Month: February 2020

At the Locke & Key: Season 1 premiere fan event in Los Angeles, executive producers Carlton Cuse and Meredith Averill explain why they changed the name of the town where Keyhouse is located, from Lovecraft to Matheson.

“It was actually Joe Hill’s idea to do that. It was an homage to Richard Matheson, one of Joe’s favorites, so that was really his choice to do that,” Cuse went on to share more about why Hill made the change. “There was a lot of Lovecraftian elements in the comics and then when we moved it to TV, [Joe] was like, ‘I wanted to honor another author.'”

For a closer look at the series, be sure to check out the official Season 1 trailer in the video below:

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Richard Matheson was an American author who wrote I Am Legend and What Dreams May Come. Both of the aforementioned titles were turned into feature films starring popular actors like Will Smith and the late Robin Williams.

Locke & Key: Season 1 premieres on Netflix on February 7th. For more on Locke & Key, check out our spoiler-free review of Season 1 and learn everything you need to know about the source material graphic novel.

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David Griffin still watches DuckTales in his pajamas with a cereal bowl in hand. He’s also the TV Editor for IGN. Say hi on Twitter.

A new chapter of Apex Legends has arrived through the Season 4: Assimilation update. There’s a new character, Revenant, and additional weapons, along with a number of other under-the-hood changes.

Fans have now discovered another big update that flew under the radar. All characters in Apex Legends have been given a unique voiceline for when they self-revive.

The voicelines match with each character’s personality. For example, the wise-ass Mirage says, “And I’m back! Did everybody miss me? You know you missed me.” The healer Lifeline reflects in a positive manner, saying “All good, just a scrape.” The defensive-minded Caustic, meanwhile, quips, “Not even death can prevent me from completing my work.”

The new character, Revenant, an assassin, has multiple voicelines. In one of them, he simply lets out an “anguished scream,” which seems pretty fitting. You can see a roundup of all of the new voicelines over on Reddit.

For lots more on Apex Legends Season 4, check out GameSpot’s extended breakdown that covers everything you need to know.

With the recent announcement that the Final Fantasy 7 Remake would be delayed until April 2020, Square Enix has revealed that the PS4 exclusivity will be pushed back as well.

The Final Fantasy 7 Remake exclusivity will now last until April 10, 2021, according to the official box art. Initially, the exclusivity was supposed to expire March 3, 2021, but was then shifted along with the game release.

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According to the Final Fantasy VII Remake producer Yoshinori Kitase, the game was delayed to allow the team “a few extra weeks to apply final polish.” He continued, “I, on behalf of the whole team, want to apologize to everyone, as I know this means waiting for the game just a little bit longer.”

Final Fantasy 7 initially released on the PlayStation in 1997 and is considered by many to be one of the best games in the series. The Final Fantasy 7 Remake was first announced at E3 2015.

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The Remake is currently available for pre-order on Amazon for those who haven’t secured their copy yet. You should also be sure to double-check that your pre-order wasn’t canceled by Square Enix. The Final Fantasy 7 Remake will be released on April 10, 2020.

In the meantime, be sure to check out dozens of new screenshots from the game. Additionally, we’ve put together a roundup of all the secrets, reveals, and surprises from the latest trailer.

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Andrew Smith is a freelance contributor with IGN. Follow him on Twitter @_andrewtsmith.

Board games for grown-ups can sometimes be a bit straight-laced and boring, what with the focus on depth and strategy. So if you’re a fan, you might be scratching your head over what kid-friendly games make good introductions. After all, most children love to game and aren’t all that well served by the shelves of toy stores.

It’s good, then, that there are lots of great games that are good enough to give hours of fun to children and discerning adults alike. A lot of them are dexterity games, which make up the bulk of this list, and no shame in that. Not only are they raucous entertainment, simple and quick, but they need a skill kids do better than thick-fingered adults.

