It's a whole week of new premieres revolving around the heroes of the DC Universe and their shows on the CW. Which of these shows kicks off with a bang and which ones fail to hit the mark?
Over the course of the next couple of months, we'll be looking at a selection of new and returning shows and giving you a quick breakdown of what is worth watching and what you should pass on. This week, we're talking about Supergirl, The Flash, and Legends of Tomorrow.
Supergirl: "Girl of Steel"
After the loss of Mon-El, Kara has alienated herself from her friends and put her sole focus into being Supergirl. She faces a new threat that has a connection to someone close to her, but she has to learn that she'll need to open up to her team if she wants to bring down the bad guys.
Typically, Supergirl hasn't been my cup of tea. Even though this episode had a pretty slow start, it ended up being pretty fantastic, hitting on a lot potentially brilliant storylines, including what seems to be the season-long villain. While everything seemingly gets wrapped up perfectly by the end of the episode, the Season 3 premiere sets up the idea that Kara has trouble living a split life between her job as a reporter and being a superhero. It seemed like she was mere moments from abandoning being a regular civilian in the city. Hopefully, as this season progresses, this is something the show goes back to because it's one of the most compelling parts of the episode.
Is it worth watching?: While it's filled with the angst and emotion that CW is known for, this is a really strong opening episode, as long as you can get through the first 10 minutes.
Flash: "The Flash Reborn"
At the end of Season 3, Barry Allen stepped into the Speed Force in order to save Central City. Now, six months later, Kid Flash and Vibe are the new faces of the superhero scene, bringing down bad guys left and right. A mysterious flying samurai wants to face the Flash, but how can he if Barry is gone?
This was a fun opening episode for Season 4, up until the final act. Without spoiling too much, the episode goes pretty much where expected, but it's interesting to see how the team dynamic has drastically changed with Barry gone. The majority of the problems with the episode stem from the third act wrapping up way too quickly, in a nice, tight package. This should have been a two-parter, but for some reason, this series shies away from doing that time and time again. Regardless, the season opener may have been a bit disappointing, but it was a fun ride.
Is it worth watching?: Longtime fans of the series will really enjoy this episode. Newcomers may feel a little lost, but regardless, it's still enjoyable.
Legends of Tomorrow: "Aruba-Con"
Rip Hunter has created a new agency to monitor time and take care of any anachronisms. That means the original Legends of Tomorrow have been disbanded, against their wishes. However, Julius Caesar is loose in Aruba, and only the Legends can fix the problem, as the new time agency doesn't believe them. However, per usual, the team messes up and has to clean up after themselves.
Legends of Tomorrow is easily the most entertaining of the shows this week. It's a bit silly and the special effects tend to look a bit cheesy, but that's all a part of the allure of the show. It exists in this larger CW/DC Universe, but it doesn't shy away from it, including Wally West in this episode. It's the only CW show that successfully embraces how outrageous it can be, like during a scene where Caesar rallies a bunch of frat bros on a beach. It's weird, but it works. While all the CW/DC series are essentially team shows, Legends is the one that works the best, as each of the characters feels fully fleshed out, adding a wonderful dynamic to the episode.
Is it worth watching?: Even if these CW series aren't for you, Legends of Tomorrow is a ton of fun and well worth your time. This season should be a blast as both Gorilla Grodd and John Constantine will appear.
We'll be back in two weeks and talking about The Walking Dead, At Home With Amy Sedaris, and Stranger Things.
LawBreakers, the first game from Gears of War designer Cliff Bleszinski's new studio Boss Key, launched in July on PC and PlayStation 4. It wasn't the out-of-the-gate success that the studio might have wanted, however, with player figures reportedly very low. In an interview with GameSpot, the industry veteran spoke frankly about the game's launch and told us what Boss Key plans to do in the future to get more players into the game.
We published a portion of this interview last month, and now we're bringing you the full thing. In our conversation, Bleszinski talks about the feedback since launch, why launching in "Destiny season" might have been a little problematic, support for new consoles like PS4 Pro and Xbox One X, and if Boss Key might ever consider bringing LawBreakers to Nintendo Switch. You can find the full interview below, edited and condensed for clarity.
LawBreakers is available now on PS4 and PC for $30.
GameSpot: What were some of the key pieces of feedback you've heard since launch?
Cliff Bleszinski: People who sit down and play the game see that, apart from it looking very different, art style wise, it actually plays quite a bit different. However, it's because I didn't do the same archetypes of the guy who builds the turret or the sniper or the traditional kind of healer that follows behind people, the healing ray, we kind of rolled our own archetypes. That ultimately proved to be very confusing for a lot of core players who were getting into it, in regards to, are they gonna watch the tutorial video? What happens if people like to go online and then they hit all the buttons or all the keys and they just want to figure out, kind of in a vacuum, what they can do with that?
So, what we've done is you kinda double back. And I'm not going to go into all the future content yet, in terms of things we're working on, but creating a far better onboarding experience where it works on PlayStation, it works on PC, it'd have more of a scripted tutorial and continue to look at ways we can improve our offline mode, so people could quote, you know, practice their lines a lot better before they get on stage. So, that was the big take away, honestly, from us.
"We made a skill-based shooter that people who actually play it love"
What are some of the things that you think went well?
Well, I think we made a darn good shooter. And the elephant in the room is our fledging CCU, which we totally understand. We remain committed to the project and those that we have who are our fans are dedicated and we're engaging with them constantly and they're doing fun things like grassroots tournaments that they're organizing themselves. But we made a skill-based shooter that people who actually play it love and continuing to double down on marketing and awareness of it and committing to the product, is something that we're very much intent on. But, if you look at ... If you Google the game right now, the first thing you see on the top right is aggregate of nine out of 10 on Steam. And for me, that's the feeling that, "Yeah, we did our job. I did what I set out to do three years ago."
And like I always said in the other interview, it's a marathon, not a sprint. We're just gonna keep iterating and keep working on it. And at the end of day, I just didn't want to make the exact same archetypes that everybody else did and I wanted to make a game that was, first and foremost, a shooter for shooter players.
