Marvel has announced a new bi-monthly series from the creator of Deadpool, set to debut this spring. The new series Major X will take place within the X-Men continuity, and he'll clash with popular characters like Wolverine, Storm, and Cable.
Comic Book reports that Rob Liefeld will handle the writing and art for the first issue of Major X in April. After that it will be written by Image co-founder Whilce Portacio with art from Teen Titans' Brent Peeples.
Major X comes from a different reality, called the "X-istence," which is only populated by mutants. This was a paradise for mutants, but the X-istence was destroyed somehow, and Major X is seeking to bring his home back. Liefeld teases that the book will slowly answer questions about how the X-istence came to be in the first place, and how a portal opened that put Major X into conflict with the rest of the Marvel continuity.
Liefeld also said he had the origins of the idea for Major X in 1992, but he held off on the project out of fatigue from other X-Men books and wanting to create more space for new creators to have a voice. He says the mysteriousness of Major X and the slow revelations of his nature is a callback to his favorite character.
"I still get asked all the time, 'Who's your favorite character?' It's Wolverine," Liefeld said. "It's always been Wolverine. He made me love comics and made me love the X-Men. And the thing about Wolverine also is the mystery. The mystery that they layered him with over multiple years. So with Cable, Deadpool, Domino, X-Force, I felt like I've subscribed to that notion of mystery and reviewing different layers."`
With its simple character designs and a game world that often looks like a young kid designed it by cutting up and sticking together different bits of colored paper, Pikuniku sometimes feels like a video game adaption of a children's book. It tells a simple story that doesn't always quite make sense, it's pointedly very silly, and there are scenes within it that seem to be based on how a child understands the world. A giant company pays a town by making money rain from the sky; a trendy nightclub will only let you in if you dress "cool" by wearing sunglasses; you play a game someone "invented," but which is, essentially, just basketball mixed with soccer.
But Pikuniku (Japanese for "picnic") never feels like it was designed specifically for children. It's a game about battling a corporate takeover, and the writing has the playful, sarcastically irreverent tone you're more likely to see from someone in their 20s or 30s. But the childish veneer is charming, and while Pikuniku isn't the deepest game around, it's lovely, funny, and engrossing in its own weird way.
At the game's opening, your character--Piku, an entity made up of an oblong red body with dots for eyes and two long spindly legs coming out of it--awakens in a cave, prompted by a ghost to go outside. The opening tutorial doesn't take long, because the controls are simple: You can jump, causing Piku to spin haphazardly as he moves through the air, you can kick in any direction, and you can curl your legs into yourself and roll around in ball form. You spend the rest of the game wandering through the small game world, encountering characters and helping solve their problems until, eventually, you find yourself fighting against Sunshine Inc, a giant corporation that is sending robots all over the land to harvest natural resources from the game's three regions.
Progression rarely requires much thoughtful effort. You explore the world on a 2D plane, talking to as many people as you can, kicking at everything, and solving objectives as they're handed to you. There are platforming elements that require some finesse, especially when you explore some of the slightly more challenging optional side quests that pop up throughout the game. Pikuniku is entertaining rather than challenging, though, and even the hardest areas you'll find are unlikely to trip you up for longer than a few minutes. But this is to the game's advantage--it's accessible to inexperienced and young players, and I never felt like the game would have been more enjoyable if it pushed me harder. Piku's weird, wobbly walk, his awkward jump, and the force of his kicks mean that just moving through the game world is inherently entertaining.
Your ability to kick everything and everyone is crucial, and much of the puzzle solving in the game comes down to kicking an object from one place to another. The kick mechanic is great fun, with objects reacting differently depending on the angle and distance you hit them from, although there are occasional moments of frustration when, for instance, a box gets wedged into a corner and is tricky to get out. Getting stuck for a moment kicking something out of a corner, or dealing with an object that isn't behaving how you'd like, can interrupt the flow of gameplay.
