It's the last week of Destiny 2's Season of the Forge, and everything to do with The Black Armory is done. It's a good time to wrap up loose ends before the Season of the Drifter starts on March 5. There's a triple Infamy event going on for Gambit players, and as always there's also the Dreaming City's Ascendant Challenge for players who still want Powerful gear drops to drive their level up to the Season of the Forge's cap of 650.
This week, the curse has been reset in the Dreaming City, which means the Shattered Throne dungeon is no longer available--a bummer for anybody who needs to finish it to unlock Izanagi's Burden from The Black Armory. It also brings us back to Week 2's challenge, which is available for one more day before Tuesday's weekly reset. Below, you'll find a complete guide on where you need to go and what to do to complete this week's bounty to earn Powerful gear.
The Ascendant Challenge always involves you heading through a portal to the Ascendant Plane, but the particulars of what you're doing are entirely different from week to week. To start out, you'll need a consumable item called the Tincture of Queensfoil. With a Tincture in hand, make your way to the Garden of Esila area near the southernmost point of the map, as seen in the image below. Consuming the Tincture will provide you with the Ascendance buff that allows to see a Taken portal that's somewhat hidden on a cliffside. Jump in, and you'll be teleported to the Ascendant Plane's Forfeit Shrine.
Once you're there, you'll have to fend off Taken--or just avoid them--while trying to secure three Arc Charges around the area. Once you pick one up, head toward the center starting area, near the giant Blight ball. Walk into the bright point at the bottom to dunk the charge you're holding. Repeat the process two more times and you'll receive an endless supply of Super energy that will help you to kill all of the remaining Taken in the area. Once they're dealt with, you can complete the bounty (netting you Dark Fragments and Powerful gear) and open a chest.
Given that the bounty (not the chest) offers Powerful gear--a reliable way of increasing your Power level--this is an activity you'll definitely want to take part in once you're able. But bear in mind it is a challenge, so be sure to come prepared. It can be done solo, but having multiple teammates to grab charges and draw the enemies' attention can help immensely.
Meanwhile, if you're hunting still hunting gear in The Black Armory, be sure to check out our guides to getting Izanagi's Burden and the Jotunn fusion rifle. Also, don't bother collecting Powerful gear bounties to turn in next week when the new season starts--Bungie is dropping an update that changes things so you can stockpile gear drops for a big boost as soon as the level cap rises. You'll have to play through Season of the Drifter content like everyone else to raise your level to the new cap.
The continually evolving Path of Exile will finally see the release of the long-awaited PS4 edition later in March. Intended to be released following the launch of the last expansion, Betrayal, in December, the game was abruptly delayed prior to its planned launch. During a recent chat with Path of Exile's managing director Chris Wilson, he offered an update on the PS4 edition, and why developer Grinding Gear Games chose to delay it.
As it turned out, the developers held back the PS4 release to give it some extra time. According to Wilson, the game was in solid shape, but the team felt it could be improved. Due to the lengthy process to authorize the game for release, the PS4 version will now have its launch in March--final date still pending. At its debut, the newest console release will have all present DLC available, which includes Synthesis.
"It really feels like we're completing the cycle with platforms for Path of Exile," said Wilson. "We wished we could have gotten on consoles earlier, but our resources were pretty limited at the time. Thankfully we were able to get them done. It's been really useful [not releasing the PS4 in December]. It would have been OK to have released it then, but we do want first-impressions to be good and there were certain areas of the game we weren't happy with. We wanted to tighten it up."
In addition to our talk about the PS4 release, he also went into detail about what's to come with the game's next update Synthesis, which adds a brand-new league to the game, along with a substantial rebalance to the game's magic and skill system. If you want a clear idea of what's to come with the Synthesis expansion, we breakdown all the new updates and rebalancing that's to come with the new expansion, and how things get weird once you start exploring the dreamscape and its shifting memory clusters.
For more on Path of Exile, including when exactly you can play the PS4 release, be sure to visit GameSpot in the weeks ahead.
World War II was a global tragedy. There was no victory without a substantial defeat of one kind or another, and for countries like Poland that got caught in the crossfire, nearly all was lost before the dust settled. Warsaw is an upcoming strategy game that looks at one of the darkest chapters in Poland's WWII story. It won't have a happy ending--developer Pixelated Milk doesn't want to rewrite history. Instead, it wants to shine a light on the heroes that did everything they could to take back their embattled homeland, while also recognizing the ramifications of attempting the impossible.
Pixelated Milk says Warsaw will focus on a substantial cast of rebels--heroes that must bear the weight of their plight while simultaneously trying to stand tall in battle. Judging by the short clips and teasers we've seen, combat bears a strong resemblance to Darkest Dungeon--a game the team doesn't shy away from acknowledging as an inspiration. "No coincidences here," they say.
"The art style was chiefly inspired by the works of Mike Mignola and his awesome Hellboy series. One of the goals of the artwork was to reflect the innate seriousness of the topic without compromising the overall visual accessibility, and we felt that drawing upon Mignola's art would help achieve that."
Outside of battle you will manage your squad and monitor the ongoing efforts in various city districts, carefully dedicating your attention to where it's needed most. "As districts provide valuable resources for the Uprising," says Pixelated Milk, "it is up to player to decide what is and what isn't worth saving.
"The game is divided into three major parts/segments: the squad's hideout, the city patrols, and the resulting combat in enemy encounters. We believe most of the time will be spent during the combat encounters but each undertaken mission presents opportunities to delve deeper into the everyday reality of the Uprising through interspersed events and mini-adventures."
The resistance fighters you meet will come from different walks of life, and with different connections to the Uprising. "For example," Pixelated Milk explains, "we have Kazimierz, the street-hustling vendor who considers the Uprising bad for business, but feels roped into active participation due to his unsafe connections with the Polish underground. On the other end of the spectrum, we have Krzysztof, a hothead youth who has joined the fight for idealistic reasons, but the same idealistic fervor makes him hard to work with within the organization. At the end of the day, none of these people are heroes--or villains--but just that: people."
They may not start out heroes, but at one point or another they will have to fight. Diving into the finer details of combat, Pixelated Milk says "the game's four primary combat mechanics revolve around balancing activations, stamina, positioning, and ammunition. Across all the weapon classes--all based on weapons historically used--there are quite a lot of different weapon-specific skills that add to the mix. So with enough time, practice, and getting to know which characters, weapons, and skills work best you will have a better chance to face the challenges ahead."
