Fortnite's Week 7 challenges are now live, which means we're quickly nearing the end of Season 9. While there are still a few weeks remaining before Season 10 officially kicks off, if you play Fortnite on PC, you may need to upgrade your rig in order to join the battle next season.
Developer Epic Games has announced that Fortnite's minimum requirements on PC will change in Season 10. "Starting with Season 10, the PC version of Fortnite will require a graphics card capable of running Microsoft DirectX 11," Epic wrote on its website. As the developer explains:
"While a DirectX 11-capable graphics card has always been one of Fortnite's system requirements, we've kept support online for players with older graphics cards--so they could keep playing! However, when Season 10 begins, Fortnite will no longer be compatible with these older graphics cards. This allows us to focus our development and testing efforts to further optimize the Fortnite experience for all players."
Epic hasn't yet announced an exact start date for Season 10, but Season 9 is slated to end on August 1 according to the game's website. That means you'll have until then to complete any challenges and unlock all the Season 9 Battle Pass rewards. If you need help completing any of those, you can find tips for the trickier ones in our full Fortnite Season 9 challenges guide.
Fortnite's most recent update, patch 9.30, arrived earlier this week an introduced a new healing item to the game: the Chug Splash. When thrown, the item will heal you and other players who are within the range of its explosion. A subsequent patch addressed a variety of bugs and other issues that have impacted the game over the last few days.
PlayStation Plus has been unusually cheap these days, starting with Sony's E3 2019 Days of Play sale that offered the annual membership for $40 and an already sold-out flash sale at Newegg with the same deal. However, the latest discount on PS Plus is the most affordable deal we've seen, and it's going down over at MassGenie now through June 30 (or while supplies last). For a limited time, you can get a year of PS Plus for only $36--and thousands have already claimed the deal.
Here's how the deal works: Click the link above, and you'll be prompted to either sign in or create a free account at MassGenie (there's no guest checkout for Power Deals). After that, you'll be redirected to checkout, where you'll see the PS Plus 12-month membership is already in your cart with the promo code PSPLUS12MO applied, dropping the price to $36. At that point, you just have to fill out all the normal checkout information and click "submit Power Deal." Within a few days, you'll receive an email with the PS Plus digital code, and you'll also be able to view the code in your order history, listed as the "tracking ID." You can check out the PS Plus deal page for more info.
The PS Plus code can then be redeemed in the PlayStation Store, and even if you still have some time left on your membership, PS Plus subscriptions can be stacked to automatically extend your time, saving you money in the future.
A PS Plus subscription is a must-have for most PS4 players, as it enables you to play online with friends and people around the world. In addition, you'll get regular discounts on games like Persona 5, which is only $14 for members right now, or Shenmue I & II, which is $18, as well as free monthly PS4 games. PS Plus members often get early access to demos and beta tests for upcoming releases, like Monster Hunter World's new full-size expansion, Iceborne, which is available exclusively for PS Plus members this weekend.
Sony Music Entertainment has launched a new imprint called Lost Rings, creating a space to promote artists who produce original content that combine their love of video games and music. Currently, Lost Rings is a collective of three artists: BlackKrystel, BunnyMightGameU, and Sunzi.
"Gamers have such an authentic community," Lost Rings A&R Tebs Maqubela said. "They tend to be passionate, super involved with their world, and experts in their craft. They can tell right away when someone is an outsider; in that sense, it is very similar to music, especially genres like hip hop. Those characteristics that Bunny, BlackKrystel, and Sunzi have on lock--knowing your space, having a specific identity, building a world around you--are all qualities that they learned and perfected in gaming that translated over to songwriting and music making. They are writing about themselves and their world and they intrinsically knew how to do that and felt comfortable doing so."
Alongside the reveal of Lost Rings, all three of its artists have each released a new song and accompanying music video. BlackKrystel's is Party Up, while Bunny's is Game U, and Sunzi stars in Joystick 'Em Up. While each song focuses on gaming, they reflect each of the artists' other passions as well. BlackKrystal's Party Up also celebrates her love of anime, for instance. You can listen to or purchase the three songs via the links below.
"Working with the Lost Rings artists is seamless as I mostly just had to find the right collaborators for them, collaborators who would be long term partners," Maqubela said. "For example, Bunny and Sunzi have the same producer, and the other day they were hanging out and playing PS4. There is a true working relationship there. The feedback I had for the artists was always structural and pertaining to arrangements. The verses, subject matter, world play, and raw matter was all them. They always came to the table with fleshed out ideas. For example, Bunny speaks Spanish and loves Latin music, and brought up doing a song in Spanish, so we set about working on that."
Senior director of publicity Sarah Cunningham added that each artist was 100 percent involved in creating their song, the accompanying music video, and their style. The references in each song were decided by each artist as well. "They bring their own ideas to the table and they fully sign off on all of their own creative," she said. "We work collaboratively with them."
After an announcement back in November 2018 and a release date reveal in March 2019, Neon Genesis Evangelion has finally arrived on Netflix. This includes all 26 episodes of Hideaki Anno's classic anime and the two films--The End of Evangelion and Evangelion: Death(True)2--available to stream to all with an active Netflix account.
Death(True)2 is a further edit of 1998's Evangelion: Death(True), which is the original 1997 Neon Genesis Evangelion: Death & Rebirth re-edited by episode director Masayuki Yamaguchi without footage from episodes 21–24. Death(True)2 sees some of that removed footage re-added, with the inclusion of some brand-new footage never before seen in either prior incarnation, making Death(True)2 the final, most complete version of the Death movies.
Evangelion has had a difficult road traveling to the West, a Polygon report reveals. While it's possible to purchase "complete" editions of the series on DVD, they're usually sold by third-party vendors for astronomical prices. (A brief Amazon search shows prices ranging from $30 USD for two episodes to $200 USD for a part of the Platinum Collection to $500 USD for the Platinum: Perfect Collection.) What seems to have made Evangelion so difficult to obtain and/or watch was the limited availability of physical media, as well as the decline in physical media production for the series. These and a myriad of other factors--like a lack of Blu-Ray releases and confusion among the various kinds of "collections"--impacted Western English releases. Netflix bringing Evangelion to its platform makes watching it easier and more complete, a blessing to both anime diehards who love the series and casual anime consumers who've heard so much about the series.
The Netflix release does come with a few changes, particularly to the English voice actors. Rei Ayanami's voice actor Amanda Winn Lee confirmed she's been replaced in a now-deleted tweet. The same goes for some of the series' main characters, including Asuka Langley Soryu (voiced by Tiffany Grant), Misato Katsuragi (voiced by Allison Keith), and Shinji Ikari (voiced by Spike Spencer). At the time of the March 2019 report, Lee said that Netflix "never had any intention of even auditioning us in the first place." Grant corroborated Lee's statement in a Facebook post, saying she knew for "months that we were all being replaced."
In addition to voice actor alterations, the Evangelion Netflix release sees some music cues and end theme changed. There's speculation that the issue is music licensing, as Netflix Japan retains the covers. Further, a Twitter user shows side-by-side translations between the Netflix release and the original seemingly censoring a gay theme involving a key character.
The series follows Shinji Ikari, a pilot of giant mechs called Evangelions, which are used to fight alien beings called Angels. Evangelion explores Ikari's experience being both a teenage boy and a pilot risking his life for the sake of human preservation, and deals with heady subject matter like violence, psychology, religion, and sexuality.
Your journey in Obsidian Entertainment's The Outer Worlds is defined by choice, with your decisions extending beyond a morality system that defines the type of hero you want to be. If you so choose, you can join up with the antagonists of The Outer Worlds and become the villain of the story.
The Outer Worlds is set in a solar system that's been colonized by corporations led by a group referred to as the Board. You play as someone who was supposed to be one of the first colonists, but your ship is mysteriously lost along the way. 70 years later, someone finally finds you and wakes you up.
"The scientist Phineas Wells finds you," Obsidian Entertainment senior narrative designer Megan Starks said in an interview with GameSpot. "He wakes you up. The Board is trying to stop him because he wants you to help save the system. You can either decide to go with his plan and help him out or you can join the Board and go forward with their agenda. Or you can try and double cross both of them, and be a lone wolf."
