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Showing posts from January, 2020

Final Fantasy 7 Remake Anniversary Trailer: The Most Intriguing Details And Takeaways

The Final Fantasy VII Remake is just a couple of months away, but in the meantime, the game that started it all is celebrating a birthday. The original FFVII launched on the PlayStation 23 years ago, and a new trailer for the Remake pays homage with more characters and scenes we remember so fondly--along with a few surprises. We've noted some of the most important, silliest, and coolest takeaways about the upcoming game. So far, the game is certainly shaping up to be quite the revisit to classic adventure, taking familiar elements from the original while also not hesitating to offer some refreshing new changes. If the full game's rendering of classic characters and moments proves as well-executed as what we've seen in trailers so far, then it just might be one of this year's finest. For more about FFVII Remake, be sure to read our feature covering everything you need to know about the game. You can also read our impressions detailing our time spent playing the game

Why Doom Eternal Incorporates Platforming Scenarios

Doom Eternal 's third level, the frozen-over Cultist Base, kicks off with a little platforming sequence, and if you've been keeping up with t he game then that might not be too surprising. You're probably aware that alongside chaotic combat with tough demons, you'll be doing a lot more than rushing to the next fight. In our three-hour hands-on preview of Doom Eternal , we experienced first-hand just how platforming and traversal has changed things. As to why it's been emphasized so much in Eternal, we asked game director Hugo Martin about that. Martin prefaced, "A criticism of DOOM 2016 is that it was kind of like skate parks and arena fights; hallways to the next arena, fight, hallways to the next arena, fight. And the arena fights were great." He then continued, "But in between the combat arenas, we really needed to make sure that we can engage the player just as much with the spaces outside of the arenas as we could inside...and expand the scope o

Animal Crossing Joy-Cons And Switch Dock Will Be Sold Separately, At Least In Japan

The Animal Crossing: New Horizons-themed Switch console is almost too cute. As an owner of a launch model Switch, I'm trying to talk myself into buying it. Mainly I want one for the wonderful design, but the practical reason I'm trying to use is that it's the updated model with better battery life. But $300 is a lot to ask for a console you already have. Luckily, Nintendo is selling the special edition Switch dock and Joy-Cons separately. Sadly, both accessories are only confirmed for release in Japan at this time. Animal Crossing: New Horizons Joy-Con Both the Joy-Cons and the dock release March 20--a week after the console releases--and will be available to pre-order from My Nintendo Store starting February 8. The Joy-Cons cost roughly $75 , and the dock costs about $60 . Unfortunately, Nintendo Japan only delivers domestically, so hopefully a store that ships internationally, such as Play Asia, will carry them as well. Of course, it'd be ideal if Nintendo just

My Hero Academia: Heroes Rising Tickets Now On Sale (US, Canada, UK)

Funimation has announced that advanced tickets for the western release of My Hero Academia: Heroes Rising are now available for purchase. Heroes Rising will debut outside Japan in the US, Canada, and UK on February 26. Like the first My Hero Academia movie (Two Heroes), Heroes Rising will release in theaters in both the original Japanese with English subtitles and English dub. Heroes Rising will see Class 1-A travel to Nabu Island to train by doing real hero work. However, the island is then attacked by the villain Nine and his cohorts. Nine's Quirk allows him to steal the Quirks of others and he now possesses nine abilities. While the members of their class defend different parts of the island, Midoriya and Bakugo team up to stop Nine--combining their philosophies to both save and defeat everyone. See Tickets Here Based on the costume designs of Class 1-A, Heroes Rising likely takes place after the events of Season 4. Midoriya is wearing his Air Force Gloves, for example, wh

Mulan Live-Action Remake Movie Gets Spectacular New Super Bowl Trailer

Disney's series of live-action fairy tale remakes shows no sign of slowing down--next up is Mulan , which releases in March. It's an update of the 1998 animated hit about a teenage girl in ancient China who disguises herself as a man to fight against invaders. A new trailer is set to screen during the Super Bowl this weekend, and a new trailer has arrived. While previous Mulan trailers were quite plot-focused, this one is only 30 seconds long, so it doesn't wait around. It features some of the spectacular action that we can expect from the movie, which is clearly influenced by martial arts and wuxia cinema, and should help it stand apart from the animated film. Check it out below. Mulan stars Liu Yifei in the lead role , and the cast also includes a number of high profile Asian stars, such as Donnie Yen , Jet Li, and Gong Li. It's directed by Niki Caro and hits theaters on March 27. The only other Disney live-action remake with a confirmed release date is the 101