The list below is divided up into age groups. For the very youngest, don’t be afraid to let them get out your grown-up games with pretty pieces and let them play how they like. It develops imagination and familiarity. And once they’re through with these, take a look at our best board games for beginners list to find entry-level games made for older kids and adults.

Board Games for Toddlers and Preschool-Age Kids

Go Away Monster

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It’s hard to imagine a better first game than Go Away Monster, designed to teach basic turn-taking while reducing fear of scary things under the bed. Players alternate pulling cardboard shapes blindly from a bag. Most are bits of bedroom furniture, which you use to decorate your bedroom play mat. One, though, is a cute monster which the player must throw away while intoning the game’s name.  It’s a lovely little ritual that delights kids and less self-conscious adults too.

Orchard

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Another super-simple game for little ones, Orchard introduces a die and a jigsaw puzzle. Roll the die and take a matching fruit from the orchard, or two of your choice if you roll a basket. If a raven comes up, though, you must add a piece to the raven puzzle. Empty the orchard before the puzzle is complete for a co-operative win. With bright wooden fruits and the cheeky raven character, this is sure to capture lots of little imaginations.

Animal Upon Animal

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Once kids have developed a little dexterity, at around age three, the wonderful world of stacking games opens up. Animal Upon Animal is a great place to start and is fine fun for adults too. A die roll decides who gets to choose an animal shape and who will stack it. Cause the pile to fall, and you must take some of the toppled animals: first to clear their pieces wins. It’s the shapes that really make this game, a brilliant set of designs that open up a myriad of stacking options that reward clever play.

Board Games for Elementary School-Age Kids

Loopin’ Louie

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The next step up the dexterity game stack is this ridiculous slice of motorized mayhem. Louie sits in a weighted plane on a battery-powered boom, so he circles above all the player’s precariously balanced chicken discs. Left alone he’ll start knocking them off. So it’s good each player has a lever to knock Louie away. Time it right and he’ll smash right into someone else’s chickens: unless they’re fast enough to bash him right back at you. There are all sorts of fun licensed versions of this game around, such as Loopin’ Chewie and Bobbin’ Bumblebee.

ICECOOL / ICECOOL2

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• See ICECOOL on Amazon
• See ICECOOL2 on Amazon

ICECOOL and ICECOOL 2 also use weighted pieces in a very different dexterity game. This time the weights are in penguins that you flick around, allowing you to make jumps, swerves and all kinds of trick shots. For most players, the aim is to leap and collect fish tokens pinned above doorways on the modular board, built out of the box itself. One though, the hall monitor, has to hunt down the naughty penguins for detention. Everyone takes a turn at being hall monitor in this fast, frenzied flicking game, and then most points wins.

Coconuts

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The titular nuts are irregular rubber spheres that players launch at a field of cups using a monkey shaped catapult. The aim is to land nuts in cups, but those tricky blighters bounce and roll in unexpected ways, adding to the chaos. It’s a simple dexterity delight for the whole family, but there’s more anarchy to enjoy if you also use the included cards. These cause players to have to make trick shots of various kinds, adding to the wow factor if one lands on target.

Pitchcar

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All the entries in this section are dexterity games, but Pitchcar is the one most likely to last well into adulthood. It needs a big, flat surface to play on. The pieces in the box allow you to build a variety of racing circuits, around which players have to flick little discs. First to the finish line wins. It’s far trickier and more exciting than it sounds, with all sorts of techniques to master and thrilling pass shots to take the checkered flag. Various expansions add crazy track pieces like a jump or a loop the loop.

Board Games for Middle School-Age Kids

Shadows in the Forest

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This is one of those games with a premise so awesome it feels irresistible, even for adults. It’s played in the dark, using an included LED lantern and a luminescent die. The board has several big cardboard trees on it that cast shadows and, in the darkness, the Shadowling players move their cute masked pieces. The Seeker player, meanwhile, moves the lantern, trying to catch Shadowlings in the light. Fellow players can rescue any so pinned, but only if they can find areas of shadow to reach the space, leaving them at risk of discovery. A brilliant idea, and a unique game.

