While for the most part, Marvel Studios has been the undisputed leader of the comic book movie phenomenon, there is one piece of the puzzle where the MCU is lagging behind the DC universe: female representation. While Patty Jenkins is hard at work directing the second Wonder Woman movie, Marvel has yet to debut its first standalone movie about a female hero or feature a female director behind the camera.
That will change with Captain Marvel's release in 2019. Starring Brie Larson, the upcoming MCU entry will be co-directed by Anna Boden--she's co-directing with longtime collaborator Ryan Fleck--marking the first time a woman has been even partially at the helm in the MCU. According to Marvel Studios President Kevin Feige, though, this is just the beginning. GameSpot sat down with the MCU boss to find out when to expect news of more women directors being hired for upcoming films.
"We've got announcements that we'll be making at some point revealing that," Feige tells GameSpot while promoting Ant-Man and the Wasp. That particular film is already a step forward for Marvel, as it's the first time a female hero has been included in the title of an MCU movie--and GameSpot's Ant-Man and the Wasp review makes it clear that she's the true star of the film.
While Feige doesn't say when the announcements about having more women behind-the-camera will come, chances are those developments will play a big role in the MCU after Avengers 4. Following that film, all that's been announced are sequels to Spider-Man: Homecoming and Guardians of the Galaxy Vol. 2.
After those, though, Feige previously spoke to GameSpot about the importance of evolving its movies and characters to keep them fresh. Just as important to him, though, is the evolution of those making the movies.
"To me, it's always actions are much more important than words, and showcasing the types of movies we're making and the types of people making those movies," he says. "And I think we've learned beyond a doubt that when you surround yourselves with different types of people, and people who don't look like you, and people who haven't had the exact same experiences than you, creatively things start to get very interesting, and very new and unique."
In the meantime, if unique is what you're looking for, Ant-Man and the Wasp is about as far a departure from Avengers: Infinity War as you can get. The latest MCU adventure hits theaters on July 6.
After the amazing gaming year that was 2017, many wondered how well 2018 would turn out. Fortunately for everyone, it has been great. The first half of the year has yielded a wealth of fantastic games, and there's more on the horizon. Upcoming games for the rest of this 2018 include slew of hotly anticipated new games, like Super Smash Bros. Ultimate, Red Dead Redemption 2, Spider-Man, and a whole lot more. To help you keep track of all the games coming out and what has already released, we've compiled a list of all the noteworthy release dates for the biggest ones confirmed to come out in 2018 so far.
Game release dates change all the time and new ones arrive every month. Be sure to bookmark this page, as we'll be updating this article with more release dates or any potential changes to any of the dates below. And if you're eager to figure out the release dates from games next year, you can also reference our feature on the game release dates of 2019.
Below you can find a list of the biggest games that don't have explicit release dates but are confirmed to release sometime this year. There are also games listed that we expect to launch in 2018. We'll be moving each of these games into the release date sections above as soon as official dates are announced.
GTA V wants you to blow things up in GTA Online this Independence Day; it's offering tons of deals on themed items, along with businesses you can buy. This is also the week when anyone who signed up for Rockstar's Guest List last week will get to reap the rewards, meaning you'll get an extra GTA$300K just for logging in.
From now until July 9, you'll be able to get 40% off the "Independence Day-themed" content below. As always, the items come with a healthy dose of tongue-in-cheek humor.
Vapid Liberator--40% off
Western Motorcycle Company Sovereign--40% off
Musket--40% off
Firework Launcher and Fireworks--40% off
Star Spangled Banner Horns--40% off
Patriot Tire and Patriot Smoke--40% off
Stars n Stripes Facepaint--40% off
Independence Day Clothing, Haircuts, Masks, and Outfits--40% off
MOC Liveries--40% off
Independence Day Mk II Weapon Liveries--40% off
If you signed up for the GTA Online Guest List last week, you'll also be able to get your first round of exclusive rewards. The first rewards are the Orange Wireframe Bodysuit and GTA$300,000. There will be more rewards in a week's time; from July 10-16 you'll be able to get a Pink Wireframe Bodysuit and an additional GTA$100,000. If you're looking to get a little more cash, Rockstar has extended Double GTA$ payouts on all Smuggler's Run, Special Cargo, and Bikers Sell Missions.
Rockstar is also offering tons of deals on businesses, ahead of its upcoming Nightlife DLC, which will allow you to design, staff, and run nightclubs in the game. For the time being, you'll be able to get 50% off the following:
Hangers--50% off
Executive Offices--50% off
Special Cargo Warehouses--50% off
Biker Clubhouses and Businesses--50% off
You'll also be able to get 40% off all facilities, as well as 30% off the Mammoth Avenger and renovations, Mobile Operations Center and renovations, Vapid GB200, Grotti X80 Proto, and the Imponte Ruiner 2000 (both Buy It Now and Trade prices). GTA V's Nightlife Update is due to release some time this month.
The Xbox One's backwards compatibility feature, introduced in November 2015, lets you play original Xbox and Xbox 360 games on the current-gen console. But what games are available? We've rounded them all up--and we'll continue to update this post as new games are made available to the extensive list. More are added regularly, although new original Xbox games will be less common. [Updated July 3 with two more games.]
Xbox One Backwards Compatibility Lineup:
Xbox
New titles are bolded
Black
Blinx: The Time Sweeper
BloodRayne 2
Breakdown
Conker: Live & Reloaded
Crimson Skies: High Road to Revenge
Dead to Rights
Destroy All Humans
The Elder Scrolls III: Morrowind
Full Spectrum Warrior
Fuzion Frenzy
Grabbed by the Ghoulies
Hunter: The Reckoning
Jade Empire
The King of Fighters Neowave
Mercenaries: Playground of Destruction
MX Unleashed
Ninja Gaiden Black
Panzer Dragoon Orta
Panzer Elite Action: Fields of Glory (Europe only)
Prince of Persia: The Sands of Time
Psychonauts
Red Faction II
Sid Meier's Pirates
SSX 3
Star Wars Battlefront
Star Wars Battlefront II
Star Wars Jedi Knight: Jedi Academy
Star Wars: Jedi Starfighter
Star Wars: Knights of the Old Republic
Star Wars Knights of the Old Republic II: The Sith Lords
Star Wars: Republic Commando
Xbox 360
New titles are bolded
0 Day Attack on Earth
3D Ultra Minigolf Adventures
A Kingdom for Keflings
A World of Keflings
Aegis Wing
Age of Booty
Alan Wake
Alan Wake's American Nightmare
Alice: Madness Returns
Alien Hominid HD
Altered Beast
Anomaly Warzone Earth
Arkanoid Live
Army of Two
Assassin's Creed
Assassin's Creed II
Assassin's Creed: Brotherhood
Assassin's Creed III
Assassin's Creed III: Liberation HD -- added July 3
Assassin's Creed IV: Black Flag
Assassin's Creed Revelations
Assassin's Creed Rogue
Assault Heroes 2
Asteroids & Deluxe
AstroPop
Aqua
Axel & Pixel (not available for purchase)
Babel Rising
Band of Bugs
Banjo Kazooie: Nuts n Bolts
Banjo Tooie
Banjo Kazooie
Batman: Arkham Origins
Battlefield: Bad Company
Battlefield: Bad Company 2
Battlefield 3
Battlefield 1943 -- added May 24
BattleBlock Theater
Battlestations: Midway
Bayonetta
Beat'n Groovy
Bejeweled 2
Bejeweled 3
Bellator: MMA Onslaught
Beyond Good & Evil HD
Bionic Commando Rearmed 2
BioShock
BioShock 2
BioShock Infinite
Bloodforge
Blood Knights
Blood of the Werewolf
BloodRayne: Betrayal
Blue Dragon
Bomberman Live: Battlefest
Boom Boom Rocket
Borderlands
Borderlands 2
Bound by Flame
Braid
Brain Challenge
Bullet Soul
Bullet Soul: Infinite Burst
Bully: Scholarship Edition
Burnout Paradise
Burnout Revenge -- added May 8
