Disney+ is getting into the spooky swing of things by releasing the house of mouse’s latest blockbuster Haunted Mansion to streaming this month, but there’s much more ahead on the service for all the little boils and ghouls to enjoy!

Genre fans will be delighted to hear that there’s a brand-new spin on R.L. Stine’s Goosebumps coming to Disney+ and Hulu in October. The new horror-comedy show is headed up by Scream King Justin Long (Tusk, Barbarian, Jeepers Creepers) and follows five teens who accidentally release supernatural forces and must work together to recapture them, all while discovering their parents’ juicy secrets from their own teen eras.

The jewel in Disney+’s crown this October belongs to the God of Mischief, though. That’s right, the MCU’s most popular series Loki is finally back for a second season, and we’ll be finding out how Thor’s brother (adopted) will be faring against all the multiversal Marvel chaos he unleashed at the end of season 1.

Here’s everything coming to Disney+ in October…

Sunday, October 1

New Library Titles

• Toy Story Funday Football (Livestreaming at 9:30am ET)

Monday, October 2

New Library Titles

• Mickey and Friends Trick or Treats

Tuesday, October 3

Live on Disney+ 

• Dancing with the Stars (Season 32) Episode 2 (Live 5:00-7:31pm PT) 

Disney+ Originals

• Star Wars: Ahsoka Episode 8 Finale

Wednesday, October 4

New Library Titles

• Haunted Mansion
• Hailey’s On It! (S1, 5 episodes)
• Kiff (S1, 1 episode)
• SuperKitties (S1, 3 episodes)
• The Villains of Valley View (S2, 4 episodes)

Thursday, October 5

Disney+ Originals 

• Loki (Season 2) Premiere (Available at 6:00pm PT) 

Friday, October 6

New Library Titles

• Bobi Wine: The People’s President
• Camping Out 
• Chips Ahoy 
• Fiddling Around 
• Inferior Decorator 
• Old MacDonald Duck
• When the Cat’s Away
• Wyken, Blyken and Nod

Tuesday, October 10

Live on Disney+ 

• Dancing with the Stars (Season 32) Episode 3 (Live 5:00-7:31pm PT) 

Wednesday, October 11

New Library Titles

• Alice’s Wonderland Bakery (S2, 7 episodes)
• Broken Karaoke (Shorts) (S2, 3 episodes)
• The Simpsons (S34, 22 episodes)
• Heartland Docs, Dvm (S5, 12 episodes)

Disney+ Originals 

• 4EVER Premiere – All Episodes Streaming 

Thursday, October 12

Disney+ Originals

• Loki (Season 2) Episode 2 (Available at 6:00pm PT)

Friday, October 13

New to Disney+

• Goosebumps Premiere – Episodes 1-5 Streaming

Tuesday, October 17

Live on Disney+

• Dancing with the Stars (Season 32) Episode 4 (Live 5:00-7:31pm PT)

Wednesday, October 18

New Library Titles

• PJ Masks: Power Heroes Music Videos (Shorts) (S1, 10 episodes)

Thursday, October 19

Disney+ Originals

• Loki (Season 2) Episode 3 (Available at 6:00pm PT)

Friday, October 20

New Library Titles

• Werewolf by Night in Color

New to Disney+

• Goosebumps Episode 6

Tuesday, October 24

Live on Disney+

• Dancing with the Stars (Season 32) Episode 5 (Live 5:00-7:31pm PT)

Wednesday, October 25

New Library Titles

• Big City Greens (S4, 5 episodes)
• Running Wild with Bear Grylls: The Challenge (S2, 8 episodes)
• Theme Song Takeover (Shorts) (S3, 7 episodes) 

New to Disney+

• Primal Survivor: Extreme African Safari All Episodes Streaming

Thursday, October 26

Disney+ Originals 

• Loki (Season 2) Episode 4 (Available at 6:00pm PT)

Friday, October 27

New Library Titles

• Explorer: Lake of Fire (Special)

Disney+ Originals

• LEGO Marvel Avengers: Code Red Premiere 

New to Disney+

• Goosebumps Episode 7

Tuesday, October 31

Live on Disney+

• Dancing with the Stars (Season 32) Episode 6 (Live 5:00-7:31pm PT)

This article contains spoilers for Gen V episode 1.

Just like its parent series, The Boys spinoff Gen V is a searing satire of the superhero genre.

Set in the fictional Godolkin University, Gen V follows a handful of young Compound V-enhanced superpowered young’ns as they try to make a name for themselves at either the Lamplighter School of Crimefighting or the Crimson Countess School of Performing Arts. As such, the eight-episode Prime Video series has plenty of opportunities to skewer our DC and Marvel-saturated entertainment landscape.

The show’s Sept. 29 three-part premiere contains many such examples of comic book satire. There’s the hyper-violence, acts of superhero selfishness, and depraved sexual acts we’ve come to expect from The Boys, of course. But in one particular instance the series gets ultra specific in its references to the Marvel-ization of pop culture. Simply put: there’s a sneaky WandaVision joke in here and you may have missed it!

The moment comes about 20 minutes into episode 1 “God U.” Accompanied by her cynical roommate Marie (Jaz Sinclair), Emma (Lizze Broadway), gins up the courage to go talk to super famous young actress Justine (Maia Jae Bastidas). As Emma and Marie approach Justine and her friends, we catch a snippet of their conversation in which Justine mentions trying out for a very unique-sounding Vought superhero project:

“So my guys at Innovative are sending me out for this limited series on Vought+,” Justine says. “It’s an elevated superhero thing – a meditation on grief told through 70 years of sitcoms. And Zach Braff is directing.”

Sound familiar? Save for the Zach Braff directing detail (that poor man has been catching satirical stray bullets for years now), Justine clearly auditioned for The Boys‘ universe’s own version of WandaVision.