"You [can actually] end up being the antagonist of the game, based on your choices," she continued. And though Starks wasn't able to provide specifics (as doing so would obviously spoil the game), she did say that choosing to be The Outer Worlds' villain "definitely" has drastic changes to the overall outcome of the story.
This style of storytelling isn't exactly new for Obsidian, as the developer crafted four unique endings to Fallout: New Vegas--all of which are dependent on which faction or individual you ultimately side with by the game's end. That said, the choices you make in The Outer Worlds can have very noticeable impacts on the story prior to reaching the end of the narrative. Not every choice is clearly laid out as a dialogue option either. Every cause, ranging from how you decide to complete a mission to choosing your clothes, can have some sort of effect.
"[Characters] will comment if you run around naked," Starks said, laughing. "A lot of [the story] is based on the actions you take in the game. If you kill someone that [another character] cares about, they're definitely going to be very opinionated. Felix is kind of this happy-go-lucky, violent anarchist, so he doesn't like it if you're siding with the Board and doing their propaganda stuff." How you present yourself can influence others' perception of you and, in turn, change what options you have with the said character going forward. Approaching a peaceful town with all your guns out isn't the best first impression, for example. "They'll ask you to put your gun away if you're in town," Starks said. "They'll say, 'Whoa! Watch where you're pointing that thing!'" Though it doesn't have as major an impact on questlines and the overall story, characters will react to whether you're a man or woman as well.
Managing how others perceive you is important because you can lose out on certain quests and storylines if you drive your companions or other important NPCs away. "The companions are like real people," Starks said. "They have opinions on things. Companions have their own quests and you can decide which way you want to push them during the quest, but you can also fail the quest based on those decisions."
Losing a companion, whether they just leave your squad or outright die via permadeath in the challenging Supernova Mode, is a loss in terms of both story and combat. Your allies aid you in battle, and their personalities provide help during conversations. Similarly to Mass Effect and Dragon Age, companions will interject their opinion into certain conversations during the main campaign. Building a bond with someone allows you to turn to them during difficult dialogue checks to provide their expertise and help you handle problems in unique ways. So choosing who you travel with on a mission extends beyond which weapons and perks they have. You (unfortunately) don't have the option to cement your connection with someone with romance, but traveling with specific companions and befriending them does allow you to get to know them better.
In The Outer Worlds, your decisions and mistakes can cause your character to develop a Flaw. As the name implies, it nerfs your character in some way. However, each Flaw also provides a helpful perk. For example, if you die to a bunch of robot enemies in a short amount of time, you may unlock the Flaw Robophobia. If you choose to accept it, you'll struggle against robotic enemies but gain something helpful in return.
"The fear ones are pretty common," Starks said, adding that there are "a few different types." There are even ones that can account for any mistakes you might make in the character creator. "On one of my recent playtests, I wanted to make a Dumb character so I could see the Dumb dialogue options as I was going through the different areas of the game, but I forgot to lower my Intelligence in the character creator," Starks said. "But then I actually took enough damage [to the head] that I was offered the Permanent Concussion Flaw, which lowers your Intelligence but also gives you the Dumb tag. So it totally worked out!"
In this example, Starks explained she was then able to make stupid remarks during conversations--opening up a whole new tree of dialogue options--but her lower Intelligence prevented her from using science weapons. In another example, developing a fear of the dark provided a welcome perk but at the cost of losing out on sneaking into an enemy stronghold via the unlit back alley. You need to think ahead when it comes to Flaws, as something that doesn't seem very important early in the game can have consequences hours later. "You don't have to take a Flaw unless you're playing the hardest difficulty, which is Supernova Mode," Starks said. "But if you choose to take a Flaw, it is with you for the rest of the game."
The Season of Opulence is in full swing with its first Iron Banner this week in Destiny 2, giving players a bunch of new gear to chase down through an extensive quest. If you want to get yourself some new gear without nearly as much hassle, though, you can always visit weekend vendor Xur, who returns with a new batch of Exotics for sale. Here's where to find Xur this weekend and everything he's offering.
Where To Find Xur
Xur is hanging out on Earth in the EDZ this weekend, in the Winding Cove area. You can find him by heading toward north from the spawn, then climbing the cliff wall at the edge of the area up to the crashed Fallen dropship. This week he's offering The Jade Rabbit, which is a powerful Exotic scout rifle that you might find very useful if you're fighting through the Iron Banner. The rifle gives you bonus damage to headshots if you chain them with body shots first, and precision shots return ammo to its magazine.
In the armor department, everyone gets Year Two offerings this week. For Hunters, there's Oathkeeper, a pair of gauntlets that let you hold your bow charges indefinitely. Titans can pick up Ursa Furiosa, a set of gauntlets that give you faster movement when using your Sentinel Shield Super, and which converts damage absorbed by the shield into Super energy. Finally, there's Phoenix Protocol for Warlocks, a chest armor piece that gives you Super energy for kills and assists you make while standing in your Well of Radiance.
Xur Exotics For June 21-25
The Jade Rabbit (Exotic scout rifle) -- 29 Legendary Shards
If Xur's inventory doesn't interest, you can also buy a Fated Engram, if you can afford it. Dropping 97 Legendary Shards on the item will grant you one Year One Exotic you don't already have for that character. Xur also offers the Five of Swords challenge card for free, which allows you to add difficulty modifiers that increase your score in Nightfall runs.
And if you haven't finished all of Xur's Invitations of the Nine from the Season of the Drifter, you can snag one of those as well. The bounty was new in Season of the Drifter, dispensing Powerful gear rewards, a bit of story about the Nine and the Drifter, and a lore drop.
Today marks the first official day of summer, and now that the days are growing warmer and sunnier, what better time to hide inside and play some games? The PlayStation Store is celebrating the new season with a flash sale on PS4, PS3, and Vita games, and the best part is that everything is $10 or less.
There are hundreds of games on sale to pick through, and you can browse the full list of discounted titles and DLC at the PlayStation blog. Plus, see some of our picks from the weekend flash sale below.
PS4
2064: Read Only Memories -- $5
8-Bit Invaders -- $7.49
Amnesia: Collection -- $9
Assassin's Creed Chronicles (China, India, Russia) -- $4 each
Harry Potter: Wizards Unite operates a lot like Pokemon Go, developer Niantic's preceding augmented reality game. The two have similar underlying premises of "go out in the real world, catch virtual things," and use a lot of the same mechanics--we even created a guide for Pokemon Go players to understand Wizards Unite (along with other Wizards Unite coverage). Where Pokemon Go has Poke Balls that you need to gather in order to use them to try to catch Pokemon, Wizards Unite finds players relying on a different resource: Spell Energy. Running out of Spell Energy will quickly put a damper on your dreams of Wizarding World glory.
Of course, you can always get more Spell Energy. But the term itself is a bit misleading. In most mobile games, "energy" is a resource expended whenever you play the game, putting a limitation on how much you can play until you wait for a set amount of time to pass and your energy to "recharge." It's a tactic to try to get you to spend money in the game to speed up the wait time so you can play more. But in Wizards Unite, Spell Energy isn't something you get over time--it's something you have to go out and find.
How To Get More Spell Energy
Just like in Pokemon Go, to get more Spell Energy (and in that game, Poke Balls), you have to visit physical locations in the real world. Wizards Unite is a game that encourages you to walk around in the world in order to play it, and physically going to certain places is part of the game. To get more Spell Energy, you can visit two kinds of locations: Inns and Greenhouses. Of the two, the most reliable place to recharge your Spell Energy is at an Inn.
Wizards Unite uses real-life location data to create its map, so Inns, Greenhouses, and other locations called Fortresses are usually placed on real landmarks in your area. A post office or a school might double as an Inn, for instance, as might anything else that grabs attention, like a piece of outdoor art or well-known graffiti. To interact with an Inn, you need to be relatively close to it; when you're within range, it'll become larger on your map screen in Wizards Unite. Tap the Inn to enter it.