The CCU's and just how many players are in the game today, that's ... I guess, how are you feeling about that? You said it's not exactly where you would want it to be, but if you could just talk a little bit more about that, that would be great.
Yeah, I mean, so the thing is, is we're now officially in Destiny season.
Right, yep.
And God bless Bungie for the fantastic job they did. The first one I played for about a week and I was like, "Okay, I get the idea." But, it looks like the second one addresses a lot of those issues and is a, really, knock it out of the park, especially with a really good frame rate on the PC version that's forthcoming. But, in regards to that, it's one of those things that there's a situation where players look at numbers on Steam, that doesn't happen on PlayStation 4. And I don't have the numbers in front of me, but in regards to, you look at PC CCU health versus PS4, PS4's doing fine. Because people just chop up, cough up 30 bucks and hop online and they just play and they don't overthink it. On PC, there's this immediately wanting to declare something a success or a bomb by this kind of internet culture that loves to just observe things.
And it's like, "Well guys, the small bit that we have, we're gonna continue to iterate with and engage." And as we issue content drops, maybe there's gonna be sales or a potential free weekend somewhere down the line. You know, continue to fluff that CCU up and I continue to go back to games like Warframe, that slowly built their very small audience as a bunch of dedicated fan and then, continued to fluff it up. And you watch the graph of the CCU and it's so low, so low, and then eventually, over the course of a year, year and a half, two years, it became this phenomenon that a lot of people weren't even talking about it. But, my friends at Digital Extremes committed to that and that's what's required. Especially in such a crowded market when you're launching a new IP.
That and of course, rebranding of the marketing, showing all the new content and saying, "Hey, if you gave it a go, come back or if you haven't done it yet, try it." And maybe other techniques like send out a, "Hey, here's a free code for your friend." So, you could write a dissertation or an entire GDC talk on the keeping, care, and feeding of maintaining a healthy player base.
One of the things that goes along with that I think would be matchmaking times. It's something you've said is maybe a little bit slower than people would have liked to see and that goes along with the player figures. Here in Australia we've been testing and it's been difficult to find a match on PS4.
Yeah, well, it's one of those things, the Australian market is one that we want to definitely support. But, when it comes to actual number of CCU with a game that has a fledgling player base, it's not a lot to be frank. So, the big thing we have to do is continue to pump into this. People said they want a team deathmatch, they've played the dart game like teamdeath match so we're like, "You want team deathmatch? Here, have it." And you just want to get around and shoot people and ignore the objective, stick with it. So, even further on down the line, we've got new maps coming, such as Valhalla, which is our first forest map, which is our first asymmetrical one.
We got our rapid fire updates hitting and it's just, that's the main thing that we do right now and continue to remind people of it. It's one of those things that whenever I talk about the game on Twitter with my pretty good following there, people respond when our LawBreaker's Facebook page posts about this, that, and the other in regards Balance. People who are playing the game are engaging and so, we're gonna continue to remind them that, in the words of Megatron, "I still function."
That's good. And kinda just what you just said there, with scrimmages, you're adding team deathmatch and that's something people had obviously been really, really asking for. But, if you could go back a little bit and talk about why that wasn't included in the product to begin with?
That was part of my design mantra in regards the way the classes were designed. I didn't want to do the exact same stuff everybody else did. And the funny thing was making a character-based, class-based shooter where it has those ... Even though it's not as simple as a traditional arena shooter, it still, it kinda has a lot of that kinda feel underneath it all. In hindsight, I think it was a mistake to not ship with it. I was stubborn. And I'm like, "Oh, everybody's done TDM, you've done it." Even Blizzard's like, "Screw it, we need to put some TDM action in Overwatch," because fundamentally, at the end of the day, players just want to get in and shoot some stuff sometimes. They don't want to think about, "Okay, what am I carrying? This objective, am I selecting the right? I just want to hop in, shoot some friends or enemies for 20 minutes and have a good time."
And in hindsight, that's one of the other mistakes, you know, you asked about things that I felt were mistakes. Not having that from the get go, honestly. I mean, that's one of my things that I consider my strengths, is I'm willing to admit when I'm wrong. I think the people in the public eye would do them a great benefit to do that more often.
I have a reputation for being brash and loud and everything like that, but I'm the first person to admit when I'm wrong. And we certainly did make our share of mistakes with the game. In spite of the mistakes, we're going to continue to update and iterate and the reviews do not lie for me.
And one of the other elements going forward, too, that I was reading about was Boss Leagues mode. It seems like a more competitive level. We don't really know too much about this. Is there anything more you can say about boss leagues and what that mode is going to entail?
"Those of you who have been kind enough to drop 30 bucks on this. We got your back and we're sticking with it."
Yeah, it's basically kinda like ... Almost like a season zero for kinda testing kind of what our kind of season based game play would be and kind of dipping our toe into that water. And again, that's admitting things we should've shipped with. Shipping with an actual ranked mode instead of just one way would've, of course, made sense. The problem with what we were trying to pull off with this company and this title was shipping a quality product with a team of 65 people without ruining everybody's marriages. And so, certain concessions did have to be made from a production standpoint. And it's easy for me to sit there and go, "Oh man, we should've shipped with this, we should've shipped with that. You know, changed the date and everything like that."
In hindsight, it would've made sense. But, as you know, hindsight's always 20/20. And if I could go back in time, I would've figured out a way to re-change the schedule and ship with more of those things and maybe not even before the crazy holiday season. But, you've gotta work with what you've got now and telegraph it to everybody. And there's a reason why we did that kinda cool little graphic that's my Twitter header profile right now that kinda just graphically lays out, boom, boom, boom, stuff is coming, those of you who have been kind enough to drop 30 bucks on this. We got your back and we're sticking with it.
Before launch, you had the big news that switching from free-to-play to a premium product and I think now, some people have been suggesting or stating online, which doesn't necessarily carry any weight, but that the game could be looking to go back to a free to play model. Is that something that's on the table or no?
"I don't want to get into Candy Crush type-tactics 'cause I just won't be able to sleep at night and I don't sleep well to begin with."