Premiering in January of 2021, WandaVision was the Marvel Cinematic Universe’s very first* foray into streaming television on Disney+. It was also quite good as far as we’re concerned! The show’s depiction of Wanda Maximoff (Elizabeth Olsen) coming to terms with her grief over losing The Vision (Paul Bettany) while paying homage to classic sitcoms was pretty compelling stuff. But it’s also hard to argue that it doesn’t sound like the most deranged thing you’ve ever heard when you merely right down the premise, sans context. A superhero show that’s a meditation on grief told through 70 years of sitcoms? Sure thing, bud. Next you’ll tell me Zach Braff is directing.

*Previous Marvel properties like Daredevil on Netflix and Agents of SHIELD on ABC weren’t technically considered part of the MCU. But it’s a bit of a gray area now as Charlie Cox’s Matt Murdock has returned to the MCU proper in Spider-Man: No Way Home and will continue on in Daredevil: Born Again.

It’s a little curious that Vought is only getting to its WandaVision-style show now. That’s pretty old news in Marvel world with the franchise moving on from Phase 4 of its storytelling and into Phase 5. But hey, better late than never. As Gen V progresses through its first season, we’re curious to hear of what other titles are on Vought+. Perhaps The Deep will find himself in some sort of time traveling bureaucracy or Starlight will become a superhero lawyer.

The first three episodes of Gen V are available to stream on Prime Video now. New episodes premiere Fridays culminating with the season 1 finale on Nov. 3.

As such, Phantom Liberty often feels like a playground for the new and improved Cyberpunk’s best features. Its combat is intense, its world feels substantial, its narrative is exceptional, and it is even filled with the difficult decisions (both micro and macro) the base game sometimes lacked. It’s one of the biggest leaps in quality that an expansion has ever offered, though it’s certainly difficult to not be a little bitter when you think that the entire game could have been like this. 

24. Cuphead: The Delicious Last Course

The Delicious Last Course is certainly one of the shorter expansions on this list, but it’s hard to hold that fact or this DLC’s long development time against it when you consider just how much time it takes to properly render this game’s stunning animations. 

Along with being much more visually ambitious than the base Cuphead game (which is saying something), The Delicious Last Course is somehow even more challenging than the infamously difficult base Cuphead experience. Yet, it rarely (if ever) feels cheap. This game demands that you master every old Cuphead trick and a few new ones, but it rewards you for your patience and talent with some of the most exhilarating boss battles in recent gaming history. 

23. Battlefield Bad Company 2: Vietnam

I’ve never been entirely sure why we’ve never gotten a truly great standalone Vietnam War video game when so many exceptional movies have covered that time in history from so many angles. While this DLC’s campaign certainly doesn’t offer the definitive Vietnam War video game experience I’m looking for, its multiplayer may just be the best in Battlefield history. 

Vietnam’s exceptional maps, incredible soundtrack, and general refinements to Bad Company 2’s already excellent multiplayer modes make it one of the most intense multiplayer FPS experiences of its era and arguably the gold standard for the entire Battlefield multiplayer concept. The vehicles, the squad roles, the surprisingly good XP system…nearly every element of this game’s multiplayer would still impress today if it was featured in a new release. 

22. Dishonored: The Brigmore Witches

Both Dishonored games benefit from exceptional DLC, but The Brigmore Witches stands tall as the series’ finest expansion.

Essentially the culmination of both the base game and the previous DLC’s continuing narrative, Brigmore Witches’ story obviously benefits from the groundwork laid before it. Yet, it’s this expansion’s gameplay that shines brightest. Brigmore’s more challenging enemies, advanced abilities, and all of the ways you can navigate its more open levels make it the closest this series has ever come to capturing the very best elements of the Thief franchise. 

21. Borderlands 2: Tiny Tina’s Assault on Dragon Keep

While nobody expects the Borderlands franchise to take itself seriously, the entire concept of this DLC seemed a little…odd. A Borderlands expansion built around the idea that you’re playing a fictionalized version of D&D? Following a series of lackluster DLC releases, some worried that the team was just desperate to prolong the game’s success. 

Instead, this DLC proved to recontextualize so many of the things that made Borderlands special in the first place. With all the rules thrown out of the window, Tina Tina offered a refined version of the Borderlands experience that benefited from top-shelf Borderlands pop culture references and Tiny Tina’s questionable effectiveness as the game master. The eventual quality of Tiny Tina’s Wonderlands only confirmed the strength of this concept. 

20. Half-Life: Opposing Force

While I’m also a fan of Half-Life’s Blue Shift expansion (which casts players in the role of a security guard during the Black Mesa incident), Opposing Force is a particularly exceptional extension of one of the best games ever. 

Built on the brilliant premise that you essentially play as one of the Marines assigned to eliminate Gordon Freeman in the base game, Opposing Force does a fantastic job of presenting familiar (and welcome) Half-Life elements in a new way while offering essential new experiences. Even some of the expansion’s ideas that don’t entirely work (like the sometimes wonky NPC companions you fight alongside early on) showcase the ambition of this expansion and developer Gearbox’s understanding of the genre. 

19. Destiny: The Taken King

While Destiny was certainly a commercial success from the moment it was released, even the game’s earliest and most adamant fans will likely admit that it didn’t quite live up to its full potential at launch. The Dark Below and House of Wolves expansions kept fans in the gameplay loop, but both essentially offered more Destiny rather than definitive proof that Bungie had any idea how to grow this game in the ways it needed to grow. 

Well, The Taken King certainly offered that proof. Its fantastic campaign showed that Bungie hadn’t forgotten how to tell a story, while its expanded Strikes and Raids tested the limits of even the best Destiny players’ builds, skills, and teamwork. Individual improvements and new additions aside, Taken King’s greatest gift to Destiny fans was showing that the game’s team was capable of crafting an adventure that felt like it could only work within their then-unique take on the genre.

