Based on the two-and-half hours spent playing some late-game missions, Assassin's Creed Odyssey seems to be improving upon all the changes that Assassin's Creed Origins introduced to the tenured franchise. By better implementing player choice across every aspect of the game, whether it's in the skills you equip in combat or by the dialogue choices you use to respond to the game's hundreds of NPCs, Ubisoft is making it easier for you to put a little bit of yourself into every decision.
Ubisoft Quebec (Assassin's Creed Syndicate) is leading the charge for Odyssey. Interestingly enough, the studio shared in Ubisoft Montreal's ambitions to turn Assassin's Creed into an RPG before even knowing that's where they wanted to go with Origins. Though the team has had the desire to work on an Assassin's Creed RPG, it's been an endeavor that's challenged them for the better part of the last three years.
At a recent Gamescom event, we had the opportunity to chat with Odyssey creative director Jonathan Dumont. We discussed at length Ubisoft Quebec's philosophy behind its approach to story and combat, as well as Dumont's thoughts on why Assassin's Creed works as an RPG, why Odyssey takes place so far in the past, and what the now decade-old franchise means to him as a creator.
GameSpot: When Origins was first unveiled, one of the biggest changes was combat. What sort of influences did you bring to Odyssey when it came to improving that area?
Dumont: Yeah, it's interesting because I don't know if we have something that we looked at necessarily. We did want you to feel like you're more capable of overpowering enemies. As you grow the strength of Leonidas' spear [your protagonist's weapon and a first civ artifact], you want it to become stronger and stronger. You have base combat and then everything we put on top is to facilitate getting the upper hand over other NPCs. We also wanted that to be a player choice, so we tried to have freedom at the core of everything that we've added. But in this case, creating your playstyle, creating your class, we were thinking about [it] as, "How cool would it be to mix and match skills?" We wanted to allow players to say, "I want to do these four things in the game and that's it. And that's the way I want to play the game!"
We were looking at it more from a customization perspective instead of trying to enforce a certain way to play the game or unlock things in a certain order. Invest the points where you want them but map them like you want them and create your own playstyle. Because Assassin's Creed has been around over 10 years now, and we all play different. Some people just want to play stealth and others might want combat, so we want to make sure that your playstyle is the right playstyle for you and that the game allows you to play that way.
Was player creativity and freedom the core design tenants this time around?
Yeah, and it goes with the story too and how you role-play the character. It goes into picking your character at the start of the game. It's even present when you're recruiting your ship's crew. So how do you want to make it your own in Assassin's Creed Odyssey? Trying to make it feel like what I do as being a reflection of me and that the game offers more choices to do so was important for us in our push to make Assassin's Creed a full RPG.
What fueled the decision for the main character to have a weapon that's essentially a piece of Eden?
So, I played all the Assassin's Creed games. In most of them, you end up fighting a boss that has a piece of Eden, and I have always been intrigued by that. Why can't we see that from the start of the game? If you're going to implement that into a game set in the 1500s, it would be tough to introduce, but if you're going back 2,500 years and, in a setting, where it's [more] tied closely to the first civilization, it makes more sense. They're seen as gods still, so it fits within that setting and the traditional hero of that time, which is typically someone elevated by some power or chosen by the gods.
I always wanted to see what would happen if you could manipulate [a first civ artifact] and control one throughout an entire game. It's not usually present in our games, but with Odyssey I felt like [it's the] right time to try something a little bit outside our typical pillars.
I heard that both the Montreal and Quebec studios logically came to the conclusion that the RPG genre is where the series should go. How did that epiphany come about for the studio? And why do you think the RPG is where Assassin's Creed needs to go?
I think we spent a lot of time creating these huge open worlds and we wanted to give more incentives to explore it. We also prided ourselves in creating these credible worlds where you meet historical characters and dive into history, but we still wanted to explore it in a deeper fashion.
The RPG was a no-brainer for us and where we wanted to go with the series, which is funny because the Origins team felt the same way. We were looking at what they were building, and we were pretty much on board, so we took their code and decided that where we wanted to push further was the role-playing elements and combat customization. The RPG genre really opens our franchise to a much deeper and richer experience where you get involved and care more about what is going on than in the past.
Assassin's Creed has always been a historical fiction series closely grounded in real-world timelines, but it's intriguing to see how you're allowing players the choice to change how the story plays out a bit. Not only that, but you're also introducing these surreal elements fueled by mythology, like Medusa and the Minotaur. How do you balance these inclinations to introduce unearthly aspects while staying within the confines of reality?
Well there's two parts to that. Even though we have choices, we don't change history. Your story changes and some of the relationships you have with some characters will change, but history will follow its course and have the same conclusions you know from real life.
For what's mythological, these are small pockets out in the world. You won't see Medusa walking around or anything like that. The Greeks valued adventure, but they also had fears about adventure. The woods were dangerous so those are places you'd find the myths and legends because that's what they thought were there. In that sense, it's more of an interpretation of what they saw. But is it a simulation within a simulation via the first civ artifacts? You could ask: "Are they really seeing these things?" And some of these things will open up more as you play the game on some explanation. We don't answer all the questions, obviously because questions are interesting and are sometimes even more interesting than the answers.
But as an RPG, we wanted the player to take on bigger things. Mythology was the right choice for us in exploring that. As a whole, 99% of the world is grounded in reality. You'll get to go to see Athens and we made it just as the city was. You'll get to go to where the Oracle of Delphi was, and it looks just like what the place was. But then there's that 1% where we tapped into that first civ to allow some of these mythological elements to come out more. Typically, we do a scenario where a drug allows a character to see these things, but now we're trying to make it coexist a little bit more with the world.
What fueled this decision for this game to be pushed even further back into the AC historical timeline?
With the introduction of choice, we were looking for a setting that was culturally rich, that exposed a lot of values dealing with chaos and order, which I feel to be the thematic root of Assassin's Creed. We ultimately fell on Ancient Greece because they were asking questions, trying to find the truth. Everybody's a philosopher. There's conversations, dialogue. We wanted that to be sort of what's going on around the world because we're introducing choice into the franchise. If you meet Socrates, you talk to Socrates, you ask questions. You're looking for answers. You're trying to see what's good, what's bad, what's true, and what's false. So that is something that we felt that if you're going to introduce choice, we needed a setting like Greece to facilitate that.
I know you can't say much, but can you tell us a little bit about what the modern day storyline will look like this time around?
It's definitely a continuation of Layla's story, and it will evolve the story quite a bit. You'll get some character development in there. She's going to change and take an adventure that goes to places that you don't expect, which is an interesting way of looking at it. Layla was introduced in Origins, but now we're digging into what she's looking for.
I don't want to talk too much about it because when it comes to the present-day, some people like it, some don't. You know how it is.
Jonathan Dumont, Creative Director
I don't want to talk too much about it because when it comes to the present-day, some people like it, some don't. You know how it is. But the way we do it is if you want to dive a little bit more into it, you can still explore, and we have optional dialogue choices you can pick to ask more questions about what's going on. Or you can choose to get it pretty straightforward, but we do have a little bit more action thrown in as well to keep it engaging for those types of players too.
Assassin's Creed has been around for 10 years now. It now has a legacy. So I'm just curious: how do you approach working on a franchise that is so tenured? And for you as a creator, what does Assassin's Creed mean to you?
Assassin's Creed means something different to everybody, and people are interested in it for different things. Some are interested in more of the mechanics. Some are interested more in the lore. Some are interested in the history. Personally, I like the fact that it allows us to explore a part of history, and I like that it allows us to recreate a world that we can't go to see now. So we put a lot of effort into documenting and building those worlds.
But the coolest thing I get to experience while creating Assassin's Creed is that the series sort of reinvents itself depending on the setting. So, if you want to be true to the setting, you need to implement aspects that fit. In Odyssey's case, we have Hoplite warriors and we get to introduce large-scale battles because it's Greece and it's the middle of the Peloponnesian War. Depending on the setting there's decisions that we need to make about gameplay that depend on the character and the setting. I personally love the creative freedom that it gives us when we switch settings, since it allows us to try new things.
As a creator, it's really interesting because, yes, Assassin's Creed is a running franchise that goes on for a while and we do games one after the other. But man, they're really different when you look at each one. You go from the French Revolution to Industrial Revolution to Egypt to Greece. That's crazy! And that's really interesting in my opinion. And I think that's why it's a franchise that people love because they get to be carried somewhere new. And we try to cater to that and make the series a fun place to discover. So, in my opinion, it's those aspects that interests me most.
That's really what drives me into making another one. Because you learn quite a bit as you develop them. You learn while making it. We're not historians. We like history, but we surround ourselves with specialists. We surround ourselves with people that know more than we do. And that first year we sort of try to become experts in a field that's not our field. Our field is making games, telling stories. But really, it's like going back to school every time you start making a new Assassin's Creed, so there's a lot of growth I get to experience during the development process.
After the amazing gaming year that was 2017, many wondered how well 2018 would turn out. Fortunately for everyone, it has been great. The first half of the year has yielded a wealth of fantastic games, and there's more on the horizon. Upcoming games for the rest of this 2018 include slew of hotly anticipated new games, like Super Smash Bros. Ultimate, Red Dead Redemption 2, Spider-Man, and a whole lot more. To help you keep track of all the games coming out and what has already released, we've compiled a list of all the noteworthy release dates for the biggest ones confirmed to come out in 2018 so far.
Game release dates change all the time and new ones arrive every month. Be sure to bookmark this page, as we'll be updating this article with more release dates or any potential changes to any of the dates below. And if you're eager to figure out the release dates from games next year, you can also reference our feature on the game release dates of 2019.
Below you can find a list of the biggest games that don't have explicit release dates but are confirmed to release sometime this year. There are also games listed that we expect to launch in 2018. We'll be moving each of these games into the release date sections above as soon as official dates are announced.
Assassin's Creed Origins released in 2017 following a year off, when Ubisoft took time off to reassess the future of its flagship series. Beyond the obvious move to Egypt, Origins' most notable area of innovation was combat. Previously reliant on engaging enemies and playing out execution animations, Origins completely transformed the series' combat into a hitbox-based system emphasizing precise timing and tactical dodging. While this was a welcome shift that introduced more complexity to enemy encounters, it still had plenty of shortcomings. You could easily fall into using a single dominant strategy to win fights, and the relatively low skill ceiling meant that you ultimately had very little improvement to strive for.