Cabela's Alaskan Adventures
Cabela's Dangerous Hunts 2013
Cabela's Hunting Expeditions
Cabela's Survival: Shadows of Katmai
Call of Duty 2
Call of Duty 3
Call of Duty 4: Modern Warfare
Call of Duty: Advanced Warfare
Call of Duty: Black Ops
Call of Duty: Black Ops II
Call of Duty: Ghosts
Call of Duty: Modern Warfare 3 -- added June 19
Call of Duty: World at War
Call of Juarez Gunslinger
Capcom Arcade Cabinet
Carcassonne
Cars: Mater-National Championship
Cars 2
Castle Crashers
Castlestorm
Castlevania: Symphony of the Night
Catherine
The Cave
Centipede & Millipede
Child of Light
Civilization: Revolution
Clannad
Commanders: Attack of the Genos
Comic Jumper
Comix Zone
Condemned
Contra
Counter-Strike: Global Offensive
Crackdown
Crazy Taxi
Crystal Quest
Crystal Defenders
Cyber Troopers Virtual On: Oratorio Tangram
The Darkness II
Dark Souls
Dark Void
Darksiders
Darksiders II
Daytona USA
de Blob 2
Dead Rising 2: Case West
Dead Rising 2: Case Zero
Dead Space
Dead Space 2
Dead Space 3
Dead Space Ignition
Deadfall Adventures
Deadliest Warrior: Legends
Deadliest Warrior: The Game
Deadly Premonition
Deathspank: Thongs of Virtue
Defense Grid
Deus Ex: Human Revolution
Deus Ex: Human Revolution Director's Cut
Dig Dug
Dirt 3
Dirt Showdown
Discs of Tron
Disney Bolt
Disney Castle of Illusion Starring Mickey Mouse
Disney Epic Mickey 2: The Power of Two
Divinity II
Domino Master
Doom
Doom II
Doom 3: BFG Edition
Doritos Crash Course
Double Dragon: Neon
Dragon Age: Origins
Dragon Age II -- added May 3
Dragon's Lair
Driver: San Franciso
DuckTales Remastered
Duke Nukem: Manhattan Project
Dungeons & Dragons: Chronicles of Mystara
Dungeon Siege III
E4: Every Extend Extra Extreme
Earthworm Jim HD
Earth Defense Force 2017
Earth Defense Force: Insect Armageddon
Eat Lead: The Return of Matt Hazard
The Elder Scrolls IV: Oblivion
Encleverment Experiment
Escape Dead Island
F1 2014
Fable Anniversary
Fable Heroes -- added June 26
Fable II
Fable II Pub Games
Fable III
Faery: Legends of Avalon
Fallout 3
Fallout: New Vegas
Far Cry 2
Far Cry 3
Far Cry 3 Blood Dragon
Feeding Frenzy
Feeding Frenzy 2
Fight Night Champion -- added May 15
Fighting Vipers
Final Fight: Double Impact
Flashback
Flock
Forza Horizon
Fret Nice
Frogger
Frogger 2
FunTown Mahjong
Galaga
Galaga Legions
Galaga Legions DX
Garou: Mark of the Wolves
Gatling Gears
Gears of War
Gears of War 2
Gears of War 3
Gears of War: Judgment
Geometry Wars: Retro Evolved
Geometry Wars: Retro Evolved 2
Geometry Wars 3: Dimensions
Ghostbusters
Ghostbusters: Sanctum of Slime
Gin Rummy
Girl Fight
Goat Simulator
Golden Axe
Go! Go! Break Steady
Golf: Tee It Up
Grand Theft Auto: San Andreas -- added June 7
Grand Theft Auto IV
Grid 2
Grid Autosport -- added June 26
Gripshift
Guardian Heroes
Gunstar Heroes
Guwange
Gyromancer
Gyruss
Half-Minute Hero: Super Mega Neo Climax
Halo: Combat Evolved
Halo 3
Halo 3: ODST Campaign Edition
Halo 4
Halo: Reach
Halo: Spartan Assault
Halo Wars
Hard Corps: Uprising
Hardwood Backgammon
Hardwood Hearts
Hardwood Spades
Harms Way
Haunted House
Heavy Weapon
Hexic 2
Hexic HD
Hitman: Absolution
Hitman: Blood Money
Hydro Thunder
I Am Alive
Ikaruga
Ilomilo
Injustice: Gods Among Us + disc-only Ultimate Edition
Insanely Twisted Shadow Planet
Interpol: The Trail of Dr. Chaos
Iron Brigade
Jeremy McGrath's Offroad
Jet Set Radio
Jetpac Refuelled
Jewel Quest
Joe Danger Special Edition
Joe Danger 2: The Movie
Joust
Joy Ride Turbo
Juju
Jurassic Park: The Game
Just Cause 2
Kameo
Kane & Lynch 2
Killer Is Dead
The King of Fighters '98
The King of Fighters 2002
KOF Sky Stage
Lazy Raiders
Left 4 Dead
Left 4 Dead 2
Lego Batman
Lego Indiana Jones
Lego Indiana Jones 2: The Adventure Continues
Lego Pirates of the Caribbean: The Video Game
Lego Star Wars: The Complete Saga
Lego Star Wars III: The Clone Wars
Limbo
Lode Runner
Lost Odyssey
Lumines Live!
Luxor 2
Mad Tracks
Mafia II
Magic: The Gathering 2012
Marlow Briggs and the Mask of Death
Mars: War Logs
Mass Effect
Mass Effect 2
Mass Effect 3
Matt Hazard: Blood, Bath, and Beyond
The Maw
Medal of Honor: Airborne
Meet the Robinsons
Mega Man 9
Mega Man 10
Metal Gear Rising: Revengeance
Metal Gear Solid: Peace Walker HD Edition
Metal Slug 3
Metal Slug XX
Midnight Club: Los Angeles -- added June 7
Midway Arcade Origins
Might & Magic Clash of Heroes
Military Madness
Mirror's Edge
The Misadventures of P.B. Winterbottom
Missile Command
Monaco: What's Yours Is Mine
Monday Night Combat
Monkey Island: SE
Monkey Island 2: SE
Monopoly Deal
Moon Diver
Motocross Madness
Ms. Splosion Man
Ms Pac-Man
Mutant Blobs Attack
Mutant Storm Empire
Mutant Storm Reloaded
MX vs. ATV Reflex
N+
NBA Jam: On Fire Edition
Neogeo Battle Coliseum
Nights Into Dreams
Of Orcs and Men
Omega Five
Operation Flashpoint: Dragon Rising
Operation Flashpoint: Red River
The Orange Box
Outland
Pac-Man
Pac-Man C.E
Pac-Man CE DX+
Pac-Man Museum
Peggle
Peggle 2
Perfect Dark
Perfect Dark Zero
Persona 4 Arena
Phantasy Star II
Phantom Breaker: Battle Grounds
Pinball FX
Planets Under Attack
Plants vs. Zombies
Poker Smash
Portal: Still Alive
Portal 2
Prince of Persia
Prey
Pure
Putty Squad
Puzzle Quest
Puzzle Quest 2
Puzzle Quest: Galactrix
QIX++ Puzzlegeddon
Rage
Raiden IV
Raskulls
Rayman 3 HD
Rayman Legends
Rayman Origins
Red Dead Redemption
Red Faction: Armageddon
Red Faction: Battlegrounds
RoboBlitz
Rocket Knight
Rockstar's Table Tennis -- added June 7
R-Type Dimensions
Runner 2
Sacred 3
Sacred Citadel
Saints Row -- added May 29
Saints Row 2 -- added May 1
Saints Row: The Third
Saints Row IV
Saints Row: Gat Out of Hell -- added May 29
Sam & Max: Beyond Time & Space
Sam & Max Save the World
Samurai Shodown II
Scarygirl
Scrap Metal
ScreamRide
Sega Vintage Collection: Alex Kidd & Co.
Sega Vintage Collection: Monster World
Sega Vintage Collection: Streets of Rage
Sega Vintage Collection: ToeJam & Earl
Sensible World of Soccer -- added June 26
Shadow Assault/Tenchu
Shadow Complex
Shadowrun
Shadows of the Damned
Shank 2
Shinobi
Shred Nebula
Shotest Shogi
Silent Hill: Downpour
Skate 3
Skullgirls
Skydive
Slender: The Arrival
Small Arms
Sniper Elite V2
Soltrio Solitaire
Sonic & All-Stars Racing Transformed
Sonic & Knuckles
Sonic Adventure
Sonic Adventure 2
Sonic CD
Sonic The Fighters
Sonic Generations
Sonic The Hedgehog
Sonic The Hedgehog 2
Sonic The Hedgehog 3
Sonic The Hedgehog 4: Episode 1
Sonic The Hedgehog 4: Episode II
Soulcalibur
Soulcalibur II
South Park: The Stick of Truth
Space Ark
Space Giraffe
Space Invaders Infinity Gene
Spec Ops: The Line
Spelunky
The Splatters
Splinter Cell: Conviction
Split/Second
Splosion Man
SSX
Stacking
Star Wars: The Force Unleashed
Star Wars: The Force Unleashed II
Steins; Gate 比翼恋理のだーりん (Japan only)
Steins; Gate (オリジナル版) (Japan only)
Steins; Gate 線形拘束のフェノグラム (Japan-only, requires game disc)
Strania
Street Fighter IV
Stuntman: Ignition
Super Contra
Super Meat Boy
Super Street Fighter IV Arcade Edition
Supreme Commander 2
Syberia
Tecmo Bowl Throwback
Tekken 6
Tekken Tag Tournament 2
Texas Hold 'Em
Ticket to Ride
TimeShift
Tom Clancy's Ghost Recon Advanced Warfighter -- added July 3
Tom Clancy's Ghost Recon: Future Soldier
Tom Clancy's Rainbow Six Vegas
Tom Clancy's Rainbow Six Vegas 2
Tomb Raider: Underworld
Torchlight
Tour de France 2009
Tour de France 2011
Toy Soldiers
Toy Soldiers Cold War
Toy Story 3
Toybox Turbos -- added May 29
Tower Bloxx Deluxe
Trials HD
Trine 2
Tron: Evolution
Ugly Americans: Apocalypsegeddon
Unbound Saga
Undertow
Vanquish
Virtua Fighter 5 Final Showdown
Viva Piñata
Viva Piñata: Trouble in Paradise
The Walking Dead: A Telltale Games Series
The Walking Dead: Season 2 - A Telltale Games Series
The Walking Dead: Michonne - A Telltale Miniseries
The Purge movies have always been about the 1% versus the 99, the privileged against the underprivileged--the rich trying to exterminate the poor by pitting them against one another while sitting safe in fortified ivory towers. In the previous three movies, that theme served as the core, beneath a veneer of fantastically stylized violence, with gangs of roving murderers draping their cars with Christmas lights and donning exaggerated masks over preppy school uniforms. In The First Purge, that thin surface of fantasy is gone, leaving only a crude, gratuitous, vaguely exploitative movie about the government openly and mercilessly exterminating poor people.