Inside, trace the arcing line at the bottom of the screen (just like spinning a Poke Stop) in order to "dine" at the Inn. You'll randomly receive one of the five meals appearing on the screen. Depending on which meal you get, you'll also receive Spell Energy--sometimes just one or two points, sometimes a whole lot more. The best way to refill your stores of Spell Energy is to go for a walk and hit multiple Inns as you go. You can also revisit to the same Inn over and over again, but you'll need to wait five minutes between Inn meals.
Greenhouses Help, Too
Greenhouses are similar to Inns and also sometimes provide Spell Energy, but in smaller amounts. The rewards you get for interacting with these locations is primarily potion-brewing materials. When you enter a Greenhouse, Wizards Unite will present you with three potted plants, and you get to pick one to see what kind of Herbology rewards await inside. Most of what you'll receive are ingredients, but you might also sometimes get a few points of Spell Energy too. It's not as good as visiting an Inn, but Greenhouses are worth a stop if they're on your way.
Keeping up your Spell Energy means visiting Inns often, so make sure you note where they are in your area. It's best if you can find a walking route that'll take you past several Inns, so you can continually stock up on your Spell Energy, search for new Traces, and log kilometers to unlock Portkey Portmanteaus, too.
Best Buy is once again living up to its name with a great deal on Razer Electra V2 wired gaming headsets. For one day only you can get a pair for just $35, which is wholly $25 off from the full price of $60. The Electra V2 uses a classic, universal 3.5mm jack, making it the perfect headset for budget-minded gamers that play across multiple platforms, but don't want to invest in separate headsets for each.
Razer lists compatibility with PS4, Xbox One, Switch, PC, and mobile devices. The Electra V2 is a perfect entry-level headset with custom 40mm drivers, virtual 7.1 surround sound, a removable boom mic, and in-line volume and mute controls, but no other expensive bells and whistles to drive up the price. Razer has been making dedicated gaming peripherals for longer than nearly anyone else in the industry, making them a reliable source for gear at both the high-end, and with consumer-grade products like the Electra.
The Netflix stream is missing some music cues, as well as the karaoke covers of the old standard "Fly Me To The Moon," which would play at the end of every episode. Some users have claimed that Netflix Japan has retained the covers, which could suggest that it's a music licensing issue.
Netflix US Evangelion has missing music cues and the iconic karaoke style covers of Fly Me To The Moon that used to end every episode, but Netflix Japan has it, probably because of not paying for a music license. Really dismaying streaming can do this. https://t.co/YXfzcmLswE
Meanwhile, another Twitter user has shown purported side-by-side translations from the original that appear to censor a gay theme involving a key character. The sci-fi series focuses on adolescents who are uniquely suited to pilot giant mecha armor to defend humanity against the attacks of beasts known as Angels. It's rated TV-14, and is known for its heady themes surrounding violence, psychology, religion, and sexuality.
Netflix has the 26 original episodes of the series, as well as the two films, The End of Evangelion and Death & Rebirth. Evangelion was given a new theatrical version starting in 2007, as a trilogy of films that tell roughly the same story in a style that is meant to be more accessible. Those movies are not available on Netflix.
Harry Potter: Wizards Unite is officially available in the US and UK, joining the existing Australia and New Zealand versions of the free-to-play mobile game. The new Harry Potter game from Warner Bros. and Niantic shares many commonalities with Pokemon Go, albeit with more content right out of the gate. And while it's built on the foundation that Niantic established with Pokemon Go, it's missing one significant feature that Pokemon Go has that's likely to produce some complaints.
Wizards Unite doesn't yet appear to have its own equivalent of Pokemon Go's Adventure Sync. That feature rolled out for Go back in October and allows the game to keep track of the distance you walk, even when the app is running in the background. Not only was it a boon for the game's battery life, it made it much easier to hatch Eggs, as you wouldn't need to have the game open the whole time while walking around.
Wizards Unite has its own version of Eggs in Portkeys, which will take you to a Wizarding World location once you've walked a certain distance. However, because the game lacks an Adventure Sync-like feature, that means you need to keep it open the whole time in order for it to log the distance you've traveled, which makes activating Portkeys a relative hassle.
Of course, considering Wizards Unite has only been live for a short time, it's still very much early days for the game. Pokemon Go didn't get its Adventure Sync until more than two years after it launched, so Niantic will presumably add a similar feature to Wizards Unite sometime down the line. As of right now, however, you'll need to keep the game open if you're hoping to activate any Portkeys you find.
There is much more to Wizards Unite than just Portkeys. The game also has a Profession system, which allows you to upgrade yourself with perks and abilities as you level up. You can read more details about those in our Wizards Unite Professions guide. We've also put together a Wizards Unite glossary guide to help you familiarize yourself with the game's vast array of terminology. For even more coverage, be sure to check out our Harry Potter: Wizards Unite hub page.
Crash Team Racing Nitro-Fueled's release date has finally arrived, meaning fans can once again enjoy the Bandicoot's kart racing debut. (Is it still a debut if it's a remaster? Who knows!)
The game is out now on PS4, Xbox One, and Nintendo Switch. While some free Crash Team Racing DLC is on the way, including Spyro the Dragon, you can already get your hands on a multitude of characters, karts, and tracks right now. For more, you can check out our US buying guide for Crash Team Racing Nitro-Fueled.
As for the reviews, the reception has been positive. We awarded the game an 8/10 in our Crash Team Racing Nitro-Fueled review-in-progress, saying it feels as good now as it did 20 years ago. For more scores, check out a selection of verdicts below, or take a look at our sister site, Metacritic.
Game: Crash Team Racing Nitro-Fueled
Developer / Publisher: Beenox / Activision
Platforms: PS4, Xbox One, Nintendo Switch
Release date: Out now
Price: $40 / £35 / AU $70
GameSpot -- 8/10 (Review-In-Progress)
"Simply put: This is a remaster done right. Nitro-Fueled maintains the spirit and rock-solid foundations of a childhood favorite while building on it and modernizing it where necessary--even if the handling might take a bit of getting used to. Adventure mode's classic variant feels a little tough, but your first race on Roo's Tubes or Sewer Speedway will bring a nostalgic grin to your face regardless. When the nostalgia fades, Crash Team Racing Nitro-Fueled remains fun and engaging enough to keep you racing on with a smile on your face for much longer yet. It's good to have Crash back." -- Oscar Dayus [Full review-in-progress]
GamesRadar+ -- 5/5
"Beenox has managed to take the original Crash Team Racing, and somehow made it better. 20 years ago, this was the kart racer to play, but Mario Kart gradually usurped it and since the early 2000s, Crash has been laid dormant, waiting for its time to seize the throne and become the king of kart racers once more. That time is now, because Crash is back, baby." -- Ford James [Full review]
IGN -- 8.2/10
"Crash Team Racing Nitro-Fueled's difficulty, memorable track design, and addictive power slide mechanic make it a kart racer worth playing, especially competitively (though new players should check out a guide or two first). In single-player it's richer than what the genre normally provides, but at the expense of a cheap and unforgiving Adventure mode design that can become overly frustrating. Overall, a new HUD, cosmetic options, and the ability to swap characters during the campaign mean there's simply no contest between playing this and the 1999 original." -- Janet Garcia [Full review]
Eurogamer -- Essential
"I was worried that revisiting CTR might feel a bit like going back to your old school, where everything's much smaller than you remembered - and maybe if it were just the base game that might be true. But Nitro-Fueled feels more like seeing and old friend than an old classroom, even if it's a pretty weird friend who refuses to grow up and still wears jorts in public. It's just plain, dumb fun, a game completely unashamed of itself even now. I think that's probably why, even beyond the enormously generous treatment it's had from Beenox and under the nice, polished-up hood, CTR is still one of the best kart racers ever made." -- Chris Tapsell [Full review]
Video Games Chronicle -- 4/5
"Comfortably the best kart racer on PS4 and Xbox One, and earning a creditable second place on Switch, this is a seriously impressive calling card for its unsung makers." -- Chris Schilling [Full review]
The Americans star Keri Russell is one of the new cast members for this December's Star Wars: The Rise of Skywalker, and now she's revealed more details about the sci-fi film. Specifically, she told The Associated Press that the script made her emotional.
