Forza Horizon 6′s Tokyo Is So Big It Has Its Own Development Team

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I am so happy to tell you all that today is Friday. What a time to be alive. Today, we have news about physical copies of Crimson Desert, a new Deep Rock Galactic spin-off, a trailer for Spielberg’s new alien movie, and a confirmation that Forza Horizon 6 is massive. It’s the latest edition of Morning Checkpoint, Kotaku‘s daily roundup of gaming news, rumors, and culture. While you all read this, I’m going to be over here mourning all the gear I lost from my Marathon vault last night after a string of disastrous runs.

Forza Horizon 6′s biggest city sounds truly massive

Turn 10, the devs behind Xbox’s upcoming open-world racer Forza Horizon 6, have talked quite a bit about how big it will be and how much larger and more detailed it is compared to past entries. But in a new interview with IGN, Forza Horizon 6 art director Don Arceta revealed that the game’s version of Tokyo is so big that the studio had to dedicate an entire team to working solely on that aspect.

“We have a team making [Tokyo] specifically, and a lot of that is: it’s our biggest city we’ve ever made,” Arceta told IGN. “It’s so layered and so detailed – much more than anything we’ve done in the past. To make Tokyo City for Forza Horizon, we really need a dedicated team. It covers everything from roads, buildings, foliage, terrain; Tokyo has all of it. It’s just such a big biome that it just warranted its own team.”

According to another dev in that same interview, Tokyo alone in Forza Horizon 6 is 5 times bigger than any other urban area featured in the Horizon game. Tokyo will even include multiple districts with distinct locations and vibes, including suburbs and docks. It sounds like Tokyo could be its own open world, and yet, in Horizon 6, there’s still the rest of the map to explore beyond it. I can’t wait to spend 200 hours driving around virtual Japan when Forza Horizon 6 launches on Xbox and PC in May. It will arrive on PS5 later in 2026.

Crimson Desert blocks physical copies from playing until launch

Players who got their hands on early physical copies of mega-hyped RPG Crimson Desert and tried to play it ahead of the game’s official launch on March 19 quickly discovered the game needed a day-one update to play. That’s not uncommon. But after downloading that update, they discovered that physical copies of Crimson Desert on console block players from playing until March 19, likely in an attempt to prevent spoilers from being spread online.

A word of caution: Crimson Desert's physical release seems to be screwed. There is a video that shows you can't start until you update. Makes you wonder why we also saw a message from a PLAION BENELUX rep claiming there is a fully playable build on disc.https://t.co/jtE5DMVj2j

— Does it play? (@DoesItPlay1) March 12, 2026

As shared by Does It Play? on Twitter on March 12, the account has received reports and spotted posts of players seemingly being unable to play Crimson Desert on Xbox or PS5 via a physical copy ahead of launch. The game demands an online connection the first time you boot it up to download an update, something Crimson Desert’s website explains. However, after downloading that update, players are still unable to play the single-player RPG via disc until the official launch. One player reportedly tried to fast-forward their offline console’s internal clock to try to trick the game into thinking it was March 19, but was still unable to play.

There are some reports that players have gotten around this, but I was unable to verify that. Regardless, it’s not great that a properly updated physical copy of an RPG, one the devs promise can be played offline once updated, can be blocked until a specific date. Hope those servers stay up forever so these physical copies don’t suddenly become expensive coasters.

New Deep Rock spin-off looks like a roguelike Left 4 Dead

Deep Rock Galactic’s next spin-off, Rogue Core, has a release date. The game is a co-op-focused FPS built around players completing runs and getting better gear and abilities as they go. A fairly classic roguelike experience. I’m a big fan of Deep Rock Galactic Survivor, a Vampire Survivors-like spin-off of the mining game. So I’m interested to check out Rogue Core when it launches on March 20.

Doom 2005 actress Roasmund Pike calls it one of the worst films ever made

Roasmund Pike is a very successful and respected actress who has appeared in some fantastic movies, like Gone Girl. But back in 2005, she took on the role of Dr. Grimm in the first (and awful) live-action adaptation of Doom. As spotted by Gamesradar, Pike, who stars alongside The Rock and Karl Urban, said she was out of her element in the action movie, and that it could have ended her career early.

“It was an absolute bomb,” said Pike during an interview on the How to Fail with Elizabeth Day podcast. “I mean, I probably could have ended my career. It was just probably one of the worst films ever made. I mean, it was a catastrophe. I don’t read the reviews, but you get the sense like you’re lucky to have survived that one.”