Because every fighter is a key character with a backstory and a unique skill set, when they die in battle, you'll lose not only a close ally, but every advantage they brought to your squad. And according to the developer, side quests "may also present dangers--risks that may be mitigated with successful skill checks... or exacerbated dramatically on failure.
"Warsaw is an attempt to create something unorthodox about a topic that traditionally does not translate very well into a video game format, and one that remains rather obscure to the world outside our home country of Poland." Fear and loss are cited as key themes, but so too are camaraderie and devotion. If the cinematic teaser above is anything to go by, Warsaw won't pull any punches when they all come to a head.
Pixelated Milk's Warsaw is heading to PC, PS4, and Switch later this year, and will be publicly playable for the first time at PAX East from March 28-31. To keep up with the game's ongoing development, keep an eye on the official @warsawthegame Twitter account.
Epic Games has dropped another teaser for Fortnite Season 8. In keeping with the previous two, this one comes in the form of a short, cryptic poem, which is accompanied by an image that offers a peek at what is presumably a new skin coming in next season.
"Awaken beasts / Of fire and ash / Battle it out / And loot the stash," the poem reads, further reinforcing the pirate theme hinted at in Epic's previous Season 8 teasers. The accompanying image, meanwhile, features a fearsome-looking tiger head in the background--presumably part of a new skin the developer is introducing to the game.
Awaken beasts Of fire and ash Battle it out And loot the stash. 2 days to Season 8. pic.twitter.com/rdMrhYbZ1S
The previous two teasers thus far have suggested Season 8 will have a pirate theme, with references to treasure and "those who arrive on the waves," although it's unclear how this will translate to gameplay. Interestingly, when all of the teasers are combined, they form one large image of a skull, as pointed out below.
Fortnite Season 8 teaser image updated. You can see what's probably the final battle pass skin. pic.twitter.com/fhTg2QpZlm
Epic has confirmed that Season 8's start date is February 28, which means you have until then to complete any remaining Season 7 challenges. As an added incentive to do so, the developer is giving the Season 8 Battle Pass for free to players who finish Season 7's Overtime challenges. The Battle Pass typically costs 950 V-Bucks, so this is a good opportunity to get it without have to spend any money.
In the lead up to Season 8, earthquakes have been occurring in the game. These first started following the release of the 7.30 update earlier this month, and they've been growing in intensity since, so much so that cracks are now appearing in the island. What this portends for next season remains to be seen, but it'll presumably lead to some significant changes to the map.
The February 25 episode of WWE's Raw began as an emotional one. Roman Reigns kicked off the show by announcing his cancer was in remission. Then, it was business as usual as Raw heavily promoted that it was Ric Flair's 70th birthday, and there was going to be a huge celebration. Patiently, the WWE Universe waited, and all the time we forgot we were watching wrestling and of course, this celebration was not going to go as planned.
The stage was set to honor WWE Hall of Famer Ric Flair, as the entrance ramp was surrounded by current WWE superstars, and in the ring were other Hall of Famers and legends. Triple H and Stephanie McMahon revealed a special, custom championship title for Flair. Wow, this is going to be one heck of a celebration. Nothing could go wrong, right?
If you're new to the world of wrestling, you were probably in for quite a shock as something did, in fact, go wrong with this celebration, which you can see in the video above. You see, Flair never came to the ring. As the cameras cut to the backstage area, we saw former WWE star and current Guardian of the Galaxy, Batista, dragging a camera man to the dressing room for Flair. The actor who plays Drax eventually came out with a beaten-up Nature Boy, dragging him across the floor.
"Hey Hunter," exclaimed Batista. "Do I have your attention now? HUH?!" Triple H ran backstage, but Batista was already gone. Obviously, this is all setting up a Wrestlemania match between Triple H and Batista, and you don't need "inside info" from WWE to see that.
Can we back it up for a second though? Before Batista laid the Smackdown® on Flair, the Nature Boy was already late to his own celebration. In fact, he hadn't even left the dressing room yet to go to the ring. So everyone is waiting for Flair, and he's just hanging out in his dressing room? I know "fashionably late" is a thing, but come on. Or did Batista beat him up in his own dressing room, then run out to grab the cameraman? If so, why did Batista make the cameraman wait outside and slam the door when he was grabbing Flair out of the dressing room? Am I thinking way too hard about this? Yes.
During Smackdown 1000 last October, there was a reunion of the wrestling stable Evolution, which consisted of Ric Flair, Triple H, Randy Orton, and Batista. When Batista got on the mic during the Evolution segment, he took a little dig at Triple H. "There is nothing... NOTHING this man hasn't done in this business," Batista said, before living in an emotional beat. "Except beat me." And that right there is the moment where WWE fans knew something was coming down the pipeline. However, being that it happened four months ago, we had already forgotten about it, but it was the catalyst for what is obviously coming, a Wrestlemania match, where Triple H will have a ridiculous, yet exceptionally awesome, entrance to the ring. As much as I tend to complain about returning wrestlers getting random Mania spots, I'm very excited about this one.
And yes, in the world of WWE, nothing goes as planned. Contract signings end with someone beaten up, weddings are interrupted and ruined by jerks, and private, backstage meetings always end up with someone getting thrown into a giant box on wheels. And I can't tell you how many times in my real life I've done something stupid like this because of my love of wrestling. I know Senior Editor Mike Rougeau is still in a lot of pain after I chokeslammed him through a table during my last contract signing for GameSpot--I'm not sorry. It's all just payback for the time he superkicked me during the middle of my wedding. This is how wrestling works, and I'd have it no other way.
Expect the Batista vs. Triple H story to brew and simmer for the next few weeks, and it will probably include Batista showing up at Fastlane, the Puddle of Mudd of WWE PPVs. Don't expect, however, this story to further itself on Smackdown, as that series already has plenty of strong storylines to work on. Wrestlemania is happening on April 7 in East Rutherford, New Jersey.
The PS4 Slim, which originally launched with a 500GB hard drive but is now available with 1TB of storage, normally sells for $300. Luckily, you can save a few bucks if you seal the deal today: Using the promo code EMCTVVA36, you can pick up the PS4 Slim with a 1TB hard drive for $30 off at Newegg, dropping the price to $270 (free shipping included).
The sale is running for today only, so act fast if you want to take advantage of the deal. Once you're a proud PS4 owner, get busy with these top-rated PS4 games from last year; plus, put these upcoming releases on your radar.
