On its surface, Mass Effect: Andromeda's latest patch polished up a ton of gameplay issues and overhauled the game's distracting eye-graphics. Now, reports say the upgrade also comes loaded with stronger anti-tamper technology that will stop pirates from cracking the game anymore.
DSOG is reporting patch 1.05 upgrades the game's Denuvo anti-tamper software to a new version. That will keep pirates from cracking the game now, and also mean anyone who's playing a pirated version won't be able to upgrade (check out what you'd be missing below).
Andromeda was cracked 10 days after its release, according to DSOG. The site also reports the new version of Denuvo included in the patch has never been broken and is also being used on Nier: Automata, Dead Rising 4, and 2Dark.
A new international trailer for The Mummy has landed. The upcoming supernatural thriller stars Tom Cruise, and this latest promo features footage not contained in the most recent US trailer. Check it out below:
The Mummy is directed by Alex Kurtzman, who co-wrote the first two Star Trek movies in the current reboot series. It also stars Jake Johnson (Jurassic World), Annabelle Wallis (King Arthur), and Courtney B. Vance (American Crime Story: The People V. O.J. Simpson), plus Russell Crowe as Dr. Jekyll.
In a recent interview with Slashfilm, Kurtzman spoke about the tone of the movie. "I think that our goal is to make a movie that's full of suspense, full of adventure, that has moments of horror but that isn't defined as 'a horror movie,'" he said.
"This goes back to the requirement, I think, of having an unpredictable Tom Cruise in the movie. Because if you remove from the audience's mind, 'Oh I know he's going to save the day,' and in fact go, 'he really might not, he has no idea what to do here,' [it becomes] a situation where they're kind of scared for him because they don't know what he's going to do and they don't know what's coming."
The Mummy is set for a June 9 release. It will be the first of Universal's classic monster movie franchise. While it is the only film so far in this connected universe to be officially announced, we know that a Van Helsing movie is in development, and Crowe is expected to return for a standalone Jekyll and Hyde film.
Mario Kart 8 Deluxe launches in just a few weeks, and now the digital version's file size has been revealed. A listing on Amazon Germany has indicated the game will take up 6.75 GB if you download it to your Nintendo Switch.
That means purchasing the game digitally will take up 21% of the Switch's 32 GB internal storage--though that proportion will be slightly higher if you take into account memory space taken up by system settings and the console's operating system.
Pokemon Sun and Moon's latest mythical Pokemon Marshadow has appeared. Although rumors about Marshadow have been circling for months, players are getting their first official sneak peek today. Just how you catch the Generation VII Pokemon remains a mystery, but check out a video of Marshadow below.
"Marshadow cannot be encountered in normal gameplay. Details will be introduced in the future on how Trainers can get this Pokémon for their game," reads a message on Pokemon's official site.
Marshadow will be a dual-type fighting/ghost Pokemon with no known evolutions, according to the online Pokemon encyclopedia Bulbapedia. Its Z-Move is the Soul-Stealing 7-Star Strike (say that seven times fast), which "punches and kicks the target consecutively with full force," according to Bulbapedia.
While we don't know when or where you'll be able to actually catch it, we do know Pokemon fans will see a lot Marshadow in the near future. It'll make an appearance in the upcoming Pokemon movie I Choose You!, due out in Japan this July. It's not yet clear when or if the movie will come out in the West, but check out this screenshot of Marshadow from the new anime below.
The first trailer for Star Wars: The Last Jedi is expected very soon. It has been reported that the trailer will debut at the franchise's annual Celebration event in Orlando, Florida later this week.
According to Star Wars News Net, the trailer will be more than just a short teaser. The site tweeted the following, and subsequently confirmed that this had been verified by sources close to the movie.
Very little is known about the film's plot. In January, Johnson spoke about the tone, stating, "I want it to be a blast and to be funny and to be a ride the way The Force Awakens and the original Star Wars movies were."
The Last Jedi arrives in theaters on December 15, 2017. It stars Daisy Ridley, Mark Hamill, John Boyega, Oscar Isaac, Laura Dern, Domhnall Gleeson, Anthony Daniels, Gwendoline Christie, and Andy Serkis. Carrie Fisher filmed her Leia scenes for the movie before she passed away in December.
GameSpot will be attending Celebration this weekend, so check back for full coverage of the various panels and events.
Elder Scrolls Online is going free all week on PlayStation 4, Xbox One, and PC, publisher Bethesda has announced. The full base game is playable without charge from 7 AM PT / 10 AM ET / 3PM BST on April 11 all the way through April 18.
In addition to the full Tamriel Unlimited game, players will receive 500 free Crowns, the in-game currency that can be spent on cosmetic upgrades, new pets, and more.