You can kick every character you meet in the game with no real punishment, which rarely stops being funny. In a few other instances Piku needs to don different hats or use items he has collected to push forward. Again, the mechanics around this are quite simple--if you see a blooming flower, for instance, you know that you need to use the watering can hat on it because a silhouette of that hat will appear above it. This makes it easy to keep track of what you might now be able to do or unlock when you find a new item. It's not the deepest mechanic, but it means that finding a hat or item can spark immediate excitement when you already know what it'll do.
Pikuniku throws little minigames and oddities at you among all the platforming to mix things up. At one point early on, you're asked to draw a new face for a scarecrow using the analog stick; later, you need to win a button-matching dance-off against a robot. There's even a Dig Dug parody, which amusingly devolves into a little joke about how some retro games don't age well. There are boss fights, too (there's no combat in the game otherwise), and while they're not super involved affairs they use the game's simple mechanics to good effect.
Pikuniku is a funny game on numerous levels--the script often undercuts tension and plays with tropes in amusing ways, the goofy way you flip when you jump is a constant source of amusement, and the game will often throw you into strange situations without much explanation. Mess with a toaster in someone's house, for instance, and you'll be hurled into the "toast dimension," which is essentially a dungeon area that you can escape by completing the simple platforming challenge within. In another instance, you enter a pottery store that is clearly begging you to smash everything inside it--it's a clear Zelda homage, but the real delight is in the merchant's zen approach to your destruction. Pikuniku is playful and mischievous. Even the soundtrack is wonderfully kooky, and often faintly reminiscent of Koji Kondo's work with Nintendo.
However, Pikuniku doesn't last long. You can jump back in after the end credits, which roll within about three hours, and enjoy the aftermath of everything you achieved, but even mopping up the last few missions and trying to collect all the optional trophies scattered around the game world doesn't add much. The world you're exploring is compact, and it doesn't take long for you to feel like you've seen everything there is to see. Pikuniku is so charming, and so much fun, that I wanted more time with it (even though the ending is great and absolutely bonkers). The game wrapped up before I was ready to leave it behind, and more story content, or another village to explore, would have gone a long way.
Pikuniku also comes with nine two-player levels, as well as a multiplayer version of Baskick, the aforementioned basketball/soccer hybrid featured in the campaign. These levels are divided between co-op challenges where Piku and his identical friend Niku need to work together and competitive levels where you race one another. You can play with two detached Joy-Cons, and the game holds up well on the smaller screen if you're playing in portable mode. This is not a major component of the game, though, so don't expect a whole second campaign. You're unlikely to get more than an hour out of these levels, but its simplicity makes it ideal to play with a younger relative or someone with little gaming experience.
While Pikuniku is a light experience, it's got enough charm and verve to stick with you well beyond completion. From Piku's weird wobbly gait and looping jumps in the opening right through to the game's funny, bizarre ending, Pikuniku is more gripping than its simple aesthetic and playful tone would suggest. It'll make you feel like a kid again.
The DC smash Aquaman is still making serious money in theaters, but the studio's next movie will be with us soon. Shazam! is released in April, and will be a more comedic superhero adventure than most of DC's previous movies. A new teaser containing new footage has now been released.
It starts off like many other superhero trailers. Young Billy Batson given incredible powers that transforms him into a full-size adult superhero, enabling him to fight the evil Doctor Sivana. But it quickly changes tone and emphasizes the movie's more humorous aspects, with Shazam attempting to buy beer and purchase a superhero lair from a realtor. Check the trailer out above.
Shazam stars Thor actor Zachary Levi in the title role, with Asher Angel as Billy and Mark Strong as Sivana. It's directed by David F. Sandberg and hits theaters on April 5. For more check out, everything we know about Shazam! so far.
A big part of the movie is Shazam's distinctive illuminated costume, and in a recent interview, costume designer Leah Butler revealed that the suit came with an extremely high price tag. "Each suit costs, oh boy, upwards of a million? We have ten suits," she said, via SyFy. "There is actually a battery in the back--we luckily had a cape to cover it all up or I don't know where we would have put all that stuff--and it is remotely lit through a switchboard operator. There is wiring throughout the costume. It's a 26-volt AA rechargeable battery. It lasts about two hours at full charge.