Red Dead Online, the online multiplayer component for Red Dead Redemption 2, is getting its first huge update. The patch includes new weapons and clothing, new gameplay elements, balance changes, and a host of other features. Some of the new features will roll out today, while others are targeting the coming weeks.
Starting today you can complete daily challenges for gold nuggets and XP. You'll have seven daily challenges that rotate every day. Completing all seven in one day will get you a bonus. You can also pick up a new Rare Shotgun weapon, and PlayStation 4 players will get the first crack at a new Jawbone Knife.
Then from next week, you can compete with other Posses in a new Free Roam event called Fool's Gold. One player will wear a protective suit of Golden Armor, and taking them down will give you armor and points, plus damage reduction to take on the enemy.
Sometime further in the future, Rockstar plans to begin dropping new modes each week. Target Races will have you race against other players on horseback while pinging targets with your bow and arrow and limited bullets. Fishing challenges pits you against your friends for the biggest cumulative catch, so you'll have to strategize if you target the biggest fish in the lake or try to rack up smaller, easier ones. Three new Showdown Modes--Up In Smoke, Spoils of War, and Plunder--are coming soon too. PlayStation 4 players will be first to get a Special Series option that launches them directly into the latest modes as they become available. Xbox One will get the feature afterward.
Also coming soon will be the Evans Repeater weapon, along with new outfits and individual clothing items like boots, coats, gloves, hats, and vests. You can also use a variety of new emotes, and emotes will have another level of intensity that you can activate with a double-tap.
Gameplay changes taking effect starting today include an update to player radar and visibility, with the option to limit proximity chat and a highlight over particularly aggressive players. It will also be easier to start a Parley or a Feud, and the law and bounty system has been revised.
If you log in to Red Dead Online anytime before March 5, you'll get a free pack of goods delivered to your Camp Lockbox or Post Office. That includes two Potent Snake Oils, two Potent Bitters, two Potent Miracle Tonics, two Horse Revivers, two Potent Horse Stimulants, eight Poison Arrows, and 10 Explosive Slugs.
If you haven't jumped into Red Dead Online yet and these changes are tempting you to give it a go, you can saddle up for almost half-price right now. Walmart has Red Dead 2 on sale for $35, making it cheaper than ever to explore the Wild West.
A Nintendo Direct presentation focused on Pokemon will air this week, Nintendo announced today. The livestream promises to bring "roughly seven minutes of new information" as part of a livestream.
The Pokemon-themed Direct is scheduled for Wednesday, February 27 at 6 AM PT / 9 AM ET / 2 PM GMT (1 AM AET on February 28). It's unclear what will be discussed, but it's possible The Pokemon Company will reveal more about its Pokemon game for Switch, which was first announced at E3 2017. You'll be able to watch the stream on Nintendo's website or here on GameSpot.
Pokemon: Let's Go, Pikachu and Let's Go Eevee were released for Nintendo Switch in November 2018 as remakes of sorts of Pokemon Yellow. They incorporated some elements of the mobile phenomenon Pokemon Go in an attempt to ease newer players into the mainline series.
Pokemon for Switch, on the other hand, is described as "a core RPG Pokemon title." Little else is known about the forthcoming title, though The Pokemon Company did confirm at its initial reveal that the game would launch in the latter half of 2019. It would make sense, therefore, for us to hear more about the game around now.
Pokemon director Junichi Masuda has stated developer Game Freak is looking into ways of transferring your existing creatures to new games. "We're definitely always thinking of that kind of forward-moving functionality, especially since we've introduced [Pokemon transfer service] Pokemon Bank," Masuda told GameSpot. "Now, up to Ultra Sun and Ultra Moon, you're able to store your Pokemon, and we know they're very important to everyone. I mean, obviously, people would be very sad if they couldn't use their Pokemon in a future game. So, it does get complicated when you talk about the details and we're still figuring it out, but we do have plans to find ways to let players use their Pokemon in the next game." For more on the upcoming title(s), check out everything we know so far about Pokemon for Nintendo Switch.
February 27 is Pokemon Day, The Pokemon Company's yearly celebration of its huge pocket monster franchise. Pokemon Go is holding a special event, with generation one creatures spawning more frequently along with shiny versions of Pidgey and Rattata.
The new trailer for Pokemon: Detective Pikachu is here. The live-action movie based on the hugely popular game series releases in May and stars Ryan Reynolds as the world-famous yellow Pokemon.
While November's first trailer set up the world of the movie, this new one gives us plenty of plot and action. A famous private detective has gone missing, leading his son Tim to start investigating what has happened to him. Tim used to be an aspiring Pokemon trainer, and finds himself reluctantly teamed up with Pikachu to solve the mystery. There's tons of wild action, plus some more Pokemon cameos, including Ludicolo, Mr. Mime, Loudred, Jigglypuff, and Mewtwo. Check it out above.
The cast also includes Justice Smith (Jurassic World: Fallen Kingdom), Kathryn Newton (Blockers), Ken Watanabe (Godzilla, Inception), and Bill Nighy (Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows). Detective Pikachu is directed by Rob Letterman, who previously helmed Goosebumps, Captain Underpants, and Shark Tale. The movie hits theaters on May 10, 2019. A new poster has also been released, which you can see at the end of this story.
This week also saw the release of a new promotional video, featuring Reynolds. In the promo, Reynolds reveals the different methods he used to fully inhabit the role, such as living at Pikachu height by lying flat on public sidewalks, and attempting to lose 182 pounds to match the character's weight.
Detective Pikachu is based on the video game of the same name. A shorter, downloadable version of the game was released in Japan in 2016, with the full version released worldwide in March 2018. In her review for GameSpot, Kallie Plagge said that it is a "simple game," with "not much variety to the way you solve cases." Nevertheless, "it's full of heart, and its silly characters and intentionally campy tone are what make it fun."
Trials Rising's release date has finally arrived, with the series' unique biking gameplay returning to PS4, Xbox One, and PC, and coming to Nintendo Switch for the first time. In fact, it's the first Trials game to ever come to a Nintendo console.
The franchise's last game, Trials Fusion, was warmly received upon its 2014 launch, but how does the latest entry fare? GameSpot's Trials Rising review awards the game a 7/10, and you can see more reviews below. Alternatively, check out GameSpot sister site Metacritic for a wider view of the game's critical consensus.