18. Mass Effect 3: Citadel

I sometimes think that the discourse surrounding Mass Effect 3 was always a touch overblown. Yes, that game’s ending was a disaster, but that finale’s shortcomings have come to define what was otherwise a very good game. People wanted to love Mass Effect 3 just as they loved the rest of the franchise. It’s just that Mass Effect 3’s ending made the game kind of hard to love. 

As corny as this will sound, Citadel is all about love. It’s a love letter to the franchise and its fans delivered at a time when everyone needed it most. By allowing the Normandy crew to take some much-needed shore leave, Citadel also allowed players to spend time with those characters in more intimate scenarios that often still featured the series’ best writing and most adventurous creative elements. Nobody officially called it an “apology” ending, but it was certainly an appropriate one

17. Starcraft: Brood War

Truth be told, Brood War is one of the less impactful expansions on this list. Whereas some expansions practically redeemed their base games by making serious changes, Brood War’s contributions are comparatively modest. Instead, Brood War’s greatest challenge was finding a way to add new content to a strategy experience that was often praised for being perfectly balanced. 

Yet, Brood War somehow found a way to improve upon perceived perfection. Brood War’s new units, expanded environments, and brilliant difficulty tweaks (most notably, its improved enemy A.I.) forced players to consider new tactics without having to completely abandon what they learned and mastered before. Starcraft may be one of the greatest strategy games ever, but it’s hard to imagine playing it without Brood War installed

16. Prey: Mooncrash

Mooncrash is probably the most underrated expansion on this list, though that’s a pretty fitting legacy for the DLC expansion to a game that has long been tragically underrated. If for some reason you did give Prey a chance but never tried Mooncrash, then I beg you to give this DLC some love as well.

By randomizing its enemy positions, traps, and loot layouts every time you die, Mooncrash essentially turns Prey into a Roguelike experience. Players are even able to choose between multiple playable characters with their own strengths and weaknesses, and eventually upgrade them as they slowly progress. While Mooncrash makes a jarring transition from the base experience to say the very least, it ultimately builds its adventure on the common ground between Rougelikes and immersive sims. In a better world, Arkane would have been allowed to make a full game like Mooncrash. 

15. Warcraft 3: The Frozen Throne

Another expansion for a Blizzard RTS? What can I say; Blizzard used to make some incredible expansions. It’s a point I’ll revisit a couple more times on this list. 

Actually, I worry that Warcraft 3’s reputation has been negatively altered by both that abysmal remaster and the ways that World of Warcraft has come to define the Warcraft legacy. Before all of that, though, Warcraft 3 really did raise the bar for RTS titles. Its mechanics weren’t necessarily the deepest, but the game’s stunningly deep story and rich visuals immediately separated Warcraft 3 from the competition and set up so many of the ideas that would later define the WoW mythos. 

Well, The Frozen Throne brilliantly continues that story by showcasing the uneasy alliance that has formed between those who oppose the Lich King as well as the mounting consequences of Arthas’ continuing conquest. It’s an epic faction-based fantasy narrative that clearly draws upon genre influences (as well as the previous games) but ultimately feels surprisingly unique to this experience. It’s also often told between some exceptional battles that are greatly enhanced by this expansion’s numerous subtle and sweeping improvements. 

14. Bloodborne: The Old Hunters

Anyone who knows FromSoftware’s works also knows that the studio loves to save the most difficult Soulsborne challenges for their DLC. Clearing a FromSoftware DLC release is a right of passage for even the most hardcore Soulsborne fans. Well, The Old Hunters may just be the studio’s crown jewel in terms of absurdly difficult expansions. 

Despite giving you a surprising amount of powerful new gear to play with, The Old Hunters is guaranteed to push Bloodborne players to their absolute limits. Like so many of FromSoftware’s best games, though, it’s Old Hunters’ execution of nearly everything it does that keeps it from being overwhelmingly frustrating. You’ll likely die a few times because you’re too busy admiring the stunning gothic world that the Old Hunters team has crafted. Your many subsequent deaths will be softened by the knowledge that you’re dying to some of the finest challenges ever crafted by the genre’s innovators. 

13  Final Fantasy 14: Endwalker

Ever since Final Fantasy 14 essentially rebooted itself with Realm Reborn, the game’s fans have been blessed with a series of high-quality expansions that represent the high points of the game’s much-needed change in direction. While any (or at least most) of those expansions could have made this list, Endwalker somehow raised a bar that people thought couldn’t go any higher. 

I won’t bore you with the wealth of content Endwalker offers and how it could have easily filled a lesser game. Instead, I think it’s enough to say that Endwalker somehow brought an emotional and satisfying end to the most ambitious MMORPG narrative ever crafted. It’s not quite the end of Final Fantasy 14, but it certainly feels like the culmination of this game’s achievements. 

12. Fallout: New Vegas – Old World Blues

While Fallout 3 and New Vegas’ DLC expansions weren’t always perfect (you know what you did, Courier’s Stash), those titles really do represent a brief golden age for ambitious DLC when creative expansions to established single-player titles were sometimes taken for granted. Yet, even when measured by some fairly high standards, Old World Blues stands apart. 

In Old World Blues, the player soon learns the legend of the Big MT: a research facility that once supposedly housed the world’s greatest scientists. What follows one of the most insane adventures in a franchise known for its insane adventures. It’d be a crime to ruin some of this DLC’s greatest moments, but it’s enough to know that Old World Blues is the funniest and best-written chapter in the entire New Vegas lineup. If you ever needed proof that Obsidian should have been handed the keys to the Fallout franchise, you’ll find plenty of it here. 

11. World of Warcraft: Wrath of the Lich King

Though the arguments over the best World of Warcraft expansion will likely never truly stop, it’s no surprise that Wrath of the Lich King regularly finds itself at, or near, the top of such lists. At the very least, Wrath of the Lich King led to the peak of WoW’s popularity, power, and cultural impact. For some, Wrath will always be associated with the MMORPG’s best days. 