"When I read his script that [write-director JJ Abrams] wrote I cried," she said. "I mean who knows what it will turn out to be and I hope it remains true to what he originally wanted."
According to Russell, Abrams is the right person to direct Episode 9 because he "really respects what it is" and "he's not trying to change it to be something else."
Russell plays a new character named Zorri Bliss who wears a helmet. Russell was excited about that. "I was like, 'That is my dream job. I can see everyone. No one can see me. Hello. Amazing!'"
The Rise of Skywalker hits theaters on December 20. It stars Daisy Ridley as Rey, Adam Driver as Kylo Ren, John Boyega as Finn, Oscar Isaac as Poe Dameron, Kelly Marie Tran as Rose Tico, Lupita Nyong'o as Maz Kanata, Domhnall Gleeson as General Hux, Mark Hamill as Luke, and Billy Dee Williams as Lando. For more, check out the movie's first trailer and everything we know about Star Wars Episode IX.
The Rise of Skywalker is said to be the final entry in the Skywalker Saga that began all the way back in 1977 with the original movie, so it seems so momentous--and emotional--events might happen.
In addition to The Rise of Skywalker, a new live-action TV show The Mandalorian will be available on the streaming service Disney+ when it launches on November 12.
Star Wars: Jedi Fallen Order is the next big Star Wars game from Electronic Arts, and now we've learned a little more about it. Specifically, developer Respawn says you will only be able to dismember enemies with your lightsaber in "select cases."
Senior designer Justin Perez explained to IGN that probably only droids and spiders can have their limbs cut off from your lightsaber attacks. Humanoid characters, however, generally cannot be dismembered--and that's apparently because Disney is a family friendly company.
Separately, story artist for The Clone Wars, Tatyana Drewry Carvin, explained to IGN that one of Disney's rules is that they should never show blood and they should "hide the cut in case of decapitation." According to the rules, "the burn of a lightsaber is supposed to cauterize it instantly," Carvin explained. Apparently this also applies to Jedi Fallen Order.
Lightsabers are capable of dismembering enemies, but this is rarely depicted in Star Wars media. Everyone remembers the scene where Darth Vader lops off Luke Skywalker's hand and when Obi-Wan cuts Darth Maul in half. The fact that instances of dismemberment by lightsaber are so few and far between make them more impactful and emotionally resonant, it seems.
The first beta test for Halo: Reach on PC will begin next week, Halo developer 343 Industries has confirmed. It's not locked down, however, as plans could change. Still, next week is when the studio is looking to release the first beta test on PC.
"We're starting more modestly because we've got quite a few levers to pull and we want to ensure our delivery pipeline runs smoothly, our communications are clear, and that participants can properly provide their feedback on the build," 343 said in a blog post. "Since there are so many pieces and levers that need testing, verification, and appropriate approvals, we need to take our time to ensure we're sending out a quality flight to our Halo Insiders."
The development team is close to finalizing a version of Halo: Reach for PC for the beta, but it is still "going through the test process."
"We're still targeting to release next week and will be sharing the details with the public, so even if you aren't selected for the flight, you'll know what's happening. Stay tuned for more details throughout!" 343 says.
Halo: Reach was playable at E3 2019 in Los Angeles this week, but this first beta will mark the first time the wider public will have a chance to check it out.
Reach is coming to PC as part of Microsoft's plans to launch The Master Chief Collection on PC. The rest of the releases will follow in chronological order, spanning Halo 2, Halo 3, Halo 3: ODST, and Halo 4. Each game will be sold for $10 USD each, except for ODST which is $5 USD. The beta releases for each title are free.
Reach is also coming to Xbox One and it'll release on consoles through a beta test as well, though a release date has not been announced.
Stranger Things has come a long way since it initially premiered back in 2016, and that's never been more clear than in the new trailer for Season 3 that Netflix released today. A lot has happened to Eleven and her friends, and it seems Season 3 will see the gang fighting against the most dangerous and menacing threat so far.
The new Season 3 trailer, which Netflix says is the final one, is riddled with spoilers about previous events, so steer clear if you're not caught up.
Season 3 is set in Hawkins, Indiana in the summer of 1985--and yes, elements of the period such as New Coke will appear. In addition to the evil alien threat they're facing, Eleven and company are learning more about one another. Here is the official description for Season 3:
"School's out, there's a brand new mall in town, and the Hawkins crew are on the cusp of adulthood. Romance blossoms and complicates the group's dynamic, and they'll have to figure out how to grow up without growing apart. Meanwhile, danger looms. When the town's threatened by enemies old and new, Eleven and her friends are reminded that evil never ends; it evolves. Now they'll have to band together to survive, and remember that friendship is always stronger than fear."
Stranger Things Season 3 premieres July 4 on Netflix. All of the main cast return for Season 3, along with Princess Bride star Cary Elwes who plays the sleazy politician Mayor Kline. There's also the offspring of some '80s stars; Jake Busey, son of Point Break star Gary Busey, will play a journalist named Bruce, while Maya Thurman-Hawke (daughter of Uma and Ethan) is set to play a character named Robin.
Halo Infinite had a big showing at E3 2019 last week, but Microsoft isn't done dropping news about the long-awaited Xbox and PC game. Developer 343 Industries to shared some new details on the game, and it's a lot to take in.
Starting off, 343 confirmed in a blog post that Halo Infinite will support LAN and that the already announced split-screen feature is "up and running" already. That's a big deal because Halo 5 dropped split-screen in a move that upset a number of series fans.
343 also announced that the beta tests for Halo Infinite, known as "flights," will take place first on Xbox and then PC. The testing periods will "start small" and then "slowly expand" up until the game's release in Holiday 2020. "Flighting may come a little bit later for PC players, but we're treating it as a first-class citizen," 343 said.
The studio also confirmed that the characters in Halo Infinite will have black undersuits. That sounds like a small detail, but in Halo 4 and Halo 5 players had different colored undersuits, which garnered a mix reaction from fans.
Additionally, 343 teased Halo Infinite's armor customization options, saying, "if you liked the level of armor customziation in Halo: Reach, you will be pleased [with Halo infinite]." On top of that, 343 confirmed that those who reach the highest level in Halo 5, SR 152, will receive a "token of appreciation" in Halo Infinite.
Finally, 343 stated that it has an internal team of professional gamers testing Halo Infinite's multiplayer. And on the story side, 343 re-affirmed that Halo Infinite's story begins "some time after" the end of Halo 5.
Halo Infinite releases in Holiday 2020 as a launch title for Project Scarlett. The game plays on the entire family of Xbox One consoles, as well as PC.
Xbox boss Phil Spencer has suggested that the form factor of the new Xbox Project Scarlett might not be traditional. Speaking to Xbox On, Spencer said the design of the next-generation console isn't locked down yet, though he personally knows what it will look like.
"At some point we'll show what it looks like," he said. "The physical ID is not done. I know what it's gonna look like. It's gonna be--I think it's a cool-looking, new thing, which will be interesting. But we don't have a final ID done."
Spencer said Microsoft did not show the design of Scarlett at E3 because it wasn't ready yet. Also, form factor isn't the most important part of what makes the system compelling, he said.
"It's not like we're going to put a half-done ID out there and say, 'This is kind of what it will look like,'" he said. "That's not really the thing that's going to drive purchase decision."
Other unknowns for Scarlett are its name and price point. On the name, Spencer confirmed that Scarlett is only a working title, and as with the form factor, he says, "I hope somebody is not making their buying decision on this product based on what it's named."
Regarding the price of Scarlett, Spencer said he understands that pricing "will be important." Microsoft has a price point in mind--that he didn't share--but he acknowledged that it could change based on a number of factors, one of which is how Trump's tariffs with China shake out.