Ubisoft Quebec's upcoming Assassin's Creed Odyssey seems to be attending to these issues, providing more tactical combat than its predecessor while making subtle adjustments that vastly improve the moment-to-moment thrills of engagement. This might not mean much if you're more inclined to play stealth or ranged. I've personally been more of a stealth player in past Assassin's Creed games, even in entries that didn't accommodate such a playstyle--I'm looking at you, Assassin's Creed III. But I was pleasantly surprised to find during my experiences playing Odyssey that its combat was one of the aspects I enjoyed the most. Here are four major changes I noted during a recent two-hour Gamescom 2018 preview session while playing one of Odyssey's late-game questlines.
No Shields, Just Dodges
The most welcome change to Odyssey's combat is the lack of a shield or guarding stance. No longer can you block enemy attacks or arrows--you dodge them instead. This alters the flow of combat, forcing you to pay close attention to enemy movements while also being mindful of the spacing between you and your opponent. This is the best part about Odyssey's take on Origins' combat, as it elevates your active investment in a fight. It was easy to become idle in Origins, often turtling up against enemies with a shield, charging up a strong attack to knock them down, and then wailing on them. You need to be fully aware in Odyssey, unleashing measured bursts of attacks and dodging before getting hit by an enemy follow-up.
You may not come equipped with a shield of your own, but your opponents do! There's a power imbalance you feel every time you square up against a group of shielded enemies--a feeling I rarely got from fighting such enemies in Origins. Luckily, you're given a shield removal skill that can quickly put foes on even ground with you. It's an added layer of defense to enemies that seems superficial at first blush, but during my experiences with Odyssey, it contributed to the tension and reinforced the need to be alert.
A drastic, yet subtle new addition to movement is the roll as an action. In Origins, you could perform a roll after mashing the dodge button three times; it would be the third maneuver Bayek would perform after two step-dodges. However, it didn't serve much of a tactical purpose and was more of a cosmetic animation. In Odyssey, a roll is performed by holding the dodge button, and it covers more ground than the standard step-dodge. In every encounter, I had to distinguish which enemy attacks called for a roll, and which could be simply dodged with a quick step. It's a minute change but it made all the difference in elevating my senses during a battle.
You're Making Way More Decisions In Combat
Remedying the issue of Origins' barebones combat are a ton of special skills you can equip and activate on the fly in Odyssey. The most prominently featured skill in early Odyssey footage is the Spartan Kick, which allows you to launch foes away, potentially off cliffs or into shark-infested waters. But there are several other skills you can use--some offensive and others defensive. For example, one allows you to slow down time and move seven times faster than your opponents, something that comes in handy for doling out more damage or simply getting out of harm's way. Skills are triggered by holding the shoulder button and pressing the face button associated with the one equipped on your wheel. You can equip up to eight skills at once, and each takes up a specific number of points from your Adrenaline Meter--which is now split up into segments--upon use.
During high-level play, having so many skills to mix-and-match made for a satisfying dance of creatively linking together the best ones to inflict the highest damage possible. But it also demanded think about how I spend Adrenaline. While you can use it to trigger a powerful special attack that can easily dispatch a single foe, you might be better served triggering several crowd-control moves to hurt multiple foes or launch them off the battle arena instead. A canvas for players to use skills the way they want was exactly what Odyssey creative director Jonathan Dumont intended to be a part of the game's combat.
"We tried to have choice at the core of everything that we've added." said Dumont. "We were thinking about how it would be cool to mix and match skills...we looked at it more from a perspective of customization instead of trying to enforce a certain way to play the game or unlock things in a certain order."
Boss Fights Are More Difficult And Complex
If there's anything that Origins was completely lacking in, it was boss fights. Bosses were often just stronger versions of standard enemies, and if they did have something more interesting at play, the strategy to beat them was incredibly simplistic. Even at high-level play, Origins' boss fights were prolonged encounters that simply required dodging and walloping on a foe until you had enough Adrenaline to perform an Overpower move; rinse and repeat.
Odyssey seems to throw more variety into difficult boss encounters. Admittedly, this observation is purely based on my experiences fighting against Medusa (yes, that Medusa). But if what I experienced with that fight is indicative of the entire game, then I'm quite excited for what other formidable opponents Odyssey is going to throw me against--mythological creature or not.
Medusa actually had varying attack patterns and different stages as the fight progressed. She would try to slow me down with her petrifying stare and then spawn stone soldiers to gang up on me. But as the fight went on, went on, she'd assault me with petrifying lasers and try to attack me directly, all while more stone soldiers spawned in. The fight actually challenged my ability to dodge and use skills efficiently. It's exactly what you want a boss fight to be: a test of everything you've learned and executed upon using the game's various systems. You can watch the full battle against Medusa at the end of the footage above.
You Can Restat Anytime You Want
This doesn't pertain to combat directly, but if you decide there's another character build you'd like to pursue that would better accommodate your fighting style, you're free to completely restat your ability points any time at no cost to you. This is a tremendous addition that gives you the ability to experiment and spend your ability points on other skills that may not have fit your initial character build. Once again, this seems to align with what Dumont believes is Odyssey's emphasis on creativity and player choice.
"Invest the points where you want them but map them like you want them and create your own playstyle," commented Dumont when asked about player customization. "Because Assassin's Creed has been around for over 10 years now, we all play differently. Where some people just want to play stealth or ranged, some people want combat. So, we want to make sure that your play style that you want to bring in is a right playstyle for you. And the game allows you to play that way."
That creativity is welcomed by the freedom to change the way you play at any time. The build given to me during the preview was focused more on combat, but I was able to restat into a hybrid of both combat and stealth. It made the build more focused on chain-killing as many enemies as possible with the Rush Assassination skill before being seen, and then clearing out the rest with crowd-control and attack buff skills. The opportunity to branch out allowed me to get creative with my character on a whim. It was refreshing to have no penalty for doing so, as Origins forced you to commit to a build for a majority of its runtime.
A Step Forward For Combat
There's a higher sense of urgency and strategizing in Odyssey's combat. You're thinking more and you're constantly making split-second decisions on the types of skills you want to perform. Enemy groups are quicker to surround and overwhelm you than in Origins, so it's essential to move quickly and act aggressively. All of this already puts Odyssey's combat system far above Origins' in complexity and nuance, often motivating me to pursue enemies head-on more than I'm usually accustomed to.
As someone who has always relished in playing stealthily in every Assassin's Creed game, it's exciting to see improvements that make combat less mindless and more tactical. For the first time in the series' history, I'm struggling to settle on a playstyle--not because of lacking quality in one over the other, but simply out of finding each genuinely appealing. It honestly surprises me, and for a series I've been following since the beginning, I find that fantastic.
Looking at From Software's Sekiro: Shadows Die Twice, it's clear that it's built on the foundations of the team's previous work on the Dark Souls series. Focusing on an uncompromising and stoic design sense that rewards patient players who learn from their mistakes, the developer's next big title definitely channels some of the best of what their last ten years of games have to offer. However, Sekiro is a major shift away from the slower, and more cautious playstyle of action-RPG Dark Souls and even Bloodborne--moving further into the direction of what seems to be a traditional action game.
In Sekiro, you're tasked with using some unorthodox gadgets, a sharp blade, and a ninja's cunning and agility to overcome foes that can drop you in only a few strikes. Just prior to Gamescom, we dove into a brief section of Sekiro, which showcased the unique combat and stealth encounters, and got an idea of how it recontextualizes the Souls-formula into a stealth-action experience.
Set in a heavily fictionalized take on Sengoku-era Japan in 1500, you play as a shinobi who faces a brutal defeat at the hands of a rival samurai, losing their left arm in the process. Defying death, the warrior is given a new arm by a mysterious monk who names him the "One-Armed Wolf". From here, the main character begins his quest for revenge against the samurai and his clan that roam the lands. But during his adventure, he'll encounter other dangerous beasts and larger than life monsters, slowly revealing a much greater threat that will push his shinobi training to its limits.
Unlike From Software's past titles, Sekiro focuses on the story of a defined character, and with stripped down RPG mechanics--there's a greater emphasis on the more action-oriented gameplay and smart use of the tools you have on hand. As more of a spiritual successor to From Software's previous games--which were also directed by Hidetaka Miyazaki--many of the familiar touchstones from the Souls games remain intact--but with many notable differences.
At its heart, Sekiro is a stealth-action game, and many encounters involve getting the jump up on unsuspecting enemies for quick and efficient kill, or by avoiding packs of foes altogether. With the One-Armed Wolf's grappling hook, there's a stronger focus on verticality and movement throughout the levels, where gaining the high-ground above your opponents can mean all the difference in your chances for survival. Though you're certainly free to engage them head-on, most areas are heavily guarded, and you can easily find yourself outmatched by ranged foes and close-range fighters. The enemies in Sekiro are incredibly aggressive, and they prefer to fight in numbers.
During my time with Sekiro, I was impressed with the versatility of the game's main character, which quickly asked you to learn the ins and outs of his arsenal. With the ability to sneak, hug walls, climb steep surfaces, and even jump, the protagonist's skills give him an incredible amount of flexibility and range, allowing you to uncover hidden vantages above groups of enemies, or secret encounters off the beaten path--such as a Shinobi-hunting monk who's immune to many of the Wolf's tricks. But the protagonist's most valuable tool in his arsenal is the Shinobi Prosthetic, which acts as your all-in-one support item, akin to Bloodborne's trick weapons. Allowing you to toss shurikens, spew fire, blind foes, and unleash a powerful axe that can break through enemy defenses, the One-Armed Wolf can pull off all sorts of clever moves on the fly--such as igniting your sword on fire to add extra damage.
Like other titles from the Souls series, death plays a large role in Sekiro. While the One-Armed Wolf is an extremely lethal fighter with gadgets and weapons that allow him to kill most common enemies in only a single blow, he's extremely vulnerable as well. While you're certainly able to face off against groups of foes, it's usually the smarter option not to. During one challenging section, I entered a courtyard with several guards trying to a contain an imprisoned Ogre, only to be spotting by ranged bowmen who had the high ground. With the stealthy approach out the window, I tried to engage each target one-by-one--but then the Ogre broke free and joined the fight. What followed was a cascade of violent blows and flying arrows--culminating in the large Ogre powerbombing me and tossing me like a ragdoll.