Popularity aside, what actually made Wrath of the Lich King so special? Well, along with wrapping up some of the lingering narrative threads that began in Frozen Throne (and allowing players to explore the wonderful world of Northrend in the process), it offered a brilliant blend of requested improvements and creative new concepts. Previously ignored class archetypes got a little more love, Raids were more accessible (yet far more intricate), and numerous mechanics were made more accessible without losing that underlying sense of wonder. 

This has never been a perfect expansion. In many ways, though, it best represents the things that made WoW special. 

10. Baldur’s Gate 2: Throne of Bhaal

Throne of Bhaal is another expansion to a game that really had nothing left to prove. Then again, Baldur’s Gate 2 was the sequel to a game that seemingly left very little off the table. This was a time when BioWare was dedicated to raising the bar they had set, and they weren’t going to settle for less just because this was “only” an expansion. 

As a result, Throne of Bhaal forges its own legacy. Though technically much shorter than the base game, Throne of Bhaal throws a lot on the table for even veteran players to deal with. While that includes a variety of new abilities and possibilities, you’re going to need all of those tools if you’re bold enough to have any dreams of actually surviving this game’s daunting battles. While I know that some are actually turned off by this expansion’s combat-heavy nature, I’ve always found that to be the kind of welcome departure from previous conventions we look for in the best expansions. 

9. Civilization V: Brave New World

Honestly, there have been relatively few Civilization expansions over the years that have fallen short of greatness. However, Brave New World stands out for the ways it elevated an exceptional base experience while encouraging entirely new ways to approach that game. 

Along with the usual array of Civilization expansion additions (new scenarios, Wonders, units, etc.), Brave New World reimagines the base game’s ideological, social, and political systems. The result is a Civilization experience where victory not only comes in so many new forms but feels satisfying in ways that even classic Civilization conquest concepts do not.

Yet, despite introducing so many complex elements and new strategies, Brave New World does little to diminish the accessibility that gives Civilization that famous “one more turn” quality that keeps you playing long past the point when greater responsibilities should be demanding your attention. Nobody was really asking for sweeping improvements to the Civilization franchise, but Brave New World delivered them in ways that have proven to be hard to top. 

8. Diablo III: Reaper of Souls

If this list was ranked solely on the basis of expansions that righted the wrongs of their base games, then Reaper of Souls would rank even higher than this. Along with the massive patch that preceded its release, Reaper of Souls addressed the many, many issues with Diablo 3 that fans just started to assume they would always have to live with. 

Defined by its darker tone and the ways that tone represented the series’ untarnished glory days, Reaper of Souls is less of a total overhaul of Diablo 3 and more of an exploration of the many ways that game could be improved by incorporating twists on old concepts that remained true to the series’ recent innovations. It wasn’t quite the “Diablo 2: 2” experience that some fans begged for, but it was a game that made a lot more people realize that Diablo 3 was really just a few improvements away from being something pretty special in its own right. 

7. The Witcher 3: Blood and Wine

Honestly, feel kind of bad for not including Hearts of Stone on this list given that it’s an exceptional expansion that sometimes gets overlooked. It’s just that there are times when I just can’t believe that something like Blood and Wine exists. 

Few (if any) people walked away from The Witcher 3 thinking “That wasn’t enough game for me.” Yet, CD Projekt Red still delivered two exceptional expansions that felt worthy of being standalone games. While Blood and Wine is certainly noteworthy for giving Witcher 3 an impossibly brilliant series of endings that somehow all feel appropriate, it’s the quality of the game’s main quest that sticks with me all these years later. 

Despite its use of numerous horror-like concepts, Blood and Wine’s surprisingly playful (yet impactful) narrative feels like the ultimate flex of an all-time great RPG studio working at the top of its game. 

6. Far Cry 3: Blood Dragon

It’s sometimes bizarre to think of Blood Dragon as an “influential” experience, but that’s very much what this game is. At a time when studios were figuring out how to make the most out of the lucrative world of DLC, the Blood Dragon team came out and said “What if everyone just let themselves get real weird with it?”

It wasn’t the first expansion to attempt such a massive departure from its base game, but nobody had really seen anything quite like Blood Dragon up until that point. Its overwhelming (in a good way) B-movie references and neon visuals were perfectly complemented by an expertly implemented synth soundtrack. Blood Dragon contains so many absurd ideas, yet the game manages to combine them in a way that somehow makes all those concepts feel like they’ve always belonged together. 

Blood Dragon was the excuse that developers and gamers needed to lighten up a bit about the whole DLC thing and just have some fun.

5. BioShock 2: Minerva’s Den

Though I like BioShock 2 more than most, it’s hard to argue against the game’s black sheep status. Not only was it not developed by Irrational Games, but it actually cast you in the role of a Big Daddy. It always felt closer to a DLC than a proper sequel, and that “2” in the name really seemed to rub some the wrong way. 

While I accept that BioShock 2 will always be an oddity, it pains me to realize that the game’s outsider status means that the majority of BioShock fans have likely never experienced arguably the series’ finest hour: the Minerva’s Den DLC. Mind you, I’m nearly being literal there. You can beat this DLC in just a handful of hours. 

Despite its short runtime, Minerva’s Den features some of the best storytelling in any of the BioShock games. Built around a battle between great minds over the fate of a powerful supercomputer known as “The Thinker,” Minerva Den’s narrative raises and addresses some tough questions about whether there is really a truly “moral” use for advanced A.I. technology (sound familiar?). While all BioShock games raise such complex questions, it’s the ways that Minverva’s Den examines them through such a human lens (despite not starring a human) that makes it so special. It’s no wonder that some of the game’s principal creators went on to form The Fullbright Company and create games like Gone Home and Tacoma. 