The game will also be "discounted" until April 18, after which it will go back to full price. It's unclear at this stage what the sale price will be, but Tamriel Unlimited (the base game) usually retails for US $30 / £20, while Elder Scrolls Online: Gold Edition (which includes the base game as well as the Imperial City, Orsinium, Thieves Guild, and Dark Brotherhood DLC packs) sells for US $60 / £40. Neither version requires a subscription to play.
We enjoyed Bethesda's MMO to an extent here at GameSpot, though it has its problems. "Hopefully, The Elder Scrolls Online will one day get out of its own way, and stop trying to stifle the very fun it's trying to provide," said critic Kevin VanOrd. Read more in our full Elder Scrolls Online review.
Nintendo has announced it will be hosting a Direct stream on April 12 at 3 PM PT / 6 PM ET / 11 PM GMT. The focus of the presentation will primarily be Nintendo Switch titles Splatoon 2 and Arms.
Although Nintendo will "mainly" show these two games, it has also teased more "information about Nintendo 3DS and Nintendo Switch games on the way." As always, the event will be streamed on YouTube and the Nintendo Direct website. Of course, GameSpot will also be delivering the news as it breaks.
We've seen quite a bit of Splatoon 2 since it was first announced. A beta for the game was held in late March and offered Switch owners an opportunity to get early hands-on with it.
Arms, however, has been out of the spotlight for some time now. It was revealed in January as an arena-based fighting game that utilizes motion controls.
"It's important to point out that [we've] been playing with the Joy-Cons--one in each hand--using motion controls," Nintendo explained at the time. "But obviously if you're a purist and you like button controls, [and] you'd rather use a more traditional controller, you can of course do that as well."
According to a recent leak, Overwatch heroes may be about to get a bunch of new skins.
New images (via Imgur user raulrsd) show an Xbox One dashboard icon for Overwatch that contains Mercy, Tracer, Reinhardt, and Torbjorn wearing new blue gear.
"We are extremely open-minded about releasing a map editor for Overwatch someday," he said. "But because Overwatch was made with a brand new engine, this is not a small task or one which can happen any time soon."
For more on Overwatch, you should definitely check out our own interview with Kaplan. He discusses an abandoned idea for a cat-with-a-jetpack hero, patching out Genji, bad Google images, Fast and the Furious, and more.
The first trailer for Thor: Ragnarok is here. The Marvel fantasy adventure hits theaters in November, and this initial look at the movie promises spectacular intergalactic action and a big gladiatorial showdown between Thor and fellow Avenger Hulk. Check it out below:
The movie stars Chris Hemsworth as Thor, with Mark Ruffalo as Bruce Banner, and Tom Hiddleston as Loki. As the trailer shows, Cate Blanchett plays the villainous Hela, while Jeff Goldblum will appear as immortal games-playing Grandmaster. There are also roles for Karl Urban (Star Trek) and Tessa Thompson (Creed).
A synopsis for the movie was released earlier this year. It reads: "In Thor: Ragnarok, Thor is imprisoned on the other side of the universe without his mighty hammer and finds himself in a race against time to get back to Asgard to stop Ragnarok--the destruction of his homeworld and the end of Asgardian civilization--at the hands of an all-powerful new threat, the ruthless Hela. But first he must survive a deadly gladiatorial contest that pits him against his former ally and fellow Avenger--the Incredible Hulk!"
Thor: Ragnarok is directed by Taiki Waititi and arrives on November 3, 2017. The movie's poster has also been released--check it out here:
Minecraft will be getting a marketplace for player-made content this spring with an update for mobile and Windows 10 PC.
On the marketplace, approved creators will be able to sell things like maps and texture packs to other players and take home a portion of the profits. Partner creators at launch include Blockworks, a group that makes RPG-style maps, and Eneija Silverleaf, a popular pixel artist who makes skins for the game.
Players on mobile and PC will be able to buy and download the content with Minecraft Coins, which work similarly to currencies in other mobile games. An Xbox Live Silver or Gold account will be required to buy on the marketplace.
The Discovery update for Minecraft is also bringing things like treasure maps and the much-requested ability to change your bed color. It also introduces new Enchantments, including Frostwalking, which lets you walk on water, and Mending, which keeps your sword sharp.
Mojang has also confirmed that if you locate a hidden forest mansion and defeat the monsters within it, you'll receive the "Totem of Undying" that keeps you alive when you should otherwise have perished.
Former Xbox and EA exec Peter Moore has recounted the opposition he faced in trying to make Sega come to terms with its declining relevance during the Dreamcast era. In the midst of his battles he even went as far as telling Yuji Naka, the creator of Sonic, to "f**k off" when evidence that Sega's brand was fading was refuted.