You'll die a lot in Sekiro. But as the subtitle of the game suggests, there's more to death than what it seems. Referred to as the Resurrection mechanic and used as somewhat of a tactical respawn, you're able to use up a life token (two at max)--found from resting at Sculptor's Idols, essentially bonfires--to instantly revive on the spot and pick up where you left. In most situations, you can wait for enemies to walk away, revive, and then sneak up for a kill when their guard is down. But of course, if the situation looks too dire--some enemies will choose to stick around your body--you can accept your death instead, which will send you back to the nearest Sculptor's Idol. And of course, all common foes will return after visiting the rest point, forcing you to take on that familiar gauntlet once again.
Eventually, you'll come across elite foes that guard the only path forward. These mid-bosses are among the more dangerous opponents you'll encounter, and battling them feels more like a game of wits and quick reflexes, rather than brute force. Much like stealth gameplay, melee combat is all about taking advantage of your opponent's vulnerabilities. With the Posture System, aggressive attacks, timed parries and blocks will add pressure to your opponent. Once the Posture gauge tops out, they'll enter a stunned state, opening them up to critical attacks. However, the elite enemies can do the same to you, which will decimate your life bar in a single blow.
There were definitely a lot of surprises to be found in this relatively modest demo for the game. After passing through the castle grounds, we entered a large canyon guarded by a massive snake. With the only way forward ahead of it, we had to time our jumps and grapples correctly to enter small cave in time to evade its attacks. Soon after, we faced off against the demo's boss on a bridge surrounded by sparkling red trees--one of the demo's most visually stunning areas. Known as the Cursed Monk, this multi-phased fight forces you to use every skill you have--even grappling to higher ground to avoid attacks. It was easily the hardest fight in the demo, and unsurprisingly, we couldn't beat it.
After playing more than half-an-hour of the game, it's clear that the roots of the Souls genre are still there--yet it's undeniably its own beast. One of the more common sensations felt when playing games like Dark Souls and Bloodborne is the sense of apprehension and dread. While those feelings are still present in Sekiro to an extent, the tools and skills that the protagonist possessed gave me much more of an empowered feeling throughout. Having said that, there's still much we have to learn about Sekiro, and just how far it will go with its mashup of stealth-action gameplay and the best of what the Souls series is all about.
For more on our continuing coverage of Gamescom 2018, which includes our hands-on impressions of Devil May Cry 5 and Hitman 2, be sure to check out GameSpot's hub page for all the latest news and videos.
On the surface, Ubisoft's new first-person psychological thriller, Transference, is a pretty spooky descent into one man's misguided efforts to transfer someone's consciousness onto a computer. As is the case with most fictional mad scientists, Raymond Hayes decides he and his family are the best subjects for his final test and attempts to upload himself, his wife Katherine, and their son Benjamin all into the same simulation. Things do not go well.
Transference picks up at the conclusion of Raymond's experiment. You take control of a nameless protagonist who stumbles upon Raymond's work, but instead of a happy family living in never-ending bliss, you discover a twisted digital reality that's partially incomplete and fractured into three different perspectives.
During a Ubisoft pre-Gamescom press event, I played a 15-minute Transference preview demo on the Vive, but the game is available as a non-VR title as well. After donning the headset, I began to explore a crumbling reality. I navigated a single apartment complex that experienced minute changes, very much like the one in Silent Hills' playable teaser, through the eyes of four different characters--the three members of the family and the neutral protagonist who can view the simulation without bias--to escape a collapsing digital world. Despite the urgency of the situation, I was often drawn to stop and watch the emotional distress that had befallen the Hayes family. I desperately wanted to know what happened and solve their mystery. Transference preys on this desire, the need to solve mysteries and fulfill patterns, throughout both its storytelling and puzzles.
"We wanted the player to use their observation and the simple interactions in the game to solve the puzzles," said Transference producer Kevin Racape. "The more the player progresses, the more the walls starts closing in. You're a prisoner of this world. You feel trapped within this simulation--this crazy experiment--and that's the feeling we wanted to give to our players."
Every clue you need to make it to the next area can be found in your immediate vicinity. The trick is changing your perspective. It's exactly like a real escape room, as each challenging puzzle is meant to be solved through the shared experiences of multiple people. Often, one clue can take on entirely new meaning when seen by a different set of eyes. Our histories affect how we take in information, and utilizing this fact is the key to overcoming the varied puzzles throughout Transference.
Throughout the Hayes' apartment complex are light switches. Flipping a switch literally switches which character you see through. When I first entered the simulation, I was looking at the world as the game's protagonist. He couldn't get into the Hayes' apartment, which comes as no surprise as he doesn't know what it's supposed to look like and thus can't visualize anything past the front door.
Flipping a switch put me into the perspective of little Benjamin, which removed the door entirely and replaced it with a gaping black mass of nothingness. Benjamin's memories of the front door had been corrupted, as the data was missing a few pieces. Switching back to the protagonist, I went down to the basement, grabbed an extra door knocker, switched back to Benjamin, and added it to the corrupted data to reform the door. As Benjamin, I made my way into the Hayes' apartment and into the next room.
Most of the perspective shifts in the Transference demo revolved around puzzles and gameplay mechanics, but there were a few times when jumping from person to person revealed story details as well. For example, both Benjamin and his father view their apartment very differently, one seeing it as a nightmare and the other as a place for new beginnings.
"[Seeing] the whole environment [as a representation of] their own psyche will help a lot in discovering who they are, because if you take the time to explore and observe every item in each of the perspectives, they all have a purpose for being there," Racape said. "Through these observations, this is how you'll manage to put the pieces together. The different perspectives are necessary in order to learn more about each of the characters."
Learning the backstory behind each member of the family can help inform how to solve the game's puzzles. Even the protagonist's perspective is important, as he's the one who can see that there's something very wrong with the simulation. Of course, the protagonist himself doesn't belong and the digital world knows it.
My time with the demo ended with the protagonist being attacked by a living mass of corrupted data. "The monster that the player faces is a part of the corrupted simulation, proof that this experiment did not turn out well," Racape said. That's all Racape would say about the corrupted data, but it seemed like the monster didn't want the protagonist learning about the Hayes family.
The monster's emergence forced me into my flight-or-fight response. Unfortunately, my decision to face the corrupted data did not end well. Perhaps Katherine would have seen the monster differently, but she was the only perspective I didn't get to play. Though terrifying at the time, the corrupted data is a welcome addition to Transference. Every good escape room pushes its players to think creatively by setting a time limit, and the monster's presence adds the necessary pressure to remain alert for the clues that lead to breaking fee.
Transference launches for Xbox One, PS4, PSVR, Vive, and Oculus on September 18. A demo that acts as a prelude to the main game is available on PS4 and PSVR right now. Although playable in non-VR, Racape advises choosing the VR version of the game for a more immersive experience. It's certainly a lot scarier.
Activision has announced and released a new trailer for Call of Duty: WW2's fourth DLC pack, Shadow War. The DLC is coming out as a timed exclusive for PS4 first, before releasing on other platforms.
Shadow War concludes WW2's Nazi zombie storyline in a final chapter titled The Frozen Dawn. Taking place in the hellish depths of a lost city, The Frozen Dawn will test you with new hordes of zombie. However, seemingly magic-infused weapons will be available for you to pull off insanely powerful attacks. Some of them can be seen in the trailer, but Sledgehammer promises there are more secrets to discover in the DLC.
"Thematically for this pack, we wanted to push the fiction as far as we could, have a lot of fun with it, and give the player a sense of creativity as they play," said Sledgehammer Games lead multiplayer environmental artist Matt Abbott in a PlayStation blog post.
Shadow War also adds three multiplayer maps: Airship, Chancellery, and Excavation. Airship takes place far up on a mountain next to a docked zeppelin. Owning the zeppelin gives your team the advantage, but you have to run out of cover along narrow cliffs to reach it, and one misstep results in death. Chancellery takes the battlefield to a French stronghold for a nighttime firefight. Buildings at either end of a courtyard provide excellent sniper spots, but you can also hide in the parked trucks and set an ambush. Excavation is located in an Algerian mine. The dug up treasure and artifacts create a littered battlefield.
Operation Arcane is the final piece of content included in Shadow War. Rather than a straitforward battle, you'll play as the Allied forces who must infiltrate an Austrian lab, steal secret tech, get to the hanger filled with UFOs, and blow up the lab while escaping. The weapons you discover, like the Tesla Gun and a super soldier serum, can be stolen and used to complete the mission.
Shadow War comes to PS4 players first on August 28. The DLC releases for Xbox One and PC at a later date. For a limited time, Call of Duty: WW2 season pass owners can invite other players who don't have the DLC to participate in the content. From August 28 to October 28, if a season pass owner creates an in-game party and is party leader, everyone invited can participate in the new multiplayer maps, operation, and zombie storyline.
Taking feedback from the Rainbow Six Siege Test Server for Operation Grim Sky, Ubisoft is implementing balancing patches for a few of the game's Operators. One of the two new Grim Sky Operators, Maverick, is getting the most changes.
Players must have felt Maverick was too effective an Operator, as all of his changes are nerfs. His smoke grenade is being replaced with a stun grenade and his blowtorch's volume is being made louder so that he can no longer easily hide where he's cutting. Maverick's blowtorch is also being made weaker against barbed wire, so the process of destroying it takes about twice as long as before. Ubisoft has heard that players want Maverick's blowtorch to run through fuel faster and have a shorter range as well, but the developer is holding off on changing either for now.
In comparison, Operation Grim Sky's other Operator, Clash, is getting no changes. Ubisoft reports that the team will continue to monitor her performance going forward, though.
Three of Siege's older Operators are getting changes. Zofia is losing one of her concussion grenades, so it's harder for her to single-handedly take over a room without a strategy. Glaz is also getting nerfed. A recent bug in Siege prevents him from being able to destroy Castle's armored panels and Ubisoft has decided to keep it. Ubisoft is also planning a patch down the line to prevent Glaz from shooting through the panels entirely. Hibana is the only Operator getting a buff. She can now destroy a hatch with four of her pellets, instead of six.
Ubisoft has heard feedback concerning the length of Dokkaebi's phone calls, but the team is passing on implementing any changes for her at this time.