Final Fantasy 7 Remake Anniversary Trailer Brings Back Familiar Faces

Final Fantasy 7 launched 23 years ago today, January 31. To mark the occasion, Square Enix released a new trailer for its upcoming FF7 Remake for PS4, featuring the theme song, more battle footage, and a ton of familiar characters we haven't seen shown in the remake yet. The theme song is called "Hollow," and it was composed by Nobuo Uematsu. It's playing in the background of most of the trailer, so you can only catch it in snippets in between the action. Fortunately the action itself is pretty exciting for Final Fantasy fans, as it provides our first official look at iconic characters like Red-XIII. The trailer also spends a significant amount of time introducing various members of the Shinra organization, including Scarlet, Reeve, and Palmer. In addition, we get an extended view of some new fight scenes, and a lot more detail about Cloud's cross-dressing adventure at the Honey Bee Inn. Some of these new tidbits were known via a prior leak . The FF7 Remake w

A Quiet Place 2's Super Bowl Trailer Features A Surprise Return

The horror thriller A Quiet Place was one of 2018's big box office hits, and the sequel was announced within a few weeks of it hitting screens. A Quiet Place: Part II arrives in March, with star Emily Blunt and director John Krasinski returning once more. A new trailer is set to screen during the Super Bowl this weekend, and it can now be watched online. Surprisingly, the new trailer reveals that while Krasinski's character Lee didn't survive the first movie, he will appear in flashbacks that show the start of the monster apocalypse. The teaser also features Blunt's character Evelyn and her kids Regan and Marcus leaving their farm home to find other survivors. Watch it below--and check out the new poster at the end of this story. A Quiet Place: Part 2 hits theaters on March 20. It also stars Millicent Simmonds and Noah Jupe as Evelyn's kids Regan and Marcus, and the new cast members include Cillian Murphy and Djimon Hounsou. For more, check out everything we kn

Coronavirus Fears Have Forced Organizers To Cancel The Taipei Game Show

Due to the ongoing concern over the coronavirus , organizers of the Taipei Game Show have made the decision to postpone the annual event. It was originally scheduled to take place next week, from Feb 6 – Feb 9. The threat of the coronavirus initially prompted organizers of the show to send a safety briefing to attendees and exhibitors, detailing temperature checks at entrances and the requirement for everyone to wear a medical mask at all times during the event. Despite this, the decision was made to postpone the event entirely, with organizers stating that they intend to host the show later this year in summer. A spokesperson for the organizing committee acknowledged the threat of the coronavirus and the danger mass gatherings pose to its spread. Understandably, the committee made the decision to not take the unnecessary risk. "Taipei Game Show is one of the iconic annual networking events," the spokesperson said. "With that in mind, W.H.O. has declared global emerge

Mythic Quest: Raven's Banquet Review - Apple TV+ Levels Up With Game Developer Comedy

When it was announced that It's Always Sunny in Philadelphia co-creator Rob McElhenney was teaming with Sunny executive producers Charlie Day and Megan Ganz to create a comedy about video game developers for Apple TV+ , it was easy to expect a show rife with Sunny's humor but set in a Silicon Valley-esque development studio. Instead, Mythic Quest: Raven's Banquet strays far from Sunny's signature brand of raunchy humor. The series follows the developers of the fictional massively multiplayer online roleplaying game Mythic Quest, as the new expansion pack--Raven's Banquet--is set to release. As the story plays out, you get to know the obnoxious creative director Ian Grimm (McElhenney) and his staff as they attempt to grow their game, while navigating the gaming world and tackling a variety of different aspects of the industry, from deals made with streamers, to their game being hacked. The result is a half-hour comedy that pokes fun at the tech and game developmen

1920s Nordic Noir Draugen Is Coming To PS4 And Xbox One Soon

Draugen, a first-person mystery adventure game from Norwegian developer Red Thread Games, is coming to PlayStation 4 and Xbox One. It will be available on February 21, following its release on PC in May 2019. The game casts players as Edward Harden, who is searching through the fictional Norwegian town of Graavik with his ward, Lissie, in search of his missing sister. As you explore the seemingly abandoned town, searching for clues, the darker secrets that haunt the area begin to come to light. Don't expect a lot of heavy puzzles or anything, though--it's more about experiencing the mystery. Red Thread Games has released a trailer for the game too--if you want to go in fresh, though, it might be worth avoiding. The game received a 7/10 in our review . Jess McDonell said that the game had a lot of promise, even if it didn't quite nail the landing. "Leaving questions unanswered doesn't present a failure in the narrative, but rather the notion that Graavik feels