At the time, Moore was Sega of America's chief operating officer and, in an interview with Glixel, he described the challenges he faced in trying to make the company understand it was seen as the "grandad" of the industry.
"We did a focus group here in San Francisco, I'm trying to think what year this would be, probably late 2001, early 2002, because I needed to prove to the Japanese that our brand was starting just to fade away," he explained. "And so we asked [a] focus group, a bunch of 18-, 19-year-olds, a classic question, 'If a video game publisher was a relative or a friend, who would they be?'"
Rival company EA was described by the focus group as the "arrogant quarterback" and Rockstar was the "drunken uncle" that is "the life of the party for a little while, and then he disappears for a long time." Sega, however, was perceived as "your grandad," who "used to be cool, but even he can't remember why anymore."
Moore filmed the focus groups where these discussions were had and presented them to the Japanese side of the company, which included Naka and Shenmue creator Yu Suzuki.
"[Naka] and I have a love/hate relationship on a good day. And we show him this, and it's subtitled in Japanese, and when it comes to that piece he just [slams his hand on the table], 'This is ridiculous. You have made them say this. Sega is the great brand, nobody would ever say this, you have falsified!' He just gets in my face.
"So I said to the translator, 'Tell him to f**k off.' And the poor guy looks at me and says, 'There's no expression in Japanese.' I said, 'I know there is.' And that was it. That was the last time I ever set foot in there."
Moore noted that he loved, and "still loves" Sega, but added that its most prominent developers weren't able to see "the world was changing around them," and therefore instigating a change in identity was difficult.
"I rarely get upset, but to be accused of doctoring a video, because there's none so blind as those who will not see, right? I loved Sega, still love Sega, but it was dominated by the developers to the extent where Sega as a company couldn't move if Suzuki, [Nights: Into Dreams developer] Nakagawa-san, [and Jet Set Radio developer, Kazuma] Iguchi weren't into it."
Moore's desire to transform Sega's identity came in light of shifting trends within the industry, which were steered by games like Rockstar's Grand Theft Auto 3 and Sony's PlayStation, which courted maturer gamers.
"That was, to me, this inflection point. Once the tech started to get more powerful, the creative elements that would come over from Hollywood and from television all of a sudden--that was what gave us Rockstar, and what the Houser brothers, to their credit, did for games. I mean, you look back on the history of this industry, you can point to these moments and say, 'That's when everything started to change.'"
Shortly after his meeting with Sega, Moore was approached by Microsoft, which was looking into challenging Sony's living room dominance. At the time, Microsoft had been working on Xenon, which would go on to become the Xbox 360. Moore agreed to join the company and was instrumental in the success of the Xbox 360.
After his time at Microsoft, Moore joined EA, most recently serving as its chief competition officer. However, in February he announced he would be leaving the company, and the games industry, to take up the role of chief executive officer for Liverpool FC, the English football team that Moore has been a lifelong fan of.
Uncharted's upcoming spinoff, The Lost Legacy, might be over 10 hours long, according to developer Naughty Dog.
In an interview with IBTimes UK, the company's head of communications, Arne Meyer, said "we couldn't keep it short."
"Years ago, when we were asked if we were ever doing a single-player expansion for Uncharted we always said, 'Well, we don't have the self-discipline to do that,'" recalled Meyer. "If we tried to do that we'd create a full game.
"There's no way we could constrict and restrain ourselves, and that's exactly what was happening here. When we were doing story pitches, we were coming up with a game that would be over ten hours long and so we suddenly realised everything we said was true and we couldn't keep it short."
While the final length of The Lost Legacy was not revealed, Meyer's comments suggest Naughty Dog was not able to shorten the story's length and it therefore may take some time to complete.
Uncharted: The Lost Legacy stars series favorites Chloe Frazer and Nadine Ross, and it doesn't feature Nathan Drake at all. It's an expansion, of sorts, to Uncharted 4: A Thief's End, though it is standalone, so you don't need to own Uncharted 4 to play The Lost Legacy. Naughty Dog previously made a standalone expansion to The Last of Us, titled Left Behind, though that originally launched as DLC and only had a runtime of around three hours.
Persona 5 has finished top of the UK physical games chart in its first week on sale, as Mass Effect: Andromeda tumbles from No.1 to No.5 in the week ending April 8. Altus's title is the first JRPG to top the UK chart since 2013's PlayStation 3 exclusive Ni No Kuni: Wrath of the White Witch, and it's the biggest Persona launch ever in the UK.
The rest of the chart is made up of many familiar faces; check out the full list below courtesy of 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.