Zombie Kidz: Evolution

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At first, this seems too simple for this age bracket. Players move their characters over the school map, eliminating zombies. If they can meet and lock the gates against the zombie horde before being overrun, they win. But as each scenario is passed, the real magic of the game unfolds. This is a “legacy” style game for kids, where each game adds to a growing narrative. Your choices also make your copy unique with pens and stickers and unlockable envelopes of new rules and other content. It’s a wild ride of imaginative customization that children will love.

Fireball Island: The Curse of Vul Kar

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Some readers may find all their nostalgia buttons pushed by the words “Fireball Island.” Well, it’s back, it’s bigger, and the volcano god Vul-Kar is badder than ever. Gone is the roll-and-move of the original for an action card system that adds strategy without complexity. But, really, what you’re here for is the huge 3D plastic board around which red marble fireballs wreak havoc. It’s a race to collect treasure and escape the island before the fire, or one of its many other perils, set you back too far. Silly, yet satisfying fun from yesteryear, given a spanking modern update.

Much like its central character, Birds of Prey (and the Fantabulous Emancipation of One Harley Quinn) is a riot – an anarchic glitterbomb of lunacy that boasts some of the most inventive fight sequences ever seen in a comic book movie, even if it often has a tendency to undermine its momentum just when it’s kicking into high gear. It doesn’t reinvent the wheel – especially in the wake of the fourth-wall breaking Deadpool franchise and the swagger of Guardians of the Galaxy – but it’s still a ballsy, biting blast that feels like a two-hour sugar high without the crash.

After being underwhelmed by the initial trailers, and frustrated by the muddled mess of Suicide Squad (which squandered one of the most entertaining and bonkers concepts in DC’s canon), I worried that Birds of Prey would end up falling into the same trap as the likes of Elektra and Catwoman, slapping a pandering “girl power” narrative onto a paper-thin plot and trusting that skintight costumes would distract from how hollow it all felt.

Luckily, in the capable hands of producer and star Margot Robbie, director Cathy Yan, and writer Christina Hodson, Birds of Prey allows us to see Harley at her most liberated; a trickster goddess who undoubtedly creates more messes than she cleans up, but one who is no patsy, despite spending years in thrall to her green-haired puddin’. It’s the most nuanced portrayal of Harley since creators Paul Dini and Bruce Timm fleshed out her backstory in “Mad Love,” one that actually takes advantage of the fact that Harleen Quinzel earned a PhD before succumbing to the Joker’s unhinged charms; meaning that she not only has the smarts to be strategic when she wants to be, but also has a delicious habit of psychoanalyzing her opponents in a way that’s hilariously disarming. And make no mistake, despite the front-loaded title, this is a Harley Quinn movie first and foremost, one that’s told from her own endearingly off-kilter point of view.

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Birds of Prey has a deliberate stream-of-consciousness quality thanks to Harley’s breakneck voiceover, which is woven throughout – first introduced via an energetic animated prologue stuffed full of easter eggs, which seems designed to get her complicated history with the Joker out of the way up front without actually showing him. (There are also a few direct nods to Suicide Squad, lest you try to forget that the two are set in the same universe, but the movie zips along fine without feeling the need to get bogged down by too much backstory.)

The plot swerves, skids, and doubles back on itself as Harley recounts the unlikely tale of her emancipation and the women who inadvertently become tangled up in it, overcomplicating a fairly straightforward story in which various factions are on the hunt for a stolen diamond… or on the hunt for those who are hunting it. Thankfully, Yan’s stylish direction and keen sense of comedic timing keep things lively even when the story starts to strain under the weight of so many competing storylines.

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Although “Mistah J” is often namedropped – and serves as the catalyst for much of Harley’s growth here – his presence isn’t missed, since Birds of Prey serves up two villains who are somehow even more unpredictable than either Jared Leto or Joaquin Phoenix’s recent takes on the Joker.