Which just boggles me, my brain because my ... I've got a decent business sense. Especially when it comes to this industry. It's gotten me fairly far. And under the assumption that games are expensive, 60 dollars is a lot of money. Even 100 dollars for all the special editions that you see coming out. And I was of the belief that $29.99, it's a little bit over ... It's pretty much an impulse buy. And did it help? Did it hurt? Should it have gone free? Maybe. Would we consider experimenting with that in the future? I wouldn't remove it from the table. But, I just ... I don't want to get down into sleazy free to play, as much as I want to keep this game afloat and with our, like I said, our fledgling community, I don't want to get into Candy Crush type-tactics 'cause I just won't be able to sleep at night and I don't sleep well to begin with.
But yeah, I wouldn't rule it out in the future, especially if we consider rolling the game out ... Well, we're considering in the future, rolling the game out in Asia. It's one of those things that you almost have to do that in Asia, so we'll be considering doing that, maybe one of those things if we do it there, would it make sense to roll it back out to the states? Possibly. But, I don't want to start doing gun rentals any time soon in game.
Another thing that's gonna keep people coming back is new roles and you've released a silhouette teaser of this new character and confirmed that, I think it's a guy. So, is there anything else you can tell us about this new hero and why people should be excited about it?
He's very good at defense, I guess that's one thing that I want to say. And it's ... He's got ... His device that's, were jokingly called a thumper, that when placed by multiple players playing as that class can essentially turn the enemy team into almost like a human pinball machine, which provides for some highly amusing moments. Oh, by the way, in hindsight, this just reminded me, I ... Having class limitations is something we also, in hindsight, would've made sense to ship with so you don't have five Wraiths stacked on one team, which just, players are merciless with each other and they ruin somebody's experience and a person's like, "Well, these guys are being dicks. I'm just not gonna play anymore," which certainly didn't help the situation.
So, in the latest patch, we limit it to two per team, which we think is fair. We don't have the ridiculously large cast that games like Overwatch has. So, limiting it to one would not have made sense. We felt like two was kind of a good compromise, which we got that feedback and that idea directly from the community. So anyway, he's an interesting character. Trying to make sure the silhouettes keep getting more and more unique as we move forward 'cause that's one thing I think we could be better about as well. Again, in hindsight.
Whenever we introduce these new classes, they're probably gonna wind up overpowered in the build, but that's an old kind of technique, taking some moments to kind of try and get people to try the new hero and then, of course, massage your back and balance it once players get a sense of it.
Is there a ceiling that you might have in mind for how many characters you might want to have in the game at the end of the day?
You know, if we can fluff up our CCU and if we can keep people engaged, I would love for it to go on as long as humanly possible. I love what we built, we have playtests and I still come out sweaty and I still thoroughly enjoy myself. And this is our baby. This is three years of blood, sweat, and tears. And the news story of the CCU is not much right now and everything, it's ... You gotta maintain a positive attitude about it. But, one thing I'm happy about is, even anecdotally from my Twitter feed, it's no longer about Gears. As much as Gears will always be a part of me, it's nice to say, "Oh, went bowling the other night," and people aren't replying and saying, "Did you chainsaw the lanes?" They're talking to me just in general about everything I post and they occasionally talk ... They're having a dialogue about the game.
Which, for me, was one of my actual goals in starting the studio and the product. I'm not going to deny my legacy of what Gears was and I'll be happy to comment and give my opinion on any future things that come out of it. But, it's nice to be known from this generation for more than one thing.
And you had kinda touched on it earlier, too, though, and I was reading in a blog post about a revamped marketing campaign. Can you talk about what that might entail and why you wanted to change things up in that regard?
Here's the thing; I really like and enjoy the characters we shipped in the game because I wanted to go in the opposite of the kind of style that's really popular right now. And is it a little bit retro? Sure, it's a little bit '90s. Maybe it's that my love of the whole '90s Spawn archetype's coming through. Who knows if that's the case? But, the thing is, is we're not gonna beat some of those other games in regards to their crazy, 400 Pixar animators creating these amazing ... The five-minute shorts that make you care about a robot and a bird, right? So, it's like the direction that I've been working with with [community manager Rojan Rivas is to] double down on the verbs you do in the game and in particular, the guns. Let's put the characters in the background, but let's really double down on the sliding, the shooting, the stabbing, the sexiness of the manufacturers of the weapons.
And remind people that what I've been saying tirelessly in interviews is we're a shooter that then, also has characters and I feel that the marketing campaign should've represented that. I also think in hindsight, leading with the [Blink 182-like logo] probably wasn't the best move to do. The example I use is going to Comic Con this year and Game of Thrones was there, of course, everywhere. But, only now, after how many seasons, they're at the point where they can just do the font with GoT? When you look at Grand Theft Auto, only when they got to GTA four or whatever, they did the Roman numerals. Only now, could Gears just pop out the crimson omen. You have to ... Eventually, if you want to get to the point where people you're Nike swoosh, that's the point. But, leading with that ... You look at that logo and actually, I like it. It's on the back of my phone.
People love the hats. People have already got some tattoos of it. But, if you're a casual person who just sees that, you know that we're a cool ... Kinda gritty, class-based shooter. You just think you're gonna have a bad time, right? So that's, the other things ... Hindsight, once again, is 20/20, which could be the damn name of this interview.
So, the concept art for the new map Valhalla looks really, really gorgeous and it's unique, as you said, and it's the first asymmetric map that you have in the game and I was also reading that it's gonna have some environmental hazards and fresh ways to mix up the game play. So, I was just wondering if you could offer an overview of Valhalla and why you think you're ... Or, why you're so excited about it?
Well, one of the trips I want to take eventually is to go to the redwood forests. And it's kinda like almost like a high tech Ewok village. It's essentially kinda the training grounds for the Valkyries. And the idea is that certain sections of it have had to be deforested because some of the trees were dying and the way that they have to do that with these large trees and they have these giant kind of wood chippers that are there. And as the battle breaks out in this location, it just so happens that you may accidentally kicked into one by an enemy and kinda go full Fargo in this game. And for me, this is ... That's one of those just things that you can do in our game that you can't see in a lot of the other kind of hero-based shooters where we could mulch people.