GameSpot -- 7/10
"Trials Rising maintains the engrossing, challenging, and occasionally slapstick gameplay from past entries in the series, building upon it in small ways with a smartly implemented school to teach fundamental skills and modifiers to make events worth revisiting. But it also doesn't fix issues from the past, either. Its track editor remains uninviting to learn, and the more outrageous stunt events and course obstacles frustratingly lean more into random luck than calculated skill. Trials Rising isn't a reinvention of the franchise--it's an invitation to lose more hours to new exhilarating, technical, and ridiculous Trials courses." -- Alessandro Barbosa [Full review]
GamesRadar -- 4/5
"Leveling up adds an extra layer that Trials really didn't need--it's always been about chasing after faster times and flawless runs, not grinding for levels and loot. Perhaps fixing the leveling issues would be as simple as a post-launch patch tuning some Contract reward numbers. But whenever you're actively revving up your bike in Trials Rising, the XP faff falls away, and all you can think about is maintaining your smooth, speedy ride." -- Lucas Sullivan [Full review]
IGN -- 7.9/10
"Trials Rising offers some of the coolest levels in the series to date, and its new tutorial system does a better job of teaching you how to actually execute its hardest techniques than any game before it. That wide variety of tracks is unfortunately bogged down by the frustrating grind it takes to unlock them all and some strange decisions that lead to a more discouraging experience, but it's still satisfying to get back on the bike and try for better medals if you can make it to the finish line." -- Tom Marks [Full review]
Trusted Reviews -- 4.5/5
"Trials Rising isn't going to set the world on fire, but it achieves what it sets out to do with aplomb. It's a simple concept, executed with flair, and if that's not worth applauding then what is? It's also worth applauding as a return to form for the Trials franchise, which hasn't made much of an impact with its recent releases, but here still manages to feel like a polished release that can stand up amongst a recent period of solid AAA releases." -- Jake Tucker [Full review]
Walmart is currently offering one of the best deals we have ever seen on Rockstar's acclaimed open-world western Red Dead Redemption 2. The US retailer is selling the game for PS4 and Xbox One for only $35, which is nearly half off its normal $60 asking price.
Go to Walmart's website here to choose a platform and place an order if you are interested. Shipping is free or you can pick up the game in store. Amazon also has Red Dead Redemption 2 on sale right now for $40. If you're after a digital copy of Red Dead Redemption 2, the PlayStation Store has the Western for $45 while the Xbox Store has it for $40.
Rockstar Games continues to support Red Dead Redemption 2's multiplayer mode, Red Dead Online, with new updates, but there is no word on if there will be any single-player expansions.
Gears of War 5, which is actually called Gears 5, is coming together well ahead of its 2019 release date, it seems. Xbox boss Phil Spencer recently traveled to Vancouver to visit Gears 5 developer The Coalition, and he came away impressed, apparently.
Spencer took a sneaky picture of the team playing Gears 5. You can zoom in on the image to try to get a closer look at what's on screen, but in any case, it's hard to make out. Spencer remarked of his trip to see the game, "Gears 5 is looking great."
This is the only one I could sneak while Rod wasn't looking. Gears 5 is looking great. pic.twitter.com/yfUxvYEoOi
That's all there is to go on from Spencer's visit to The Coalition to see Gears 5. Earlier in February, The Coalition boss Rod Fergusson teased that the game was at that point still recording voice lines.
Another awesome day in the booth directing some of our talented VO cast. Can't wait for this story to come out! #Gears5pic.twitter.com/TTCOYuVHGP
Gears 5 is the first entry in the series with a female playable lead. The game tells the story of Kait Diaz, who was first introduced in Gears of War 4 and whose character arc culminated with a conclusion that left many wondering what could happen next.
If you've missed out on the Gears of War games or want to revisit them, all of the Gears of War games are available through Xbox Game Pass.
In addition to Gears 5, a Gears of War movie is in development. There is no word yet on who may star in the film, but Guardians of the Galaxy and James Bond actor Dave Bautista has said Marcus Fenix is his dream role.
As part of a wide-ranging Reddit AMA recently, Epic Games answered loads of questions about the hugely popular free-to-play battle royale game Fortnite. One topic that came up in the AMA was respawning.
Fortnite's non-solo modes allows players to revive teammates, but there is never true respawning like there is in Respawn's new battle royale game Apex Legends. In the AMA, one of the game's producers said Epic has been "considering [respawning] for a while and have been exploring it."
We haven't seen it in Fortnite yet because Epic still needs more time to fully understand the impact it would have on the overall balance. "We've been considering this mechanic for a while and have been exploring it. Want to make sure we give it the time it needs and fully understand its impact on the game as a whole," Epic said. "Look for further updates during Season 8."
Season 8, which may have a pirate theme, is set to begin on February 28, so it may not be long until we learn more about Epic's plans for respawning in Fortnite.
Fortnite is a last-player-standing, Hunger Games-style battle royale game, so respawning seems to run counter to the appeal of the experience. Apex Legends allows players to respawn teammates--but it's not always easy or effective. And that game is different, as players are put into squads of three and there is generally more of a focus on teamplay.
Rage 2 is coming out in May for PS4, Xbox One, and PC, but before that, publisher Bethesda is planning a big promotional event for the game in Australia. The publisher is installing a "Goonfest Marquee" at the metal-themed Download Festival in Sydney and Melbourne in March.
According to a press release, those in attendance can visit the Rage 2 installation to get (temporary??) tattoos and makeup, and have their hair done with a punk flair. "Join the squad at the 'Goonfest' Marquee so you too can experience the ultimate chaos of dystopian characters, contortionists and firebreathers!" reads a line from Bethesda's press release.
Download Festival comes to Sydney on March 9 and Melbourne on March 11. The bill includes heavy metal juggernauts such as Slayer and Judas Priest, as well as Alice in Chains, Rise Against, Sum 41, Anthrax, Pennywise, Halestorm, and Australia's own Airbourne, among others. Ozzy Osbourne was set to play at the main headliner, but he dropped out recently due to health issues.
Rage 2 is developed by Avalanche Studios in Sweden, a country home to loads of metal bands including Amon Amarth, In Flames, At The Gates, Opeth, and Meshuggah, among others. Id Software, the developer of the original Rage, is also assisting in the game's development.