4. Grand Theft Auto 4: The Ballad of Gay Tony

I love Grand Theft Auto 4, but like some other fans at the time of its release, I just couldn’t shake the feeling that the game somehow felt smaller than San Andreas. While the game was, of course, technically larger, its more grounded nature meant that it sometimes lacked the absurd activities that San Andreas could utilize without any real explanation ever being needed. 

The Ballad of Gay Tony DLC brings back some of that classic GTA absurdity, and with it comes some of those little pleasures that it sometimes felt like GTA 4 lacked. Yes, that includes outlandish missions like stealing a subway car for a misguided kid trying to give his dad the ultimate present, but it extends lesser side activities like golfing, running a nightclub, and delivering drugs across town. Such things may not sound like much on their own, but they gave you those invaluable little things to do that were missing from the base GTA 4 experience.

More than anything, though, it is the ways that Ballad of Gay Tony incorporated those sillier elements into the GTA 4 experience without completely betraying that game’s more mature evolutions that make it a minor miracle. No matter how crazy things get, the people and events of Ballad of Gay Tony somehow feel like they belong in a world that is a bit closer to our own. 

3. The Last of Us: Left Behind

I went into Left Behind with some trepidation. Unnecessary DLC in video games was nothing new, but in the case of Left Behind, there was a very real chance that the events of the DLC could compromise or negatively alter a game that was widely acclaimed for its storytelling. 

Instead, Left Behind solidified The Last of Us‘ status as the greatest video game story ever told. Impeccably incorporated into the game’s main narrative, Left Behind staged one of the game’s greatest tragedies by also featuring some of its most notable triumphs. We know (or rightfully suspect) that Ellie and Riley’s joyful journey through an abandoned mall can’t end well. Yet, much like the girls themselves, our knowledge of the horrors that may come does little to diminish the pure joy of watching two true souls who need and deserve a victory enjoy a brief respite from the terrors that will otherwise shape much of their existence. 

It’s now impossible to imagine telling The Last of Us story without Left Behind. That chapter was even a highlight of the HBO series, and its intimate nature almost certainly inspired that series’ finest, and most original, episode. 

2. Red Dead Redemption: Undead Nightmare

Given Red Dead Revolver’s mixed reception, few expected Redemption to be anything greater than an old-west GTA spin-off. Of course, it proved to be so much more than that. Similarly, few fans expected Undead Nightmare to be little more than a cute, brief, zombie-filled “horde mode” released just in time for Halloween. What we got instead was a game that the talented team at Rockstar took very seriously despite its seemingly silly premise. 

Not satisfied with relying on the same old genre tropes, the Undead Nightmare team instead asked themselves what a horror movie version of Red Dead Redemption’s take on the Western genre might look like. The result was a game that somehow retained the spirit of RDR’s most impactful thematic ideas while translating those ideas into an entirely new genre. No matter how wild this expansion got (and it got real wild), everything felt like it fit into the acclaimed RDR universe. 

Of course, it didn’t hurt that battling waves of zombies with RDR’s excellent shooting and riding mechanics proved to be so much more fun than it had any right to be. In some ways, Undead Nightmare has become even more famous (or perhaps just beloved) than even RDR was. It’s a miracle that something like this was allowed to exist, and video game DLC was (briefly) better because of it. 

In the early days of video game DLC (or at least the digital age of the concept), Bethesda made the truly terrible decision to release the now-infamous “Horse Armor” add-on for Oblivion. For $2.50, Bethesda offered the…privilege of owning entirely cosmetic armor for your in-game horse. Mocked even in its time, the Horse Armor DLC has since gone on to define the laziest and greediest elements of a multibillion-dollar corner of the industry that more than a few people say has irreparably damaged the creative soul of gaming as an art form. You could say I wasn’t a fan. 

Bethesda didn’t stop there, though. They continued to release more, and gradually more substantial, DLC for Oblivion. The game’s run of DLC eventually culminated with the 2007 debut of Shivering Isles: the greatest DLC expansion in gaming history. 

While Shivering Isles wasn’t necessarily more substantial or ambitious than the biggest and best expansion packs that preceded it, it was an often stunning example of what DLC was truly capable of. Thrusting players into the Shivering Isles (which are ruled over by the always charming Prince of Madness, Sheogorath), this expansion allowed the Oblivion team to push their already impressive work to incredible new heights. The world was more colorful, the gear was more creative, and the quests…well, the quests are some of the best in RPG history. 

It is strange, yet strangely appropriate, that Oblivion offered the best and worst DLC in gaming history. To this day, though, Shivering Isles stands as proof that truly exceptional DLC can make even the greatest games greater than we ever dreamed.

This article contains The Wheel of Time spoilers.

Actress Hayley Mills may have upended her parents’ lives in Disney’s The Parent Trap back in 1961, but her cameo in The Wheel of Time similarly showed how one Aes Sedai appearing in a flashback could influence the course of history for several of the show’s major characters. What at first glance appears to be a Dragon Reborn prophecy of which viewers were already aware becomes, upon closer inspection, a turning point not only for Rand as the subject of the vision, but also for Siuan, Moiraine, and the entire Damodred family.

Mills portrays an Aes Sedai of the Blue Ajah named Gitara Moroso, who was Keeper twenty years ago when Siuan and Moiraine were still among the Accepted in the White Tower. In The Wheel of Time, they are shown as a happy, carefree couple, who are particularly glad to announce the end of the Aiel War to their elder. However, the blind sister is struck by the clairvoyant certainty that the Dragon is being born at that exact moment, a prophecy we saw fulfilled in an action-packed season 1 flashback.

Without a doubt, Gitara’s vision is important in the sense that, without it, the Aes Sedai wouldn’t have found Rand and the others in time to save them from the Dark One’s forces. However, there’s also the overwhelming sense that Siuan and Moiraine would have perhaps formed a joyful life together had the Keeper not put them on the mission to find the Dragon Reborn and guide him. Maybe Siuan wouldn’t even have become the Amyrlin at all!