"It took 16 weeks to build the costume. We had to scan Zach's body and start building the costume even before he started his very strict regime--his diet and working out."
Shazam! is one of two DC movies arriving in 2019. The Joker prequel movie is released in October, and recently finished production. It stars Joaquin Phoenix as the Clown Prince of Crime, and will reportedly be unconnected to the other movies in the DC universe.
Mario & Luigi: Bowser's Inside Story + Bowser Jr.'s Journey is a remake of sorts of the 2009 DS game, this time for the Nintendo 3DS. It's out now in North America, though its release date in Europe isn't until January 25 (January 26 in Australia). The important question, though, is whether the remake is any good.
Critical consensus has been positive, with many praising the new mode, Bowser Jr.'s Journey. "The extra mode certainly sweetens the pot for those who owned Bowser's Inside Story on DS, but fundamentally, it's the same game," wrote Justin Clark in GameSpot's Mario & Luigi: Bowser's Inside Story review. For more opinions on the 3DS version, take a look below or check out GameSpot sister site Metacritic.
Game: Mario + Luigi: Bowser's Inside Story + Bowser Jr.'s Journey
Developer / Publisher: AlphaDream, Arzest / Nintendo
Platform: Nintendo 3DS
Release date: Out now (North America), January 25 (Europe), January 26 (North America)
Price: US $40 / £35 / AU $60
GameSpot -- 8/10
"The extra mode certainly sweetens the pot for those who owned Bowser's Inside Story on DS, but fundamentally, it's the same game. If anything, the real drawback is the game coming off as an unnecessary surprise on the 3DS--which can already play the original game via backward compatibility. But the game itself remains one of Mario's RPG best, and it's a cheerful, inventive journey." -- Justin Clark [Full review]
Game Informer -- 8.5/10
"The updated visuals are attractive and the new mode is interesting--especially if you want to spend more time in that world--but if you played the 2009 original and consider yourself satisfied with that experience, then the incentive to return is small. If you've never played Bowser's Inside Story, this is a fantastic way to experience what is probably the best of the Mario & Luigi games. As a remake, it doesn't drastically change the experience or improve on it in a big way, but that's a testament to the original's quality more than it is a knock against this version." -- Kyle Hilliard [Full review]
Nintendo Life -- 9/10
"Mario & Luigi: Bowser's Inside Story + Bowser Jr.'s Journey stands as a well-made remake of a game that was excellent to begin with, polishing up the original in small ways and adding some extra content that meaningfully establishes its own identity. If you've ever been a fan of the Mario & Luigi series (or are looking for a reason to dust off the old 3DS), do yourself a favour and pick this game up. Although Bowser Jr.'s Journey is just an 'okay' addition, the inventive battles, great writing and creative gameplay of the main game make this one an easy recommendation." -- Mitch Vogel [Full review]
Kotaku -- No score
"I'd love to have gotten a brand new Mario & Luigi game this year, or even a remake that was on Switch instead of the 3DS. Still, a remake of Bowser's Inside Story, one of the best games in the series, is better than none at all. I'm enjoying reliving the high points of the story with the beautiful, upgraded graphics and have found a surprising amount of fun in guiding Bowser Jr. through absurdist misadventures with the rest of Bowser's minions. The Mario universe has become so much bigger in the years since Inside Story was originally released. It's nice to be able to spend time with some of the under-explored characters on a smaller scale." -- Ethan Gach [Full review]
You can read the full top 10 sales chart below, courtesy of UKIE and sales monitor Chart-Track. Note this table does not include digital sales data, and so should not be considered representative of all UK game sales.
Ace Combat 7 enjoys "the biggest debut in the long running series' history," according to Chart-Track. It launched last week to a positive critical reception, including an 8/10 from GameSpot.
"Good aerial combat is important for a game involving jet fighters, but it's a given quality for Ace Combat," wrote Edmond Tran in our Ace Combat 7 review. "Skies Unknown boasts a beautiful photorealistic world, entertaining mission variety, and a reason to get excited about clouds. But most importantly, it carries renewed devotion to the history and stories of its fictional universe, and with that, it brings back the human, emotional center that makes it remarkable. Ace Combat 7 is a fantastic return for a series that is at its best when it wears its heart on its wings."