Weapon recoil is also getting patched. Ubisoft is focusing on shotgun recoil for now. An update won't be ready by the time Grim Sky launches, but Ubisoft will implement one before the new season is over. Ubisoft is also monitoring machine pistol recoil but has nothing planned for now.
The full patch notes for the updates coming to Operation Grim Sky prior to the expansion's launch can be found on Siege's website. Although it is not included on the game's website, Siege tweeted out another change coming to Grim Sky: partial destruction to hatch reinforcements. This balances the meta of the game a little bit back towards the Attackers, who can now eventually get to hidden Defenders with enough explosives.
Operation Grim Sky launches this September. Rainbow Six Siege is available on Xbox One, PS4, and PC.
The Star Wars Battlefront 2 dev team just announced the game's next update will launch on August 29. The Elite Corps Update adds new clone trooper appearances to the game, as well as a map playlist and multiplayer improvements.
The Elite Corps Update is the start of several Clone Wars-themed content drops that EA outlined in the company's planned roadmap for Battlefront 2. The biggest change in the update is the addition of new clone trooper appearances. You'll be able to customize the Republic Army with skins of the 41st Elite Corps and 327th Star Corps. The 41st is seen in Revenge of the Sith aiding Yoda on Kashyyyk, while the 327th is seen in the same movie gunning down Aayla Secura on Felucia during Order 66. Both corps play more significant roles in Star Wars: The Clone Wars animated series.
Skins are available for the Assault, Heavy, and Specialist classes of the Galactic Republic, with each going for 20,000 credits or 500 Crystals. There are also bundles that net you all three skins for a corp for 40,000 credits.
The new update also adds the Prequel Era Maps playlist to the game, which limits multiplayer matches to Galactic Assault on Clone Wars era maps. The Naboo Palace Hanger map is being added to both Blast and Custom Arcade, and Ewok Hunt is becoming a permanent game mode.
Other multiplayer improvements include a new end-of-round screen that lists your overall score, as well as your number of kills, assists, and deaths. You'll also be able to see the time of your longest kill streak and where you placed in terms of other players. Both emotes and victory poses are also now purchasable for both heroes and troopers. Hero emotes and victory poses will cost 2,000 credits or 50 Crystals each, while those for troopers will only set you back 1,000 credits or 25 Crystals each.
Although they are still not available, the update lists the prices for upcoming heroes Obi-Wan Kenobi, General Grievous, Anakin Skywalker and Count Dooku at 35,000 credits each.
The full patch notes for the Elite Corps Update will be releasing in a few days. The Battlefront 2 forum does have an initial outline of the major bug fixes, though, which we've listed below. Keep in mind, these changes won't be implemented until the Elite Corps update drops on August 29.
Elite Corps Update Bug Fixes And Improvements
Spawn positions for Rebels have been adjusted in Extraction on Jabba's Palace.
An issue that let players reach an area behind the armor racks on Death Star II has been fixed.
An issue that allowed a force using hero or Boba Fett to jump onto buildings on Bespin and Kashyyyk, and an unreachable ledge on Jabba's Palace has been fixed.
Star Wars Battlefront 2 is available for Xbox One, PS4, and PC.
It's been quite the day in Fortnite. After weathering a massive lightning storm, players discovered a mysterious glowing cube in the desert. No one knows exactly what it's for yet.
Earlier today, purple lightning began striking the desert. Players quickly observed that the bolts were coursing from the rift in the sky, and that some were striking and destroying cacti. The lightning strikes started coming faster and faster, until they suddenly just stopped. In the aftermath, players discovered a massive, seemingly interdimensional cube on the edge of the desert. The rift is now gone as well.
Players have been experimenting with the cube and theorizing what it might be for. Standing near the cube rejuvenates a player's shields, but striking or shooting it will force players back and damage them. The cube glows with strange symbols, which some players, like Reddit user ulus10, have begun theorizing might be an encoded message.
Locating the cube is pretty simple if you want to experiment with it yourself. It stands out against the desert landscape and you can easily glide to it from the Battle Bus. If you manage to land on top of the cube, jumping up and then striking its surface before you touch down will send you careening into the air. It's pretty fun.
Fortnite is available for Xbox One, PS4, PC, Nintendo Switch, and iOS and Android devices.
As the search for a director continues, it looks like Guardians of the Galaxy Vol. 3 may have to move its production start date. A new report says that production for the Marvel Cinematic Universe film has been put on hold.
The news comes from The Hollywood Reporter, which states a small group that was preparing for pre-production are being dismissed from their tasks and told they are free to find other work. It was expected that pre-production on the movie would begin in the fall prior to Disney firing director James Gunn.
The studio released Gunn from the franchise after a series of decade-old tweets that joked about rape and pedophilia--jokes that the director had previously discussed and apologized for. In the aftermath, the cast of the Guardians of the Galaxy films has come out in support of the director, with Dave Bautista (Drax) being a particularly vocal opponent of Disney's decision on social media.
"I will do what [I'm] legally obligated to do but [Guardians of the Galaxy] without [James Gunn] is not what I signed up for," he tweeted on August 5. "GOTG [without] [Gunn] just isn't GOTG." He also threatened to leave the franchise if Gunn's script for the third movie wasn't used.
According to THR, the production hold is seen as temporary as the studio looks for a director to take over the third Guardians film. "The timeline has been pushed out," a source tells the outlet.
A release date for Guardians of the Galaxy Vol. 3 has not been announced. The Guardians team will next be seen in Avengers 4 when it releases on May 3, 2019.
Fortnite's Week 7 challenges on PS4, Xbox One, PC, Nintendo Switch, and mobile, bringing the running tally of Season 5 challenges to a whopping 49. As usual, completing these will level your Battle Pass up and unlock Season 5 rewards, but there's an extra incentive to finish all of the challenges in a given week; doing so will check off a corresponding Road Trip challenge and net you a special loading screen that points to a secret Battle Star hidden around the island.
If you've managed to stay on top of all of the challenges to date and clear Week 7's batch of tasks, you'll unlock the loading screen pictured below. This one depicts a group of characters standing around in shock as another group--dressed in the Legendary Enforcer outfit you receive for completing seven Road Trip challenges--emerges from a Rift atop the motel sign.
The clue to the Battle Star's whereabouts is very subtle this time, but if you peer closely beneath the motel sign, you can see its faint silhouette sitting atop the far end of the brick wall. Head to the motel, which is located to the northwest of Lazy Links, at the start of the match and you'll find the Battle Star waiting about the brick wall just as on the loading screen. Collect it to level your Battle Pass up by one tier, bringing you another step closer to unlocking the Season 5 rewards.
If you need help locating the Battle Star, you can watch us pick it up in the video above. However, as usual, you will need to meet the aforementioned requirements in order to find it; you won't be able to simply go to its hiding spot and collect it unless you've completed seven weeks of challenges and unlocked the corresponding loading screen.
The latest set of weekly challenges arrived a little later than usual, shortly after Epic rolled out Fortnite's 5.30 update. Among them is a new kind of multi-step challenge that requires you to go to specific locations, open a treasure chest, and unlock the next step in the process. Another of Week 7's challenges tasks you with following the treasure map found in Dusty Divot. You can find guides on how to complete all of the missions in our Season 5 challenge roundup.
Blizzard has released a new animated short for Overwatch called "Shooting Star" and this time the focus is much-loved Meka pilot D.Va. With Gamescom 2018 going on in Germany, the short was shown at Korea Fanfest, where Blizzard also debuted a brand-new Overwatch map. The video starts with a news report about D.Va, who has become a national hero by defending her nation from the Omnics.
Although the news report says D.Va, whose real name is Hana Song, is enjoying the fruits of her efforts by living a life of glitz and glamour, she's actually shown at home, repairing her Meka and chowing down on non-copyright infringing Doritos. D.Va is always thinking about how her country is relying on her to keep them safe, and this means she isn't able to relax. And she's proven right, as the enemy Omnics launch an assault. You can see what happens next in the video above.
The new Overwatch map is also themed after D.Va and set in South Korea. Players will have to duke it out over Control points across three locations. "Explore the serene setting of the Sanctuary, surrounded by an ancient temple, beautiful gardens, and historic architecture," Blizzard said. "Clash in the bustling metropolis of Downtown, where players will fight across a busy PC bang, flashy karaoke bar, and central light rail station (just watch out for the train).
"Explore the serene setting of the Sanctuary, surrounded by an ancient temple, beautiful gardens, and historic architecture. Clash in the bustling metropolis of Downtown, where players will fight across a busy PC bang, flashy karaoke bar, and central light rail station (just watch out for the train)." You can watch the trailer for the new Busan Overwatch map here. It's available now on the PC version's PTR.
In the midst of Gamescom 2018, Blizzard has announced a new map for its competitive shooter, Overwatch. The map, called Busan, is a Control map themed around D.Va, and it's available to try right now on PC. A trailer for the map was shown during Korea Fanfest, where Blizzard held an event and shared some more information about it. You can get a look at it in the replay of our livestream above.
"Travel to Busan, South Korea and battle for control across three distinct locales within one map: Sanctuary, Downtown, and MEKA Base," reads the trailer's description. "Explore the serene setting of the Sanctuary, surrounded by an ancient temple, beautiful gardens, and historic architecture. Clash in the bustling metropolis of Downtown, where players will fight across a busy PC bang, flashy karaoke bar, and central light rail station (just watch out for the train).
"Contest for position in MEKA Base--home of South Korea's frontline defense against the gwishin omnic attacks: D.Va and the rest of the MEKA squad," it continues. "Teams must fight to hold each of the three stages to establish complete control of the city that refuses to surrender its way of life to any threat." Check out the trailer above.
The new map is available now on the Public Test Realm, letting anyone who owns a PC copy of the game try it out. To do so, you'll need to first download the PTR client from the Battle.net launcher.
Alongside news of the map, Blizzard released a new animated short featuring D.Va. During the show the Lego Group also teased that an announcement concerning a collaboration between Overwatch and Lego is coming soon. It showed the outlines of six Lego figures that are styled after various Overwatch heroes. During a recent interview, the developers behind Diablo 3 on Switch discussed working with Nintendo's console, saying Overwatch on Switch is feasible.