It's just ... We aren't gonna make it completely disgusting. When it happens, you're gonna laugh kinda like the old school Unreal Tournament. And also, just for me, this is gonna be probably one of our most vertical maps yet because the stacked layers of kinda the high tech Ewok village and since the trees are mostly vertical and for me, it's a full circle moment because that was one of the very first images that just, I had concepted all those years ago, four years ago, when I was initially kinda conceiving the game. And it's one of those things that I'm excited to break out of kinda that cycle of techy doo doo. We have a lot of really great, fun maps, but some of them are just kinda ... It's a reactor. Fuck it.
And yeah, the map looks great and it's cool, but you want to really get that sense of atmosphere and location that if the crap hasn't hit the fan or the mulcher in Valhalla, hearing some birds tweet in the background or kinda having that kind of contrast of a beautiful nature environment with the over the top verticality and violence is what Law Breaker's kinda entails and it's a good map and yean, it's fun.
All of your DLC, the maps and everything is free and this is the case for a lot of multiplayer games these days, but it definitely was not always that way. So, I'm wondering if you could talk about just why it was important to have the DLC in that way be free?
Well, first off, separating the player base, especially when you have the fledgling one that I've said multiple times of course, through the course of the interview. But also, it's just that nickel and diming that happens with players. It's like, "If I sell as a player, it's like oh hey, you're at this even, this party at a bar. But, if you want to go in the other room where your other friends are, now you have to pay an extra cover charge. Oh, then there's another one with another cover charge," and it's like, I love how I always use restaurants and bar in my analogies. But, it's just, it's kind of an old school, flawed way of thinking. And for me, I if I get these kind of cosmetic crates, which I'm rewarded and encouraged to kinda stick around and play the game?
When there's DLC, I'm just like, "Yeah, okay, you just lost me now. You're just gonna split your servers and I have to just cough up more money for a game that I felt like should have had this in the box from the get go." So I think that's why the movement's shifted that way. I think there is a lot of gamer resentment, based on the old techniques that everybody used to use, throughout the industry, which is why we're here now. It just took a while to get here.
And another big topic these days is new consoles and the power inside them. And we know LawBreakers is gonna have enhancements, or already does, for PS4 Pro and obviously, Lawbreakers is not announced for Xbox, but I wonder if you could speak more generally to what the power of new machines can do for a game, specifically like LawBreakers.
I think it always goes back to Moore's Law, where the computing power doubling, and what you saw with this generation of consoles, is very, very quickly the power kind of really kicked in, hence the need for the new Xbox and the PlayStation Pro. And in regards to considering doing an Xbox version. I'd love to, but there's still other discussions that need to be had. And I think, you look at Xbox ... from my prior work, and I think they felt miffed and kind of rejected, that we chose PlayStation, but for us it was just a matter of install based for PlayStation at the time, and then considering we'd see for Xbox down the line.
Obviously there has been solid third-party support already from companies like 2K and EA, but is Nintendo Switch something you're ever thinking about, or you have ever thought about for LawBreakers?
We would probably consider the Xbox first, and then we're very much in wait and see mode right now. It is a fine console, the Switch. I am taking my wife to Japan on a trip tomorrow, and I'm finally going to take the time to sit down and continue digging in to Zelda, because the entire concept of it is just brilliant. Nintendo just really knocked it out of the park with this one. Would definitely love to have even more games on it. But I sit back and think about what kind of experience. If we were to do the Switch, would it be like a Rocket Arena, 1v1 with nearby people or something like that? I don't know. But if we were to do it, we'd want to switch the game up in a fun and interesting way, that would make itself work with the portability aspect of the console.
Rabbids is also wonderful too, if you're looking for something to do on Switch.
Is it? You mean Minions?
Yeah, basically. Basically.
Somebody at Minions is like, "Hey, those rabbits? Let's just do that."
I think it worked out for them. I think it did. And then, I saw some of your recent tweets about the realities of living and working in San Francisco as a game developer. I know this is very different. I know that you had talked about making North Carolina a game dev hub. So I was wondering how you think things are going in that regard, and would you ever consider running for a political office, to try to push that initiative forward?
That's a lot.
Sorry about that.
So the first thing is, I've been here since 1998. I'll talk about North Carolina first. And I have a shirt that says, "I used to be a Yankee, now I'm a Southerner." And the South is a fantastic place. It's not without its faults, but I'm doing everything I can to kind of help encourage the South to kind of be this new South, that's more known. Not just known for sweet tea and BBQ, but also technology, with my small crew of 65 folks. But also, I have gotten involved with local politics. I'm on a first-name basis with the Governor, that helps kind of get him elected with all the HB2 garbage that was going on. And to kind of steer this state right back in the, what I consider the better direction.
But the thing about San Francisco is it's a fantastic city. There's a great documentary I'd recommend watching on Netflix, called San Francisco 2.0, that kind of basically outlines the thing the drew the tech companies to San Francisco in the first place, is the very thing that they're driving out with the gentrification and all of the money in tech. Yeah, San Francisco is such a great town, with such an amazing Bohemian art scene and everything, and then here come the tech bros, then the rent goes up and all the awesome artists that made San Francisco what it is and was, are driven out. I saw that image a couple years ago, it was a public bus that had gotten in an accident with a Google bus and it was like the ultimate metaphor for the contradiction that that city has.
But if you're a game developer, especially if you have a family, the main thing that they consider often is, "Okay, well if things don't work out in one studio, there are a bunch in the area that I could potentially move over, without having to uproot my family and the kids have to go to a new school." Because I don't have kids, but the one thing I've learned the last few years of moving people to the state of North Carolina, it's basically they find the proper school that they want their children in and then they put a pin there, and then they put the radius out for what house they're gonna pick. And the school is the deciding factor for that. And San Francisco's expensive. It's ridiculous over there. But also, the West Coast has a very large concentration of game development, and for me, I always talk about North Carolina. You can buy a beautiful house for a quarter million dollars out here. And help bring North Carolina forward.