But more than that, we know that Moiraine hasn’t seen her family in decades, and it seems very possible that her mission to find the Dragon became an all-consuming quest once Gitara set her on her path. Alanna Sedai even tells Lan in an earlier The Wheel of Time episode that Moiraine became much more serious quite suddenly just before she bonded her Warder. Her estrangement from her sister might also spring from Gitara’s sudden vision and subsequent events.

Because Gitara, Moiraine, and Siuan were all in the Blue Ajah, the secret of Rand’s birth on the Dragonmount was likely known only to the three of them, and Gitara did not survive the shock of the history-changing vision. The responsibility placed on the two young Accepted became a crushing weight, far too heavy to sustain a viable romance, and we see the aftermath of that burden in the latest The Wheel of Time, particularly in the final heartbreaking moments.

Siuan clearly thinks that six months should have been enough time to prepare Rand for the coming battle, but Moiraine argues that the Amyrlin has failed to prepare the Aes Sedai to accept and support the Dragon Reborn. Siuan recalls that her predecessors planned to use the Dragon as a weapon that they controlled rather than as a general leading an army of the  Light. Perhaps if Gitara had not set them on their mission, Siuan and Moiraine would have seen eye-to-eye on the issue.

Readers of the Robert Jordan novels are likely aware that Gitara’s influence extends even further, to the point where she creates the circumstances for Rand being born in the first place, but as it stands in Prime Video’s The Wheel of Time, a cameo from a notable classic Disney star had the appropriate amount of impact for a pivotal moment in the lives of the show’s principal characters.

This Castlevania article contains spoilers.

The vampire killers have essentially lost by the final scene of Castlevania: Nocturne. Richter, Annette, Tera, and Maria’s plan to destroy the Abbot’s Forgemaster machine has failed miserably, Tera is forced to sacrifice herself to Erzsebet Báthory in order to save Maria, and now the remaining heroes are on the run. There’s basically nothing stopping Drolta Tzuentes and her legion of monsters from hunting down their opponents. But just as a bloodthirsty Drolta is about to strike at her prey, a sword pierces her through the heart. And it’s no ordinary blade that finally takes down the vicious vampire but the one belonging to Alucard.

Yes, James Callis returns as the son of Dracula in the final moments of Nocturne, setting up what will likely be a much bigger role for the fan-favorite dhampir in season 2. His surprise cameo makes a lot of sense, as Nocturne is not only meant to adapt elements of Rondo of Blood but some of the other Konami games. Báthory and Tzuentes, for example, are actually from the 1994 Sega Genesis game Castlevania: Bloodlines, which takes place a century after Richter’s adventures. Meanwhile, Juste Belmont hails from the underrated 2002 Game Boy Advance title Harmony of Dissonance.

The show is also meant to bring in more elements from the 1997 PlayStation hit Symphony of the Night, arguably the best entry in the entire series. It’s why a heavily reimagined Olrox, one of the bosses in that installment, is prominently featured in Nocturne. And now we have Alucard, who will not only be a major boost to the ranks of heroes trying to stop Báthory, but whose arrival can bridge the gaps between the first animated series and Nocturne as well as Rondo and Symphony. After all, despite releasing years apart and on completely different game platforms, these two games essentially tell one complete story about Richter.

In fact, if Nocturne season 2 were to adapt Richter’s storyline from Symphony, it would mean some very dark times ahead for the young Belmont. You see, although Richter defeats Dracula and the sorcerer Shaft, the Dark Lord’s most loyal servant, and saves his beloved Annette in Rondo of Blood, things don’t turn out that well for the hero in the aftermath. When we meet Richter again a few years later in Symphony of the Night, he’s become the new Lord of the Castle, taking Dracula’s place as the main villain. His plan? To bring Dracula back from the dead!

But how has this happened? Why has a Belmont joined forces against the family’s sworn enemy?

The chaos forces Alucard to rise from his slumber and head to his father’s castle. It’s during the quest to find Richter that he learns that Shaft is behind Belmont’s sudden change of allegiance. In the time between Rondo and Symphony, the evil priest brainwashed Richter into taking over for Dracula. Much of the first half of Symphony sees Alucard fighting his way through the castle until a boss fight with Richter finally breaks the spell. But they’re both too late to stop Shaft’s ultimate plan, as Dracula is resurrected, launching Alucard into the famous second half of the game where he must make his way through an upside down version of the castle.

Nocturne isn’t completely beholden to the games, of course, and goes in its own direction when it needs to. We likely won’t see a direct adaptation of Symphony, but if the show does choose to use this part of Richter’s story, all of the key pieces are there.

While Shaft isn’t technically in Nocturne — at least not yet — it’s clear the Abbot is meant to fill the role of evil priest. But there’s also Olrox, the vampire that’s haunted Richter for years. Olrox killed Richter’s mother, the vampire hunter Julia Belmont, when he was just a boy and Richter is still dealing with the trauma of that life-altering event as an adult. In fact, when he learns that Olrox is back and working with Báthory in France, his immediate reaction is to run away from a fight before he’s forced to confront the vampire. A vampire who has that much of a hold on a Belmont would certainly think to use that to their advantage, especially Olrox, who has a personal vendetta against Richter.

We learn in the series that Olrox hunted down Julia in America to avenge the death of a lover, who Belmont vanquished prior to the events of Nocturne. And as he stood over Julia’s lifeless corpse, Olrox promised that he’d one day return for Richter so that he too could pay for the sins of his mother. What if Olrox’s final revenge on Julia is to turn her son to evil?

There’s also the vampire queen herself, who could manipulate Richter into joining her cause like she did the Abbot and Tera (in her defense, she didn’t really have much of a choice), leaving Alucard, Annette, and Maria to work together to save the young Belmont. And will it all lead to the return of the Dark Lord himself? In Castlevania lore, Dracula is said to rise once every century. Now that 300 years have passed, we’d say it’s about time for a comeback.