"The price will be important. Clearly, price is one of those things that people want to know," he said. "As we're watching how the cost of the components are coming in, and things like tariffs and other things, trying to figure out what that price is going to be next year. We have a price point in mind; I think we're going to hit that. But we want to make sure everything comes in right. We'll get price out as soon as we can."
Trump's proposed tariffs with China would put a huge 25 percent tax on electronics--including video games--that are shipped into the United States. Microsoft, and others, manufacture consoles in the country and would in theory pass along the cost to consumers leading to a more expensive product. The tariffs aren't in place yet, and they might not go through. Despite that, Nintendo has already decided to shift production of its Switch models--including its new, more powerful system--out of a China as a result of the threat.
Scarlett launches in Holiday 2020 with Halo Infinite releasing day-and-date as a launch title. Scarlett was at one point thought to be the name of Microsoft's two-SKU next-generation console strategy spanning a high-power model, codenamed Anaconda, and a lower-spec system known as Lockhart. However, multiple recent reports state that Microsoft is no longer moving forward with the Lockhart system. At the same time, in the Xbox On video Spencer on multiple occasions references new consoles with plural terminology. It's not clear what's going on, and Microsoft has not commented officially on if it will release one or two next-generation consoles.
A big part of Harry Potter: Wizards Unite--the just-released iOS and Android game from Pokemon Go developer Niantic--is getting more energy and battling against the dark creatures, oddities, and magic-users of the Wizarding World. Some of the best rewards and rarest Foundables in the game are locked inside Fortresses, which put you into cooperative battles with other players on your side. If you're a player of Pokemon Go, some of this will be familiar to you--but Wizards Unite adds a lot of depth to its battle system, as well. We've got even more Harry Potter: Wizards Unite coverage on our hub page.
When you level up enough, you'll unlock the ability to pick a Profession, which lets you upgrade yourself with perks and abilities that make you more effective in battle and useful to your teammates.
Choosing a Profession is a big part of the game, as is spending the items you earn as you play in order to level yourself up over time. But how to choose whether you should be an Auror like Harry Potter, a Magizoologist like Newt Scamander, or a Professor like Albus Dumbledore? There are a lot of factors that go into the decision, including what kind of wizard you want to be, what battle stats are important to you, and how you'll best contribute to a team of players.
We've run down the basics of the Profession system below to help you make the right decision. Here's everything you need to know about Wizard Unite's class system, including each class's specializations, and what the stats you'll be upgrading with the game's RPG elements mean and how they work.
Which Profession Is Right For You?
There are three different professions to choose from in Harry Potter: Wizards Unite, which become available when you hit Level 6. Each has different benefits and drawbacks. All the professions have different areas of combat they specialize in, and are tuned to defeat different kinds of enemies. Picking the job that matches your playstyle in battle is important, but having a balanced team in situations like multiplayer Wizarding Challenges in Fortresses is also essential to victory. The good news is, you can switch specializations at any time, so if your team is short on someone to specialize in dealing with Curiosities or Beasts, you can change roles to fill the gap. There are three jobs from which to choose, each with its own unique tree of skills and perks you can earn over time.
Auror
Under the mentorship of none other than Harry Potter, Aurors are the folks who specialize in magical combat against the Dark Arts. Their abilities tend to focus on combat strength and dealing direct damage to enemies, so think of them as the frontline fighters of the Wizarding World. Aurors have the lowest Stamina, or health, of the three classes, but the highest Power. They also get more critical hits, and do more damage with them, than other wizards. Aurors do extra damage to Dark Forces enemies but take extra damage from Beast enemies.
Magizoologist
Rubeus Hagrid serves as mentor to Magizoologists, whose abilities are more aligned with caring for creatures--and other humans. This is your defensive healer class of wizards, wielding spells that are more about helping out the team than damaging enemies directly. They also have the highest Stamina of the three classes. Magizoologists are strong against Beast enemies and weak against Curiosities.
Professor
With Minerva McGonagle heading their order, Professors are a more versatile class of wizard. Their spells focus generally on buffing their teammates and debuffing their enemies, making them the status manipulators of a squad. This is your middle-of-the-road class, balanced between the power of Aurors and the defensiveness of Magizoologists, but with a lot of good traits of both. Professors do extra damage to Curiosities and take additional damage from Dark Forces enemies.
Upgrading Your Skills
You'll need to keep an eye on a new set of items you'll find as you venture through Wizards Unite, once you've unlocked Professions: Scrolls and Spellbooks. You'll spend these in the skill trees of your professions to unlock new spells and passive perks that make you more effective in combat, like gaining additional stamina or dealing more damage.
Scrolls come from the chests unlocked when you complete Traces and catalog Foundables in your Registry, so they're fairly easy to come by. Especially in the early part of the skill trees, you'll mostly be spending Scrolls to advance and unlock different abilities and perks. Tougher to get are Spell Books, which are found in the chests when you complete Wizarding Challenges in Fortresses. If you want to advance your wizard abilities, you're going to need to engage in multiplayer battles with other players.
The Stats
When you reach the Profession screen, you'll see a page that gauges a series of stats you'll increase for your wizard as you unlock perks in the skill tree. Their meanings aren't immediately clear, so here's what each one does:
Stamina: Your health in battles.
Power: The strength of the spells you use against enemies.
Protego Power: The strength of your protection spell, used to defend against incoming attacks from enemies.
Precision: The likelihood of landing a Critical Hit, which does increased damage.
Critical Power: The boost in damage you get when you land a Critical Hit.
Proficiency Power: The bonus strength of your spells against enemies your class is especially strong against.
Deficiency Defense: Added protection against enemies that do bonus damage to your class.
Accuracy: How likely your spells are to hit their targets.
Obviously, increasing all these stats is important, but some stats are higher for certain classes than others. Aurors are geared toward Power and Precision, Magizoologists toward Stamina and Defense, and Professors toward Accuracy and Proficiency.
Important Stats: Proficiency Power, Deficiency Defense
There are lots of stats you can amp up in your skill tree as you progress through it, including the power of your offensive spells and the effectiveness of Protego, your magical defense. But when it comes to specializing in your particular Profession, you're going to want to keep an eye on two stats: Proficiency Power and Deficiency Defense.
Proficiency Power denotes how much of a boost you get against enemies that are weak to your chosen Profession. If you're an Auror, you'll get a bonus against Dark Forces enemies such as Death Eaters, but Proficiency Power dictates how big a bonus you receive. Especially when you're able to play with other specialized wizards on a team, boosting this stat will make you highly effective in your particular role.
Deficiency Defense is the other side of the coin. The higher the stat, the less of a hit you take against the enemies to whom you are weak--in the case of Aurors, that would be Beast enemies such as spiders. Regardless of your strategy, investing in Deficiency Defense will help you survive in battle no matter what kind of enemy you're facing.
Coordinate With Friends And Teammates
It's possible to change your Profession on the fly, but you're going to access more perks and stronger abilities sooner if you specialize in one job instead of investing in all three skill trees. Therefore, if you mean to be a serious Wizards Unite player, you're going to want to team up with other people in your area and coordinate your Profession choices with them. If you've got a strong team, you can spread out your Professions and capabilities, making you a much more effective unit in multiplayer. On the other hand, if you intend to play Wizards Unite more casually, any Profession will probably do the job.
Choose Carefully
The strongest upgrades are the "Lessons" toward the bottom of each skill tree. Every time you spend Scrolls or Spell Books to unlock a node, you gain access to the ones beneath it--but you don't have to purchase something from every single node in order to progress down the tree. That means it's beneficial to be discerning about what lessons you invest in as you upgrade your wizard; you don't need to buy everything, and doing so will impede your progress toward your best skills and perks. Pick your way down the skill tree to try to get upgrades that feed into your playstyle, so you can get the best upgrades sooner. You can always go back and fill in with additional nodes if you find you're lacking in a particular stat later on.
Russell Crowe is among the list of actors who turned down the role of Aragorn in Peter Jackson's Lord of the Rings film series, and now he's spoken about why he said no to what could have become a career-defining role. Crowe told Howard Stern that it was his impression that Jackson never really wanted him for the part, and he agreed that it was his understanding that the studio went after him because he was so popular at the time.