The weekly challenges for Fortnite have been refreshed on PS4, Xbox One, PC, Nintendo Switch, and mobile, which means there's a new batch of Battle Stars to be earned. We've already put together a guide to all the Week 6 and Week 7 challenges, including a walkthrough of how to complete the Search Where The Stone Heads Are Looking challenge. However, there's a second challenge in the Week 6 batch that is a little more difficult than the rest--complete timed trials. But never fear, we've got some tips that will help you through it.
The challenge is exclusive to the paid Battle Pass tier and asks players to complete five timed trials. This is the first challenge of its kind and involves collecting a number timer symbols within a certain location before the allotted time runs out. This is pretty easy on its own, but it's not simply a case of running to them and grabbing them. Some of the timed trials are much easier if you build your way up to the collectible, so you'll need to have resources handy. Others, meanwhile, can be done quicker by using an ATK, which doesn't automatically spawn nearby, so you'll have to hunt for one.
Thankfully, the trials are repeatable, so you can usually take a shot at one, get a feel for where the timer collectibles are placed, and then figure out what you need to get them all. Completing this is very much a case of trial and error, so set aside a little time to work through the process and get it done. Below you can find a map of where we found the Time Trials.
Once you've completed this week's challenges, there's still plenty of Battle Stars left to earn for those who haven't managed to finish previous challenges. To make that easier for you, we've put together a round-up of guides for all Season 5's challenges. Alternatively you can find the specific one you're looking for below.
Fortnite has launched on Android devices. The beta launched exclusively on Samsung devices last week, and now it's available on other Android platforms. However, you'll have to jump through a few hoops before you can jump from the battle bus.
Epic is using a special Fortnite Installer on the company's website, so you're not going to find what you're looking for in the Google Play Store like other mobile games. Searching for "Fortnite" or "Fortnite Battle Royale" won't get you anywhere. What type of Android device you're using will determine where and how you install the game.
Things are a bit easier for you if you've got a Samsung device. If you have a Galaxy S7, S7 Edge, S8, S8 Plus, S9, S9 Plus, Note 8, Note 9, Tab S3, or Tab S4 then go to Game Launcher. From there, search for Fortnite and download the installer. That's it. You can also download the game straight from Epic's website.
It's with other Android devices where things get tricky. First, you'll need to check Epic's list of compatible devices. If your device is eligible, you can sign up on the Fortnite Android beta waiting list with your email. Eventually, you'll get to the front of the queue and get an email invitation to the beta. Log in with your Epic account to connect your Xbox Live, PSN, or PC Battle Pass progress.
After that, you'll need to wait again. Epic reports it should only take a few days for you to get your official invite to the Fortnite beta. When your invitation is registered, you'll be able to download the Fortnite Installer. Once that's on your device, you'll be able to download the Fortnite app to your phone or tablet.
When the download is done, wait for Fortnite to boot up and log into your Epic account. From there, you'll be able to start playing. You're advised to keep the Fortnite Installer even after you've started playing, as the installer is what keeps the game updated with new patches, not the actual game app.
If you'd rather avoid waiting for your invite to the beta, you can delay trying to install Fortnite until the game's official Android launch. The app still won't be available in the Google Play store when it does release. You'll either have to download the game through Samsung's Game Launcher or from Epic's website.
Fortnite is available on Xbox One, PS4, PC, Nintendo Switch, and mobile devices.
If you feel like you've already watched everything you want to watch on Amazon Prime, despair no more; Amazon is coming out with a whole host of new titles in August. Here's what on tap for this month in terms of movies, TV shows, and Prime Originals.
Several original series are debuting, including All or Nothing: Manchester City which follows the legendary coach of the titular soccer team. A limited series called Agatha Christie will be released, as well as Tom Clancy's Jack Ryan with John Krasinski, which debuts on August 31.
Amazon Prime will also be adding some oldies to the streaming service, including dramas like The Blair Witch Project and Watchmen, and some kids movies like A Cinderella Story and Spy Kids 2: Island of Lost Dreams. The bulk of the additions came on August 1, but there's an assortment of other things coming throughout the month, too.
If this list isn't enough, there were a lot of titles added to Amazon Prime in July as well, including the likes of American Psycho, Mulholland Drive, The Twilight Saga. If you'd like to see everything that's coming to Amazon Prime in August, check out the complete list below. We also now know what to expect on Amazon Prime in September.
Everything Coming To Amazon Prime In August 2018
August TBD
All or Nothing: Manchester City, Season 1 --Prime Original series
If you're looking to escape the scorching heat, catch up on some shows, or you're just a binging addict like me, you'll want to know what's going to be on Hulu this August. Here's the breakdown of all the movies and TV shows arriving on the streaming service next month.
There are quite a lot of movies that arrived on the streaming site on August 1, including 10 Things I Hate About You, The Hunt For The Red October, Shaun Of The Dead, and Teen Wolf. There are even a few classics like High Noon.
Throughout the rest of the month, there are also movies like The Terminator and Baby Driver coming to the streaming site, along with some Hulu originals like Crime and Punishment, a documentary which looks into some discriminatory practices of the NYPD.
As far as shows, the premiere of the Season 5 of Bachelor in Paradise will be coming to Hulu, as well as some HBO premieres like Season 3 of Insecure and Season 4 of Ballers.
There are also a good amount of titles leaving Hulu in August, including A Beautiful Mind, Hellboy, Rainman, and Trainspotting. Look below for the complete list of everything arriving and leaving Hulu in August 2018.
Arriving On Hulu In August
August 1
Heartland: Complete Season 10 (Content Media)
10 Things I Hate About You (1999) (*Showtime)
A Conspiracy to Rule: The Illuminati (2017)
American Gigolo (1980)
American Ninja (1985)
American Ninja III: Blood Hunt (1989)
Babe (1995)
Be Cool (2005)
The Beatles: Made on Merseyside (2017)
Black Hawk Down (2001)
Black Mask (1996)
Black Rain (1989)
Bluefin (2018)
Boomerang (1992)
The Brady Bunch Movie (1995)
Bratz: The Movie (2007)
Bring It On: In It to Win It (2007)
Bring It On: Fight to the Finish (2009)
Cheri (2009)
Cold War (2012)
CSNY/Deja Vu (2008)
Curse of the Starving Class (1995)
Double Whammy (2002)
The Elephant Man (1980)
Extract (2009)
Fled (1996)
G.I. Joe: The Rise of Cobra (2009)
Get Shorty (1995)
Halloween H20: 20 Years Later (1998)
Heartbreakers (2001)
Hey Arnold! The Movie (2002) (*Showtime)
Hidalgo (2004)
High Noon (1952)
Hoosiers (1986)
The Hunt for Red October (1990)
The Hurricane (2000)
The Hurt Locker (2008)
I Went Down (1997)
In & Out (1997)
Jackie Brown (1997)
Jacob's Ladder (1990)
Joe (2014)
John Grisham's The Rainmaker (1997)
Kazaam (1996)
Leaving Las Vegas (1995) (*Showtime)
Loser (2000)
Lost in Translation (2003) (*Showtime)
The Nasty Girl (1990)
The Ninth Gate (2000)
No Way Out (1987)
Original Sin (2001)
Out of Time (2003)
Point Break (1991)
Pretty Woman (1990)
Private Parts (1997)
The Rock (1996)
Scary Movie 3 (2003)
Shanghai Knights (2003)
Shaun of the Dead (2004)
Sheep and Wolves (2018)
Species (1995)
Species II (1998)
Species III (2004)
Stir of Echoes (1999)
Stir of Echoes 2: The Homecoming (2007)
The Swan Princess: A Royal Family Tale (2014)
The Swan Princess: Princess Tomorrow, Pirate Today (2016)
Swan Princess: Royally Undercover (2017)
Teen Wolf (1985)
Teen Wolf Too (1987)
The Time Machine (2002)
The Thomas Crown Affair (1999) (*Showtime)
True Colors (1991)
Urban Legend (1998) (*Showtime)
The Usual Suspects (1995)
Young Guns (1998)
Young Guns II (1990)
August 2
All at Once (2016)
America Divided: 201 (Epix Series)
The China Hustle (2018)
Ismael's Ghost (2018)
August 3
Animals: Seasons 3 Premiere (*HBO)
En Otra Piel: Complete Series (Telemundo)
Sharp Edges (1986)
August 4
Marshall (2017) (*Showtime)
August 7
Dating My Mother (2017)
Perfect Bid: The Contestant Who Knew Too Much (2017)
Wraith (2017)
August 8
Bachelor in Paradise: Season 5 Premiere (ABC)
Castaways: Series Premiere (ABC)
Blood Ties (2013)
August 9
America Divided: 202 (Epix Series)
Baskin (2016)
Desolation (2018)
Terminal (2018)
August 10
Rosa Diamante: Complete Series (Telemundo)
Tim & Eric Bedtime Stories: Complete Season 2 (Adult Swim)
Borg Vs McEnroe (2018)
August 11
Baby Driver (2017) (*Showtime)
The Cage Fighter (2013)
August 12
Ballers: Season 4 Premiere (*HBO)
Insecure: Season 3 Premiere (*HBO)
Very Good Girls (2013)
August 13
The Powerpuff Girls (2016): Complete Season 2 (Cartoon Network)
August 15
The Actors (2003)
America's Sweethearts (2001)
Duplex (2003)
The Monkey King 3 (2018)
August 16
11 Minutes (2016)
America Divided: 203 (Epix Series)
Marrowbone (2018)
Role Models (2008)
August 17
Minding the Gap (Hulu Documentary)
Perro Amor: Complete Series (Telemundo)
Stan Against Evil: Complete Season 2 (IFC)
August 21
Eva La Trailera: Complete Series (Telemundo)
To The Moon and Back (2016)
August 23
America Divided: 204 (Epix Series)
Jiro Dreams of Sushi (2011)
August 24
Crime & Punishment (Hulu Documentary)
August 26
Captain Fantastic (2016) (*Showtime)
Gangs of New York (2002)
Mother! (2017)
Available August 28
Pasion Pohibida: Complete Series (Telemundo)
August 30
Deuces Wild (2002) (*Showtime)
August 31
The Terminator (1984)
Leaving Hulu in August
August 31
1492: Conquest of Paradise (1992)
2 Days in the Valley (1996)
52 Pick-Up (1986)
A Beautiful Mind (2001)
A Guy Thing (2003)
Across the Universe (2007)
Analyze That (2002)
Analyze This (1999)
Baby Mama (2008)
Bad Influence (1990)
Barnyard (2006)
Beer for my Horse (2008)
Blue Like Jazz (2012)
Bowfinger (1999)
Brokeback Mountain (2005)
The Brothers Grimm (2005)
The Burbs (1989)
Chinese Box (1997)
Clue (1985)
Criminal Law (1989)
Dead Man Walking (1995)
Doctor Dolittle (1997)
Drive Me Crazy (1999)
Drop Zone (1994)
East is East (1999)
End of Days (1999)
Escape from Alcatraz (1979)
Event Horizon (1997)
Fatal Instinct (1993)
The Frozen Ground (2013)
Hard Rain (1998)
Hellboy (2004)
Hot Boyz (2000)
House of D (2005)
Immigration Tango (2011)
Into the West (2005)
Men with Brooms (2002)
Mindhunters (2004)
Mr. Majestyk (1974)
Mutant Species (1995)
My Left Foot (1989)
Nanny Mcphee (2006)
Nurse 3D (2014)
Over the Top (1987)
Panic (2000)
Prancer (1989)
Primal Fear (1996)
Rain Man (1988)
Remember the Goal (2016)
Restoration (2016)
Revenge of the Pink Panther (1978)
Spawn (1997)
Sweeney Todd: The Demon Barber of Fleet Street (2007)
We've entered the month of August, which means that the new offerings for free PlayStation Plus games have rotated into circulation. As always, these games will be available throughout the month of August, expiring on September 4.