Sega Europe Will Use Fully Recyclable Packaging For All PC Games From Now On

Sega Europe has announced a new initiative that will see all of its PC physical releases going forward being packaged in 100% recyclable cardboard. This new packaging model was quietly rolled out with the November 2019 release of Football Manager 2020 , and will continue with the upcoming release of Total War Rome II - Enemy at the Gates Edition. This package contains the Hannibal at the Gates, Imperator Augustus and Empire Divided DLCs, and will be spread across three discs. The cardboard used to house them will be both recycled and recyclable. Sega Europe is doing this to reduce the company's carbon footprint--plastic packaging in landfill is not as environmentally friendly as recyclable cardboard. The packaging for these first two releases was market-tested thoroughly beforehand, as people who purchase physical copies of PC games often want a premium product. All printing on the boxes and manuals is done with water and vegetable inks, and the shrink-wrap used is a recyclab

Super Bowl 54 Winner Predicted By Madden NFL 20

As it does every year, EA Sports has now released the results of its Super Bowl simulation that uses the latest Madden game to predict the winner of the big game. According to the simulation, the Kansas Chief Chiefs will defeat the San Francisco 49ers in a very close game, by a score of 35-31. Chiefs QB Patrick Mahomes will earn the Super Bowl MVP award for his performance, according to the simulation. You can watch the announcement video below, which follows a teaser featuring Peyton and Eli Manning. In previous years, EA posts a detailed breakdown of its Super Bowl simulation--featuring player statistics and other key details--but it's not clear if that's happening this year. Whatever the case, the Madden Super Bowl simulation is often wrong, as it has been for the past few years . So 49ers fans shouldn't get too upset over this. It would be great for Mahomes, who is also on the cover of Madden NFL 20. Then again, if the Chiefs lose, fans will no doubt blame the Madden

How To Watch Super Bowl 54 On TV Or Streaming

Super Bowl 54 is upon us. The big game takes place at the Hard Rock Stadium in Miami, Florida this Sunday, February 2. The San Francisco 49ers and Kansas City Chiefs are set to do battle in a game that is projected to be an action-packed affair with a lot of excitement. The game kicks off at at 3:30 PM PT / 6:30 PM ET on Sunday, February 2. You can watch the game on traditional linear TV on Fox or through the streaming site fuboTV , which offers a free trial. The service streams to PC, mobile phones, Google Chromecast, and more. Outside of the football we're expecting trailers for the biggest upcoming movies and advertisements for all kinds of products. It's rumored that Marvel will air a new Black Widow trailer during the big game, while a trailer for Fast 9 is also expected. Super Bowl 54 will have numerous trailers for products. We've already seen a lot of ads, including a recreation of The Shining featuring Bryan Cranston , who gives his wife Mountain Dew instead of

Star Trek: Picard Episode 2 “Maps and Legends” Breakdown & Easter Eggs

In the second episode of Star Trek: Picard, Jean-Luc Picard seeks Starfleet's help as he investigates the mystery surrounding Dahj. Join Chastity and Greg for a breakdown of the plot, Star Trek references, and The Next Generation Easter eggs from Episode 2 "Maps and Legends." from GameSpot - All Content https://ift.tt/37T7g8R

Stadia Addresses Lack Of Game Announcements, Saying It's Up To Publishers

The Google Stadia has had a bit of a rough launch, with only one exclusive (Tequila Works' Gylt ) and middling reviews from critics. Now, as one owner has pointed out on Reddit , it's been 40 days since a new game was announced for the service--and when questioned on this, Google has responded. Google has provided a statement to Gamesindustry.biz about its silence on upcoming releases, and has said that much of this falls on publishers who are gearing up to make their own announcements. Google has previously said that there are 120 games coming to Stadia in 2020, including at least 10 exclusives in the first half of the year, and in its statement they say that they won't be announcing all of them directly. "Of course, not all 120 titles will be announced by the Stadia team," the statement reads, "As we leave it up to the publishers to make the announcement about their IP/games, and which platforms it will appear on--just as we will do with the exclusive

Kingdom Hearts 3 Re:Mind Review - Not Simple Or Clean

Kingdom Hearts 3 Re:Mind's title doesn't lie. It's more of an addendum to Kingdom Hearts 3 than a meaningful addition. In some ways, it's fitting that a franchise as labyrinthine as Kingdom Hearts received such a strange expansion. Re:Mind is a brief but laborious retread of events we already experienced last year, dressed up with new details that only make the already maddeningly elaborate story all the more obtuse. The DLC also brings back Replica Data bosses, which provide a ridiculous challenge that requires inordinate level grinding. [Editor's note: This review contains spoilers for the ending boss and area in Kingdom Hearts 3.] Kingdom Hearts 3 ended with Sora going off on his own to search for Kairi. Re:Mind takes you on that quest in typical Kingdom Hearts fashion: neither simply nor cleanly. It runs synchronously with the events at the Keyblade Graveyard, meaning you actually have to replay the climax again from the Keyblade Graveyard maze all the way to