"Persona 5 is a game that shouldn't be missed," said our reviewer, Lucy James. "It's stuffed to bursting point with gameplay ideas and presentation flourishes--there's an overwhelming level of artistry in every part of Persona 5, making it a truly standout entry in the series. It's a refined, effortlessly stylish RPG that will be talked about for years to come."
The Microsoft Store in Sydney, Australia will this week launch Xbox Academy, a series of free game development classes in collaboration with the Academy of Interactive Entertainment (AIE), a multi-national and non-profit college focusing on game development, animation, and visual effects. The move is timed in conjunction with Australia's Easter school holiday period, in an effort to encourage school-aged children to discover what the process behind game development entails, and get a taste of what career paths are available to them in the field once they graduate.
The program will feature three different courses led by AIE tutors, which cover different aspects of the game development process: Game design, game programming, and developing games on the Xbox One. Each course is intrinsically linked to a similar course taught by AIE, which allows for an obvious path for further education should attendees seek to pursue it. All workshop costs covered by the Microsoft store, and each course runs for three hours.
GameSpot recently had a chance to attend a media session where we got a taste of the contents for each course. For the duration of the class, each student is provided with a Surface Tablet for note-taking, drawing, and programming tasks, as well as a development-ready Xbox One S.
The game design course focuses on the conceptual stage of development, with the goal of equipping students with the terms and tools to be able to analyse and speak about aspects of a game's design, as well as workshop the specifics of a burgeoning game concept before even beginning to program it.
In our condensed version of the course, each student began by writing a short pitch on a game we wanted to develop. From there, the class moved between desks to provide feedback and iterate on the concepts of other students, in order to give new ideas and perspectives in terms of its themes or mechanics. We then refined our original ideas and were given guidance into how best to communicate these game ideas to different audiences, how we wanted our games to make the player feel, and think about the business side: how to best pitch a game to potential investors.
The game programming course revolved around giving students a primer on the cross-platform game engine, Unity. We were taught the basics of using Unity's graphical interface by populating a 3D world with solid planes of ground, introducing shapes and objects, and giving those objects properties that would allow them to physically interact with the world in ways we desired.
We were simultaneously shown how to write and apply basic code to these objects in a text-based scripting interface, learn how these two types of creation tools interacted, and gained some understanding to how team-based game development can work between programmers and designers. AIE representatives told us that the full, three-hour class would also cover some basic artificial intelligence application and program deployment.
The Developing Games on Xbox One course also involved learning cross-platform game programming skills, but dealt with techniques specific to coding on Microsoft's wide-reaching Universal Windows Platform, which covers PC, Xbox, Hololens, and mobile platforms. Our concise version of the course involved tinkering with a prefabricated project, learning to code variables to assign movement parameters and Xbox controller configurations to an image of Master Chief, and then deploy the final product onto an Xbox One for live testing, which was a satisfying and motivating result to see first-hand.
The emphasis is that students can easily continue to pursue the skills and programs they learn during the Xbox Academy courses at home. Unity is a free download, and every Xbox One can easily be turned into a development kit. Participants of the Xbox Academy program will be able to save any work done at the Microsoft Store onto a complimentary USB flash drive and continue working on their projects.
A Microsoft Store representative told GameSpot that they expect to teach up to 120 prospective students throughout the current holiday period, and that the Xbox Academy program is something they hope to continue hosting in future.
The current series of Xbox Academy classes will run from April 10 until April 22, 2017. Interested students can apply for Xbox Academy workshops on the Microsoft Events page.
United States box office estimates for the April 7-9 weekend have come in, showing that the animated movie The Boss Baby continues to dominate, while Ghost in the Shell fell significantly.
The Boss Baby, which features the voice of Alec Baldwin in the lead role, made $26.3 million to stay at No. 1 for two weeks running, according to Entertainment Weekly. Coming in just behind it was Beauty and the Beast, which made $25 million to add to its already-huge domestic haul of $432.3 million. Worldwide, the live-action remake has now made an incredible $977.4 million; it is 2017's highest-grossing movie so far.
Rounding out the top five were Smurfs: The Lost Village ($14 million), Going in Style ($12.5 million), and the aforementioned Ghost in the Shell ($7.4 million). Ghost in the Shell's box office numbers in the US dropped by 60.6 percent compared to week 1. Globally, the film has now made $124.4 million against a $110 million budget. A previous report said the film could end up losing $60 million.
Another notable new release was the Anne Hathaway monster movie Colossal, which made $125,809 from only four US theaters. That's an average of $31,452 per theater, the highest of any movie this past weekend.
The full Top 10 highest-grossing movies in the US for the April 7-9 weekend follow below (via Entertainment Weekly):
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