First up on PlayStation 4 is Mafia III, the open-world crime game set in New Bordeaux, a New Orleans-like city from the civil rights era. You take on the role of Lincoln Clay, a Vietnam vet who comes back into town to get revenge for the death of the family who took him in. PS4 also offers Dead by Daylight, a competitive 4v1 horror game that matches four survivor characters against one relentless killer.
PlayStation 3 offers the action-RPG Bound by Flame, along with Serious Sam 3: BFE. On Vita, you can get Draw Slasher and the Warhammer 40K game Space Hulk. As a bonus, a couple more games are on-tap for an extended period. The PSVR horror game Here They Lie is available until October 2 and the quiz game Knowledge is Power is up until November 6.
PS3 and Vita owners have less than a year to continue reaping the benefits of PlayStation Plus. Starting on March 8, 2019, those two platforms will phase out of the service and only PlayStation 4 games will be offered from that point onward.
A new month is underway, which means another pair of free Legendary Pokemon are now available for Pokemon Ultra Sun and Ultra Moon. This time, The Pokemon Company is giving away the Ruby and Sapphire cover monsters Groudon and Kyogre as part of its ongoing Year of Legendary Pokemon promotion, but as usual, you'll only have a limited time to grab them. [Update: The deadline for grabbing these freebies is coming up fast, so make sure to get them while you still can.]
As with previous distributions, the way to receive the Legendaries differs depending on where you live. Once again, US residents will need to travel to a specific retailer to pick up a free download code for the Pokemon. This time, the code will be available at participating GameStop stores from August 3-26. Pokemon fansite Serebii reports that players in the UK will need to travel to Game stores to get the code.
The Legendaries can be redeemed in any seventh-generation Pokemon game, but the one you receive will depend on which version you're playing. Those with either Sun or Ultra Sun will get Kyogre, while Moon and Ultra Moon players will get Groudon. Additionally, the Pokemon will come at different levels and know different attacks based on the game you own. You can see their movesets in each version below:
Pokemon Ultra Sun
Kyogre -- Level 100 (w/Gold Bottle Cap)
Origin Pulse
Ice Beam
Water Spout
Calm Mind
Pokemon Sun
Kyogre -- Level 60
Ice Beam
Origin Pulse
Calm Mind
Muddy Water
Pokemon Ultra Moon
Groudon -- Level 100 (w/Gold Bottle Cap)
Precipice Blades
Earth Power
Fire Punch
Swords Dance
Pokemon Moon
Groudon -- Level 60
Earthquake
Precipice Blades
Bulk Up
Solar Beam
To claim your Legendary, you'll need to redeem the download code using the Mystery Gift feature from the games' main menu. After selecting Mystery Gift, choose the option to receive your gift with a code/password, and input the code you picked up from GameSpot. The Pokemon will then be downloaded into your game. Once those steps have been completed, you'll be able to pick your Pokemon up from the deliveryman waiting inside any Pokemon Center.
A new month is nearly upon us, and The Pokemon Company is continuing its Year of Legendary Pokemon campaign with another pair of free Legendaries for Ultra Sun and Ultra Moon. During September, players will be able to claim one of the two Eon Pokemon from Ruby and Sapphire, Latios and Latias, but as usual, the way to get your hands on them will vary by region.
Once again, those who live in the US will need to go to a participating retailer to pick up a free download code for the Legendaries. This time, the code will be distributed at Best Buy stores around the country from September 2-29. Players in Europe and Australia, meanwhile, will be able to download the Legendaries directly from the Nintendo Network between September 1-23.
As usual, the Pokemon you receive will depend on which version you're playing. You can claim the Legendaries in any seventh-generation Pokemon game, but there's an added incentive to redeem them in the Ultra titles; not only will the Legendaries come at higher levels and know different moves, they'll be equipped with a Gold Bottle Cap, a rare item that can be exchanged to Hyper Train a Pokemon. You can see their movesets and other details below.
Pokemon Ultra Sun
Latias -- Level 100 (w/Gold Bottle Cap)
Mist Ball
Psychic
Draco Meteor
Tailwind
Pokemon Sun
Latias -- Level 60
Mist Ball
Dragon Pulse
Psycho Shift
Wish
Pokemon Ultra Moon
Latios -- Level 100 (w/Gold Bottle Cap)
Luster Purge
Psychic
Draco Meteor
Tailwind
Pokemon Moon
Latios -- Level 60
Luster Purge
Dragon Pulse
Psycho Shift
Dragon Breath
To get the Legendary, select Mystery Gift from the main menu and choose the option to receive your gift with a code/password. Enter the download code you picked up and the Pokemon will be downloaded into your game. (Players in Europe and Australia, meanwhile, will simply need to select the option to receive their gift via the internet.) Once those steps have been completed, you'll be able to pick your Legendary up from the deliveryman waiting inside any Pokemon Center around Alola.
In the meantime, you still have a little more time to claim August's free Legendary Pokemon, Groudon and Kyogre, if you still haven't done so. The Ruby and Sapphire cover monsters will be available from GameStop stores until August 26. You can see all of the other free Pokemon available right now in our roundup.
We're another week into Season 5 of Fortnite, and with it comes a new set of challenges for players to complete. As before, finishing all of the objectives in a given week will check off one of Season 5's Road Trip challenges, which in turn will reward you with a special loading screen that points to the location of a secret Battle Star hidden somewhere around the island. We also know what the season-long Road Trip skin reward is.
Epic has released a long list of challenges in Season 5 thus far, and if you've managed to complete six full weeks' worth of them, you'll unlock the loading screen pictured below. This one depicts a group of characters gathered around a giant projection screen at a drive-in theater watching a movie together.
That's a fairly obvious indication that the Battle Star is hidden in Risky Reels, although its actual location is much more subtly alluded to. If you look closely at the red pickup truck nearest the movie screen, you'll see the faint silhouette of a Battle Star just above its trunk. Head to the area at the start of a match, find the same red pickup truck, and the Battle Star will be waiting. Collect it to level your Battle Pass up by one tier.
If you still need help finding the Battle Star, you can see its exact location on the map below. We've also put together the video above showing exactly where the Battle Star is hidden. Be advised, however, that the Battle Star will only appear if you've completed six weeks of challenges and unlocked the above loading screen; you won't be able to simply head to the area and find it if you haven't done the preceding steps.
The latest batch of weekly challenges has players searching where stone heads are looking and completing time trials, among other objectives. The latter are a new type of challenge that task players with going to a certain location and collecting stopwatch symbols before a time limit expires. You can find all of our guides for Fortnite's Season 5 challenges below.
This week also brought with it a new update for Fortnite. Patch 5.21 introduced a new weapon to Battle Royale--the Heavy Sniper--and marked the start of two new limited-time modes: Soaring 50s and Sniper Shootout. For more on Epic's popular battle royale game, be sure to check out our complete Season 5 coverage.
As August rolls on and summer begins coming to a close, Netflix has quite a few new things for you to stream this week. In addition to a bunch of new originals movies and shows, something the service can't seem to get enough of, there are also a couple TV shows and films ready for you to enjoy. Here's what's new this week.
For films, the 2009 Jack Black comedy Year One arrives this week. Additionally, original films Deadwind, The After Party, and a new stand-up comedy special Bert Kreischer are being added to the streaming service.
For TV fans, new seasons of Young & Hungry, Great News, and Trolls: The Beat Goes On are on the schedule. Other arrivals include Ghoul, a new Indian horror series from Blumhouse, as well as Ask the StoryBots.
It's time to say goodbye to fireworks and hello to heat waves. To aid you in procrastinating on back to school shopping, we're here to let you know about everything coming to Netflix in August. Lots of movies and TV shows will be added throughout this month, while a number of others are on their way out. Let's dive into the highlights.
A lot of hard-hitting dramas will be available in August. Some of the notable additions include Christopher Nolan's Batman Begins, Gran Torino, Million Dollar Baby, Lord of the Rings: The Fellowship of the Ring, and No Country For Old Men.
A handful of TV shows are coming to the service in August as well. We will be getting the second season of The Good Place, the fifth season of The 100, and the fifth and final season of The Originals, along with a few others.
A ton of Netflix Originals will also be added, including the highly-anticipated second season of Ozark, as well as a brand new Matt Groening animated series called Disenchantment. There are also several original documentaries coming out, including one called Zion about a young man who was born without legs and wants to become a professional wrestler.
There are some comedy specials coming out as well, including Demetri Martin's new special, Bert Kreischer's new special, and part two of The Comedy Lineup, which features a handful of comedians doing 15 minute sets.
Clearly, there's going to be a lot to watch on Netflix this month, but sadly, there are also several titles that are leaving the site like Finding Dory, Sausage Party, and 40 Year Old Virgin. Many of these departed on August 1, but there's still time for certain titles.
If you'd like to find out about everything that is arriving and leaving on Netflix and when, check out our complete list below. We also have a complete list for titles arriving and leaving on Amazon Prime Video in August or Hulu in August, so if you're a streaming addict like myself, you'll want to check out that list as well.