Disneyland Is Going To Hurl A Life-Sized Spider-Man Robot Over Avengers Campus

With the final piece of Star Wars: Galaxy's Edge slotting into place now that Rise Of The Resistance is finally open on Disneyland and Disney World's Batuu, we can now start shifting our focus to the next big project on the horizon: Disneyland's Avenger's Campus , the new land in California Adventure, themed around Marvel Studios characters and franchises. Last year's D23 Expo gave us some up-close and personal looks at what we can expect from the new park area, including a preview of the new Spider-Man themed ride and Ant-Man and The Wasp themed eatery--but now, with the opening of Avengers Campus just months away, the nitty-gritty details are starting to be fleshed out. And, unsurprisingly, given the sort of characters and stories the MCU tends to deal with, they're getting pretty weird. The official Disney Parks blog has announced that Avengers Campus will feature a life-sized animatronic Spider-Man that will periodically hurl itself in a fashion that on

Star Wars Underground Test Footage Emerges--Check Out George Lucas' Abandoned TV Show

Before The Mandalorian , there was another Star Wars TV series planned. Footage of Star Wars Underground, a show that was in development all the way back in 2010, has surfaced online. The footage shows a very different show from the one many people enjoyed in 2019. The show was to be set in the lower levels of Coruscant, a planet that plays a major part in the Star Wars prequels. It was set after Order 66, and the test footage below was produced by VFX specialists Stargate Studios. The show was eventually delayed and then cancelled due to the high production costs and the eventual sale of Lucasfilm to Disney. According to a comment from the uploader, a two-episode arc would have involved Darth Vader coming to Coruscant to "personally quell a rebellion". It certainly looks a little ropey in places, and it's a bit hard to follow, but it's worth remembering that "test footage" is different from a pilot--this footage was meant to nail down the look and tone o

Destiny 2: Bungie Had To Do Something It's Never Done Before To Fix A Major Bug

With its latest patch for Destiny 2 , Update 2.7.1 , Bungie accidentally created more problems than it solved. The patch added a bug to the game that caused players to lose some of their upgrade materials and currencies--a big problem, especially because the issue cost players their Bright Dust, a currency they can earn in-game to buy premium items from Destiny 2's microtransaction store, Eververse. In response, Bungie took down its Destiny 2 servers for most of the day on Tuesday after the patch was released, and rolled back the game to before Update 2.7.1 was implemented. The developer detailed the rollback on its This Week At Bungie blog , where it explained that this is the first time it has ever had to roll the game back to an earlier state. Destiny 2 News And Guides Destiny 2 Patch Notes: Wormgod's Caress And Winter's Guile Perk Bugs Get Squashed Destiny 2 Bastion Exotic Quest Guide: How To Get The New Fusion Rifle Solved! Destiny 2 Corridors Of Time Bas

Bungie Is Hiring An Art Director For A New Game, And It's Not Destiny 3

Bungie is currently advertising for a new position is an " Incubation Art Director ," one who would oversee art direction on a new IP. The job description outlines a game that sounds very different from previous Bungie titles, like Destiny 2 and Halo . "Are you on a mission to create games that bond players together into deeply invested communities?," the description opens. So far, so Destiny, but things change in the next lines. "Would you like to work on something comedic with lighthearted and whimsical characters?" Bungie's games haven't, historically, been particularly funny or whimsical. "As the Incubation Art Director, you will define the look of a new Bungie IP and work on all aspects of art to guide a prototype on the path to production," the description continues. "Most importantly, you will work with a fun, dedicated, and passionate cross-discipline team devoted to making a new franchise at Bungie." A year ago, Bun

Star Trek: Picard Episode 2 - 14 Star Trek Easter Eggs And References

Star Trek: Picard's second episode, " Maps and Legends ," sees the storied captain continuing to investigate the mysterious android Dahj--and the people who hunted her. The story takes him back to Starfleet headquarters, while also showing us a new look at the Borg Cube teased at the end of Episode 1, "Remembrance." As with the premiere episode, Star Trek history is a big part of the story, and Episode 2 has plenty of references to Treks of the past. There are also quite a few Easter eggs to be found, and the show even takes an opportunity to get a bit meta and make a joke about Picard's aversion to science fiction. We've uncovered a host of tidbits and references you might have missed--check out the complete list below. Disclosure: ViacomCBS is GameSpot's parent company. 1. First Contact Day Episode 2 starts with a look back at the events that took place on Mars 14 years before the start of Star Trek: Picard. We know that synths destroyed Ma