Ewan McGregor is clearly having the time of his life as Roman Sionis (aka Black Mask), a mercurial and sadistic crime lord with a penchant for carving people’s faces off and wearing pajamas adorned with his own image. (Sidenote: the costuming choices in this movie are spectacular across the board, and just begging for cosplay — it’s no coincidence you can buy most of Harley’s clothes at Hot Topic already.) His cruel volatility, coupled with his control-freak tendencies, make him the perfect funhouse mirror reflection of Harley’s more benign brand of chaos – there’s no malice in her casual disregard for others, whereas Black Mask makes a game out of toying with his foes. McGregor chews the scenery with such commitment that it’s hard not to be charmed by his charisma, but just when it feels like the audience might be enjoying Roman’s antics a little too much, Yan expertly flips the switch, forcing us to be unwilling witnesses for his most discomfiting acts, just to remind us that it’s all fun and games until somebody loses a face.

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Roman’s theatrics are made all the more chilling because he has the dead-eyed Victor Zsasz (Chris Messina) as his unflappable enforcer. Although the knife-wielding serial killer is an iconic member of Batman’s rogues gallery in his own right, Victor’s obsessive desire to please his boss and Roman’s unchecked narcissism combine to create a dynamic duo who are pure nightmare fuel.

If it sounds like we’re spending a lot of time on the villains, that’s because the movie does too. Birds of Prey has a lot of masters to serve between emancipating Harley, setting up her antagonists, and establishing the other women crammed into that very long title, and unfortunately, the Birds of Prey are the ones who get shortchanged by the ambitious scope of this tale.

Black Canary (Jurnee Smollett-Bell), Renee Montoya (Rosie Perez), and Huntress (Mary Elizabeth Winstead) are all perfectly cast and utterly magnetic when they’re on screen – with Winstead’s Huntress proving to be an unexpected scene-stealer in her comparatively limited screen time – but there’s no doubt that this is Harley’s show. Ella Jay Basco’s Cassandra Cain fares a little better because she spends a good portion of the story in Harley’s custody, and the film really finds its groove whenever they’re together, but you can’t help but wish that Birds of Prey leaned a little harder into the team-up aspect of the title, especially when Smollett-Bell, Perez, and Winstead imbue their characters with such depth in such a short period. Familiarity with the comics (or other iterations of the Birds of Prey) isn’t a necessity, but it certainly adds more context and emotional heft to some of the easter eggs the movie drops, especially in the case of Black Canary’s storyline – but not so much for “Cass,” who is notably different from her comic book iteration, in ways that thankfully end up working to the movie’s advantage.

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Hodson’s script does a good job of tying the women’s disparate plot threads together and giving all of them believable reasons to hate Black Mask (along with some tantalizing hints of each reluctant hero’s backstory), and when they do eventually team up, it’s more than worth the wait, culminating in a dazzling action setpiece. But the delayed gratification calls to mind Netflix and Marvel’s Defenders miniseries, which took three episodes to get the titular heroes fighting together, and even longer for them to all acknowledge that they were, in fact, a team. There’s certainly plenty of scope for a sequel, but it feels like a more streamlined story might’ve left more room for character development, even if the movie had to sacrifice some sass to accomplish it.

One area of the movie that perfectly balances character and sass is in its many elaborate fight sequences. In terms of pure, blood-splattered action, Birds of Prey has far more in common with the John Wick franchise than any recent superhero film, which makes a lot of sense when you realize that Chad Stahelski (director of all three John Wick movies) was reportedly brought on to help punch up the brawls. The fight scenes in Birds of Prey are jaw-dropping and more than earn the movie’s R-rating – utilizing all manner of props (from baseball bats to bags of cocaine), satisfyingly squelchy sound editing, and a deranged sense of humor to create something truly thrilling. And, thanks to an emphasis on practical stunts and well-choreographed camera movements, the smackdowns have a tangible, bone-crunching quality that sets them apart from the overly CGIed slugfests found in many other superhero movies lately.