Rockstar has announced the latest limited-time discounts and bonuses Grand Theft Auto V players can earn in GTA Online.
From now until June 12, players will be awarded double GTA$ and RP for doing Special Vehicle Missions. You can also earn an additional 25% GTA$ on all Biker Business Sales and Special Cargo Deliveries.
The latest round of discounts, meanwhile, lets you save on "big-ticket items" like special vehicles, executive offices, and more from Warstock, DockTease, Dynasty 8 Executive, Elitas, and Ammu-Nation. Here are some of the items currently available for 25% off (the full list can be found on Rockstar's website):
Executive Offices
Executive Office Garages & Garage Mod Shop
Imponte Ruiner 2000 (both prices)
Coil Rocket Voltic (both prices)
Rhino Tank
HVY Insurgent Pick-Up (both prices)
Buckingham Valkyrie (both prices)
Brute Armored Boxville (both prices)
Yachts (all models & model upgrades)
The Premium Race this week is Steeplechase, while Del Perro Pier is the current Time Trial. Both run until May 29, after which they'll be replaced by Ascent and Observatory, respectively, until June 5. As always, all participants will earn triple GTA$, but only the top three players will earn a "sizable" payout.
Meanwhile, GTA Online's next big update Gunrunning is scheduled to arrive sometime in June. While details on the expansion are still scarce at the moment, Rockstar says it will be "massive."
The game is scheduled to arrive in Japan this summer on August 25. The physical release will retail for ¥5,800 ($52), while the digital version will cost slightly less at ¥5,546. ($49.82).
Monster Hunter XX was initially released for 3DS back in March. The upcoming Switch version features the same content, but now supports 1080p resolution when docked and 720p in handheld mode. Like Monster Hunter 3 Ultimate, which released simultaneously for both 3DS and Wii U, players can transfer their save data from the 3DS game to the new Switch version, and vice-versa. Likewise. Monster Hunter Generations players can transfer their saves to the Switch game, though this data cannot be transferred back. The Switch version also supports cross-play with the 3DS title, though it's strictly limited to online sessions; up to four Switch players can play together either locally or online, however.
Capcom also revealed a special edition Switch bundle, which will launch alongside the game in Japan on August 25. The bundle retails for ¥36,280 ($325.87) and includes a copy of Monster Hunter XX along with a special Monster Hunter-themed Switch dock.
Monster Hunter continues to remain one of the most influential franchises in Japan. After the Switch version of Monster Hunter XX was revealed, Nintendo's market value experienced another jump, closing at ¥33,510 ($301.27). The company's share price had already been trending upward thanks in part to demand around its new Switch console, but Monster Hunter's announcement helped push Nintendo's market value to its highest point since October 2008.
Capcom hasn't announced if it plans to localize Monster Hunter XX, though nearly every recent installment in the series has eventually made its way to the West.
Yesterday's full reveal of Far Cry 5 comes at an interesting time, to say the least. Its choice of a US setting--as opposed to the "exotic" locations in previous Far Cry games--seems acutely prescient, primed and ready to make a statement about the country. While Ubisoft's decision to tackle a potentially controversial and difficult setting is admirable, there's a thin line between an interesting examination of the current political climate of the US and a game that is incredibly tone-deaf in its approach. For Far Cry 5 to really nail its setting and themes, it shouldn't shy away from the messy, complicated reality of its real-life inspirations.
Far Cry 5's cult-occupied Montana setting isn't an accident. During a behind-closed-doors presentation ahead of the reveal, creative director Dan Hay specifically mentioned the occupation of the Malheur Wildlife Refuge in Oregon in 2016 as an influence of sorts (whether it's for the anti-government militia themselves or the phallic fan mail they received during the occupation remains to be seen). He first presented the game by describing a side of America dedicated to Constitutional freedoms and possessing a strong aversion to the federal government, an America built on the mantra "faith, freedom, firearms."
But Far Cry 5's antagonists aren't merely a militia group fighting for individual freedoms justified or not--Eden's Gate is also a radical doomsday cult. They control the fictional Hope County, and when you, a new junior deputy, arrive in their county, things get violent. The cult's religious fanaticism is plastered all over the promotional materials for the game, from the Last Supper-inspired cover to a preacher in the trailer with the Seven Deadly Sins etched into his skin. All things considered, the roles seem pretty cut and dried: Your job as the deputy is to liberate the county from the cult's stranglehold, and you can even "engage cult forces in aerial dogfights" in order to do it.