Arriving On Netflix In August
August 1
Batman Begins
Chernobyl Diaries
Clerks
Constantine
Dreamcatcher
Edge of Fear
Eraser
Gran Torino
House of Deadly Secrets
Los tiempos de Pablo Escobar: Season 1
Million Dollar Baby
No Reservations
Once in a Lifetime Sessions with Moby
Once in a Lifetime Sessions with Nile Rodgers
Once in a Lifetime Sessions with Noel Gallagher
Once in a Lifetime Sessions with TLC
P.S. I Love You
Secretariat
Silverado
Steel Magnolias
Stripes
Switched-- Netflix Original
The Aviator
The Golden Compass
The Informant!
The Lord of the Rings: The Fellowship of the Ring
The Princess Diaries 2: Royal Engagement
August 2
Emelie
August 3
Brij Mohan Amar Rahe-- Netflix Original Film
Cocaine Coast-- Netflix Original
Dinotrux Supercharged: Season 3 -- Netflix Original
I AM A KILLER -- Netflix Original
Like Father -- Netflix Original Film
Marching Orders --Netflix Original
August 4
Flavors of Youth: International Version- Netflix Original
Mr. Sunshine (Streaming Every Saturday)-- Netflix Original
On Children -- Netflix Original
August 5
Paid in Full
August 9
Perdida-- Netflix Original Film
The Originals: Season 5
August 10
72 Dangerous Animals: Asia-- Netflix Original
Afflicted-- Netflix Original
All About the Washingtons-- Netflix Original
Demetri Martin: The Overthinker-- Netflix Original
Insatiable-- Netflix Original
La casa de las flores --Netflix Original
Million Pound Menu-- Netflix Original
The Guernsey Literary and Potato Peel Pie Society-- Netflix Original Film
The Package-- Netflix Original Film
The Ponysitters Club-- Netflix Original
Voltron: Legendary Defender: Season 7-- Netflix Original
Zion-- Netflix Original
August 11
No Country for Old Men
August 13
Alexander: The Ultimate Cut
Splash and Bubbles: Season 2
The Nut Job
August 15
Adventures in Public School
Hostiles
The 100: Season 5
August 16
Evan Almighty
Wish I Was Here
August 17
Disenchantment-- Netflix Original
Magic for Humans-- Netflix Original
Pinky Malinky--Netflix Original
Spirit Riding Free: Season 6-- Netflix Original
Stay Here-- Netflix Original
The Motive-- Netflix Original Film
To All The Boys I've Loved Before-- Netflix Original Film
Ultraviolet-- Netflix Original
August 19
The Investigator: A British Crime Story: Season 2-- Netflix Original
August 21
Year One
August 23
Deadwind-- Netflix Original
Follow This-- Netflix Original
Great News: Season 1
August 24
Ask the StoryBots: Season 2-- Netflix Origianl
Bert Kreischer: Secret Time-- Netflix Original
Ghoul-- Netflix Original
The After Party-- Netflix Original Film
The Innocents-- Netflix Original
Trolls: The Beat Goes On!: Season 3-- Netflix Original
Young & Hungry: Season 5
August 28
The Good Place: Season 2
August 29
Inequality for All
August 31
Inside the Criminal Mind-- Netflix Original
Ozark: Season 2-- Netflix Original
Paradise PD-- Netflix Original
The Comedy Lineup: Part 2-- Netflix Original
The Laws of Thermodynamics-- Netflix Original Film
Ultimate Beastmaster: Survival of the Fittest-- Netflix Original
Undercover Law-- Netflix Original
Leaving Netflix In August
August 1
3000 Miles to Graceland
Adventures in Babysitting
Can't Buy Me Love
Care Bears: Welcome to Care-a-Lot: Season 1
Finding Dory
Harold & Kumar Escape from Guantanamo Bay
Reasonable Doubt
The Killing: Seasons 1-3
Walk Hard: The Dewey Cox Story
August 2
10 Rules for Sleeping Around
August 5
13 Assassins
August 6
Welcome to Me
August 10
St. Vincent
August 12
For a Good Time, Call…
August 13
Help, I've Shrunk the Family
August 16
Being Flynn
Enter the Battlefield
Jem and the Holograms: Seasons 1-3Littlest Pet Shop: Seasons 2-4
Pariah
Pound Puppies: Seasons 1-3 Seeking a Friend for the End of the World
Unless you've been avoiding any of the new story-centric trailers for Destiny 2's upcoming Forsaken DLC expansion, you know Cayde-6 is in a bad way. A new trailer for Forsaken that debuted at Gamescom 2018 has revealed exactly what precipitated our previous look at Cayde's apparent final moments. And if Destiny's most interesting character has to go out, at least he's doing so like a badass.
Created in collaboration with Blur Studio, the trailer shows Cayde fighting off numerous enemies who have escaped the Prison of Elders. While he's often used as the comic relief (thanks to the excellent voice acting of Nathan Fillion, who has been replaced), here he's fighting for his life. And while he holds his own for a while, his Ghost is ultimately destroyed and he finds himself on death's door.
We'll have to wait for Forsaken to find out exactly how things play out from here and if Bungie has some kind of swerve up its sleeve. The DLC will bring much more than just a possible conclusion to the tale of Cayde; this is the biggest expansion to date, appearing to be on par with the original Destiny's acclaimed Taken King DLC. It includes new superclasses and Supers, weapons and gear, locations, and more.
Another big component of Forsaken is Gambit, a hybrid PvP/PvE mode that was revealed back at E3. Those eager to try it fortunately won't have to wait to do so, as a limited-time free trial will be held just ahead of Forsaken's launch. PS4, Xbox One, and PC players who own the game will be able to jump into Gambit on September 1 at 10 AM PT / 1 PM ET / 6 PM BST until the same time on September 2.
Forsaken releases on September 4. Unlike the first two DLC expansions, it's not included in the original Expansion Pass. You can read more in our Forsaken pre-order guide, and find out exactly how and when the day one patch will be rolled out.
We're more than halfway through 2018 now, but there are still plenty of games to look forward to this year. While summer has traditionally been a slow period for game releases, August stands as a stark exception to that rule, with a variety of great titles coming to each platform this month, from WarioWare Gold for 3DS to the console release of the critically acclaimed Divinity: Original Sin II and much more.
With so many releases on the way, it can be easy to lose track of all the great games coming over the next few weeks. We've rounded up a list of the biggest games launching this month below to give you a quick glimpse at some of the notable titles in store for PS4, Xbox One, Nintendo Switch, and PC in August 2018. For a look at all of the major games coming throughout the rest of the year, be sure to check out our complete list of game release dates in 2018.
Monster Hunter World (PC) -- August 9
Seven months after it debuted on PS4 and Xbox One, Capcom's acclaimed co-op RPG, Monster Hunter World, finally arrives on PC via Steam on August 9. The game comes with everything that was available when it first launched on consoles, with additional monsters, quests, and other content slated to arrive down the line via free updates. The PC version will also follow a different Event Quest schedule than its console counterparts.
This year's installment in EA's long-running football series, Madden NFL 19, arrives on August 10. The game is coming to PS4, Xbox One, and PC, making it the first entry to release for the latter platform in more than a decade. Along with improved sweat graphics, Madden 19 boasts a new Real Player Motion Technology animation system for even more realistic player movements and introduces some new features to both Franchise and Ultimate Team modes.
World of Warcraft: Battle for Azeroth (PC) -- August 14
This month sees the arrival of World of Warcraft's seventh expansion, Battle for Azeroth. It lands on August 14, and along with raising the level cap to 120, it shakes the long-running MMO up in some major ways by introducing new continents to explore, raids to undertake, dungeons to plunder, and more. Ahead of its release, Blizzard rolled out a big pre-patch that introduced War Mode and kicked off a questline that sets the stage for the expansion.
The Dreamcast classics Shenmue I & II come to PS4, Xbox One, and PC together in one package this month. While not a proper remaster of the games, the collection does boast some improvements over the originals, including scalable screen resolution, the option to play with either modern or classic control schemes, an updated user interface, and Japanese or English voiceovers. The collection launches on August 21 for the budget price of $30.
Monster Hunter Generations Ultimate (Switch) -- August 28
While Monster Hunter World is coming to PC, the Nintendo Switch is getting its own Monster Hunter game this month: Monster Hunter Generations Ultimate, an expanded version of Generations for 3DS. On top of all of the base content from the original 3DS release, Ultimate introduces new Hunting Styles, monsters, and the even more challenging G Rank quests. Players who have the 3DS game can also transfer their save data to the Switch version.
The second installment in the Yakuza series comes to PS4 this month as Yakuza Kiwami 2. Like the first Kiwami before it, Kiwami 2 is a complete remake of the PS2 title, built using the Dragon Engine that powered the series' latest installment, Yakuza 6: The Song of Life. Picking up one year after the events of the original Yakuza, Kiwami 2 finds protagonist Kazuma Kiryu once again caught up in inter-clan drama. The game launches on August 28.
When the first trailer for The Happytime Murders arrived, it was clear what kind of movie this was going to be. It's a dirty version of the Muppets. What's more, it's from director Brian Henson, son of Muppets creator Jim Henson. The potential for something cool and different was obvious. The only question is whether the movie would hit the mark or not.
As it turns out, for the most part, it lands pretty well. The Happytime Murders is set in a world where humans and puppets coexist. When the former stars of a 1980s TV show get murdered, disgraced former puppet cop Phil Phillips (Bill Barretta) and human detective Connie Edwards (Melissa McCarthy) are forced to work together to find the killer. It's a pretty straightforward murder mystery that just so happens to be loaded with foul-mouthed puppets, lots of violence, and one wildly awkward sex scene.
Still, the story actually works. While it's not hard to figure out who the villain of the film is, figuring out their motivations is a different story. The plot also opens up a world that would be very interesting to visit again in future movies, should that be in the cards.
As simple and interesting as the story is, though, there is one major problem with The Happytime Murders. This adult puppet movie is simply too adult. There is a certain novelty to the idea of puppets that curse, have sex, and do horrible things. In practice, though, it's very easy to take the joke too far. Throughout the film, puppets and humans let the cursing fly so gratuitously and frequently that the impact of it simply wears off. It happens so often that it ceases being funny and instead seems like the movie is trying too hard to be edgy. How many times can a character drop an F-bomb in the span of two minutes before it means absolutely nothing? That's something The Happytime Murders is keen to explore.
