t wait to play this game again. I love Metal Gear. That one’s out August 28th for Xbox Series, PS5, and PC. If you want to swallow an entire car, I’m not going to kink shame. And neither will Nintendo because they made a video game where you can do that. And now they’re releasing it again. Kirby in the Forgotten Land hyphen. Nintendo Switch 2 edition plus sign. Starcrossed World is the latest Switch One game to get an enhanced nextG port that features a bunch of new bells and whistles and errant punctuation in the needlessly long-winded title. The Nightling is a charming looking openw world action adventure game where you play as a little knight with a cool high-tech or possibly magical shield which he can use to do various things aside from regular shield stuff. Between this and Doom: The Dark Ages and that cool Predator cartoon, Shields are having a good year. If you’d like to do even less conventional activities in a fantasy setting, Goblin Cleanup will have you and a friend cleaning dungeons after adventurers have come through and made a big mess, and you got to do it in time for the next band to come through and mess things up all over again. That one’s on PC. Finally, on the 28th, there’s Destiny Rising, which takes Bungie’s long-running game about orbs and galler horns and wizards that came from the moon or what have you, and puts it on mobile. And hot dog have mobile games come a long way since Destiny first launched. That’s hitting iOS and Android. And finally, finally, finally, on August 29th, PS5 and PC players can push a lot of buttons very fast to make a bunch of cool stuff happen on the screen in Lost Soul Aside, the Devil May Cryesque action game that was supposed to be out a while back, but hopefully benefits from some extra time in the oven. You can also push a lot of different buttons really fast to make a bunch of different cool stuff happen on the screen in Shinobi: Art of Vengeance. This is from the team behind Streets of Rage 4. And once again, they are taking an old school Sega property and giving it a fresh but still 2D overhaul, which looks pretty promising. Speaking of Streets of Rage, something else I spent too much pocket money on in the ’90s was Goosebumps. And would you believe it, there’s a new video game about Goosebumps. Goosebumps: Terror in Little Creek looks like a survival horror game for children, which is a really awesome idea. And hopefully it’s better than that old Goosebumps game where Jeff Goldblum played Dracula. Hey, stay away from me. Midweight. The new Goosebumps game is out on Xbox Series, PS5, and PC. And there you have it. Those are August 2025’s biggest game releases. Let me know what you’re playing in the comments below. And if you want a better way of keeping track of what’s coming out, what you’re playing, what you already played, or what you hope to play someday in the distant future, go check out IGN playlist. It is a big huge database of basically every game ever released, announced, or even rumored, lovingly curated by the wonderful Logan Plant, who also helps out fact-checking these videos every month when he has a million other things going on already. Meanwhile, these videos would flat out not get made without Amanda Medina producing or Chris Del Padre editing. So, a big huge thanks to them. And as always, a big huge thanks to all of you who take the time to watch, especially if you go to the trouble of saying something nice in the comments. We read those and we appreciate them. We’ll be back next month as we go hurtling into the churning vortex of fall releases. I hope we survive this one. We’ll see you then. Speaking of big huge stuff, get a load of this gigantic Pomeranian dog. Massive, dude. He’s supposed to be a small dog. He’s not a small dog. He looks really mad. Are you okay? He’s large. Look at the size of this hound. He’s almost 20 lb. They say he’s going to be the size of a car someday. And I shall ride him around like a warg in Lord of the Rings. You don’t need to put this part in the video.