It's easy to condemn extremism, to turn it into a convenient enemy; it's harder to develop an antagonist by examining the socioeconomic and political factors at their core, both extreme and moderate. The fact that Far Cry 5 puts you in the shoes of a police deputy against anti-government religious extremists is significant. It's a dynamic that has a history with subtleties and complications that shouldn't be ignored, and to represent it as anything but complicated--especially when violence is the core pillar of gameplay--is shallow at best and a dangerous misrepresentation of real-world tensions at worst.
In that sense, Far Cry 5 has more in common with the explosive 1993 Waco, Texas siege on the Branch Davidians compound than it does the occupation of the Malheur Wildlife Refuge. The months-long siege by federal and state law enforcement as well as the US military on the compound resulted in over 80 deaths, including the religious sect's fanatical leader, David Koresh. It wasn't a question of federal versus state law, as it (at least partially) was in the Malheur case; Koresh was a radical leader, allegedly taking underage "brides" and stockpiling illegal weapons.
It's easy to condemn extremism, to turn it into a convenient enemy; it's harder to develop an antagonist by examining the socioeconomic and political factors at their core.
Before Waco, though, was the standoff at Ruby Ridge in Idaho in 1992. It involved a man named Randy Weaver and his family, who moved to a remote area for reasons that included distrust of society and their religious belief in an upcoming apocalypse. After Weaver failed to appear in court for firearms charges, US Marshals surveyed the property before shots broke out. Weaver's son was killed initially, and his wife was killed by an FBI sniper. The incident led to controversy over the actions of the Marshals and their assessment of the threat Weaver posed.
The key to Far Cry 5's success, at least in portraying a modern-day separatist portion of America, is dependent on how it frames both Eden's Gate and your place in Hope County. If there is depth to the cult's members and compelling exploration of how and why a cult takes hold--and if there's an opportunity for introspection into the role of government and violence against radical groups and individuals--then Far Cry 5 can be seriously impactful. But if it's just you versus the crazies of a cult, it will be a bombastic shooter that oversimplifies a political reality in the US, and that serves no one.
One limitation of the Oculus Rift virtual reality platform was the lack of room-scale tracking, but that has changed with release 1.15 of the Oculus App. The new version introduces full room-scale capability and improves tracking for setups with three sensors, which is required for a room-scale experience.
Full 360-degree tracking was available in 1.14 as long as you had three Oculus sensors setup, but was essentially in an experimental phase. Two-sensor 360-degree tracking is still an the experimental phase and doesn't allow full room-scale, however.
Room-scale allows those in VR to walk around their space and have movements fully recognized in all directions within the VR application. A few notable games on Oculus that benefit from room-scale are Rec Room, Onward, and Arizona Sunshine. The HTC Vive launched with room-scale capability with the tracking of its lighthouse sensors, but remains the most costly consumer VR solution.
The Oculus Rift and its included accessories (Touch controllers not in picture).
The Oculus Rift is packaged with two sensors and the Touch controllers for about $600 USD. Those looking for the room-scale experience will have to purchase an extra sensor, which goes for around $60 USD.
Update: A post on the Friday the 13th: The Game's Kickstarter page addresses a number of issues that players are dealing with today. Regarding the Steam server issues, it states, "We are currently being slammed by thousands and thousands of players and had our servers go down. The servers should be back up, but there is a chance of downtime as we manage server load and spin up more servers to meet demand. If you encounter a server error, please try playing a Private Match with friends. If you need to find players please head over to the Steam forums to get together with other Friday the 13th: The Game fans."
It also specifically notes that it's bringing more servers online in Europe and Australia to accommodate demand in those regions. Similarly, servers that handle player progression are being upgraded, so your level may not be displayed properly until that is complete.
Original Story: Friday the 13th: The Game launches today on PC, PS4, and Xbox One. At least for those playing on PC, it has not been an entirely smooth debut.
In addition to problems with the party system, numerous players are reporting difficulty getting online--a serious problem for a multiplayer-only game. Most of these issues seem to stem from a "database game failure" error. There are numerous threads on Reddit and the official Steam forums with complaints about this; one in particular has racked up more than 800 comments in about two hours' time.
The game's official Twitter account has acknowledged the problems and attributed them to a huge influx of players. Despite some indications that fixes were rolling out, the issues appear to be persisting this afternoon.
One of its most recent tweets states, "We are looking into why this keeps occurring, but it comes down to so many users...which is a weird problem to have."