It's one thing I learned from my business partner in the restaurants is, find an emerging market and ride it up. Raleigh recently is, the shared working spaces are starting to explode out here. We finally have Barcades, restaurant wise. Putting the beer garden out here when there was none. And the beer garden's doing rather well. My buddy put a meatball shop down here, 'cause he saw there's a bunch of those doing well in New York. And make Raleigh happen and watch it change. And one of my favorite things to do is, if I have to do a temperature check with employees, on a nice day go outside, just go for a walk and see, "That old storefront has cardboard on it. I wonder what's going in there. Oh, it's going to be a new coffee shop." And to see our little Southern city grow, it's very much one of my favorite hobbies to do.
That's really nice. Another question, I'm sorry, this one goes back to Gears. What's your take on Gears of War 4 and the future of the series in Microsoft's hands?
Well, I have fans tweeting me occasionally, "Come back to Gears, the screwed it up." And it's like, if you love something that much and you love your memory of it, I don't know if anything can ever compete with what your memory is of it, right? And so I played through Gears 4 in co-op with my wife. I really enjoyed it. Would there be things I would have done differently? Of course. That's because I wasn't working on it.
I'm not going to delve too deep in to what Rod's going for in the [Gears of War] mythology, but there's a lot that he layered in there, in a very, very smart, tricky way. And I remember, we were always grappling with, "So, are we going to be in a civil war at the beginning and are we just gonna have a protagonist that's just going to be killing other people? Are we going to have the Nathan Drake problem, of he's charismatic and swagger, but he just murdered 4,000 people."
That's true.
That the internet was losing their brains over. It's a video game, but why did he shoot that guy? He shot at him first, he was defending himself. He just happens to be a mass murderer. But also, what they wound up doing was going with the robot that you're fighting in the first are killing people, which is a really smart and creative solution to that.
And I guess just the last one, I know we're running out of time here, but what kind of future would you say you see for LawBreakers, potentially as an Esport? Now that the game is out there, are you looking at this as a new path maybe to grow, for the growth and visibility of the game?
I believe that I made a very fun core shooter, that is very watchable and it has a lot of, the marketing term, the buzzer beater moments. I would love for it to potentially eventually happen, we just, we need the bodies. We need to keep fluffing up the CCU and then once we get to better numbers, do the things like that phase match that's going to be happening, I think it's tomorrow. Where you get the phase players playing the game in this kind of almost eSport like setting, because there's so many times in our lab, or when we've done events with influencers, that people don't see, where the energy in the room is amazing, where people are streaming and hooting and hollering and getting sweaty. And I've seen influencers get up from their computers, literally shaking after playing it.
And that's not coming across right now. So we need to do what we can to let people know that this is a really sweaty palm type of experience, that hopefully can lend itself to ESports, but I have to keep this game alive first and foremost. I could be very cocky and very brash on social media and realizing that the fledgling player base that are very humbling for me and I'm gonna continue to iterate on this game, continue to add to it. And try to be less of a dick, honestly.
A new Hearthstone hero is joining the fray this Halloween season, and you can claim her for free starting October 17. Warlock Nemsy Necrofizzle will be available at any Fireside Gathering Tavern--even after the Hallow's End festivities come to a close.
If you're wondering where you've seen this tiny, red-headed warlock before, you wouldn't be wrong in recognizing her. Nemzy has been seen on the Bog Creeper card from the Whispers of the Old Gods expansion set.
To get your hands on this pint-sized gal, all you have to do is participate in a Fireside Brawl at any Fireside Gathering Tavern. These taverns, which are a part of the game's Halloween event, are real-life locations and events. For more details on finding one near you or hosting, head on over to the Fireside Gatherings website.
This month, the exclusive Fireside Brawl is a game of Tag Team. While you're out at one of the Taverns, you'll be paired with others around you for a 3v3 team tournament.
By Anonymous on Oct 14, 2017 07:30 pm We kick into a high octane race around a dirt track so you can take a look at the racing sim action on offer from Gran Turismo Sport before it releases.
Middle-earth: Shadow of Mordor was a marquee game for benchmarking PCs back in 2014 with its expansive environments and chaotic action sequences. The recently released sequel, Shadow of War, follows suit, and we figured this new adventure into Mordor is ripe for a quick graphics settings guide with some performance tips. It's an open-world action game, so twitch reactions and precision aiming aren't really part of the equation. It's not exactly necessary to maintain 60+ frames-per-second (FPS), but of course you want a smooth experience with as much eye candy as possible.
Shadow of War's System Requirements
The game uses Monolith's own Firebird graphics engine (formerly known as LithTech), and despite having large, detailed environments, the system requirements aren't too demanding. However, for a more optimal experience on PC, the recommended specs provide more than enough juice as you'll see in our results.
Minimum requirements:
CPU: Intel Core i5-2300 / AMD FX-4350
GPU: Nvidia GTX 660 / AMD HD 7870
Memory: 6 GB RAM
Disk Space: 70 GB
Recommended:
CPU: Intel Core i7-3770 / AMD FX-8350
GPU: Nvidia GTX 970 or 1060 / AMD RX 480 or 580
Memory: 12 GB RAM
For the purposes of our tests, we're using a mid-range system that closely represents the recommended specs for the game. Our PC includes an Intel Core i5-3570K CPU, MSI GTX 970 GPU, and 8GB of RAM.
A Look At Our Graphics Options
Let's take a quick look at our options. We're sticking with 1080p for our resolution, but there are more than enough choices here, even allowing you to try 8K (7680x4320). V-Sync helps prevent screen tearing, although we prefer to keep it off. Dynamic resolution helps maintain consistent performance by adapting resolution in real time to how demanding the game gets; you can set the floor for how low the resolution goes.
While Shadow Of War has six graphical quality presets, we're going custom here. Lighting, Shadows, Mesh qualities are all set to High. Texture quality is also set to High since Ultra is specifically for the 4K texture pack and requires a video card with at least 8GB of video memory. Tessellation adds more three-dimensional detail to surfaces based on mapping data; we kept this on for more visual flair. Depth of Field is an effect that blurs areas that aren't at the focus of the player, and you should set this to your preference.