Like The Purge: Anarchy, the second in the series, The First Purge wants to suggest that, with scattered exceptions, normal people aren't inherently violent enough to Purge. They need a push, and that shove comes from the New Founding Fathers of America, the government that, in this movie, just recently emerged as the third option in America's two party system and seized power from Republicans and Democrats alike. The First Purge explains how the NFFA was able to pull it off: Much like the politicians in power today, they exploited people's fear. The movie spends an opening montage citing a grab bag of real world social unrest, from the Black Lives Matter movement to a housing crisis worse than 2008's.
Now, it's time for an "experiment" that Marisa Tomei's Dr. Updale, a scientist working with the NFFA, promises will give the American people the outlet they need for all their hate, anger, and aggression. There's an unintentionally silly scene late in the movie when Updale, seeing the actual results of her "experiment," utters dramatically, "What have I done?" It's unclear what results she was expecting from this whole thing.
The movie centers on a handful of characters on New York's Staten Island, the isolated site of this first, experimental Purge. (Through their public representative Arlo Sabian (Patch Darragh), the government issues some hazy explanation about the island's demographics being representative of the country as a whole, but behind closed doors the NFFA readily admit they just want to kill poor people.)
Dmitri (Y'lan Noel) is a drug kingpin who wants to keep his neighborhood safe while protecting his product and his business. Nya (Lex Scott Davis) is his ex-girlfriend, a conscientious protestor who opposes the experiment. Her little brother, Isaiah (Joivan Wade), was supposed to get off the island, but secretly stayed behind to get revenge on Skeletor (Rotimi Paul), a violent drug addict who attacked and humiliated him. These characters and those surrounding them--every single person the movie follows during the experiment--are non-white, while almost everyone actually causing violence during the Purge is white.
Early on, there are isolated scenes of NFFA officials interviewing Staten Islanders about their pent up rage, then offering them monetary compensation for remaining on the island and actively participating. The government implants them with tracking devices and issues them high tech contact lenses that will record the night's events so the results can be broadcast to the world. Glowing red, green, or blue in the darkness, these contacts are one of the movie's only creative aesthetic liberties, although they often verge on looking silly.
But when the would-be Purgers throw block parties instead of tearing one another apart, the NFFA sends in militaristic bands of mercenaries dressed in the regalia of the KKK, white supremacist biker gangs, and masked, Nazi-like soldiers. At times, The First Purge is hard to watch, and not in the fun way that horror movies are supposed to make you hide behind splayed fingers. Whatever thin veil of subtlety this series ever possessed is gone from this movie, murdered by flocks of heavily armed drones the New Founding Fathers of America sent to make sure the citizens of Staten Island "participated" in the experiment.
The First Purge doesn't hesitate to mirror real world events, and never to its benefit. At one point, off screen (thankfully), a group of white mercenaries disguised as a biker gang guns down dozens of black, hispanic, and Asian people huddling for safety in a church--something that more or less happened in real life just three years ago. Later, white soldiers rampage through a towering housing project, systematically, inhumanly slaughtering the hundreds of non-white people inside, room by room and floor by floor. There were points in The First Purge I could have been watching last year's Detroit, a movie about the real life terror inflicted on black people by white cops during Detroit's 1967 12th Street Riot. That's not imagery you want to evoke lightly, yet The First Purge uses it readily, in between scenes of cackling homeless ladies setting traps in alleyways and Dmitri's gang members eagerly arming themselves to the teeth.
When Nya gets her foot caught in a trap and attackers burst from a grate nearby, hands scrabble furiously at her crotch. Running away, she yells behind her, "P***y grabbing motherf***er!" Somehow, despite being completely out of character, that line is predictable, too. It's the exact kind of low-hanging fruit this movie hungrily plucks, scene after scene.
There's nothing fun or thrilling about watching white people dressed up as real world hate groups efficiently murdering innocent victims. The Purge series' veneer of fantasy is gone. It's too on the nose, and it knows it. That The First Purge is a prequel means the people we see suffering in it are doomed to at least another 25 years of annual violence and oppression, a fact you'll be acutely aware of as the dawn breaks on the first experiment, the few survivors limp down the street, and the tastelessly summoned Kendrick Lamar song "Alright" ("Alls my life I had to fight…") thumps into life over your theater's speakers.
2016's The Purge: Election Year ended on a hopeful note. That movie tried to mirror the real world too, but the real life politics it mimicked turned out much differently than the film's. In 2018, we could have used a movie where, for once, the good guys won. The fact that series creator James DeMonaco, who's written all four entries and directed the three before this, chose to give us a prequel instead is empirical evidence that he may be out of good ideas.
Star Wars Battlefront 2 is getting several updates this year. EA unveiled a roadmap that details when players can start seeing content drops. The first update is free and out now. It launches a new Hero Starfighter mode and patches Hero gameplay, map layouts, and a few other quality-of-life improvements.
Hero Starfighters is a new multiplayer mode that pits two teams of four against one another. Every player spawns as one of the Hero ships for their side. When a player is killed, they can no longer pilot a Hero ship and have to spawn as a standard fighter, interceptor, or bomber. Standard ships have unlimited lives. Teams win the round when all opposing Hero ships are destroyed and the game goes to whichever team wins three out of five rounds. This new mode will also offer a swifter way for players to level up any of their Hero ships.
The rest of the Hero Starfighter update addresses content that's played on the ground. Hero characters that use a lightsaber can now turn their weapon on and off at the press of a button, and blocking blaster bolts with a lightsaber will now consume stamina. Ewok Hunt is back with a few tweaks to gameplay. Jetpack Cargo is now available on the Great Temple Yavin 4 map. Extraction is once again available as an Operation, but only for the month of July.
Almost every existing hero, hero ship, game mode, and map is getting an update. The full patch notes can be viewed on the Star Wars Battlefront II forum, but here's a list of the more notable updates:
Sullustan appearance has been added to the Resistance and Rebel version of the Assault class
Players can swap their appearances pre-round
Daily quest system now gives three quests per day instead of one, and the daily quests reward per quest has been reduced from 1000 to 500
On Strike, Objective Delivery Zones are now visually represented in the world
On Hero Showdown, there are new HUD elements that show the health of team members
Star Wars Battlefront 2 is available on Xbox One, PS4, and PC.
Assassin's Creed Liberation HD is a home console port of the formerly Vita-exclusive title. A spin-off of Assassin's Creed III, Liberation is set in Louisiana and casts players in the role of Aveline de Grandpre, the series' first female protagonist. The HD version boasts upgraded visuals and audio, but it otherwise features the same content as the Vita release. You can read more about it in GameSpot's Assassin's Creed Liberation HD review.
Ghost Recon Advanced Warfighter, meanwhile, is one of Xbox 360's earliest shooters, first launching for the console in 2006. It received widespread acclaim on its release, earning a 9.2/10 in GameSpot's Advanced Warfighter review for its tactical gameplay and (at the time) stunning visuals. "Even those who don't necessarily like shooters may want to at least try the game out, as GRAW represents the best of what a tactical shooter can offer and can serve as a useful graphical benchmark to judge other games on the console by," we wrote.
If you still own a physical copy of Ghost Recon Advanced Warfighter, you can pop its disc into your Xbox One and begin playing. Likewise, if you already own a digital copy of Liberation HD or GRAW, you'll find it waiting automatically in the Ready to Download section of Xbox One's My Games and Apps area. You can also buy either of the new BC games digitally from the Microsoft Store.
Xbox One's BC library has grown steadily ever since Microsoft first introduced the feature back in 2015. It now features more than 400 Xbox 360 titles and more than 30 original Xbox games. You can see everything that's available in our full list of backwards compatibility games, and for recommendations on what to play, check out our gallery of the best Xbox One backwards compatible games.
A new sale on Xbox One and Xbox 360 games is live on the Microsoft Store. You can find the full details here, but we've sorted through the offers and selected the highlights below. Note that some of the deals require you to have an Xbox Live Gold subscription, while others are available to everyone. The sale ends July 9, so don't wait too long to purchase any games that catch your eye.
For starters, there's a big sale on Mega Man games. With the 11th core installment in this long-running franchise coming out later this year, now's a good time to catch up on the these older Blue Bomber games. Mega Man Legacy Collection, which contains the first six games in the series, is on sale for $6. Mega Man Legacy Collection 2 completes the main series, with installments 7-10.
The throwback 3D platformer Yooka-Laylee is on sale for $13 this week. Song of the Deep is Insomniac's take on the Metroidvania genre, and it's on sale for just $4. If you want to know what happens when you combine Metroidvania level design with pinball, you can scoop up Yoku's Island Express for $15.