The game is set 30 years after the events of the first Rage, which was released in 2011 for Xbox 360, PlayStation 3, and PC. The Earth has started to recover after being ravaged by a global catastrophe, and plant and animal life have begun springing up around the planet, making it more colourful.
Blizzard recently began teasing another Overwatch story, seeming to focus on a new character named Baptiste. The company has now released a lengthy story trailer focusing on his background, and confirming that he'll be the next playable hero--Hero 30.
As detailed in the story trailer, Baptiste was one of millions orphaned during the Omnic Crisis. In an apparent act of desperation, he joined the villainous group Talon. But he came to regret his decision and abandoned them. As detailed in the initial teaser, the group subsequently sent operatives to silence him, and they went missing themselves. Now he roams the world trying to help people, whether they need a band-aid or a bullet.
The first teaser was a letter signed by a Captain Cuerva, as part of one of the Talon ops to capture or kill Baptiste. Cuerva said not to underestimate Baptiste, and that he personally oversaw his Talon training. Cuerva's mission went awry and several agents went missing. At the time, it wasn't clear if Baptiste was the new hero or Cuerva.
Now we know for certain that it's Baptiste, but we haven't seen his abilities or play style, or exactly when he's coming as a playable character. The attention given to his background as a medic suggests he'll be a support character.
New characters are released first on the PC's Public Test Realm before moving into the live game on PC, PS4, and Xbox One sometime later. With multiple teases having now been released, the character's release could be coming soon.
Apex Legends, the new battle royale game from Titanfall developer Respawn, is doing very well less than a month after release, but it hasn't been entirely smooth sailing for the free-to-play title. One recurring complaint from fans is about the game's hitboxes. Specifically, people are upset that the hitboxes--that is, the invisible area on a character that registers shots--appear to vary by character.
A Respawn community manager said on Reddit (via PC Gamer) that the studio is "definitely aware of" these concerns. "We were actually discussing it today. I can't say anything more for now but we hear you guys."
A YouTube video from SookieSpy shows that Apex Legends' hitboxes are generally very good; in some cases, you're able to shoot between legs and through Bloodhound's feathers without registering a hit. However, the robot Legend, Pathfinder, registers hits that appear to be outside of what would be reasonably considered the hitbox. In essence, he's much easier to hit, which is seemingly a problem that Respawn may look to address in a future update.
In other news, Apex Legends recently released a brand-new gun called Havoc. Unlike other weapons, Havoc has multiple hop-up attachments and the ability to function as an automatic rifle or a sniper.
Apex Legends reached 25 million players after its first week, hitting more than 2 million peak concurrent players. It's set in the Titanfall universe, but it doesn't feature the franchise's trademark giant mechs or wall-running mechanics. Still, many people are enjoying the game, including here at GameSpot.
In GameSpot's Apex Legends review, critic Phil Hornshaw awarded the game 9/10. "Apex Legends is a mix of smart shooter ideas that makes for a competitive, team-based game that gets at all the best parts of battle royale while addressing a lot of the weaknesses," he said. "Respawn's intense focus on team play makes Apex more than just a worthy addition to the genre; it's an indicator of where battle royale should go in the future."
After Bungie split off of Microsoft, the Halo series was at something of a crossroads. Veteran Microsoft developer Bonnie Ross recalls in a fascinating new interview that at this time, some at Microsoft questioned whether or not the series would live on.
"When we spun Bungie out, the future of Halo was uncertain," Ross said in an interview with IGN. "We weren't actually sure [if] Halo 3 was going to be the last game."
As fans may recall, Halo 3's story ended in ambiguous fashion. Master Chief could have been dead. He wasn't of course, and his story would go on to be continued in Halo 4 and Halo 5. Those games were developed by 343 Industries, Microsoft's internal Halo development studio that Ross founded.
She recalled pitching the idea for an internal Halo development studio, and the reaction wasn't entirely positive. Ross said she remembers then-Xbox boss Shane Kim advising against it. He warned her that people at Microsoft might try to convince her to do things with the franchise that aren't right for it. Another former Xbox boss, Robbie Bach, also said it might not be a smart move to continue the Halo series with Bungie out of the picture, Ross said.
"Robbie Bach and Shane Kim were like, 'Hey, Halo's great, Bungie doesn't want to do it anymore.' Robbie and Shane were not people who were thinking just for the money but it was basically like, 'Hey, I think it's maybe good for another game or two and [then] let's just cut our losses and tell another story.'"
So the idea became to potentially tell a four-game series of Master Chief-focused Halo games and then "wrap it up," Ross said. With that in mind, Microsoft considered potentially bringing on an outside studio to make potentially "one or two other [Halo] games" after Halo: Reach and Halo 3: ODST. Those titles, which were developed by Bungie and published by Microsoft after the split, do not feature Master Chief as the main character. But the new titles presumably would.
The leading name to take on the job was Gearbox, the studio behind Borderlands. The studio has a history with Halo, as it developed the PC edition of Halo: Combat Evolved. However, Ross said she thought it was "blasphemy" to have an outside studio make a Halo game.
As for why Ross believed in Halo as a franchise so much, she pointed out that the entirety of Halo 1-3's story takes place in only three months of time, fictionally, so there are many more stories to be told. Indeed, the story of Halo 4 and Halo 5: Guardians went in new directions. The next Halo game, Halo Infinite, puts more of an emphasis on Chief than Halo 5, but nothing else is known about the story. A recent report from Brad Sams claims Halo Infinite will be a launch title for a new Xbox releasing in 2020.
Ross was recently inducted into the AIAS Hall of Fame. The first woman in the AIAS Hall of Fame, Ross joins other industry legends like Bethesda's Todd Howard, along with Mario creator Shigeru Miyamoto, Metal Gear designer Hideo Kojima, and Valve founder Gabe Newell.
The Pokemon series is celebrating its 23rd anniversary on February 27, and Niantic is commemorating the occasion with a special event in Pokemon Go. The annual Pokemon Day celebration returns at 1 PM PT / 4 PM ET on February 26, and it'll feature a lot of Pokemon from the original Red and Blue versions.
Throughout the event, Pokemon that appear early on in the Gen 1 games will spawn much more frequently in the wild. Moreover, players will have a chance of finding Shiny versions of Pidgey and Rattata, and Kanto Pokemon will also be featured in Raid Battles.
On top of that, players will have a chance of encountering special versions of Pikachu and Eevee during the Pokemon Day event. These variants will be wearing festive flower crowns, and they can be found either in the wild or through special Field Research tasks.