"I didn't think Peter Jackson actually wanted me on the film; I think he was forced into talking to me. There was a moment in time where everybody wanted me in everything," Crowe said. "And he's a fellow New Zealander; so I can hear his voice. I'm talking to him on the phone. And it's like, I don't think he even knows what I've done. My instinct was that he had somebody else in mind, which turned out to be Viggo Mortensen. And he should be allowed to hire the actor that he wants."
Other actors who reportedly said no to the role of Aragorn include Nicolas Cage and Daniel Day-Lewis. Stuart Townsend was ultimately cast as Aragorn. He spent months training and filmed multiple days on set before Jackson decided to recast the role with Mortensen.
According to Stern, Crowe missed out on $100 million by passing on The Lord of the Rings, but it might have actually been more. If Crowe was actually earning 10 percent of total box office grosses for the series, he would have made many, many millions more considering the series brought in more than $3 billion. Sean Connery, meanwhile, passed on the role of Gandalf. He was reportedly offered $10 million per movie in addition to 15 percent of the franchise box office, which would have amounted to $450 million or more, according to Syfy.
Also in the Howard Stern interview, Crowe talked about passing on another high-profile role: Wolverine. Hugh Jackman was eventually cast, and Crowe praised his performance. "Even if I had done the film, I wouldn't have carried it through with the grace and the direction that Hugh gave it," he said.
The latest Lord of the Rings movie is the biopic Tolkien that tells the story of author J.R.R. Tolkien's life and the events leading up to his writing of the acclaimed series.
On the heels of Fortnite's 9.30 patch, Week 7's challenges have now arrived on PS4, Xbox One, PC, Nintendo Switch, and mobile. Not only will completing these tasks help level your Battle Pass up and unlock more of Season 9's cosmetic rewards, an extra bonus awaits if you can clear all seven challenges from a given week: a special loading screen that points to a free item hidden somewhere around the map.
The loading screen is the reward for completing one of Season 9's Utopia challenges, and the item they point to varies by the week. Each even-numbered Utopia challenge will lead you to a Fortbyte, a new kind of collectible to find in Season 9. Odd-numbered Utopia challenges, on the other hand, will guide you to a free Battle Star, which will level your Battle Pass up by one full tier once collected.
Complete seven weeks' worth of Season 9 challenges and you'll unlock the loading screen pictured below. This week's screen is set in the Pressure Plant, the new facility located where Season 8's volcano stood. The clue this time should be fairly easy to spot; look on the left side of the picture and you'll see a Battle Star on the set of stairs. That's where you'll find it in the game.
Make your way to the Pressure Plant after you jump into a match and locate the stairs featured in the loading screen--the Battle Star will be floating in the air there, just as teased. Build your way up to it to collect it, then finish the match and you'll level your Battle Pass up by one tier. If you need more help finding it, we've marked the Battle Star's location on the map below. You can also see where we go to find it in the video at the top of this guide.
Unlike the aforementioned Fortbytes, which can be found by anyone who owns a Season 9 Battle Pass, the secret Battle Star will only appear if you've cleared its corresponding Utopia challenge and unlocked the above loading screen, so you can't simply go to the right area and expect to find it if you haven't done the necessary work. If you need helping finishing any of this season's challenges, you can find tips for the trickier ones in our complete Fortnite Season 9 challenges guide.
Fortnite's 9.30 update arrived on June 18 and added a new item to the game, the Chug Splash, which can be thrown to heal yourself and other players within the range of its explosion. With the update, Epic also vaulted three items--the Boom Bow, Dual Pistols, and Dynamite--and tweaked a handful of other ones. You can find the full patch notes for the update on Epic's official website.
WWE's next PPV is Stomping Grounds, coming to the WWE Network on Sunday, June 23. Among the many matches on the card, New Day member and WWE Champion Kofi Kingston will defend his title against Dolph Ziggler in a steel cage. These are two superstars have been fan favorites for years and have both risen--and risen again--to the main event in 2019.
This Sunday's steel cage match for the WWE Championship is a daunting task for Kingston, as he's up against another veteran superstar just as athletic as he is. "Honestly, Dolph is one of my favorite opponents, and I almost forgot how much I enjoyed competing against him," Kingston told GameSpot. "Over the past few weeks, I've been able to do so on some of the live events, and back in 2000, I think it was 2009 all the way through 2010, we wrestled each other every single week on Raw and Smackdown, and all the live events; probably a good 500 times. Now we get to go out and do it again after our careers have both gone in different directions, and now we come back and do it again for the WWE Championship, like that's really what it's all about."
Kingston sees this rivalry with "The Showoff" and the types of wrestlers they both are comparative to two other iconic WWE superstars from the past. "Back in the day, you had Shawn Michaels and Bret Hart going at it for the Intercontinental Championship, and then years, later they were doing the same thing for the WWE title as well," Kingston continued. "Not to put ourselves on the same level as those legends, but that's really the way I like to think about it is, we were guys who were underrated, undersized, underappreciated, underused, undervalued, and somehow, someway we've been able to stay at it and for the past decade, and still be at the top of the game.
"It's a story that's a lot deeper than just the physical steel cage match. It's the whole journey that we've been through over the past decade of trying to get to this point, and now we can finally do it in the steel cage at Stomping Grounds, it's going to be awesome. It's going to be a war between us, but from a performer's perspective I can't wait, I can't wait. I feel like we bring out the best in each other, and the real winners are going to be the fans that get to witness us go at it toe-to-toe, so I'm pretty excited about it."
Without a doubt, Kingston vs. Ziggler is one of the most anticipated matches on the card, and you can see the battle between them yourselves, when Stomping Grounds comes to the WWE Network on June 23 at 7 PM ET / 4 PM PT. We're predicting that Kingston will come out on top.
PlayStation Plus is a necessity for many PS4 gamers as the annual membership grants access to online multiplayer as well as even bigger discounts on PS4 games. The subscription also nets members two free PS4 games every month (June's freebies are quite good), as well as early access to certain demos and beta periods for games, exclusive content, and more. The 12-month membership generally sells for $60 a year, but right now, you can get a year of PS Plus for only $40 using promo code EMCTBVT44 at Newegg, a full 33% off the normal price. The membership is already discounted to $50, and the promo code will slash another $10 off.
After entering the promo code at checkout and purchasing, you'll receive the membership code via email. The great thing is that you can stack PS Plus memberships, so even if you already renewed recently or don't need to renew for a while, you can still take advantage of this deal, and the additional 12 months will just be added to your account.
Apex Legends has been one of 2019's biggest successes, and developer Respawn Entertainment is looking to keep its success going with Season 2. During EA Play at E3 2019, the creators revealed what's to come for its battle royale spin-off from the Titanfall franchise, and how much the team learned following the runaway success after its surprise February debut. In addition to a significantly revised battle pass--lessening the grind and offering better rewards--we also learned of some buffs coming to characters like Mirage, along with everyone's favorite gun--the Mozambique.
But the biggest news to come from EA Play was the reveal of Wattson, the game's upcoming new legend. During EA Play, we spent some time talking with Apex Legends project lead Drew McCoy and lead product manager Lee Horn--along with a surprise special delivery from Respawn co-founder Vince Zampella. In our talk, they reflected on the fast and unexpected success of the game, and the big lessons they learned following the game's debut.
For more info on Apex Legends, including what weapons will change and why dragons have suddenly appeared on the map, be sure to check back with us for updates on this evolving game.
Editor's Note: This interview has been edited for clarity and readability.
First off, can you talk about what it was like seeing Apex Legends become such a hit after launch?
Lee Horn: Yeah, I mean, the first couple weeks was just us watching twitch being like "Oh my god, I can't believe this is happening." No one here expected to find such a rabid fan base so quickly, and to find fans that were just excited about our game. This was great for the team, everyone was like "Yeah, we put a lot of time into this and it's great to have that payoff." But it's also a learning experience for us.