Overwatch has begun teasing its next in-game event, 2019's Lunar New Year. The annual event focuses on Chinese culture and often introduces new skins based on Chinese historical figures or folklore. Blizzard has revealed its first three skins for the upcoming Year of the Pig, with fresh looks for Reaper, Hanzo, and Reinhardt.
The skins were rolled out on the official Twitter account. Reaper gets a new look as Lu Bu Reaper. Hanzo grows a mighty beard as Huang Zhong Hanzo. Finally, Reinhardt loses the helmet for Guan Yu Reinhardt. All three are modeled after generals who lived during the Han dynasty, so there's a definite theme to the inclusions so far.
Year of the Pig will begin on January 24 and last through February 8. New skins are being debuted daily through Twitter and Facebook. That leaves a few more days for more skin reveals. Some possible contenders include Brigitte, Wrecking Ball, and Ashe, all of which were released after the last Lunar New Year event.
Last year's Lunar New Year event was the Year of the Dog, which debuted a host of new skins and a capture-the-flag mode. The most recent Overwatch event focused on Ana and paired with a free skin for the character, right on the heels of the annual Winter Wonderland event.
New year, new me. Make your own luck this year as LÜ BU REAPER! Overwatch Lunar New Year begins January 24. pic.twitter.com/jIJc1505Ys
Respect your elders! Share your wisdom on Capture the Flag traditions as GUAN YU REINHARDT. Overwatch Lunar New Year begins January 24. pic.twitter.com/cHdGpq5sex
One of the next big video game movies is Detective Pikachu, which comes out in May featuring the voice of Ryan Reynolds as the electric yellow creature.
Now, a new TV spot for the film has arrived, providing another quick look at it--and now there's a fart joke. You can check out the new TV spot in the Instagram embed below.
Like the game it's based on, Detective Pikachu follows the story of Tim (Justice Smith), the son of a famous private detective whose father has gone missing. Tim can understand Pokemon, and he teams up with Pikachu to investigate his father's disappearance.
It's directed by Rob Letterman, who has experience directing films that mix live-action and CG having directed the Jack Black movie Gulliver's Travels. It also stars Kathryn Newton (Blockers), Ken Watanabe (Godzilla, Inception), and Bill Nighy (Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows).
Streaming network Hulu's TV show The First, which starred Sean Penn as an astronaut trying to go to Mars, has been canceled after one season. Created by House of Cards creator Beau Willimon, The First marked Senn's first time as a regular on a TV show. The Hollywood Reporter was along the news sites to confirm the show's cancellation.
It's just the latest cancellation from Hulu, as the network recently axed comedian Sarah Silverman's show, I Love You, America, also only after one season.
Hulu, like Netflix, does not release viewership figures for its original content, so we don't know how well The First performed. What's clear, however, is that the ratings were not good enough to keep the show going for a second season.
The First premiered on Hulu in September. It also stars Natascha McElhone (Californication), LisaGay Hamilton (True Crime), and Hannah Ware (Hitman: Agent 47).
While The First may be canceled, Hulu still has a number of other high-profile original shows including The Handmaid's Tale, Future Man, and Veronica Mars.
It's not every day a hero gets a chance to literally walk around in their mortal enemy's shoes, which is what made Bowser's Inside Story such a bizarre but wildly unique concept back in 2009. Even though not much has changed since its original DS release, it's still one of the stronger Mario RPGs, and its innovative gimmick remains exciting on 3DS. The setup here is that a mysterious affliction called the Blorps is spreading across the Mushroom Kingdom thanks to Fawful, an obnoxious trickster who's been handing out poisoned mushrooms. Naturally, Mario and Luigi are on the job, but after Bowser gets suckered into eating one of the mushrooms, he ends up with a surprising side effect: accidentally swallowing everything in his current field of vision, including the Mario Brothers. As Fawful makes a play to take over the kingdom, Bowser heads out to get some fiery payback with some unexpected help from the Mario Bros.