The Pokemon Day event runs until 1 PM PT / 4 PM ET on February 28. You can read more details about it on the official Pokemon Go website.
Niantic recently rolled out a new AR photo mode for Pokemon Go, and it came with a surprise: Smeargle. The Painter Pokemon has begun appearing in the mobile game for the first time, but the only way to encounter it is through the new mode. Smeargle will reportedly occasionally appear in photos you take, then show up in the wild after you exit the mode, giving you a chance to catch it.
In other Pokemon Go news, Niantic is introducing a new item to the game this week called the Team Medallion. It can be purchased from the in-game shop and gives players the option to switch teams, but it can only be used once every 365 days. The developer has also brought back the Legendary Pokemon Latias for a limited-time Raid event.
Red Candle Games has removed its game, Devotion, from Steam. The removal occurs after a weekend of bad PR for Devotion, which saw heavy review bombing after being caught in controversy.
According to PC Gamer, Devotion launched to positive reviews. However, the Taiwanese first-person horror game came under fire when a piece of in-game art that seems to mock Chinese president Xi Jinping was discovered. The art compares the president to Winnie the Pooh, a comparison the Chinese government frequently objects to. Red Candle Games issued an initial apology--which implied the image was simply a placeholder--but after Devotion came under heavy review bombing, the developer followed up with a longer, more comprehensive apology.
"When the art material was made, each teammate was busy working on one's own tasks while chasing the deadline," Red Candle Games wrote in the second apology. "None of the other colleagues were aware of this. It was until we received a private report made by a player on February 21 that we realized what was exactly written on that art material. Upon learning of this, we immediately replaced the art material within an hour."
"We would also like to take this opportunity to reaffirm that Devotion's publisher Indievent and Winking Entertainment did not know about the art material beforehand and were not involved in this incident at all," the developer continued. "Currently our partnership has terminated." Red Candle Games ended the apology with the announcement that Devotion is now removed from Steam China. However, as of writing this article, the game is gone from Steam entirely. Every trailer for the game has been removed from Red Candle Games' YouTube channel as well.
Devotion is Red Candle's second game, which follows the developer's horror title, Detention. Both games borrow elements of Taiwanese and Chinese religion and mythology to create terrifying experiences that also critique elements of both countries' cultures. In Devotion, you explore an abandoned apartment complex in Taiwan during the 1980s, only to discover a religious family that lived there suffered some spooky, cult-like events.
Red Candle Games hasn't yet announced whether Devotion will return to Steam. The game was only available on PC exclusively through Steam so you can no longer buy it.
If you're looking for something to watch on Netflix, then you're in luck, as the month of March starts this week, and that means a whole slew of new content is coming to the streaming service. From movies to TV series to Netflix originals, there is plenty for you to binge in your free time.
While February is coming to a close, there are still a few more releases to keep your eye on. On February 27, the 2018 A&E series Unsolved: Tupac & Biggie hits Netflix. The 10 episode season is a true crime series that recounted the murder investigations of rappers Tupac Shakur and Biggie Smalls. Then on February 28, a new collection of Jeopardy episodes hits the service, and you and your friends can watch the game show and discuss Alex Trebek's mustache, which we all greatly miss.
Friday, March 1, is when Netflix drops a ton of new content. There are eight Netflix originals and series dropping, but nothing with a lot of hype behind it. However, there are a few movies you'll want to check out. Stanley Kubrick's A Clockwork Orange hits the service, where you can get your fill of ultra-violence. Additionally, Wet Hot American Summer comes to Netflix as well, which is a bit confusing, as the service has an original series spin-off of this movie. When did Wet Hot American Summer leave Netflix to begin with?
Anyway, below, you can find everything coming to Netflix this week. Mark our calendars for the ones that excite you, and you can check out everything coming to the service for March.
Avail. 2/25/19
Dolphin Tale 2
Avail. 2/26/19
Our Idiot Brother
Avail. 2/27/19
Unsolved: Tupac & Biggie
Avail. 2/28/19
Jeopardy!: Collection 2
The Rebound
Avail. 3/1/19
A Clockwork Orange
Apollo 13
Budapest (FR)-- NETFLIX FILM
Cricket Fever: Mumbai Indians-- NETFLIX ORIGINAL
Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon
Disney's Saving Mr. Banks
Emma
Junebug
Larva Island: Season 2-- NETFLIX ORIGINAL
Losers-- NETFLIX ORIGINAL
Music and Lyrics
Nick and Norah's Infinite Playlist
Northern Rescue-- NETFLIX ORIGINAL
River's Edge (JP)-- NETFLIX FILM
Stuart Little
Sweeney Todd: The Demon Barber of Fleet Street
The Boy Who Harnessed the Wind-- NETFLIX FILM
The Hurt Locker
The Notebook
Tyson
Wet Hot American Summer
Winter's Bone
Your Son (ES)-- NETFLIX FILM
Avail. 3/2/19
Romance is a Bonus Book (Korea) (Streaming Every Saturday)-- NETFLIX ORIGINAL
Pokemon Go's new AR photo mode is now live for all players level 5 and above, and it comes with an added surprise: a new Pokemon. By using the feature, players will have their first chance of encountering the elusive Gen 2 Pokemon Smeargle in Niantic's mobile game. Here's how you can catch one of your own.
According to Pokemon fansite Serebii, Smeargle may appear in photos you take using the Go Snapshot feature. If the Painter Pokemon does show up in one of your pictures, it will be waiting in the wild after you exit out of the mode, giving you an opportunity to capture it.
It's unclear if there's a way to ensure that Smeargle will appear in your photos, but if you do manage to encounter one, it will have the same moves as the Pokemon it photobombed. You'll also receive a new Photo Bomb medal after you find one.
Smeargle is unique among Pokemon in the mainline series due to the fact that it can only learn one move, Sketch, every 10 levels. This move will permanently copy the last move the opponent Pokemon used, effectively giving Smeargle the ability to learn any attack.
Once you've hit the requisite level, you'll be able to use the Go Snapshot feature any time by selecting the Camera in your item bag. The mode allows you to position one of the Pokemon in your collection around the screen and take photos of it. These pictures will be automatically saved to your device, allowing you to easily share them with friends and on social media.
In other Pokemon Go news, Niantic has brought back the Gen 3 Legendary Pokemon Latias for a limited time as part of a special Raid event. The developer is also introducing a new item to the game this week called the Team Medallion, which will give players the ability to switch teams.