Drew McCoy: It was crazy. Nothing can prepare you for that. You realize what's happening as it's happening. You don't get much premunition to it, and so it's just kind of washing over you.
Horn: On the first day, I think we were watching the meters fill up and it's like, "I can't believe we have that many players already." Everyone was cheering, it was a very surreal experience.
McCoy: Yeah, we smashed our 7-8 week expectations on the first day. So it's like "Oh no, what's going to happen?" There's a little strip mall next to the office. At lunch, we went over to get some food, but because everything was just continually growing, I actually brought my laptop and logged into work so we can watch the graphs while we ate--in case something started breaking. I was with a lot of the server engineers and that was our life for a while.
Horn: Now we can sort of take a breath.
McCoy: Yeah, time to get back to work.
Lee: Yeah, get back to work.
Following that success, it seems like there was a number of paths you could have taken with the game. What did you think was important to focus on first?
Horn: We definitely wanted more variety. We want you to sort of tackle a bunch of different things with challenges, but we're not trying to go crazy yet. Again, a lot of people play the core of the game. We want to shake it up, but nothing too crazy. There's a fine line and we'll keep dancing on that. We're also trying to come up with more game modes. We now have the Elite Queue, and that sort of gives players, especially the hardcore, a new way to play. Then the evolution of that is, with Season 2, we'll have ranked. It's not a temporary one, that's more of a full feature game mode for Apex Legends.
With that in mind, what were some of the lessons learned from the last version of the Battle Pass, and how that informed what was to come with Season 2?
Horn: We spent a lot of time reading Reddit, going through Reddit, getting the community feedback. A lot of it was like we talked about, the game came out, it was like "Oh, crap we've got to work fast, we got to add more." The players were asking for a Battle Pass so we kind of had to do the best we could do given that we had a five to six-week timeline to work with.
So with this season, we've heard all the feedback. A big thing for us this season is challenges, which will keep the gameplay fresh as you're leveling up. The total time to get to max level is reduced considerably, and even casual players will feel a nice ramp-up to the battle pass. We're putting crafting metals in, that was a big community request, and you will be able to get the legendary of your choice. We added three other legendaries to the track, so that's Caustic, Octane, and then the Spitfire weapon skin. We're also adding three new content types that will replace the voice lines, badges, and the stat trackers. We're leaving other things as a surprise for when season two launches, but there will be completely new categories that you've never seen before content.
Another change that a lot of people are happy about is for Mozambique, a gun that's somewhat notorious for being unreliable in most combat encounters. Can you talk about the general reception it's had since launch, and how you wanted to change it?
Horn: So, I think we're leaving that one for a surprise, but our hope is that we'll have some late-game potential for it. If you find it, you'll consider it as a real choice versus a sort of temporary measure. But I mean, we enjoy a good meme, and it's exciting to see people responded so strongly to it. That's sort of why we added like a joke throw away animation. Now, when you replace Mozambique, you like just throw it down.
So yeah, we embrace it but we also--at the same time--are trying to come up with ways to be viable and things like that. So a lot of the changes you'll see for weapons are sort of trying to give the underplayed weapons situations when they're good.
Is there a worry there that a slight buff to one gun--even the Mozambique--could seriously disrupt the flow?
Horn: Yeah, most of the time we try to stick with hop ups [gun attachments that alter weapons] so that way it sort of makes it late-game, because you have to find component A and component B and put them together. So the Mozambique's still the early game, better than a kick--or arguably better than a kick, but it's still worse to some people. So yeah, we're trying to do it through ways that will make it not better early-game necessarily. We're buffing some damage here and there, and some small tweaks to just sort of make it not feel like a wet noodle gun. But we are trying to make it so that it'll be worthwhile when trying to progress to the next weapon. That is a goal, and hopefully the hop ups we'll add as well can make it exciting and open up new gameplay.
The new Legend coming to the game is Wattson, who has some cool tactics that relate to locking areas down. Have there been any cool tricks or skills that you've seen players pull off from your playtests?
McCoy: Well, I'm a mostly simple player, so Wattson's like really complex for me. You have to plan, have an idea, and try to execute on it. So I'm part of the wrong one to ask about her. I don't know if you've had any really good experience with her?
Horn: We've seen some cool things so far. Like when there are multiple teams in Skull Town with Wattsons, and they essentially just lock it down with her fences. They basically turn it into this crazy prison city.
McCoy: I was actually in a final circle once where Caustic and Wattson were hunkered down in a building during the final circle, and it was like impenetrable. We got just destroyed because it was their house and we were not welcome.
Lee Horn: (Laughs) Yeah so they'll have a great trade-off of being really strong, or that duo will be really strong in buildings obviously, but if they get caught out in the open and they didn't have time to set up. So it's a lot of like anticipation gameplay and sort of thinking about where the fight will be versus reacting to the fight right now.
Can you talk a little about the process of making a new legend?
McCoy: Generally, a legend can take a year and a half to make--so we came up with our main roster really far in advance. We have a bunch of them that we prototype and iterate on, and they all have kind of like different stages they go through in development. We have to make sure that they're fun enough, they've got a good personality, their assets are looking good, and that they have a silhouette that gives off their personality.
It just takes a long time. We've got stuff that we haven't shown yet that we've been working on for more than a year and a half. That's the tricky part about game development, the live service world. People expect satisfaction immediately and they don't realize how long it takes to make content. So we have to use our crystal ball and think; what are people going to like a year from now? And start working on that while looking at what the game's doing and it's adjusting along the way. It's kind of a dark art.
I'd imagine that you all must agonize over how new legends will play with others.
Horn: We play test the game twice a day, which can be up to three or four hours if you participate in all of it. That's usually where we get that kind of insight. We'll lock all characters but say the four or five we're working on, and just play those so we can get a lot of reps on them. That's where we feel out the balance changes. We also have periodically brought in streamers to give feedback. Not for marketing purposes but just to play the game, tell us what's working. If they have a crystal ball, what do they see happening with this character if it was to come out as it is? That's been really helpful as well.
Editor's Note: At this point, Respawn Entertainment Co-Founder Vince Zampella arrived with lunchtime fajitas for the devs, proudly asking McCoy and Horn "would you like some fajitas?" He stuck around for the remainder of the interview.
Since you're here, what are your overall thoughts on just how successful Apex Legends has been?
Vince Zampella: Yeah, holy shit, right? (Laughs) It just went way past our expectations. I think Lee and Drew already spoke this, but you know, it creates its own set of problems too right? We weren't prepared for it, I mean even like just on the hardware side. It's a great problem to have, don't get me wrong, right? But it's still like, I think Drew was walking around in a zombie-like state for about two months. It's created a lot of work, but it's amazing to see. I don't think we would change it if we could. It took us all by surprise.
Did the sudden success of the game force you to reevaluate certain features or shift your perspective of what the game can be?
McCoy: Not necessarily what it could be, but like a really practical example of what we wanted to focus on was anti-cheat. Cheaters go to games that are popular. Not that we were expecting the game to fail, but we weren't expecting it to be as popular as it was. So we thought our anti-cheat would be sufficient--it turned out it wasn't. So we had to divert a bunch of resources away from other things, and start working on cheaters, spammers and stuff like that. That's just one of the things we knew we were going to have to do if the game got big enough. We just happen to do it in the first month, rather than it be twelve months down the road.
Horn: A lot of the features we wanted on day one was going to be hard to deliver, regardless of how much time we had. But now that frenzy at launch has died down, we can now sort of take a breath, and then get back to work.
Harry Potter: Wizards Unite, the new mobile game from Warner Bros. and Pokemon Go developer Niantic, is now live a little early in the US and UK. Since its announcement, Wizards Unite has drawn frequent comparisons to Pokemon Go, and not without reason; not only are both titles developed by the same studio, they share many similar gameplay elements. Now that we've gotten our hands on the full game, how exactly do the two titles compare? Read on as we break down their similarities and differences, or check out more in-depth guide to Wizards Unite for Pokemon Go players.