Castlevania: Nocturne is streaming now on Netflix.

This Power Rangers Cosmic Fury article contains spoilers through episode 9.

2025. A year that’s loomed over Power Rangers since 2005 when Power Rangers S.P.D., the 13th season of the franchise, aired. S.P.D.’s unusual jump forward in the timeline (previously each season had more or less matched it years of airing) was so the show could tell stories about an Earth that, to quote the shows first episode, “has become a haven for all alien races who come from the farthest reaches of the galaxy.” 

The world of S.P.D. was one where aliens lived freely amongst humans, just a regular part of everyday life, and the titular Space Patrol Delta protected Earth against the few aliens who refused to live in harmony. It set up the idea that, within twenty years of the season’s airing, Earth in the Power Rangers universe would soon be crawling with aliens. But as each subsequent season got closer to 2025 and aliens never showed up to Earth en masse? Fans began to worry that the show would never address it. It seemed more and more likely that a season would air and be set in 2025 and there would be no mention of aliens. This would shatter the (admittedly already battered) Power Rangers timeline.

While a few aliens had shown up on Earth in the interim between 2005 and 2025, restaurateur Piggy in Mystic Force (2006), Andresian Orion in Super Megaforce (2014), and some Rafkonians in Dino Fury (2022), they weren’t integrated into society the way S.P.D. portrayed. Fans would try and explain it away with theories such as the aliens only live in New Tech City (where much of S.P.D. takes place) but you think someone in at least the last five or ten years of the show would mention aliens living on Earth at some point. You could try and fudge the dates but S.P.D. was clear. Episode 32, “Wormhole” conclusively gave an onscreen date of 2025. The chances of Power Rangers addressing this impending massive gap in its continuity looked impossible.

Then, out of nowhere, Power Rangers Cosmic Fury, the 30th season of the franchise, addressed it in a single line.

In episode 9 of the season, the Rangers’ backs are against the wall. Lord Zedd has returned and the entire galaxy is in trouble. MMPR Blue Ranger Billy (David Yost) informs Cosmic Fury Red Ranger Amelia (Hunter Deno) that “alien civilians caught in the battle are losing their homes. Our forces are having to take them to New Tech City back on Earth.”

With two years to spare, Power Rangers finally managed to do it. The aliens in New Tech City are refugees from the battle with Zedd. It’s perfect! Power Rangers finally addressed the looming continuity disaster… But did it really?

The world of S.P.D. isn’t one that lines up with the idea that aliens came to Earth in large numbers only two years previously. The biggest piece of evidence was the S.P.D. episode “Sam Part 2” where Yellow Ranger Z remembers her time at school when she was 12 years old. In that flashback several aliens bully her. Z was an adult in 2025, so that doesn’t make sense with what Cosmic Fury just established, right? 

In truth, this was an impossible task from the start. Outside of the Power Rangers TV show world, it’s understandable that most of the team behind the shows in the years after S.P.D. aired didn’t want to bother with slowly introducing aliens into the population of Earth. It’s certainly not the first time Power Rangers has ignored its past continuity but also characters in Power Rangers traditionally should be relatable to their audience. The more you make their world different to ours the less it may appeal to a general audience. Plus, alien makeup costs money and Power Rangers is notoriously a very cheap show to produce.

It’s not dissimilar to how the revival of Doctor Who in 2005 slowly made aliens attacking Earth more and more common, to the point most people in London would evacuate on Christmas just because an attack happened there every year at that time. Later seasons under new production teams sidestepped this because having the people of Earth aware of aliens made it less relatable to the casual viewer. Much like Power Rangers, Doctor Who could have become far too burdened with its own continuity instead of simply telling fun and engaging stories. So it chose to sidestep it as much as it could.

Then why did Cosmic Fury even bother with giving an explanation for aliens on Earth at all? The simplest answer is that it knew it had a chance with the story it was telling and went for it. Cosmic Fury, and Dino Fury before it, have made a point to find engaging ways of back filling old continuity errors in the franchise. Dino Fury did a whole courtroom drama with it! The S.P.D. timeline issue is something that writers were aware of and took the opportunity to address,

Could Billy have gone more in-depth that actually there were some aliens on Earth already just to satisfy anyone who remembered “Sam Part 2”? Possibly, but Power Rangers Cosmic Fury wisely focuses on its own unique story and only adds little references and explanations in a way that organically makes sense. As much as hardcore fans would want the longer explanation, it would kill the pacing of the show for anyone else watching. 

There’s also a key difference with Cosmic Fury that most other seasons have not had. Cosmic Fury looks to be the last Power Rangers season for awhile. There’s a Netflix reboot in development and it’s extremely unlikely it’ll even address the TV shows continuity. There’s a solid chance that Cosmic Fury could be the end of 30 years of continuity. 

This means the people behind Cosmic Fury knew there probably wouldn’t be another season that would have to worry about aliens suddenly living on Earth. With no upcoming season they could finally shift the status quo of Power Rangers continuity to what S.P.D. had set up without alienating new audiences. This was the only chance and they took it. 

So yes, the smaller details don’t match up, but it mostly works. If you really want to make it work, perhaps a few more aliens came to Earth, lived with Piggy, and had a settlement of sorts that flew under the radar. Z did live most of her life on the streets, it’s not impossible she fell into a small alien community. 

And like previously stated, Power Rangers continuity has almost always had major issues. Lost Galaxy claimed it was set “sometime in the not too distant future” after the previous season of In Space and in that time Earth had constructed a giant space colony that was meant to cross the galaxy. Yet later seasons made it so there was only a gap of about a year between In Space and Lost Galaxy. It’s not impossible Earth was able to construct a giant space worthy colony in a year but it’s pretty unlikely.