Finally, to celebrate the Pokemon series' anniversary, Niantic is holding a special Pokemon Day event this week from February 26-28. During the event, players will have a chance of encountering special versions of Pikachu and Eevee wearing floral crowns, as well as Shiny variants of Pidgey and Rattata.
True Detective's Season 3 finale was an oppressively strange episode of television, even by True Detective's standards. The entire hour and 20 minutes rode a tense, haunting score that had me holding my breath between every scene, waiting for some awful, final other shoe to drop. Even as Wayne's discoveries turned happy--or, at least, as happy as this show is capable of getting--the tone remained oddly ominous. And then, it was over--just like that, no final revelations or satisfying last note. True Detective Season 3 ended with a sigh, and it felt utterly flat.
The reasons for that aren't hard to discern. Series creator Nic Pizzolatto has been open about wanting to make Season 3 more straightforward; he said at a press conference before the season began airing that he wanted to have "no tricks up his sleeve."
"Because 2015 and 1990 are happening at the same time as 1980, you're sort of constantly being told what is going to happen," Pizzolatto said. "It's telling you everything that's going to happen before it happens. I wanted to be able to do that--to not play any cheap games with the viewer, to respect their attention and their time, but still reward them with revelation and reversal."
In this, he definitely succeeded. It just wasn't a great idea to begin with. The mystery genre is dependent on withholding information from the audience until it's time to make the big reveal, but True Detective Season 3 took a different tact. Instead of a shocking twist, Season 3's mystery--the missing kids--unfolded gradually throughout the entire season. There wasn't a final reveal, but a series of smaller, successive realizations that built throughout all eight episodes. As a result, the finale held no surprises for anyone who was paying attention. From the one-eyed man's magical exposition dump to the ultimate role Mike Ardoin played, every "reveal" in the final 80 minutes was clearly telegraphed and easily predicted. While that may have done the characters justice, it wasn't exactly an exciting high note on which to end.
The whole season felt deliberately written to throw off the armchair sleuths on Reddit who dissect every frame of each new episode. There were red herrings everywhere, giving rise to more outlandish new theories week after week: Was Amelia really the killer, getting close to Wayne and writing true crime books to hide in plain sight? Did the Hoyt family run a pedophilia ring to which Lucy Purcell was pimping out her kids? Were Tom and Roland secretly lovers? Had Roland actually betrayed Wayne years ago, and Wayne simply forgot because of his increasing dementia?
Turns out, nope. Amelia simply fell in love with Wayne, there was no pedophilia ring, Roland was always on Wayne's side, and Hoyt knew that Wayne had had something to do with Harris's disappearance because--unsurprisingly--security cameras caught the detectives tailing Hoyt's head of security. Like a deeply unsatisfying Occam's Razor, the answer to every question during True Detective Season 3 was simpler than fans guessed. And the whole season felt designed to guide us onto false trails.
Compare this all to another HBO show with an unsatisfying recent arc: Westworld Season 2. The latest season of the sci-fi cowboy caper was unbelievably convoluted, with timelines, characters, and twist after twist all muddled together until viewers could hardly tell what was going on. It was the exact opposite of True Detective Season 3's problems, but it felt like it came from the same point of origin: a desire on the creators' parts to befuddle theorizing fans on the internet.
This, in turn, feels like an indictment of said fans--and nobody enjoys being admonished, especially by the creators of something we love. In True Detective Season 3, the documentary interviewer in the 2015 timeline can be read as a stand-in for us. And she's not meant to be a sympathetic character. She pries at every small crack in Wayne's story, poking and prodding in an attempt to learn truths that, at that point in the story, Wayne himself hadn't even discovered. Wayne grudgingly submits to this questioning, despite wanting to keep his secrets to himself, and he weathers the onslaught like a righteous rock facing an annoying tempest. To top it off, the interviewer is also probably sleeping with Wayne's married son, Henry--a pointless detail that just makes her that much more villainous.
True Detective Season 3 wasn't all bad by any stretch. Mahershala Ali and Stephen Dorff's portrayals of the two detectives throughout their lives were incredibly nuanced, and those impressive performances alone might warrant re-watching the show again in the future. But when the thing you're "reversing," as Pizzolatto put it, is fans' expectation that the show's central mysteries will conclude with a satisfying payoff, it's understandable that True Detective's Season 3 finale felt flat.
Back in October, the recently crowned WWE Universal Champion Roman Reigns announced that he would be vacating the title as he had been diagnosed with leukemia and needed to take time off. However, Reigns returned to Raw on February 25 to reveal that he's in remission and ready to compete in the WWE again.
There has been a lot of speculation around Reigns the past week, as WWE put out a press release stating the superstar would appear on the February 25 episode of Raw. During the opening moments of the show, Reigns came out to the ring and declared, "The good news is I'm in remission, y'all. So with that being said, the big dog is back!"
It was back on the October 22 episode of Raw where Reigns gave a speech to the world about his leave of absence, vowing to return: "Sometimes life throws you a curveball," Reigns said. "And right now, the best thing for me to do is to go home and focus on my family and my health... But I want to make one thing clear. By no means is this a retirement speech. After I'm done whooping leukemia's ass once again, I'm coming back home."
Now that Reigns is back, he's just in time for Wrestlemania season--and the Fastlane PPV airing on the WWE Network on March 10. He didn't actually announce any plans for where he goes from here, though, whether he'll be back in the ring for Fastlane or the upcoming biggest show of the year.
However, with all eyes focused on Wrestlemania on April 7, where Brock Lesnar defends the Universal Championship against Seth Rollins--Reigns' former Shield partner--it's impossible to count him out for the granddaddy of them all. Could we see a triple threat match for the title, and more importantly, are we finally done with the era of Brock Lesnar? Or will he find another place on the card?
Whatever the case, welcome home, Roman Reigns. It's good to have you back.
Marvel's Spider-Man launched as a PS4 exclusive last September for $60, but if you've been waiting for that price to drop, today might be your best chance to snag this Insomniac Games hit title. Earlier this month, Insomniac Games announced Spider-Man has had a permanent price drop from $60 to $40, and you can snag the game for even cheaper right now at Newegg, where the standard edition is being sold for $35 (with free shipping!) through Thursday.
The game is also a few dollars off at Amazon, selling for $37 with free two-day shipping if you're a Prime member.