Likewise, with graphic content, this movie doesn't seem to know when to stop. In the red band trailer, there is a sequence where one of the puppets has an orgasm that lasts so long it overstays its welcome a bit. Somehow, though, it's even longer in the movie. There's an audience for gross-out humor that will undoubtedly find themselves giggling at these moments in the film, but just a bit of restraint would have greatly improved the movie.
There's still plenty to like about The Happytime Murders, though. Strangely, building this odd world where humans and puppets live together in something far less than harmony is where The Happytime Murders excels most. From the beginning of the film, it's explained that puppets are seen as less than, and often subservient to, humans. They're the target of verbal and physical abuse, and some of them spend their time and money in an attempt to transform their looks to appear more human, while others have bought into the idea that they exist only to entertain humans.
Chances are you're not expecting the dirty puppet movie to examine racism in America at all. However imperfect a comparison it may be, though, it's one of the things The Happytime Murders does well. What's more, setting the film in Los Angeles, a city with a massive immigrant population, goes a long way in illustrating the divide.
The cast is another piece of the puzzle that fits well. While Melissa McCarthy is mostly doing the same thing she always does--yelling and falling down, while cursing--she somehow manages to have chemistry with a puppet. However, there is an odd running joke throughout the film that everyone thinks she's a man. It might have been funny once or twice, but by the third, fourth, or fifth time that particular joke is revisited, it's just tired.
The biggest standout of the of the movie is Maya Rudolph, who plays Phillips' secretary Bubbles. She serves as a potential love interest for the former cop and manages to have many of the movie's funniest moments, whether at her desk in Phillips' office or out in the field helping to solve the mystery.
If you're expecting to see some of your favorite Muppets in the film, you'll be disappointed. None of them make cameo appearances. After all, the Muppets are owned by Disney. Still, it will be impossible to look at the puppets in this film without knowing they were designed by The Jim Henson Company. Likewise, Muppet veterans Barretta, Kevin Klash, and Alice Dinnean make up the puppet voice cast.
In all, The Happytime Murders is a fun and very interesting film to watch. It's as close as you'll ever get to a Rated-R Muppet movie and sets up what could become a potential franchise that would be exciting to revisit--just maybe with a little restraint next time.
The Good
The Bad
A simple, easy-to-follow plot
There's so much cursing that it makes the foul language mean nothing
The use of notable Los Angeles locations helps ground the movie
It's not hard to figure out who the killer is
Its examination of racism was very unexpected
The puppet sex scene lasts way too long
Maya Rudolph blows the rest of the cast out of the water
Pokemon Go is in the midst of a Gen 2 celebration following the arrival of Celebi earlier this week, and now another Legendary from the Johto region is returning to the game for a limited time. From now until the end of the Johto Week event, players around the world will once again be able to encounter the Rainbow Pokemon Ho-Oh.
Just as during its initial run, Ho-Oh will appear as a Raid Battle at Gyms. To catch it, you'll first need to team up with other players at a Gym where a Ho-Oh Raid is taking place and challenge the Legendary to a battle; once it's been defeated, you'll be rewarded with Premier Balls and a chance to capture it.
Ho-Oh is a dual Fire/Flying-type, so you'll want to bring along strong Rock Pokemon like Golem, Tyranitar, and the game's newest Legendary, Regirock, to battle it. This time around, Niantic teases that you'll also have a chance of encountering a Shiny Ho-Oh, making that a good incentive to visit a nearby Raid even if you already have the Legendary in your collection.
Ho-Oh will only be available until August 27, while the Johto Week event is scheduled to end at 1 PM PT / 4 PM ET on August 28. As part of the event, Pokemon that originally appeared in the Johto region have been spawning in Pokemon Go much more frequently. Niantic also introduced six new Shiny Gen 2 Pokemon to the game.
Ho-Oh isn't the only Johto Legendary making a comeback. Next month, Niantic is rolling out a new batch of Field Research tasks related to Fire Pokemon. If you manage to complete enough of them to achieve a Research Breakthrough, you'll be rewarded with another encounter with Entei, one of the three Legendary dogs from Pokemon Gold and Silver.
The aforementioned Regirock will appear in Raid Battles until September 20. Shortly after that, Niantic will host the next Pokemon Go Community Day, which will feature the Gen 2 starter Chikorita.
Star Wars: Episode IX just picked up Lost and Lord of the Rings alum Dominic Monaghan for an unspecified role in the 2019 film.
JJ Abrams--who also directed The Force Awakens--reunites with Monaghan for the Episode IX, according to Deadline, and this will be the first time the two have worked together since the 2004 ABC series Lost, in which Monaghan played Charlie Pace. The actor is also well known for his work in the Lord of the Rings trilogy where he played the hobbit Meriadoc Brandybuck.
Things are slowly coming together for the next installment in the Star Wars saga, with filming already underway in the UK, as recent set pictures revealed Finn (John Boyega), Poe (Oscar Isaac), and Chewbacca (Joonas Suotamo) climbing a hill in front of some horse-looking creatures. Abrams tweeted the first set picture at the beginning of August which showed Boyega in a ship cockpit, but it's a bit hard to make out, since the background is blurred out.
Monaghan joins the ensemble cast which also features Daisy Ridley (Rey), Adam Driver (Kylo Ren), Lupita Nyong'o (Maz Kanata), Domhnall Gleeson (General Hux), Kelly Marie Tran (Rose Tico), Mark Hamill (Luke Skywalker), Anthony Daniels (C-3PO), Billy Dee Williams (Lando Calrissian), Billie Lourd (Lieutenant Connix), and Carrie Fisher, as Abrams will utilize unused footage from previous films. Additionally, newcomers Keri Russell, Naomi Acki, and Richard E. Grant join Episode IX as well, and like Monaghan, their roles are also unknown as of this writing.
Tran recently left social media due to online harassment and recently discussed this in a New York Times piece about her experiences and said, "I am the first woman of color to have a leading role in a Star Wars movie. I am the first Asian woman to appear on the cover of Vanity Fair. My real name is Loan. And I am just getting started."
There's still a long wait for the next Star Wars movie to come to theaters. Episode IX is slated to come out on December 20, 2019.
The Nintendo Switch is a unique gaming machine that does double duty as a home console and a handheld without breaking a sweat. Despite its all-in-one approach to gaming, the Switch doesn't come with everything that would be useful to owners. In fact, its versatility makes a whole array of accessories all but necessary if you want to get the most out of Nintendo's flagship hardware. Below, we highlight all the Switch accessories that might come in handy no matter how you use it.
Carrying Case
The ability to take the Nintendo Switch on the go with you is one of the console's main selling points. Unfortunately, the Switch is a fragile machine that can break or scratch easily if left loose in a bag. That's why a carrying case is essential for keeping your Switch in tip-top condition. This one from Orzly is tough enough to keep your Switch secure, and it comes with enough pockets to store all the cables and games you'll want to bring along with you.
The onboard storage that comes in a Nintendo Switch doesn't get you very far in the age of HD gaming. That's not a problem if you install a microSD card to give your Switch more storage space. Here are several options so you can pick one that suits your storage needs.
The Nintendo Switch comes with two Joy-Cons and a Joy-Con Grip you can slide them into to create a, well, controller-like device. But nothing beats a real controller, and that's what you get with the Nintendo Switch Pro Controller. It even has a true D-pad.
Even the most careful Switch owners can wind up getting scratches on their screen. A screen protector like this high-rated glass one is cheap and easy to apply. And if you do get a scratch on it, just remove it and apply the other one that comes in the package.
If you've ever used your Switch's kickstand, you know how thin, breakable, and unadjustable it is. Nearly anyone who spends serious time gaming in tabletop mode would prefer something a little sturdier that can tilt for maximum comfort. This stand does both, and as a bonus, it can charge your Switch while you play.
It can be a major pain when your controller runs out of batteries. To keep your Joy-Cons powered up with this charging station all you have to do is drop them in, and they'll go from zero to fully charged in four hours. It holds up to four Joy-Cons at a time, so you'll always be ready to get your game on.
Before traveling with your Switch, you could try to remember to disconnect your AC adapter from the dock--if you can even reach it in the tangled cables behind your entertainment stand. Or you could just buy an extra charging cable and keep it in your bag at all times.
Playing on the go is all fun and games--until your Switch's battery dies. If you have an extra battery pack, you can keep the fun going. It can even charge your phone or tablet whenever they need juice and an outlet is nowhere in sight.
Many Switch games have fantastic soundtracks and audio effects, but if you rely on the Switch's tiny built-in speakers to hear your games, you'll miss out on a lot. These highly recommended headphones from Mpow sound great and come in a variety of colors.
Alongside the Ragnarok skin available for reaching Battle Pass level 100, the other big chase during Season 5 of Fortnite: Battle Royale has been an until-now secret outfit. With a sufficient number of Road Trip challenges now available, the first players have unlocked the accompanying Legendary-tier skin, which we now know is called Enforcer.
Enforcer dresses your character up to look like a sort of ninja in black, complete with a sword on their back (as well as a hood and, for some reason, knee pads). The outfit also comes with a Legendary piece of Back Bling, Subjugator, that puts a black shield on your back. One Redditor aptly pointed out how it looks a lot like one of Destiny's characters, the Exo Stranger. You can get a look at the skin in the video below, which shows it off performing the game's many emotes.
Obtaining the Enforcer skin is no easy task. It's the reward for completing a total of seven Road Trip challenges (out of nine total). Each Road Trip challenge entails completing every challenge from a given week. As we're only in Week 7, that means doing all 49 Season 5 challenges released to date. That includes the latest batch, such as dealing with the Dusty Divot treasure map and the new stage-based approach to opening chests.
Road Trip challenges serve as more than just a means for unlocking this skin. Each one you complete rewards you with a loading screen which hides a clue for the location of a hidden Battle Star. Provided you've earned the corresponding loading screen, you can head to that spot in-game to grab a free Battle Star. We've got a complete list of how to find these below.
Week 7's challenges have come shortly after the launch of Fortnite's new 5.30 update, which itself was followed by the 5.30.1 update. The main update introduced a new item, map changes, and more, while the follow-up served to roll back undesirable changes made to aiming with a controller on consoles.
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