That's where the inventive gimmick comes in. You switch back and forth between controlling Bowser on the top screen (punching enemies and obstacles and burning down trees) and controlling Mario and Luigi in 2D inside Bowser's body (running, jumping, hitting things with hammers, and sliding down what you can only pray are literal pipes). Specific puzzles on Bowser's side require some assistance on the inside from Mario and Luigi, like shocking his muscles to give him more power to push things, and some actions Bowser performs will affect Mario and Luigi--Bowser drinking water will flood the bottom screen. If Bowser uses the mushroom's power to swallow his foes, Mario and Luigi will be responsible for finishing the enemy off internally. There's an abundance of cleverness in this story--inspired moments where you are, essentially, playing co-op with yourself, and it's exciting to wonder how it will bend your brain next.
The fundamentals of combat are building off the same-old turn-based Mario RPG mechanics, where attacks have a chance of doing extra damage and you have a chance to defend yourself using carefully timed button presses. There are very few surprises for anyone who played on DS, but a graphical overhaul on 3DS changes the cartoonish watercolors of the original game to something closer to 1996's Super Mario RPG: Legend of the Seven Stars. It's not as bright and immediately eye-catching, but there's a gentle, storybookish beauty to it.
As far as gameplay is concerned, the series always been delightfully accessible, and the only difference here is the minor learning curve of remembering which buttons control which characters (Bowser's actions use X; Mario and Luigi use A and B; specific to this port, Y controls both brothers at the same time). That said, the game does go a bit too easy on you most of the play time. The game never gets truly challenging until the latter third, and by then, if you're playing carefully, you've learned how to counter every enemy and racked up a massive collection of recovery items. As a result, fights quickly become an unwelcome hindrance on the way to more story after a while.
Thankfully, the story and writing do drive you forward. There are body-based jokes at every opportunity, Bowser is humorously angry and obtuse, and the Globins--Bowser's melodramatic cellular structures--frequently try to steal the show with their laments. Even just the bizarre little moments of Mario and Luigi speaking to each other in pseudo-Italian are a joy. The entire concept of Fantastic Voyage-but-Nintendo is ripe with possibilities for outlandish twists and turns and distortions to characters we all know and love. Having that apply to someone other than the usual Mario Bros. crew is a special treat, especially for the more ambitious moments, like having to turn the 3DS on its side to play as a giant-sized Bowser. More than all this, though, it's a chance to get to know Mario's archnemesis in more detail.
This is the rare opportunity that makes the game's brand new side-story, Bowser Jr's Journey, worthwhile for many of the same reasons. It's an odd little real-time strategy game that more resembles a wonky sumo match than, say, Starcraft. Bowser Jr. himself is the commander sending waves of baddies across the screen to butt heads with others, dealing damage based on a rock-paper-scissors system of weakness. Like the main game, there isn't a terrible amount of difficulty in getting through each battle, and these fights are also a lot less interesting and dynamic. There's a lot more waiting around for enough damage to happen, or for Jr. to accumulate enough points to activate special moves.
There's an abundance of cleverness in this story--inspired moments where you are, essentially, playing co-op with yourself, and it's exciting to wonder how it will bend your brain next.
If there's a redeeming quality to Bowser Jr.'s tale, it's that it gives us the first real look at familial relations within the Bowser clan in ages. Jr.'s tale takes place after his dad goes off to his sit-down with Princess Peach about Blorps. In Bowser's absence, Jr. takes it upon himself to make a move to take over the kingdom. Unfortunately, his bratty overzealousness ends up earning the ire of the other Koopalings as well as the three wacky underlings Fawful plants in Bowser's Kingdom. And yet, as the story goes along, there's a strangely heartfelt streak to the proceedings, of a kid who really just wants his dad's approval and figuring out that he has to earn it, not throw tantrums for it. Towards the end, you're almost rooting for the little guy, and it makes the interminable nature of the fights worthwhile.