Graphics options menu in the PC version Shadow of War
The game doesn't specify what type of ambient occlusion techniques it uses outright, but we found Medium to be a good balance between performance and visual quality with our specs. For anti-aliasing, we used TAA (temporal anti-aliasing). It's an increasingly popular technique to get rid of jaggies, since it hits a nice balance of quality and performance. You'll definitely want this on over FXAA (fast approximate anti-aliasing), which tends to look too blurry. Texture filtering should be set to Ultra; this basically means anisotropic filtering is set to 16x.
Shadow of War does a great job of showing you what's going behind these graphics settings. Not only does the game explain what each setting does, but it gives you a breakdown of how the settings affect system memory and VRAM consumption. It even provides you with a neat little benchmark tool to get specific frame-time readings and FPS results through a 60-second fly by of an in-engine sequence, which is how we tested our systems.
Running On Recommended Specs
With our modest system close to the recommended specs and aforementioned choices in graphics settings, the benchmark results showed an average of 71 FPS. It hit a minimum of 41 FPS but just for a brief moment it got as high as 96 FPS. For the most part, the live FPS readings were consistently between the mid-60s to mid-70s. This gives you a little wiggle room if you want to bump a few other options up a notch.
The benchmark tool tries to capture many of the scenarios you'd encounter in-game.
Bumping shadows up to Ultra alone brought the average down to 62 FPS, which is still an admirable result. If we max out all the quality settings (except for textures), the average went down to 51 FPS; it's still playable, but not as smooth as we'd like. Regardless, if you meet the recommended specs, you should have no issues running Shadow of War at 1080p with plenty of visual bells and whistles.
Balling Out On 4K
What if you're on a high-end system and want to do 4K? We also ran the benchmark with a few of the beefiest graphics cards: AMD's RX Vega 64, and Nvidia's GTX 1080 and GTX 1080 Ti. The system we used for this also had an Intel Core i7-6700K CPU and 16GB of RAM. Not only can we can benchmark performance at 4K (3840x2160), but we're now able to factor in that 4K HD texture pack since these high end cards have 8GB of VRAM or more.
With every graphics option set to max, the GTX 1080 produced an average of 39 FPS while the RX Vega 64 pulled ahead with an average of 44 FPS. If we turn anti-aliasing off and set shadows down to High, we got a slight FPS boost to a 43 FPS average on the GTX 1080 and a 49 FPS average on the RX Vega 64.
When we slapped in the GTX 1080 Ti and cranked every graphics setting up along with 4K, our average was 55 FPS. To get us over the coveted 60 FPS bar in the benchmark, we turned anti-aliasing off and knocked shadows down to high and got a 61 FPS average.
Verdict
There were slight hitches during normal gameplay, but they were few and far between and inconsequential to the game's action in our experience. Visually, the game looks a little flat overall, but the PC version of Middle-earth: Shadow of War runs exceptionally well, even on modest hardware. But we were also reminded that 60 FPS at 4K resolution with the highest visual quality in modern games is still tough to attain unless you're willing the shell out the big bucks for the best video card available.
If you want more coverage on this latest game in the Lord of the Rings universe, check out Justin Haywald's Middle-earth: Shadow of War review here on GameSpot. He gave the game a 7/10 and stated, "At its core, it's a fun experience with brilliant moments that provide fascinating insight into some of the untold stories of Middle-earth." For gameplay tips, check out all of our Shadow of War guides and walkthroughs.
Over the past 20 years, horror fans have seen some exceptionally wonderful horror movies. We're living in a golden era of modern horror where filmmakers don't have to rely on witty supernatural villains spouting terrible one-liners while killing off their victims one by one. Now, both indie and major studios are producing memorable films that mix horror with other genres to create something unique and wonderful, like this year's Get Out, which won big at the box office.
We're taking a look at the past two decades of horror and picking out the best movie, year by year. Some years were better than others, but all of these movies should be on your watch list, especially with Halloween right around the corner.
1997: Event Horizon
1997 was not a great year for horror movies. It was a summer filled with movies like Scream 2, I Know What You Did Last Summer, The Relic, and a slew of other very forgettable films. That year, Event Horizon was released, a sci-fi/horror hybrid about the reappearance of a ship that went into a black hole. The rescue team discovers something horrifying inside. Sure, it's not an amazing movie, but it's fun, and there are plenty of memorable moments, like when one character's eyes get sewn shut.
1998: Ringu
Ringu kicked off what eventually become America's love affair with Asian horror cinema. A reporter and her ex-husband investigate a mysterious tape that reportedly kills you seven days after you watch it. The vast majority of people are much more familiar with the 2002 American remake, which had a much bigger budget, but the original Ringu is a much better horror film with some great scares, even if a couple effects sequences are dated.
1999: The Blair Witch Project
For better or worse, depending on your outlook, The Blair Witch Project started a revolution when it came to "found footage" movies. This was a new genre for horror to jump into and part of the allure was the audience wondering if what they were watching was actually real. The Blair Witch Project follows three film students that head into the Maryland wilderness to shoot a documentary about local myth the Blair Witch. Obviously, things don't go well for them.
Runners-up:The Sixth Sense and Audition
2000: American Psycho
In 2000, the world fell in love with potential sociopath Patrick Bateman, a wealthy white-collar worker during the '80s who fantasizes about murdering everyone around him while discussing Huey Lewis and the News. American Psycho isn't just a horror film; it mixes and bends genres to tell its tale. However, the amount of blood, brutality, and violence in this film makes it feel like a precursor to the modern gore sub-genre that came a few years later. American Psycho isn't just a good horror movie, it's a great movie in general.
Runner-up:Ginger Snaps
2001: The Devil's Backbone
Spanish director Guillermo del Toro is a name you're going to see a few times on this list because he is not only a fantastic director when it comes to horror, but he puts his name behind some incredibly memorable films. In The Devil's Backbone, a young boy, who lost his father in the Spanish Civil War in 1939, is forced to live in an orphanage. He never feels quite comfortable in his new surroundings as there's a groundskeeper who doesn't want him looking in a storage locker, and the building is haunted by ghosts. This is one of del Toro's most underrated films.