These problems are not impacting everyone, and some players are having success playing. Whether you'll be one of the lucky ones appears to be a crapshoot.
During a livestream today, Battlefield developer DICE has previewed many of the changes being made in Battlefield 1's upcoming May update. This doesn't introduce much in the way of new content, but it does make balance changes and add some quality-of-life improvements.
One such improvement is called Operation playlists. Rather than playing through an Operation and then having to return to the main menu to find a new game, these servers will keep you playing. This is described as a "first step," and it shows--for the time being, the same Operation will loop over and over, with players simply swapping sides at the end of each game. In the future, DICE intends for this to cycle through different Operations. In the meantime, this should allow you to keep playing on a full server without having to deal with matchmaking.
Bayonets see a change to mitigate the frustration of those who have found themselves on the receiving end. The damage reduction players have while performing a bayonet charge has been removed; previously, they took 15% less damage. Additionally, you can now turn less during a charge, making it so that you can't rush around corners in the way you could before. More changes are also being explored, including making it clearer to players when someone is beginning their charge.
Other noteworthy changes include:
Domination's ticket count increases from 100 to 200
In Conquest, flag captures now count for less, but holding most points provides a bonus
Self-repair on all tanks is now the same: 200 health every five seconds
The Dogfighter and Bomber Killer have swapped gadgets
The AA gun's range on the ground has been reduced, but it can now hit targets further away in the air
The stationary AA and field guns can now be repaired; after taking a certain amount of damage, they'll become inoperable until they're fixed
In terms of netcode, DICE has implemented a new threshold that dictates whether hit detection is performed on the client or server level. Provided your ping is under 130 ms (or 200 ms if you're not in the US or Europe), this will continue to happen at the client level. Those with higher pings will have hit detection performed by the server, which means they will have to lead shots slightly.
A release date for the May update has not yet been announced. It's currently going through the certification process on consoles, and a date will be shared once that's complete. Full patch notes will be shared alongside the update's release.
If you needed further proof of Monster Hunter's immense influence in Japan, the mere announcement that the series is coming to Nintendo Switch caused Nintendo to experience another jump in market value (via CNBC).
Following the news that Capcom would be bringing Monster Hunter XX to Switch, Nintendo's share price rose 5.48% to ¥33,510 ($301.27). Nintendo's stock had already been trending upward; earlier in the week, the company hit a seven-year high thanks in part to strong demand for Switch. This latest jump has now put the company's market value at its highest point since October 2008.
Monster Hunter XX is an expanded version of Monster Hunter Generations, featuring a host of additional monsters, weapon sets, quests, and other content. Monster Hunter XX released for 3DS back in March, but it has so far remained exclusive to Japan. Capcom hasn't announced whether it will be localizing the title for either console, but the publisher has released other recent installments like Monster Hunter 4 Ultimate and the aforementioned Generations here in the West. Capcom is also bringing the 3DS role-playing off-shoot Monster Hunter Stories to the US later this year.
It's also unclear if 3DS players will be able to transfer their Monster Hunter XX save data over to the new Switch version, though it wouldn't be the first time Capcom offered that luxury to fans; players could freely transfer their saves between the 3DS and Wii U versions of Monster Hunter 3 Ultimate using a special app available on the eShop.
Capcom will be revealing more details on the Switch version of Monster Hunter XX during the Monster Hunter Championship event on May 27.
Vudu has announced the latest set of movies that it will be streaming for free next month. The streaming site, owned by Walmart, began streaming select movies for free last year on its Vudu on Us service.
Starting June 1, there about a dozen new films available from many different genres, including Hannibal, Antitrust, and The Legend of Bruce Lee, which tells the story of the legendary martial arts star. Films are available to watch at no charge, but they are supported by ads.
The Legend of Bruce Lee will only be available for free on Vudu on Us for the month of June. It's also your last chance to watch My Week with Marilyn, Brothers, and True Grit for free, as those films will leave Vudu on Us at the end of the month too. Check out the full list of what's coming and what's going below.
Vudu June 2017 Arrivals
The Legend of Bruce Lee
Igor
Material Girls
Hannibal
Some Girls
Antitrust
Desperately Seeking Susan
Aftershock
Rollerball
The Mod Squad
Submarine
Saved!
Quartet
Vudu June 2017 Departures
Brothers
My Week with Marilyn
The Legend of Bruce Lee
True Grit
Check out the full list of Vudu's free-to-watch movies over on its website and check out our story on what's new and leaving Hulu and Netflix in June as well.
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