Spider-Man made GameSpot's list of the top 10 games of 2018 for its strong narrative, exciting combat, and impressive physics of wall-crawling and web-slinging around Manhattan. "It's exhilarating to step off a skyscraper and hear the orchestral score begin to swell, only to crescendo and level out as you start swinging towards your next objective," wrote associate editor Jordan Ramee. "There's never a moment in the game's 20-hour run-time where you don't want to be flying through the air."
And the best part about jumping into Spider-Man this late in the game is that all three chapters of the post-launch DLC, "The City That Never Sleeps," are available to play now as well, giving you hours of extra content to enjoy once you finish the main story. There's no better way to step into Spider-Man's shoes (and dozens of fantastic suits) and experience what it's like to be everyone's friendly neighborhood superhero.
Ubisoft has hosted a couple of private betas for The Division 2, but this weekend, the publisher is giving all players across PS4, Xbox One, and PC a chance to try out the upcoming shooter with its first open beta. Ahead of the test, Ubisoft has shared a new trailer showing off some of the content players will be able to experience.
The Division 2 open beta will run on all three platforms from March 1-4. During that time, players will be able to embark on three main missions on Normal and Hard modes. Two of these, Grand Washington Hotel and Jefferson Trade Center, were previously featured during the game's private betas, while Viewpoint Museum is new for this test.
The open beta will differ from the private tests in a few other ways. First, Ubisoft is raising the level cap to 8. There will also be an additional Skirmish PvP map (Capitol Ruins), as well as another Skill, Chem Launcher, which has two variants: Riot Foam and Explosive Vapor. Finally, Ubisoft is adding two additional Settlement Projects.
On top of that, players will be able to try out five side missions during the open beta, as well as a slice of The Division 2's endgame content. Once players complete Jefferson Trade Center, they'll unlock an endgame mission and three level 30 characters. The endgame mission will then begin when players log in as one of the unlocked characters.
Ubisoft has shared more details about this weekend's open beta on the game's official website. The Division 2 launches for PS4, Xbox One, and PC on March 15. In the meantime, you can read more about the title in our roundup of everything we know about The Division 2 and our favorite new features.
It's hard to argue that the Stan Lee cameo fans saw in the Academy Award-winningSpider-Man: Into the Spider-Verse is one of the comic book legends best yet. That the film's release came so soon after Lee's death gave the appearance even more impact for fans. However, what fans don't realize is that Lee is in almost every scene of the movie.
While it was previously revealed that Lee also popped up as a passenger on a train, thanks to a tweet shared by Sony animator Nick Kondo, it turns out that's only the tip of the iceberg. "He was a model that every animator wanted to use in the New York scene, so he often appeared quickly or briefly in a number of shots throughout the movie," producer Chris Miller revealed at an event celebrating the release of Spider-Man: Into the Spider-Verse on digital and Blu-ray. "Almost anytime there is a train going by, Stan's in it."
As it turns out, though, Lee isn't just in train scenes. "There's a scene when Miles and Peter land on the sidewalk and he says, 'Thanks New York' and the person walking over him is Stan on the phone, not noticing," Miller continues. "And there are many, many others, just tiny little bits because every animator wanted so desperately to be the one that animated Stan."
Of course, for sticklers who want to believe that each of the cameos is the same character popping up again and again, it creates a pretty insane day for Lee. As co-director Rodney Rothman joked, "The story of Stan's character in the movie if you were to lay it out is, he goes to work at his merch shop, he goes home [and] gets his dog, walks his dog, goes home, and then rides a train for 35 straight hours."
While Lee was animated into a number of scenes throughout the movie, he only provides his voice for the moment in which his character sells Miles Morales a Spider-Man costume. Recording that dialogue was a very special event for Rothman and his co-directors Bob Persichetti and Peter Ramsey, though.
"He was a sweetheart! He was kind of a sweet, little old man," Ramsey told GameSpot. "When we recorded him at his office, his health already wasn't the greatest and his eyesight wasn't very good. But, he was jovial, joking around, stiff upper lip. Not an unpleasant second in that whole experience."
As Persichetti explained, the role allowed Lee to, "Pass the torch in a very real way, which he was really down to do, and it meant a lot to us that he even knew our movie existed and clearly supported it and understood." He continued, "The spirit behind what he created is very much present in Miles, even though it is expressed differently and it meant a lot to us that he was part of our project."
Spider-Man: Into the Spider-Verse is out on digital on Tuesday, February 26. The Blu-ray release follows on March 19.
Despite what he says in this newly published video promoting Warner Bros.' upcoming Detective Pikachu movie, Ryan Reynolds isn't actually known for disappearing into his roles--unless you count putting on the Deadpool mask as disappearing. But it seems the actor is giving it his all to truly become the electric yellow mouse at the heart of Detective Pikachu.
In the video, Reynolds contends he did everything he could to lose himself in the role of Pikachu. He stopped picking his daughters up from school, practiced living at Pikachu height by lying flat on public sidewalks, and attempted to lose 182 pounds to match the character's weight. The video even features a special guest to weigh in on the toll the actor's exhaustive dedication has taken--but you'll have to watch the video to find out the rest.
Detective Pikachu is the live-action adaptation of the strangely conceived game of the same name, in which Pikachu takes on a human voice and solves mysteries. Here's the official plot synopsis from Warner Bros.:
The story begins when ace detective Harry Goodman goes mysteriously missing, prompting his 21-year-old son Tim to find out what happened. Aiding in the investigation is Harry's former Pokémon partner, Detective Pikachu: a hilariously wise-cracking, adorable super-sleuth who is a puzzlement even to himself. Finding that they are uniquely equipped to work together, as Tim is the only human who can talk with Pikachu, they join forces on a thrilling adventure to unravel the tangled mystery. Chasing clues together through the neon-lit streets of Ryme City--a sprawling, modern metropolis where humans and Pokémon live side by side in a hyper-realistic live-action world--they encounter a diverse cast of Pokémon characters and uncover a shocking plot that could destroy this peaceful co-existence and threaten the whole Pokémon universe.
It's a weird idea, but honestly, that sounds kind of incredible. And based on the movie's trailers, Detective Pikachu might actually be the live-action Pokemon movie we always wanted. Check out our Detective Pikachu hub if you want to dig deep and find out everything we know about this weirdly compelling film, and check it out in theaters May 10.
No comments:
Post a Comment