Runner-up:Session 9
2002: 28 Days Later
While 1985's campy Return of the Living Dead was the first time a fast zombie appeared on screen, 28 Days Later popularized the idea of fast-moving infected/undead chasing down their prey. The diseased in 28 Days Later are not traditional zombies nor are they the living dead, but Danny Boyle's frantic and intense film was terrifying and helped usher in a resurgence in zombie films and media. In 2003, the comic series The Walking Dead started and in 2004, Zack Snyder's Dawn of the Dead remake came to theaters. Fans of the genre owe a lot to Boyle's film.
Runner-up:The Ring
2003: A Tale of Two Sisters
While South Korea's A Tale of Two Sisters may not be as well-known or regarded for ushering in Asian horror renaissance like Japan's Ringu, it's a great example of Korea's style of horror filmmaking: a genre-mixing, intense process that leaves the viewers on the edge of their seats. A teenage girl returns home from a stint in a mental hospital, and is terrorized by her cruel step-mother and ghosts within the family home. A Tale of Two Sisters balances psychological horror and a mystery exceptionally well and makes that year's biggest American horror film, Freddy vs. Jason, look like child's play.
Runner-up:2LDK
2004: Shaun of the Dead
In Shaun of the Dead, Shaun decides to try and win back his ex-girlfriend; however, the only problem is that there's a zombie apocalypse happening around them. This movie is one of the best horror/comedies of all time, thanks to the witty writing of Simon Pegg and Edgar Wright, and let's not forget how amazingly this movie is edited as well. While the focus is a bit more on Pegg's character, Shaun, and his best friend Ed, played by Nick Frost, there are a few jump scares and classic "trapped by zombies" moments that make this a legitimately great film.
Runners-up:Dawn of the Dead and Saw
2005: The Descent
If you're claustrophobic, then The Descent is a total nightmare. A group of explorers head out on an adventure to search an uncharted cave system, only to find monsters in the darkness that are hunting them all down, one by one. Aside from the scares coming from the man-eating beasts, what sets The Descent apart from other horror movies that year is the feeling of being trapped, thanks to the way it was filmed, which--believe it or not--was all in a studio outside of London, as filming in an actual cave was deemed too dangerous. The Descent is a must-watch for horror fans, and one of the better movies on this list.
2006: Pan's Labyrinth
Once again, director Guillermo del Toro makes the list. Pan's Labyrinth takes place in Spain in the mid-1940s and follows a young girl obsessed with fairy tales. One day, she finds a faun who tells her she's a princess but must complete three tasks in order to prove she's royalty. Pan's Labyrinth has a narrative setup that could easily be used for a children's film, but del Toro takes it down a dark path, setting it against a war, and creating some haunting creatures, like the one above. It's a movie that appears to be a fantasy, but upon closer inspection, is filled with unimaginable horrors.
Runner-up:The Host
2007: The Orphanage
2007 may have been one the best years for horror. It was a year that produced The Mist, 28 Weeks Later, 30 Days of Night, and 1408 to name a few, but none of those films hold a candle to The Orphanage, which was executive produced by Guillermo del Toro. In the movie, a young woman (Laura) and her husband raise their son in an old house that used to be an orphanage that Laura was raised in. Soon, her son begins talking to invisible friends and quickly disappears, so Laura enlists outside help to figure out what's going on. Obviously, the little boy in the mask is creepy, but this movie shines in its use of location, sound, and overall tone. There's a reason del Toro put his name on this movie: It's haunting.
Runners-up: Paranormal Activity and REC
2008: Let The Right One In
Sweden's romantic horror film is bizarre and haunting, and the American adaptation--Let Me In--just isn't the same. Let The Right One In follows a young bullied boy who is befriended by a strange girl, who turns out to be a vampire, of sorts. It's one of the early adopters of the the new age of horror that puts the focus on a slow-building tension that immerses the audience into the world where the real horror is rooted in realistic fears, even if said fears are coming from something supernatural. It's a film that's best enjoyed on your own, and we won't say much else about the film because there are so many twists and turns to it.
Runner-up:Quarantine
2009: Drag Me To Hell
Sam Raimi--known for the Evil Dead franchise--made a return to horror in 2009 with Drag Me To Hell. A loan officer has to evict an old woman from her home, and after doing so, finds herself cursed and on a mission to save her own soul. This movie is pure Sam Raimi, who has a knack for blurring the lines between comedy and horror at times. Are we supposed to laugh when the main character has blood/bugs/vomit/black tar dumped on her face or are we supposed to be disgusted? Sadly, Raimi doesn't direct as much anymore, but he did produce one of the best horror films in the past decade, Don't Breathe.
Runner-up:Pandorum
2010: I Saw The Devil
2010 was another great year for horror films: Tucker & Dale vs. Evil, Black Swan, Rare Exports, and The Dead were all released. However, South Korea's I Saw The Devil was easily the best horror film of the year. It brilliantly mixes the genre with a Korean favorite: the revenge film, as a serial killer murders a secret agent's fiance, and he takes vengeance into his own hands, even if it means becoming a monster himself. Where this movie truly succeeds is with the character arc of the lead, Kim Soo-hyeon, as he morphs into what he is hunting down, in a sense.
Runners-up: Let Me In and Insidious
2011: You're Next
You're Next was one of two good horror films to come out of 2011, which was a pretty bogus year. Luckily, both of those films are pretty fantastic. You're Next has a new spin on the home-invasion story. A family on an anniversary vacation find themselves being hunted down by masked killers; however, one of the hunted has a secret: they know how to fight back. This genre of horror has been overdone, but the twist gives this story some new life.
Runner-up:Grave Encounters
2012: Cabin in the Woods
Cabin in the Woods is a really weird movie, in all the right ways. It starts as a typical horror film featuring a group of attractive young adults, heading to a remote cabin, where they're hunted down by zombies. However, what sets this movie apart is the turn, which happens during the first act--and we won't spoil it in case you've never seen it. Cabin in the Woods is ingenious and actually pretty funny at times. In addition, it's the only horror movie that will have you rooting for a gross merman to kill someone.
Runners-up:Sinister and VHS
2013: The Conjuring
Ed and Lorraine Warren's alleged supernatural encounters have been made into countless movies, with the most memorable being The Amityville Horror. However, in 2013, The Conjuring came out, which recounts one of the Warren's early investigations of a Rhode Island farmhouse that is under attack by a supernatural force. It is, by far, one of the best horror films of the decade and launched a fantastic franchise as well.