Sports fans who can peel themselves away from the World Cup long enough to play a game can pick up FIFA 18 for $20. Or, if you'd prefer a vehicular take on soccer, you can grab Rocket League for $10 (it's also free to play this weekend on Xbox One and Steam).
We have more highlights from this week's Xbox One and Xbox 360 sale below. Now get out there and save some money.
Bandai Namco released a new story trailer for the company's upcoming action-RPG Code Vein. The trailer focuses on Mia Karnstein, one of the Revenants who can accompany the player throughout the game as a "buddy." These Revenants, vampiric humans who gain power in exchange for lost memories and a lust for blood, have their own quest lines and stories. Moments in Code Vein's story can change depending on which Revenant the player chooses to travel with and help.
As the player journeys through Vein, which has collapsed beneath the Thorns of Judgment and been overrun with The Lost, they'll begin to discover how the world fell into such a sorry state. Vein is a dark world that will challenge player's skills, much like Dark Souls, which is also published by Bandai Namco.
Code Vein's new trailer primarily catches us up to speed on who Mia Karnstein is. Her motive for fighting is to protect her younger brother Nicolas, who appears to suffer the same affliction as the other Revenants. In the trailer, we also get to see Mia fight with her rifle and bayonet against The Lost, as well as her long metal stinger that's unique to her character.
Though it hasn't been confirmed if The Lost, former humans who lost their humanity, are simply Revenants who have given up too many memories, such an explanation might explain why Mia is traveling through Vein. Perhaps she is seeking a cure for her younger brother before he becomes like the monsters she's forced to kill.
Code Vein is scheduled to release on September 27 in Japan and worldwide on September 28. The game is launching on Xbox One, PS4, and PC.
Talking to Chris Zimmerman, Sucker Punch co-founder and programmer on Ghost of Tsushima, it's clear his latest game is a dream project that's given purpose to his innate passion for Japanese history. The upcoming PS4 game is based on an actual 13th-century Mongol invasion that serves as catalyst for the fictional hero's transformation from quintessential samurai to scrappy shadow warrior.
According to Zimmerman, Sucker Punch has gone to considerable lengths to study the island of Tsushima and understand its past, and he believes eagle-eyed historians will appreciate the numerous authentic touches throughout--details so subtle as to be lost on the average player, but details deemed important nonetheless.
As jazzed as Zimmerman is about these efforts, he's also confident that it's worth taking creative liberties to make Ghost of Tsushima as relatable as possible. Thanks to comics, games, and movies, people have an idea of what samurai are supposed to look like, and this is what Sucker Punch is aiming for. Think the characters we've seen thus far are wearing authentic 13th century samurai armor? Not so, according to Zimmerman.
In the excerpt from our E3 2018 interview below, Zimmerman further explores the reasoning behind the team's selective commitment to fact, and identifies some aspects of the game that have been moulded to fit mainstream expectations of samurai.
GameSpot: What's the balance of historical accuracy in Ghost of Tsushima?
Zimmerman: The way I think about it is: we're going to deviate from historical truth, we just want to do it intentionally. A lot of the support we get from our friends from Sony in Japan, and our Japanese friends in Sony US, and all the cultural consultants we've assembled to help us do this stuff, is to make sure we don't deviate accidentally. There are things we are going to do that are different and we want to choose those wisely.
There are places where we're really pretty true, right? Like if we're putting birds in the game, they're Japanese birds. Brad Meyer, our sound lead, took a trip to Japan to capture the actual sounds of things in nature… It's an awesome game to work on because it lets us do this cool stuff. So, stuff like that is going to be perfect, like the statues that you see in the temple, in the demo, those are actual 13th-century statues.
And then there are things where, well, there's some stuff where the consultants help us not make mistakes. If anyone asked that question, I probably gave the example of us rewriting that scene, with Jin and Masako, when they meet. Originally we wrote it as, "Hello, Jin." Ryuhei, our producer, said, "Yeah, Japanese people don't say that. She would just say, 'Jin.'" Little stuff like that, just to make sure that if you're a Japanese speaker or if you're Japanese, you don't snag on stuff.
In terms of how they fought, what they wore, it doesn't match your expectations. So we're not sticking exactly to the historical truth of Kamakura-era samurai. It's gonna be a little different.
I asked him another one today, I was like "Ryuhei, in the English version the horse is named Nobu--a Japanese name--[so]why is it that when we did it in Japanese they changed the name?" He said, "Oh, we didn't change the name, you just don't give horses names in Japan; that's an American thing." So when he calls the horse, [Jin] says, "Hey, over here," and the horse comes. He doesn't give him a name.
Things like that are going to fly over most players, and that's okay. Knowing that we're trying to get that stuff right, and knowing there are people that notice and appreciate that the Kanji are actual 13th century Kanji, that actually is why we're doing it. I think people not necessarily seeing those details or realizing the lengths we've gone to to make sure it's true at where we want it to be true, they still benefit because it just adds a level of coherence to the whole thing, that it's not made up.
The challenge for us, making a game, in an original story but taking place in a real historical time, is making sure we're telling a story that people can relate to, you know, that they can empathize with. So when we are deviating from this historical truth, we are doing it to stop you from snagging on stuff.
If you have an idea about what samurai look like or how they act or how they think we're going to give that to you. Most people's idea is really based on an idea of samurai which is really more of a 16th-, 17th-, 18th-century idea of samurai; 13th century, historically, is pretty different. In terms of how they fought, what they wore, it doesn't match your expectations. So we're not sticking exactly to the historical truth of Kamakura-era samurai. It's gonna be a little different. The armor that you see him wear, it's not 13th century armor. It's more warring states period armor. Because, honestly, the 13th century armor is pretty jarring looking, it's not what you'd expect. It's really boxy. It doesn't look aspirational. And we wanna make sure that what we give you is your fantasy of what being a wandering samurai is.
How do you manage the realities of fighting with a Katana while making a video game that's not Bushido Blade?
We tried it both ways. The truth is, if you ever pick up a katana and you actually hold it in your hands, you realize how dangerous it is. It's sharp, and it's kind of scary to hold one. If you get hit with a katana for real, unless it's just a nick, the fight's over. True, historic fighting styles are built around that idea. The ancient fighting style expert that comes and helps us, and does mo-cap, has been really helpful in helping us find that balance, where there is a historical basis to how you move.
The movement style for Jin, when he's fighting, is actually pretty grounded, and wasn't necessarily what we would have done to begin with. He helped us find the right style and to identify what in the movement of the characters makes them feel like samurai, and what do we do with the mongols, who move very differently--he's also an expert in ancient mongolian combat, by the way--so that also helped us make sure that you can feel the difference in this clash of cultures show up in the fights that you have.
But, there are things that Jin does when you're fighting that no samurai would ever do. He does spin strikes, which are fun, they're very showy, they are completely… you would never do that [in real life]. You would never turn your back. There are things that he does even right now that we may continue to edit as we look for that balance. We'll see if we can find the best of both worlds, where it's as real as it can be while still being a video game.
We've tried versions of the game where it's all one-hit kills, and it's not as much fun to play. It's not just about your expectations of what a samurai is, which are really more formed by watching movies than by careful academic study. It's also, whether people know it or not, people's experience playing games--samurai games, fighting games, or whatever sort--your expectations are kind of set by that. So we have to play within that set of expectations to make you [think], "I feel like a samurai!" You don't want it to be jarring, you want it to be natural. There are so many natural barriers between you and this time-machine experience that we're going for, that we have to be careful to take all the barriers that we can get rid of and get rid of them.
Fortnite: Battle Royale has gained another new mode, as the Playground LTM (limited-time mode) is now live. The mode first launched a few days ago, but was taken down soon after due to server problems. Thankfully, the issues have now been resolved, and the mode is available to play on PS4, Xbox One, PC, Nintendo Switch, and mobile.
Unlike previous limited-time modes, Playground is intended to be a "low-pressure environment" that acts much like a private server. It allows players to explore the map and play around with up to three friends, free from the risk of being eliminated by other people.
Each Playground match lasts for one hour, and the storm circle won't begin closing in on the map until 55 minutes have passed. Friendly fire is enabled, although players will respawn immediately unless eliminated by the storm. There's also much more loot to find.
Meanwhile Fortnite has another content update available now. It adds the Drum Gun for Battle Royale and Stink Bomb for Save the World, as well as special American-themed cosmetics in celebration of the United States' Independence Day, July 4.
Finally, Season 5 of Fortnite is scheduled to begin on Thursday, July 12, at 1 AM PDT / 4 AM EDT / 9 AM BST / 6 PM AET. In the meantime, players can still complete this season's challenges to level up their Battle Pass and unlock any remaining rewards. If you need help completing the challenges, be sure to check out our full Season 4 challenge guide.
It's July, which means we've finally hit the second half of 2018. Summer usually has a reputation for being a rather dry period for exciting games, but this month looks to have some interesting titles to keep you busy during the warm and sunny days. In the month of July, there's a surprising amount of remasters and re-releases looking to find new homes on PC, PS4, Switch, and Xbox One--which includes Sonic Mania Plus and the cleverly named Red Faction: Guerilla Re-Mars-tered Edition. While remasters and ports are common, July certainly has them in healthy abundance.