The extra mode certainly sweetens the pot for those who owned Bowser's Inside Story on DS, but fundamentally, it's the same game. If anything, the real drawback is the game coming off as an unnecessary surprise on the 3DS--which can already play the original game via backward compatibility. But the game itself remains one of Mario's RPG best, and it's a cheerful, inventive journey.
M. Night Shyamalan's latest movie, Glass, opened this past weekend, and it's expected to win the weekend by a large margin and become one of the most successful releases ever over the Martin Luther King. Jr long weekend. According to Deadline, Glass is tracking to make $47 million over the Friday-Monday period in the United States and Canada.
It's set to become the third biggest domestic release over the MLK long weekend, only behind Ride Along ($48.6 million) and American Sniper ($107.2 million). A finance source told Deadline that Glass' opening-weekend box office haul is "disappointing and profitable at the same time."
As @GlassMovie opens around the world today, I feel so very lucky. Cinema has always been sacred to me. My religion in many ways. To be able to add my voice to the mix. I can not thank the fans enough for making this happen. Here we go!!!
Shyamalan paid the $20 million production budget for Glass out of his own pocket. The film made a further $48.5 million from international markets, which boosts its three-day global box office figure to $89.1 million as of Sunday and $95.5 million counting all four days.
For comparison, Shyamalan's previous film, Split, made $40.6 million in the US and Canada over its first three days, according to Entertainment Weekly. Unbreakable, which is also connected to Split and Glass, made $30.3 million over its first three days back in 2000--and that works out to around $49.7 million today.
The third of five planned Fantastic Beasts movies has hit a bit of a speedbump. Production on the film was expected to begin this July, but now cameras are set to start rolling in the Fall, according to a new report from Deadline. Why the production delay?
According to the site, Warner Bros. simply wants more time in pre-production, which sounds like a good thing. The move is supposedly part of management's belief that giving the creative teams more time will lead to a better end result, and again, that sounds like a good thing.
Previous Warner Bros. administrations had the tendency to rush event films to meet release dates, and in this case Fantastic Beasts 3 was rumored to be 2020. Warner Bros. executives now have a new approach of allowing big productions to brew as needed," Deadline said.
According to the report, Fantastic Beasts actors are now being told about the production delay so they can adjust their own schedules accordingly.
2016's Fantastic Beasts And Where To Find Them made $814 million worldwide, with 2018's sequel Fantastic Beasts: The Crimes of Grindelwald taking in $648.8 million globally. Together they have made around $1.4 billion.
Both films were directed by David Yates, and he's expected to direct the third one as well. The series stars Eddie Redmayne as magizoologist Newt Scamander in a story written by J.K. Rowling and set before the events of the Harry Potter series.
Director M. Night Shyamalan has a history of self-financing his movies, and that continued with his latest effort, Glass. According to Forbes, Shyamalan made Glass with $20 million of his own money. That money was a combination of the earnings from his two most recent movies, Split and The Visit, as well as collateral from his 125-acre estate in Pennsylvania.
According to the report, Shyamalan took out a $5 million loan on his home years ago pay for The Visit. The movie was a huge success, going on to make $98 million worldwide. For Split, Shyamalan paid the $9 million production budget himself, and then reaped the benefits, as the movie earned a massive $278 million at the box office. The successes of The Visit and Split, as well as the aforementioned collateral, allowed Shyamalan to cover Glass' $20 million production budget.
Glass is expected to make more than $40 million in the US and Canada alone this weekend, according to Entertainment Weekly, so it appears it'll be another profitable film for Shyamalan.
As Forbes points out, it's not uncommon for up-and-coming directors to finance their films with their own money, but Shyamalan is an established director whose movies make a lot of money no matter what you say about their quality. One reason why Shyamalan opts to finance his movies out of his own pocket is because when big studio money gets involved, directors like Shyamalan generally have to give up some amount of creative control. Shyamalan financing movies himself theoretically gives him more freedom.
Glass, which stars James McAvoy, Samuel L. Jackson, and Bruce Willis, has received a mixed critical reaction. GameSpot's review said it was a disappointment in some ways, while other critics had problems with it, too. For more, check out GameSpot's Glass review roundup to see what other critics are saying.
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