The general thrust of Wizards Unite is very similar to Pokemon Go, albeit with a Harry Potter spin. Just as in the Pokemon mobile game, gameplay primarily revolves around exploring the real world in search of collectibles. Rather than catching Pokemon, however, you'll be hunting for "Foundables"--people, creatures, and artifacts from the Wizarding World that have begun appearing in the Muggle world.
Not only is the basic premise of Wizards Unite similar, many of its elements have analogs in Pokemon Go. The game's equivalent of Gyms are called Fortresses, and just as in Pokemon Go, these will host Raid-like "Wizarding Challenges" that will require players to team up in-person to tackle. Instead of a Pokedex, you have a Registry that gradually fills out as you collect Foundables. Inns serve the same function as Pokestops, while Portkeys are similar to Eggs; after you've used either a Gold or Silver Key (Wizard Unite's version of Incubators), you'll need to log a certain number of steps and the Portkey will take you to a Wizarding World location.
While the games' foundations are very similar, however, Wizards Unite differs from Pokemon Go in some significant ways. The most obvious is the sheer amount of content it has from the outset; right from the start, Wizards Unite features a variety of quest objectives to complete. The game also places a bigger emphasis on story, with fully voiced dialogue and a clear--if not entirely comprehensible--plot running through the experience.
Wizards Unite also employs more traditional RPG-like elements than Pokemon Go does. Once you've reached level six in the game, you'll be able to choose a Profession, which will allow you to unlock abilities in skill trees. The game also features a potion-brewing system.
The screenshots look similar to Kingdom Hearts in aesthetic, but with a darker, grittier palette. They show iconic characters Aeris, Barret, Cloud, Tifa, and Sephiroth, all rendered in typical Testuya Nomura fashion. Some are stills from combat encounters with bits of the HUD visible, while others are likely from explorative gameplay sections. There also seem to be a handful of shots from possible in-game cutscenes, including an epic back-to-back shot of Cloud and Tifa. You can check out the new screens below.
We discussed the modernization of Final Fantasy VII Remake in a feature article, with managing editor Peter Brown saying he "[fell] in love with the world and characters all over again" after going hands-on with the game on the E3 2019 show floor. "It would be far too premature to claim that the final product will be as amazing as my demo, but at the risk of sounding naive once again, I'm given hope as I recall the experience I had when I first played the original PlayStation demo in 1996, and how that experienced carried over to the full game," Brown wrote of the demo.
Final Fantasy VII Remake will launch exclusively for PlayStation 4 on March 3, 2020. Square also confirmed that the hotly-anticipated RPG will be playable on PlayStation 5 and will span two discs worth of gameplay content.
Funko Pop vinyl figures have taken fandom by storm over the last several years, expanding into nearly every arena of pop culture, with gaming being a huge part of that. Amazon is now offering a sale on a huge variety of the figures, including a lot of characters from many of our favorite games.
Harry Potter Wizards Unite is now available in the US and UK, offering an experience similar to Pokemon Go but set in JK Rowling's Wizarding World--and with a little more polish at launch to boot. Like Pokemon Go, Niantic's latest game has you scouring the real world for items to collect and taking part in social challenges with other players. That means if you want to get the most out of your wizarding experience, it's time to start making some friends.
"In the course of your efforts to contain the Calamity, you're sure to encounter other witches and wizards of the Statute of Secrecy Task Force," a prompt in the game reads. "When you add them to your Friends List and work together, you'll earn social benefits. The more Friends you have, the better the rewards!"
It goes on to state that if you meet up with friends at a Fortress to take on a Wizarding Challenge together, you'll earn bonus Wizarding XP as well as extra Wizarding Challenge XP. Wizarding Challenges are essentially this game's versions of Pokemon Go Raids, gathering players together for a larger encounter that promises exclusive rewards.
Friends can be added through the Social menu, which is accessed using the icon in the bottom-left corner of the screen that features two hat-wearing wizards. From there, you'll be able to add others and see your own 12-digit friend code, which is what you'll need to share with others so they can add you. Once you've become friends, you can see players' status and see their Ministry ID, a profile page which shows off their wand, code name, Achievements, and so on.
If you're looking for friends in your area, a fan site called Accio Wizards Unite is already up and running and mapping friend codes. You can search by area or add your own to the database to find other local wizards and witches.
Nintendo Switch games are notoriously expensive, but there are a few reliable ways to save yourself some cash. The Nintendo Eshop regularly has sales, and the company began offering a pair of game vouchers for $100 to players with a Nintendo Switch Online subscription that you can then redeem on two games, saving yourself up to $20. But on top of these deals, there's another way to make your money go even further that fewer people consider: gift card discounts.
Currently, at Newegg, you can save 10% on a $50 Nintendo Eshop gift card by using promo code EMCTBVT49 at checkout. That translates into getting a $50 gift card for only $45, which may not seem like a huge price cut, but why stop there? You can then turn around and use that gift card on already discounted games, saving yourself even more money.
An even sneakier way to use discounted gift cards is to buy a pair of $50 gift cards and use those to buy two game vouchers at Nintendo for $100, assuming you have a Nintendo Switch Online subscription. (Reminder: You can get a year of Switch Online for free through Amazon Prime.) Not only are you saving $20 on two full-price games with the vouchers, but you're saving an additional $10 with the gift card deal, getting you $120 in value for only $90. That translates to getting two new $60 Nintendo games for only $45 each. Plus, you'll get 500 My Nintendo Gold Points from the voucher purchase, which equals another $5 in Eshop credit. The eligible list of games for Nintendo's vouchers includes upcoming releases like Pokemon Sword and Shield, The Legend of Zelda: Link's Awakening, Super Mario Maker 2, Fire Emblem: Three Houses, and more.
This particular Newegg gift card deal is only running for a few more days, but gift card discounts do pop up often in case you miss this one. Xbox One and PS4 gift cards also get marked down by $5 or $10 regularly, so you can save money when shopping for those platforms as well. For example, BJ's members can currently get a $25 PlayStation Store gift card for only $20, which can be used to save even more money on some of the great PS4 games on sale right now.
Microsoft exclusive Gears 5, which unveiled a haunting cinematic trailer during the company's E3 2019 presentation, is only a few months away. Details about the upcoming third-person shooter continue to emerge with its September release right around the corner, and a new post on the Gears 5 official website provides some enticing information, including free content and the lack of a season pass.
The news post outlines a bunch of the game's details. We get a cinematic glimpse at new Gear Fahz Chutani (played by Rahul Kohli, Rage 2's Garcia the Gregarious). The post also goes over the game's new 3-player co-op mode Escape, which you can check out 10-minutes of gameplay footage above. But the biggest piece of news centers around additional content.
Developer The Coalition touts a "player-first experience," stating some of the game's additional content will be free. According to the post, Gears 5 will feature no season pass, no loot boxes, and free DLC maps for matchmaking and private play. The maps sound similar to Gears of War 4, but where that game required you own the map to play them in private matches after they left the playlist, this game doesn't seem to have that limitation. Though Gears 5 will have microtransactions, the post confirms that "all store purchases are direct," meaning no RNG (random number generator) will play in a role in what you get. An IGN report reveals that Gears 5 will feature seven different types of cosmetics that can be purchased will real money: costumes, weapon skins, banners (emblems with more surface area), expressions (emotes), executions, blood sprays, and marks (to mark targets). "The only random kind of chance you have is that there's a type of content that we essentially give to the player for free just for playing," The Coalition boss Rod Fergusson told IGN during E3 2019.
Gears 5 follows Kat Diaz (played by Laura Bailey, Uncharted 4: A Thief's End's Nadine Ross) as she searches to uncover the truth behind her heritage and her connection to the Locust. Xbox boss Phil Spencer said Gears 5 was " looking great" when he visited the Vancouver-based studio in March 2019.
Gears 5 will release on September 10 for PC and Xbox One. A versus technical test is scheduled for Friday, July 19, with Horde Mode getting its own test sometime this August.
Recent Articles:
You are receiving this email because you opted in at our website.
No comments:
Post a Comment