Along with these remasters, we also have the first-time releases of Octopath Traveler and The Banner Saga 3, which should keep RPG and strategy fans engaged for quite sometime. For a more in-depth look at all the most notable games coming this year, check out our more detailed list of releases here.
Octopath Traveler (Nintendo Switch) -- July 13
Set for release on July 13 for the Switch, Octopath Traveler is Square-Enix's long-awaited return to classic 2D RPG gameplay that fans have been yearning for. With a visual style that recreates those familiar old-school graphics for the HD era, you'll band together a party of heroes, level up, and do battle with bandits and other monsters in a world of myth and mystery.
Sonic Mania Plus (Nintendo Switch, PS4, Xbox One) -- July 17
Coming almost a year after the original release, Sonic Mania Plus plans to offer new and returning players alike the purest form of classic Sonic the Hedgehog gameplay. Coming to the Nintendo Switch, PS4, and Xbox One on July 17, Sega's next big return to traditional Sonic action will include new levels, more secrets, and two additional characters in the form of Mighty the Armadillo, and Ray the Flying Squirrel--both of whom have been long absent since their appearance in the arcade-only release of SegaSonic the Hedgehog.
The Banner Saga 3 (PC, PS4, Switch, Xbox One) -- July 24
Starting out as a Kickstarter success story, The Banner Saga series has grown from crowdfunding hopeful to a game series with a passionate following. With the third installment now approaching its release, the developers behind the punishing RPG aim to give the main story a fitting conclusion, while also offering far more challenging battles and tough decisions to make in order to stay alive in the harsh environment.
We recently shared Sucker Punch's approach to historical accuracy for Ghost of Tsushima, the upcoming samurai game based on an actual 13th-century invasion of Japan that features decidedly non-13th-century elements. As studio lead Chris Zimmerman described, the team will lean hard into historical fact so long as it doesn't conflict too strongly with the mainstream definition of samurai, be it their stereotypical appearance, combat techniques, or demeanor.
Sucker Punch's concoction of facts and fiction extends to the island of Tsushima itself; lots of small details are derived from on-location research, but the layout and atmosphere are tuned to heighten moment-to-moment exploration and combat. For Sucker Punch, it's all about glorifying the source material to set the stage for equally beautiful and tense moments in a war-torn idyllic countryside.
As we saw during the E3 gameplay reveal, Ghost of Tsushima's story isn't simply about good versus evil; rather, it aims to display the devastating, transformative effects of war. Distressing emotions like pain, fear, and desperation manifest in different ways depending on the person, and Zimmerman promises that perspectives from both warring factions will surprise players expecting a straightforward campaign.
In part two of our interview below, Zimmerman gives us a taste of what players can expect from Ghost of Tsushima's story and open world, and how he hopes to draw you into not only the conflict at large, but the interpersonal chaos that occurs when groups of people are forced into survival mode.
GameSpot: Based on what we've seen so far, Ghost of Tsushima is a very serious game. Are there moments of levity that help break things up?
Zimmerman: There's serious stuff going on in the story, but it's not just a drear fest from end to end. There are moments of quiet and beauty too--that's part of the experience. This isn't a sea of enemies. It's more grounded than that. There are times when you're walking through the woods and you listen to birds, or you spook a deer, or you hear a wolf in the distance and then it pads across the path and looks at you before it keeps going. That's kind of magical, when that sort of thing happens.
In any open-world game, you're not spending most of your time in combat. You're spending most of your time exploring and experiencing the world, and that's kind of why we put so much effort into designing a world that's so great to experience and explore. We're doing our best to capture the beauty and serenity of Japan, but there is an air of ever-present danger. It's beautiful, but there's a cloud of smoke on the horizon. Or you're going through and you crest some pass and you see a gorgeous valley in front of you, and then you stumble upon a Mongol party. It's that juxtaposition that I think is pretty special. There's an ugliness to the violence [of] some of the stories set against this natural beauty. There's this tension there that plays into the experience.
It's one of those things where you're trying to figure out how to get the player's experience to mirror the character's experience. Removing the barriers between those two is what pulls you into a time machine, to make you feel like you're actually there.
For these people, for many of them, this is the only home they've ever known. They know it was beautiful. They know that what it is now is not what it should be--that something's wrong. Making sure that when you're a player that you can feel that as well, that you can feel the tension between natural beauty and being in a building that's been burned and looted by the Mongols. We'll sometimes show you buildings that haven't been touched so you can sense that this place, this beautiful place, has been or is being ruined.
It's the difference between an open-world game that does a good job of pulling you in to let you feel like you're actually there, and an open-world game that never lets you forget you're playing a game. There's nothing wrong with those games, but that's not what we're aiming for. We're aiming for a game where you forget it's a game. That's a fun thing to try to do. It's nice to be able to aim high.
Are the Mongols always your enemies, or do you ever encounter Mongols that are more complex?
I think that'll be super interesting. That's one of the things that came across in the debut trailer, where the speaking part is actually the general who's leading the invasion, and you get a sense that they're not orcs, you know, they're actually people. We're not showing anything or really even talking about it, but I think what you're looking for--that idea that there's some nuance there, at least at some points--you're going to see that, I think on both sides. Maybe not all the Mongols are just purely bad, and one of the points we're trying to make with what we showed at E3 this year is that not all the Japanese people are all good either, right? It's tough on everybody.
I decided halfway through the show, when we were in the mud pit [in the demo], I was going to tell people that mud is a metaphor, and in fact it is. It's a metaphor because this is a messy place and a messy time and nobody gets out clean. The decisions that everybody makes here are leaving them a little bit muddier each time, and at the end of the whole thing everybody is covered in mud.
As development continues, what are some of the big decisions you still have to make?
Lots of details. We wouldn't have showed this demo unless we thought the heart of the game was pretty solid. But, there are lots of details to polish. The thing we're trying to do here is build a big open-world game, and all that means, entails, and implies, but we're doing it as a Sucker Punch game. It's not just about scale, but about taking the quality of the experience that we demand of ourselves and maintaining that at the scale you expect of an open-world game, so that your control experience, your action-game experience, and the characters and the graphics, everything is up to the standards that we expect of ourselves. But, it's just a lot bigger--it just keeps going, there's more to do.
How long do you think it will take to get from one end of the map to another?
It depends on whether you're on a horse or not, and it's a great question to ask because it's a question we ask ourselves. I'll give you my smartass answer: an epic amount of time. I don't mean it takes forever; I mean that if you make that journey you really want to feel like it was a journey, you went through stuff along the way. It's less about how long did it take or how many kilometers is it, but more about how long would it take you to tell the story of that trip from one end of the island to the other. I think what we're aiming for at the end is to be able to tell a great story from that.
Grand Theft Auto V players in GTA Online have reported receiving in-game messages stating that Grand Theft Auto VI will launch in 2019. Developer Rockstar Games has addressed the rumors, confirming the messages are fake and not from official channels.
GTA Online players reported receiving the message, which reads, "Rockstar Message GTA VI Coming 2019," on Reddit and the GTA Online forum. This inevitably prompted people to ask the Rockstar Support Twitter account about it. The response follows below; it confirms it is indeed a hoax, as suspected.
Although Rockstar hasn't provided any information on how this happened, the Reddit community has speculated that an opportunistic hacker is using mods and a flaw in the Rockstar Social Club's messaging system to send out the message. Perhaps the biggest giveaway is that the pop-up messages are predominantly appearing in the PS3, Xbox 360, and PC versions of the game, where mods are more prevalent.
This is a hoax made with the use of mods, and not an official message or statement from Rockstar Games. *OV
— Rockstar Support (@RockstarSupport) July 2, 2018
Obviously, it'd be incredibly out of character for Rockstar to simply reveal the release date for the next entry in its biggest franchise in such a haphazard way. Rockstar like to be very measured in the way it reveals games, delivering fleeting teases and drip-feeding little details to build up excitement.
On top of that, casually announced GTA VI would steal all the thunder from its next game: Red Dead Redemption 2. As confirmed in July, Red Dead Redemption 2's release date is October 26, 2018. The much-anticipated sequel will be available for PS4 and Xbox One. Rockstar hasn't said whether the game is coming to PC, but one of the programmers working on the game has indicated Red Dead Redemption 2 for PC is in development.
With Pokemon Go's next Community Day right around the corner, Niantic has shared a few more details about the upcoming event. The featured Pokemon during this month's Community Day will be the classic starter Squirtle, and now we've learned that some players will be able to find a special version of the Pokemon if they complete research quests.
Niantic revealed on Twitter that players who complete Field Research tasks during the Community Day will have a chance of encountering a Squirtle wearing sunglasses--a reference to the Squirtle Squad from the Pokemon anime series. It's unclear whether or not players will need to complete specific quests in order to find a sunglasses-wearing Squirtle, but a new set of Field Research tasks that focus primarily on Pokemon from the Kanto region were recently added to the game.
In addition to the sunglasses-wearing Squirtle, players will likely have a chance of finding a Shiny Squirtle during this week's event, as every previous Community Day has introduced Shiny versions of its featured Pokemon. On top of that, any Wartortle that evolves into Blastoise before the Community Day ends will learn the powerful Water-type attack Hydro Cannon.