Runners-up:Oculus and VHS 2
2014: The Babadook
Jennifer Kent's 2014 film, The Babadook, follows a widow trying to take care of her problematic child who thinks there is a monster in the house. The mother quickly discovers a creature called the Babadook is terrorizing the family. Much like a few other films on the list, The Babadook slowly builds tension, and while the film has a few jump scares, it doesn't rely on them to horrify the audience.
Runners-up:REC 4 and Housebound
2015: It Follows
It Follows is a great way to promote abstinence. Joking aside, the 2015 film does revolve around a curse that can only be passed on by intercourse, and that curse comes in the form of a slow-moving, supernatural being that kills you if it reaches you. The movie centers around a young woman who becomes cursed after a sexual encounter with a young man who mysteriously disappears. She and a group of friends do what they can to keep her from being reached by the creature. The story is unique and keeps the viewers on the edge of their seats for the entire film. At no point does the tension let up.
Runners-up:They Look Like People and The Visit
2016: The Witch
On this list, 2016 was the best year for horror, as you can see from the long list of runners-up below. The film that beat out everything else that year was the slow-paced movie The Witch. This movie is an extremely slow burn that follows a family in the 1600s who believe their daughter may have been influenced by witches. What makes this such a great film is the attention to detail, from the clothing to the insanely specific dialect. In addition, it has some of the best cinematography in modern horror. It is a beautiful movie with some chilling undertones.
Runners-up:Don't Breathe, Green Room, Hush, The Conjuring 2, Train to Busan, Under The Shadow, The Shallows, and The Wailing
2017: Get Out
2017 may not be over, but as of October, the best horror film of the year is Get Out. The Jordan Peele-directed film follows Chris, a young black man who is on his way to meet his white girlfriend's parents for the first time. He quickly learns that something is off about the family and everyone in the circle of friends. Get Out has such a good story that weaves mystery and thriller genres into it as the movie progresses--along with a little comedy. What makes this such a great film is that while some of the elements in the film are "out of this world," it has its rooting in reality. Not only is it a great horror film, it's one of the best films of the year.
All your fire-type cuddle dreams are about to come true. Vulpix joins Build-a-Bear's line of Pokemon plushies beside Meowth, Charmander, Pikachu, Squirtle, and Eevee.
Vulpix comes just a month after the release of Meowth's plushie. Fashioned in it's in-game likeness, this softer version Vulpix sports its six curled tails, but in a more convenient flat, fan-like form. You can check out its plush and the two outfits designed for it below.
The plush itself is $28 in stores. On online exclusive bundle includes a cape, pokeball sleeper, 6-in-1 Vulpix sound box, and a Build-a-Bear Workshop Vulpix trading card for $60. The cape and trading card are exclusive to the online bundle.
Build-A-Bear also offers bears based on characters from popular franchises such as Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles, My Little Pony, Minions, and Peanuts. You can get your hands on Vulpix online here. The website is also offering $20 for orders of two bundles or more.
By Anonymous on Oct 14, 2017 09:30 am We use the recommended specs to see how Shadow of War runs on PC and give some tips to improve performance and get an FPS boost. We also throw high-end video cards at the game in 4K.
By Anonymous on Oct 14, 2017 08:30 am The final trailer for Stranger Things Season 2 gave us a peek at new characters and the new monster. For Friday the 13th, Ryan breaks down the 13 best moments from the new trailer!
By Anonymous on Oct 14, 2017 08:00 am Here's the full virtual reality demo for Blade Runner 2049: Memory Lab. Captured on the Oculus Rift, this free demo releases on October 19th.
By Anonymous on Oct 14, 2017 07:30 am Mr. Robot is finally back! What is going on with Angela, and can Elliot really stop stage 2? Greg breaks down season 3, episode 1 - "_power-saver-mode.h"
GameSpot and CNET have teamed up to give you a chance to win an SNES Classic Editionfor free! Two (2) winners will be chosen after the competition ends on Sunday, October 15th at 11:59PM PT. Entry is open to legal residents of the United States, Puerto Rico and Canada; void where prohibited.
To enter: Please read the rules carefully, fill out the form below, and remember to share the unique link you will get at the end of your registration. You can get up to 10 extra entries to increase your chances of winning.
Don't forget to check out our review to learn all about the SNES, and good luck!
The Evil Within 2 is out now, and it's a solid improvement on its predecessor. Aside from getting to play through a story that centers around returning protagonist Sebastian Castellanos attempting to save his daughter, players can also come across a variety of Easter eggs. [Potential spoilers ahead.]
We've already called attention to one particular mode that unlocks after finishing The Evil Within 2. A "more cinematic game experience" awaits those who make their way through the campaign, giving players the option to toggle on a letterbox mode. This was a contentious aspect of the first game, which made the unusual choice of forcing a 2.35:1 aspect ratio on players, though this was ultimately made optional. Given the unlock screen in Evil Within 2, this seems to be a tongue-in-cheek callback to the first game.
But that's not the only secret waiting to be uncovered. You unlock a number of bonuses for completing the game, but other Easter eggs require you to actively explore and uncover things for yourself. As you'll see in the video above, there are collectibles scattered throughout the game that reference other games published by Bethesda. These include Doom, Wolfenstein, and The Elder Scrolls Online.
We kick into a high octane race around a dirt track so you can take a look at the racing sim action on offer from Gran Turismo Sport before it releases.
The gorgeous action game hasn't been available for long, and it's already reached a big sales milestone.
We use the recommended specs to see how Shadow of War runs on PC and give some tips to improve performance and get an FPS boost. We also throw high-end video cards at the game in 4K.
The final trailer for Stranger Things Season 2 gave us a peek at new characters and the new monster. For Friday the 13th, Ryan breaks down the 13 best moments from the new trailer!
Here's the full virtual reality demo for Blade Runner 2049: Memory Lab. Captured on the Oculus Rift, this free demo releases on October 19th.
Mr. Robot is finally back! What is going on with Angela, and can Elliot really stop stage 2? Greg breaks down season 3, episode 1 - "_power-saver-mode.h"
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