Still, it can work and that’s what really matters in a franchise that lasts as long as Power Rangers.

Power Rangers Cosmic Fury is now streaming on Netflix.

Over the last couple of decades, the Open-World genre has slowly come to define Triple-A gaming. In fact, the most popular question that precedes the release of most major modern single-player games is “Is it Open-World?” More and more gamers (especially those who only purchase a couple of major new games a year) seemingly find it difficult to believe that all of that development time and production money (as well as their personal time and money) would go toward a game that doesn’t let them go anywhere, do anything, etc. 

For the most part, the rise of the Open-World genre has been good for gaming. Even older, great franchises (like The Legend of Zelda or FromSoftware’s Soulsborne games) have greatly benefited from pivoting to open worlds. Open-World and sandbox games were seen as the natural evolution of the medium when they started to take off 20+ years ago, and little has changed since then. The very best Open-World titles continue to exceed expectations that already seemed impossibly high.

Yet, for as many great Open-World games as we are regularly blessed with, we’re starting to see more and more Open-World games that fall painfully short of those expectations. It’s not that those games are terrible (though some of them certainly are), but rather that they fail to do enough to justify their open worlds. In some cases, those games are actually made worse by their lazy open worlds. Yes, that statement includes notable disappointments like Gotham Knights, the Saints Row reboot, and Rage 2. More recently, though, it’s grown to include two of the biggest (and otherwise best) games of 2023: Starfield and Cyberpunk 2077 2.0. 

The recently released Cyberpunk 2077 2.0 update (and the accompanying Phantom Liberty expansion) greatly improves the original game in various ways. The action is better, the character building mechanics are much more robust, and most of those lingering technical issues have finally been fixed. Cyberpunk 2077 2.0 is being called “the game that Cyberpunk 2077 should have always been,” and that’s a pretty fair summary of both the quality and extent of that update’s sweeping changes. 

For as incredible as that update is, though, it does little to address one of Cyberpunk 2077’s biggest launch issues: the game’s dead and barren world. Yes, enemies and NPCs are smarter and more aggressive, and yes, the game finally supports car combat. However, Cyberpunk 2077’s world rarely feels like a place that anyone actually lives in (if only begrudgingly so). Insignificant characters perform redundant activities while large parts of the map go unused. It’s nice that some NPCs actually react to having a gun pointed at them now, but the game rarely leaves you feeling like something is happening in Night City if you’re not causing it at that moment.

Starfield suffers from a similar issue, though in a slightly different way. It is undeniably impressive that the game offers 1000+ planets to explore, but few of those planets (even the ones that contain major cities) actually offer meaningful reasons to explore them for long. “Well, duh,” you’re probably saying, and I hear you. I also didn’t expect all of those planets to offer Rockstar-level Open-World designs, and I accepted that some of those planets would ultimately be resource farms. 

What I didn’t expect was how joyless the process of discovering those worlds would be. Starfield‘s daunting size turns fast travel into even more of a necessity than it was in previous Bethesda titles. What’s really annoying, though, is that Starfield’s designers were seemingly painfully aware of the necessity of fast travel and built much of the rest of the game around it. As a result, you don’t just encounter largely barren planets in Starfield but barren sections of space itself that are mostly intended to be fast-traveled through so you can get to the areas that actually matter.

Ultimately, both games suffer from the same fundamental design issue. Exploring their open worlds isn’t a highlight but rather the thing you have to do to get to the actual highlights. 

To be fair, both games have quite a few highlights worth reaching. Cyberpunk’s already exceptional missions are made that much better by the improved AI, combat, and character building mechanics featured in that recent update. The Phantom Liberty expansion really showcases how great Cyberpunk 2077 can be when you are allowed to focus on those parts of the game.

Similarly, there are numerous quests in Starfield that rank surprisingly high amongst the very best RPG adventures that Bethesda has crafted. I was stunned by both the quality of those quests and how they were often tucked away in parts of the galaxy that the game doesn’t technically make you explore. Granted, that often made it that much more annoying that those quests were often separated by such joyless exploration and extended dead zones. 

Starfield is, fundamentally, an exceptional Bethesda RPG. Cyberpunk 2077 is, fundamentally, an incredible Deus Ex-like RPG. It’s just that the things that make those games great are strung together by Open-World elements that often do little more than remind you of better examples of that genre. I’ve heard of people bouncing off both games, and I truly believe that’s largely because the things that make them great are too often separated by prolonged stretches of tedious navigation that delay the thrill of getting to enjoy the things that really make those games special.

In recent years, the best Open-World games have distinguished themselves by making the process of navigating their worlds enjoyable for reasons other than eventually reaching the thing you really want to do. Marvel’s Spider-Man makes slinging around the city an unrivaled pleasure. Tears of the Kingdom, Red Dead Redemption 2, and Elden Ring make you feel like every corner of the map contains something worth exploring (often because they do). These are games that fundamentally would not work as anything other than Open-World titles. At the very least, they would not work nearly as well as they do. They are not games that feel like they should have been significantly smaller were it not for the lingering pressure of that “Is it Open-World?” question.

Like it or not, that question isn’t going anywhere anytime soon. It’s a shame that smaller games that require significantly less money and significantly less time are often less favored than games that offer at least the illusion of freedom, but that’s where the industry is at. I’ve seen little to suggest that anything significant is going to change on the consumer end of things anytime soon. Quite frankly, given the quality of the best recent Open-World games, I’m not sure that the demand for them should change anytime soon. 

Instead, it falls to studios everywhere to do what Cyberpunk 2077 and Starfield often fail to do; find ways to make Open-World games that feel like something more than a smaller, better game broken into pieces and strung together with meaningless McMansion space. After all, if the “Is it Open- World?” question isn’t going anywhere, then the question that really needs to be asked alongside it is, “Why does it deserve to be Open-World?”