Once again, rather than being hosted at a specific location, this month's Community Day runs for a three-hour window of time, which kicks off at different times depending on what part of the world you live in. You can find the Community Day schedule for each region below:
North America
11 AM - 2 PM PT
2 PM - 5 PM ET
Europe and Africa
10 AM - 1 PM BST
Asia-Pacific
12 PM - 3 PM JST
Finally, players who participate in this month's Community Day will be able to take advantage of other in-game bonuses. For the duration of the event, Eggs will hatch at a quarter of the distance they typically require. Any Lure Modules that are activated during the event will also last for three hours, as opposed to their usual 30-minute limit.
In addition to the arrival of the delayed Playground mode, a new content update is now available for Fortnite on PS4, Xbox One, PC, Nintendo Switch, and mobile. The update introduces a handful of new weapons to both Save the World and Battle Royale modes, including the recently-teased Drum Gun.
Following the rollout of the 4.5 content update, players can now find and wield the Drum Gun in Battle Royale mode. Epic describes the new gun as a "hybrid weapon that combines the stopping power of a rifle with the suppressive ability and fire rate of an SMG." It comes in Uncommon and Rare varieties, uses Medium Ammo, and can be found in chests, Vending Machines, or as floor loot.
The Drum Gun is the only new weapon to arrive in Battle Royale this week, but Save the World players can now get their hands on two new items: the Freedom Herald Pistol and the Stink Bomb--the latter of which made its debut in Battle Royale mode last month. Additionally, to coincide with Independence Day, Stars and Stripes Heroes are now available to purchase from the Event Store for a limited time. You can read more about the new items in the patch notes on Epic's website.
The new content update arrives after last week's 4.5 patch, which also introduced a new weapon to Battle Royale: the Dual Pistols. On top of that, the patch made a number of changes to existing weapons--particularly shotguns--and introduced the Final Fight Teams of 12 limited-time mode, which would eventually be replaced by 50v50.
Season 5 of Fortnite: Battle Royale is right around the corner. Ahead of the new season, players got to witness the Evil Lair's rocket take off and create a mysterious crack in the sky. Since the rocket launch, additional rifts have begun popping up around the island, and they appear to be growing and swallowing up nearby objects. What that means for the future of the game remains to be seen, but players won't have to wait too long to find out, as Season 5 kicks off next week on July 12.
Looks like Amazon's streaming list is getting a whole lot longer this July. A host of new shows and movies are coming to Amazon Prime Video including oldies, newbies, and originals.
A handful of new shows are being added like Burn Notice and The Closer, along with a few originals like Comicstaan. Amazon will also be adding new seasons of shows they already have like season 6 of The Americans. One notable addition is that the first two seasons of 21 Jump Street, the show that made Johnny Depp famous, will be added to Prime.
Most of the titles added will be movies though, and there are a lot of them. To name a few, Snowden, American Psycho, Mulholland Drive, The Twilight Saga, and the Jaws franchise will all become streamable on Amazon starting in July. Amazon will also be the only place to stream a new movie called Zoe starring Ewan McGregor which will be released July 20.
If you want to know everything that's coming to Amazon Prime Video in July and when, check out the complete list below.
Amazon Prime Video's New Releases For July 2018
July 1
21 Jump Street, Seasons 1-2
Burn Notice, Seasons 1-7
Damages, Seasons 1-5
NYPD Blue, Seasons 1-12
The Closer, Seasons 1-7
20,000 Days on Earth (2004)
A.I. Artificial Intelligence (2001)
All is Lost (2013)
American Psycho (2000)
American Psycho 2 (2002)
An Inconvenient Sequel: Truth to Power (2017)
And God Created Woman (1988)
Angel Heart (1987)
Angela's Ashes (1999)
Assassination (1987)
Avenging Force (1986)
Barfly (1987)
Blazing Saddles (1974)
Blue Chips (1994)
Body Count (1997)
Breakfast at Tiffany's (1961)
Cadillac Man (1990)
Christmas Trade (2015)
Cronicas (2004)
Dead Man Walking (1995)
Double Jeopardy (1999)
Dr. T. and the Women (2000)
Finding Bliss (2009)
Gran Torino (2008)
Highlander II: The Quickening (1991)
Incident at Loch Ness (2004)
Invaders from Mars (1986)
Jeepers Creepers (2001)
Killer Klowns from Outer Space (1988)
Ladybugs (1992)
Late Phases: Night of the Lone Wolf (2014)
Letters to Juliet (2010)
Maximum Overdrive (1986)
Mixed Signals (1997)
Monkey Shines: An Experiment in Fear (1988)
Ms. 45 (1981)
Mulholland Drive (2001)
Murphy's Law (1986)
Next (2007)
Number One with a Bullet (1987)
Our Nixon (2013)
P.O.W. the Escape (1986)
Patriot Games (1992)
Pee-Wee's Big Adventure (1985)
Pretty in Pink (1986)
Rabbit Hole (2011)
Sahara (2005)
Sex Drive (2008)
Six Shooter (2013)
Snake Eyes (1998)
State of Grace (1990)
Street Smart (1987)
Stripes (1981)
Switchback (1997)
The Act of Killing (2012)
The Adventures of Buckaroo Banzai Across the 8th Dimension (1984)
The Brothers Bloom (2009)
The Eternal (1998)
The Foot Fist Way (2006)
The Fourth War (1990)
The Graduate (1967)
The Haunting of Molly Hartley (2008)
The Invisible War (2012)
The Longest Yard (2005)
The Mechanic (1972)
The Monster Squad (1987)
The Twilight Saga (2008)
Trade (2007)
V for Vendetta (2005)
Waste Land (2010)
Witness (1985)
Woody Allen - A Documentary Parts 1 & 2 (2011)
Wooly Boys (2004)
Yelling to the Sky (2011)
Zodiac (2007)
July 8
Snowden (2016)
July 9
Jaws (1975)
Jaws 2 (1978)
Jaws 3 (1983)
Jaws: The Revenge (1987)
July 13
Comicstaan, Season 1, Episodes 1-4-- Prime Original series
Nintendo has announced a new trio of 2DS XL models themed after some of the platform's most popular games: a Minecraft 2DS with a face plate that looks like a Creeper, a Mario Kart 7 2DS with red-and-black theme, and an Animal Crossing 2DS with the series' iconic leaf symbol. The Animal Crossing edition includes a pre-installed copy of Animal Crossing: New Leaf - Welcome Amiibo, the updated version of New Leaf that includes Amiibo support.
All three were announced through the Nintendo's Japanese site, and Nintendo of Europe promptly followed with a tweet advertising the Animal Crossing model. However, Europe hasn't confirmed the Minecraft or Mario Kart versions, and none of them have been announced by Nintendo of America. So depending on your region, we may be seeing announcements soon, or you could have to import your version of choice.
The New Nintendo 2DS XL is essentially a 3DS body--including the clamshell design not found in standard 2DS models--but without the 3D functionality. The GameSpot review called it the best 3DS/2DS family design yet, even coming late as it was to the generation. Nintendo's newly named president, Shuntaro Furukawa, recently said the company is considering a 3DS successor.
Nintendo has been keen on marketing the 2DS XL to collectors, with special editions themed after certain fan-favorite games and franchises. On top of the launch Black/Turquoise and White/Orange versions, it has Pikachu, Poke Ball, Dragon Quest, and Zelda themed version, along with these new additions.
The first reactions for Ant-Man and the Wasp are rolling in on Twitter after the red carpet premiere, and the critics are hyped about it. So far there have been very few negative reactions to the movie; people just want to talk about how funny Paul Rudd is.
Many are saying that this is one of Marvel's best sequels, and some have even said it rivals Winter Soldier although clearly the tones of those two movies are very different. This movie is supposedly very fun and a little bit strange. Many are crediting the uniqueness of the concept to director Peyton Reed. Reed also directed the first Ant-Man and both movies have been praised for their blend of comedy and the action.
The reaction from critics has been resoundingly positive, with one of the most negative comments coming from John Campea who tweeted, "Everyone seemed to love it. I liked it, but not as much as the first one." It seems like even the critics don't have much criticism for this sequel.
I have emerged from #AntManAndTheWasp and bring good news. This movie is a total blast. Liked it more than the original (which I dug). It's remains self-contained in the crazy MCU of it all, which is a good thing. Doesn't ignore its connections to that world, though.
A lot of people are commenting on the end credit scene, which raises the question, is it so great because it's funny? Revealing? Teasing? All three? I guess we'll have to see it to find out. Ant-Man and the Wasp will have its general release July 6 and after these tweets, I think it's safe to say that expectations are high.
Each year in July, Amazon runs a massive sale it calls Prime Day. This Black Friday-like event sees the online retailer dropping prices on a huge array of products, ranging from Echoes and Kindles to games, electronics, furniture, apparel, and just about every other category of items Amazon sells. The only catch is that you have to be an Amazon Prime member to take advantage of the sale prices. Now that July has begun, the company has finally confirmed the date for Prime Day 2018. It's a 36-hour event that will kick off on July 16 at 12 PM PT (3PM ET / 12PM BT) and run through July 17.
If you're not a Prime member already, you can sign up here. In addition to Prime Day discounts, Prime members get free two-day shipping on many products, access to Amazon Prime Video, Prime Music, free books, and a free Twitch Prime membership, which includes free PC games each month. This month, to build anticipation for Prime Day, Amazon/Twitch Prime members are getting 21 free PC games.
An Amazon Prime subscription costs $119 for a one-year membership or $13 for a single month. New members get a month-long free trial. Students get an even better deal: a free six-month trial, with a monthly price of only $6.49 after that.
Every previous event quest will once again be available to play during Summer Twilight Fest, and a few new exclusive quests will be added too. Bonuses will be available each day for players who log in. You'll want to log in every day too, as Summer Twilight Fest's exclusive bounties will only be available for a limited time.
The event will also offer a few aesthetic changes. Like April's Spring Blossom Festival, the Summer Twilight Festival redresses Gathering Hall NPCs in new seasonal outfits. New clothing options will unlock for your Poogie and Handler as well.
Capcom revealed a few more in-game surprises will be available during the event, but players will just have to wait and see what they are. Summer Twilight Fest starts on July 13 and ends on July 27.
Monster Hunter: World is available on Xbox One and PlayStation 4, with a PC version scheduled for this fall.
The Nintendo Eshop is running a sale on a number of excellent games. So if you've finished or grown bored with your current collection of Nintendo Switch games, now is a great time to save money while adding new downloadable titles to your collection. The games will go back up to full price at different times, so grab them quickly.
Unlike some recent weeks, no big first-party Nintendo games are on sale, but you can save money on lots of indies and other games. For instance, the surprisingly intense rhythm game Thumper is on sale for $10. This game has you play as a metallic beetle hurtling down a nightmarish psychedelic space road.
From GameSpot's Thumper review: "Surprisingly little has been sacrificed in the transition to the portable console, and in some ways the fact that you can now hold it close by undocking the Switch makes it a slightly more immersive experience than sitting feet away from your TV."
If you ever have people over, The Jackbox Party Pack 2 can make your gatherings more enjoyable. It's a group of party mini-games that support up to eight players. You don't need a box of Switch controllers, because everyone can use their phones for input devices. It's on sale for $13.
Battle Chef Brigade, a side-scrolling brawler and a match-three puzzle game in one, is on sale for $12. Fans of horror can grab Layers of Fear: Legacy for $16, while platformer aficionados can add Owlboy to their collection for $18.
You can find more of our picks for the best games in the Eshop sale below, or look at the full list here.
Steam's Summer Sale is such a massive event that you could miss out on some incredible savings if you don't dig around a bit. A notable chunk of the best games on sale come from Bethesda, a company that's going all out right now, with tons of deep discounts on its games on Steam. The Bethesda deals go up to 75% off, often on games that aren't all that old. Here are some of the highlights.
For starters, the whole Fallout franchise is available at 50% off or more. You can get Fallout, Fallout 2, and Fallout Tactics for $2.50 each. Fallout 3 and Fallout: New Vegas are only $3.29 right now, and Fallout 4 is only $15. All of the Game of the Year editions and individual expansions are also on sale.
The demonic kill-fest Doom is on sale for $15, but if you want to try it before you buy it, you can play the demo for free. If you have a Vive, you can turn demons inside out in virtual reality with Doom VFR for $21.
Rage 2, which is coming out next year, looks like a lot of fun, but there's a good chance you haven't played the original Rage. You can change that for just $2.49. If you like sneaking around and assassinating enemies, you can get Dishonored for the same price. Its sequel Dishonored 2 is available for $20, and the Death of the Outsider standalone expansion is on sale for $15.
In honor of the Fourth of July, Best Buy is running a huge sale right now on all kinds of items, from computers and TVs to movies and games. We've dug through the sale to find the most appealing deals on the games, hardware, and accessories you want. Here are some of the highlights of Best Buy's Fourth of July Sale.
Sports game fans have an array of options. FIFA 18 is on sale for $30, Madden NFL 18 is down to $25, and NBA 2K18 is $20. If fighting is more your thing, you can grab UFC 3 for $40, or if you'd prefer something more theatrical, you can get WWE 2K18 for $20.
Finally, if you've been putting off upgrading your TV, now may be the week to pull the trigger. Best Buy has a ton of televisions on sale, with 4K sets starting at $230, meaning you can almost certainly find a deal on a TV that fits your size and budget preferences.
There's a recurring source of tension in Ant-Man and the Wasp thanks to Scott Lang's sentence of two years under house arrest for his actions in Captain America: Civil War. No matter how many zany adventures Paul Rudd's character has in this sequel, he has to periodically race back to his San Francisco apartment and re-don his ankle bracelet whenever hapless FBI agent Jimmy Woo (the funny Randall Park) decides to check in on him. It's a fun bit, and it harks back to an earlier age in the MCU, when a Marvel hero's biggest concern could be staying out of trouble with the law.
We've yet to see what a post-Infinity War world looks like in the Marvel Cinematic Universe. Regardless of how it eventually gets undone, what effect will Thanos's finger snap have in the short term? How will the tone shift in Avengers 4? Those questions are irrelevant in Ant-Man and the Wasp, which quickly places itself before the events of Infinity War. That may be a knock against it for those hoping for some answers, but this movie's tone is much lighter as a result, perfectly in line with the original Ant-Man's.
The first Ant-Man introduced Scott Lang (Rudd) along with Hank Pym (Michael Douglas) and his daughter Hope van Dyne (Evangeline Lilly). Ant-Man and the Wasp directly picks up their story following Scott's involvement in Civil War: Scott's two years of house arrest are almost up, but Hope drags him back into a life of illegal heroism in a plot to save her mother, Michelle Pfeiffer's Janet van Dyne, from the "quantum realm" in which she's been stranded for 30 years.
How can Janet be alive down there after all this time? How could Hank and Hope possibly find her? This movie is brimming with pseudo-scientific mumbo jumbo about things like "entanglement" and "quantum tunnels." It gets a little exhausting, but the movie is self aware about its own ridiculousness; at one point, Scott asks Hank and his colleague Bill Foster (Laurence Fishburne) whether they just stick the word "quantum" in front of everything to make it sound more scientific. Good question, Scott!
Ant-Man and the Wasp introduces a couple of new villains in the forms of Hannah John-Kamen's Ghost, who stalks the heroes in hopes of stealing their secret lab, and Walton Goggins' Sonny Burch, a black market merchant who decides he wants the quantum tech for himself. Goggins is his typical hilariously sleazy self, while John-Kamen's more overtly dramatic performance fits her character.
But most important is the Wasp herself, Evangeline Lilly's Hope van Dyne, who completely owns this movie. Hope proves--unsurprisingly--to be a much more capable Ant-Man than Ant-Man himself, with confidence and skill that are thrilling to watch. It makes the entire plot of the first movie--that Hank had to enlist the deadbeat Scott in the first place instead of just trusting his daughter to do the job--seem even more ludicrous in retrospect. Hopefully Lilly decides to stick around the MCU for a while, as her presence would be much appreciated in future installments.
Like the first Ant-Man, this movie has great fight choreography that sees both heroes frequently changing from normal to small to massive and back again in creative ways. Some of the most fun sequences are car chases where one or more vehicles are constantly shrinking down to Hot Wheels size and back to normal, throwing off pursuers and causing general zany chaos.
There's an added dash of humor from the fact that Scott's suit for much of the movie is malfunctioning, leaving him unable to control when he changes size. That leads to an especially funny sequence where Scott is running around his daughter's middle school at about 3 feet tall, trying to remain undetected. Cassie herself is still played by the ridiculously charismatic Abby Ryder Fortson, who gives Paul Rudd tit-for-tat in every scene they're in together.
Michael Peña's Luis returns with a vengeance too, with his voice-overed montage gag from the first--in which he tells a story while the characters he's describing act it out--is funnier than ever. This time around he gets injected with a sort of truth serum, causing his rapid fire rambling to span topics ranging from Scott's psychiatric health to his family's love of Morrissey. He's more actively involved in the story, as well, which is pure wish fulfillment for viewers who loved his character in the first movie.
Like the original Ant-Man, Ant-Man and the Wasp is primarily a palette cleanser in the MCU as a whole (the first movie was sandwiched in between the dense Age of Ultron and the dour Civil War). Ant-Man and the Wasp is hilarious, fun, silly, self aware, and creative. Filled with pseudo-science gobbledigook, crazy action, and multiple villains all vying for screen time, it's one of the most comic-booky MCU movies yet. The fates of all our favorite heroes after Avengers: Infinity War may still be up in the air, but in the meantime, Ant-Man and the Wasp is a welcome distraction.
The Good
The Bad
Lighthearted and funny
Pseudo-science mumbo jumbo gets ridiculous
Evangeline Lilly phenomenal as the Wasp
No answers for Infinity War fans
Multiple fun new villains
Creative shrinking-and-growing action
Self aware about its sillier aspects
Much-needed palette cleanser following Infinity War
If you're looking to escape the heat, or you prefer streaming to barbecues, looks like July is your month. Netflix is making moves this July, releasing originals, bringing back some oldies, and giving the boot to more than a few long-timers.
All kinds of titles are coming this July, and a lot of them are classics or just kind of old like Jurassic Park (one and three), Her, Get Smart, Bo Burnham's What, Happy Gilmore, Kevin Hart's Let Me Explain, and Interview With A Vampire.
Orange Is The New Black, Blue Bloods, Madam Secretary, and Shameless are among the TV shows getting new seasons added to Netflix as well as several original series like Comedians in Cars Getting Coffee.
Sadly, a lot of favorites are leaving Netflix this July so get to your devices ASAP because you might not be able to see these ones for a while. Some notables include all five Bring It On movies, all four Lethal Weapon movies, V for Vendetta, Tropic Thunder, and Breakfast At Tiffany's.
If you'd like to know about everything arriving and leaving Netflix in July, check out the list below.
Arriving on Netflix July 2018
July 1
Blue Bloods: Season 8
Bo Burnham: what.
Chocolat
Deceived
Finding Neverland
Get Smart
Happy Gilmore
Hawaii Five-O: Season 8
Interview with the Vampire
Journey to the Center of the Earth
Jurassic Park
Jurassic Park III
Madam Secretary: Season 4
Menace II Society
NCIS: Season 15
Pandorum
Penelope
Queens of Comedy: Season 2
Rica, Famosa, Latina: Seasons 1-4
Scooby-Doo
Scooby-Doo 2: Monsters Unleashed
Spanglish
Stealth
Swordfish
The Boondock Saints
The Lost World: Jurassic Park
The Princess Diaries
The Voices
Traitor
Troy
Van Helsing
We Own the Night
We the Marines
What We Started
July 2
Dance Academy: The Comeback
Good Witch: Season 4
Romina
The Sinner: Season 1
July 3
The Comedy Lineup - Netflix Original
July 5
Blue Valentine
July 6
Anne with an E: Season 2- Netflix Original
Comedians in Cars Getting Coffee: New 2018: Freshly Brewed- Netflix Original
First Team: Juventus: Part B- Netflix Original
Free Rein: Season 2- Netflix Original
Inside the World's Toughest Prisons: Season 2- Netflix Original
Sacred Games- Netflix Original
Samantha!- Netflix Original
Somebody Feed Phil: The Second Course-Netflix Original
The Fosters: Season 5 New Episodes
The Legacy of a Whitetail Deer Hunter- Netflix Original Film
The Skin of The Wolf- Netflix Original Film
White Fang- Netflix Original Film
July 7
Scream 4
July 9
Lockup: Extended Stay: Collection 1
July 10
Drug Lords: Season 2 - Netflix Original
July 12
Gone Baby Gone
July 13
How It Ends- Netflix Original Film
Jim Jefferies: This Is Me Now- Netflix Original
Kevin Hart: Let Me Explain
Sugar Rush- Netflix Original
The Epic Tales of Captain Underpants- Netflix Original
July 15
Bonusfamiljen: Season 2- Netflix Original
Going for Gold
The Joel McHale Show with Joel McHale: Part 2- Netflix Original
July 20
Amazing Interiors- Netflix Original
Dark Tourist- Netflix Original
Deep Undercover: Collection 3
Duck Duck Goose- Netflix Original Film
Father of the Year- Netflix Original Film
Fix It and Finish It: Collection 3
Home: Adventures with Tip & Oh: Season 4- Netflix Original
Jimmy: The True Story of a True Idiot- Netflix Original
Last Chance U: EMCC & Life After- Netflix Original
Last Chance U: INDY: Part 1- NEtflix Original
Luna Petunia: Return to Amazia: Season 2- Netflix Original
July 22
An Education
Bolt
July 24
The Warning- Netflix Original Film
Iliza Shlesinger: Elder Millennial- Netflix Original
July 27
Cupcake & Dino - General Services- Netflix Original
Extinction-Netflix Original
Orange Is the New Black: Season 6-Netflix Original
Roman Empire: Reign of Blood: Master of Rome- Netflix Original
The Bleeding Edge- Netflix Original
The Worst Witch: Season 2- Netflix Original
Welcome to the Family- Netflix Original
July 28
Shameless: Season 8
The Company Men
July 29
Her
Sofia the First: Season 4
July 30
A Very Secret Service: Season 2-Netflix Original
July 31
Terrace House: Opening New Doors: Part 3- Netflix Original
Fortniteseason 5 is almost here, but no superhero franchise is complete without a big-budget blockbuster motion picture. To that end, Epic is holding a contest for aspiring filmmakers to cut together their own masterpiece, with some notoriety and virtual bucks on the line.
The fan films must be at least one minute in length, and no longer than five minutes. They'll be judged on creativity, mastery of the Replay tools, and "Fortnite-ness"--the quality of capturing the tone of Fortnite. You can only use your own original gameplay and royalty-free audio, and no voice-over narrative or on-screen text is allowed. Submissions should include the hashtag #FortniteBlockbuster. They're due by July 11 at 11:59 ET.
Winners will be announced on July 24. Five finalists will get 10,000 V-Bucks, and one grand-prize winner will get 25,000 V-Bucks. Plus the grand prize winner will have their film featured at Risky Reels, complete with the title displayed on the marquee and a poster for the film displayed in-game.
You just have to upload your submission to YouTube, make it publicly visible and searchable. Email contestsubmissions@epicgames.com with your full name and Epic ID. Full contest details are available through the official site.
Following its apparent leak on the Australian Microsoft Store, Sega has confirmed pricing and release details for the upcoming Shenmue I & II collection. The combo pack will launch for PS4, Xbox One, and PC via Steam on August 21, and it'll retail for the budget price of US $30 / £25 / AU $49.95.
First announced during the Sega Fes fan event earlier this year, the Shenmue I & II collection combines both Dreamcast classics together in one package. The games come with a handful of improvements, although they aren't true HD remakes or remasters. Among the new features players can enjoy are modern and classic control schemes, an updated user interface, scalable screen resolution, and both English and Japanese voiceovers.
Shenmue was created by famed game designer Yu Suzuki, who directed a number of Sega's arcade hits, including Out Run and Virtua Fighter. The first title originally launched for Dreamcast in 1999. At the time of its release, it had the distinction of being the most expensive video game ever created. Its sequel, Shenmue II, arrived in 2001, although it would only be released on Dreamcast in Europe and Japan. The game would be subsequently ported to the original Xbox the following year.
Both games cast players in the role Ryo Hazuki, a young martial artist on a quest to avenge his father's death and ultimately uncover the secret behind a mysterious relic known as the Dragon Mirror. The titles were renowned for their impressive open world, deep battle system, and variety of minigames. You can learn more about each in GameSpot's original Shenmue review and Shenmue II review.
A third installment in the series, Shenmue III, was announced during Sony's E3 2015 press conference. The game is currently in development for PS4 and PC, and like its predecessors, it is being directed by series creator Yu Suzuki. Shenmue III was originally slated to launch this year, but was delayed into 2019 in order to further refine the game. Publisher Deep Silver recently revealed that Shenmue III will require a whopping 100 GB of storage space on PC.
The lead-up to Amazon's Prime Day has officially begun. While Twitch normally gives a handful of free PC games to Amazon/Twitch Prime members each month, this month the company is going all out and giving Prime members one game a day between now and July 18. With three games also being offered for free all month, Prime members will receive a total of 21 free games in July. The first freebie is Pillars of Eternity: Definitive Edition.
The game is only free until July 4, so make sure to grab it quickly. To get your free copy, you'll first have to link your Twitch and Amazon Prime accounts. Then, head to Twitch.tv and click the crown icon next to the search bar. That opens a drop-down menu where you'll find your free game along with any other freebies you haven't collected yet. Just note you'll need the Twitch desktop app to access your game.
Pillars of Eternity is an isometric RPG in the vein of Baldur's Gate and Planescape: Torment. Released in 2015, it takes place in a fantasy world in which babies have begun being born without souls. You're tasked with assembling a party and finding out why. The game received high marks from critics and players alike and has spawned a sequel.
GameSpot's Pillars of Eternity review awarded it 8/10. "Pillars of Eternity effortlessly ensnares you, both by reminding you of the places you've been, and by showing you things you didn't expect," it reads. "It is not changing the future, but it is repackaging the past in a way that deserves praise while falling into a few old traps--and creating a few of its own--along the way. You can easily dodge these traps, however, and emerge victorious in a world where the gods show you both scorn and favor, and it's up to you to hew your own path."
Adult Swim Games has shared a new trailer for its ridiculous billiards game, Pool Panic. The video, which you can watch above, provides a closer look at how to play the game and shows off some of the outlandish challenges players will come across during the course of the adventure.
Described by developer Rekim as the "world's least realistic pool simulator," Pool Panic puts players in control of a "mischievous" pool ball. The object of the game is to aim your pool cue and shoot the ball into the other balls around the stage to sink them into pockets, but the title quickly introduces increasingly ridiculous permutations of that idea.
There are more than 100 levels in Pool Panic, which are laid out on a large overworld that changes and expands as you complete stages. As demonstrated in the trailer, the theme and objective of the levels can vary wildly; one stage, for instance, has players trying to knock pool balls off of motorcycles while they're racing down a freeway, while another features zombie balls that chase players around the level.
In addition to the single-player campaign, the game features a multiplayer party mode, in which up to four players can compete against each other locally in various mini-games. The Nintendo Switch version of the game also allows two players to play together on one console using a single Joy-Con each.
No comments:
Post a Comment