Author: Trafficblast

Nickelodeon All-Stars Brawl, the Smash Bros-like crossover fighting game developed by Ludosity and Fair Play Labs, has announced two new characters in the form of CatDog and April O’Neil.

Following her Gamescom 2021 Opening Night reveal as a playable character in TMNT: Shredders Revenge, the Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtle jumpsuit-wearing news reporter April O’Neil was announced to be joining the roster of characters set to battle it out in Nickelodeon’s All-Stars Brawl. O’Neil’s reveal trailer saw her back in her iconic yellow look as she showed off an impressive move that features acrobatic flips and split kicks alongside a weaponized microphone.

As previously mentioned, O’Neil isn’t the only character that was revealed during the show. NickToons fan favourite CatDog will also be making their appearance when the game debuts this fall. Unlike April O’Neil, CatDog’s reveal trailer appears to show a unique combat style that complements both the character’s canine and feline capabilities. From a swole Caninius Dog right hook to Felinius Cat battering opponents with a fire hydrant, CatDog looks like a force to be reckoned with.

Nickelodeon All-Star Brawl was initially revealed back in July where it was announced that the game will also feature characters from SpongeBob SquarePants, Rugrats, Ren & Stimpy, Hey Arnold and more when it launches on PlayStation 4, PlayStation 5, Xbox One, Xbox Series X|S, and Nintendo Switch later this year. If you’re looking forward to jumping into the cartoon-based brawler then make sure to check out the game’s official announcement trailer.

Jared Moore is a freelance writer for IGN. You can follow him on Twitter.

Wonder Woman 1984 director Patty Jenkins has commented on the “detrimental” impact of the DC sequel’s day-and-date release.

As reported by Deadline, Jenkins shared her thoughts on Wonder Woman 1984’s theatrical day-and-date model while speaking on a panel at CinemaCon on Thursday. She reportedly referred to the movie’s release as a “heartbreaking experience,” even though she acknowledged that it was “the best choice in a bunch of bad choices” at the time.

Warner Bros. announced its industry-shaking approach to distributing movies last year, revealing that the studio’s entire 2021 film slate would be available concurrently for an exclusive window on HBO Max. WW84 was released in December, serving as an early test of how blockbuster movies might perform when given a day-and-date release.

The sequel to 2017’s Wonder Woman got off to a slow start at the international box office, opening to just $18.8 million in China and a total of $38.5 million overseas. However, it then went on to earn $46.5 million in the U.S. market and $120 million in other territories, for a worldwide total of $166.5 million against a $200 million budget.

“It was detrimental to the movie… I knew that could have happened,” Jenkins said, referencing the movie’s box office performance following its simultaneous release on HBO Max and in theaters. “I don’t think it plays the same on streaming, ever. I’m not a fan of day-and-date and I hope to avoid it forever. I make movies for the big-screen experience.”

Jenkins also affirmed that she would never make a movie for Netflix or any other streaming service, given the fact that those movies typically only get a short time in theaters before segueing to streaming. She admitted that “it’s hard to market a movie when it has a limited run,” whereas television is something that she likes working on with the streaming giant.

The release of WW84 on HBO Max helped to double the streamer’s subscriber numbers in the fourth quarter of last year, with an estimated 554,000 users signing up between December 25 and December 27 alone. In addition, WarnerMedia noted that “nearly half” of its HBO Max subscriber base watched the superhero sequel on the day of its release.

Warner Bros. has already confirmed that Wonder Woman 3 is in development with director Patty Jenkins and lead star Gal Gadot both set to return, so you might want to check out 7 of the biggest WTF questions we had after watching the Wonder Woman sequel and read our explainer of the ending and how the movie could change the DCEU.

Adele Ankers is a freelance writer for IGN. Follow her on Twitter.

Sports clothing and footwear brand Puma has announced a new collaboration with Nintendo, which will see the company release its very own Animal Crossing New Horizons-inspired sneakers.

As revealed in a first look on Sneaker Freaker, the wild world of footwear is about to reach new horizons with Puma announcing its new Animal Crossing-themed Wild Rider footwear collection. No release date or price has been revealed.

Pairing Animal Crossing’s natural color palette with a range of charming character icons from New Horizons, the sneakers are up there with some of the best Animal Crossing collaborations to come from Nintendo. In addition to nods to the game’s tone and characters, the sneakers’ suede paneling gives them a more robust feel whilst Puma’s trademark side stripe completes the look.

With muted Animal Crossing branding implemented across the design of the shoe, without garishly overdoing it, the upcoming shoes look to be a welcome addition to the world of video game-inspired fashion. Other clothing wil also be part of the Animal Crossing x Puma reveal, with a hoodie also shown off. According to Sneaker Freaker, clothing from the collab will feature styles for both adults and children when it’s released.

This isn’t the first clothing collab to come out of Nintendo in recent years. In October, we saw the worlds of Animal Crossing and Mario feature in a collection from Australian-based brand BlackMilk Clothing. Meanwhile, last March, Nintendo and Levi announced a Mario-inspired denim collection that included overalls, pants, jackets, and more.

With the latest collaboration between Puma and Animal Crossing set to be a stylish one, perhaps someone ought to notify Tom Nook that the housing market might not be his most lucrative business venture after all.

Jared Moore is a freelance writer for IGN. You can follow him on Twitter.

Up until now, folks have been attempting to define Deathloop via comparisons with a fairly broad list of existing games. Previous time loop games, assassination games, and highlights from developer Arkane’s own back catalogue have all come into the crosshairs. After a five-hour hands-on with Deathloop from the beginning of the game it’s certainly true these associations have merit – but it’s equally true they’re not really painting a complete picture of Arkane’s ambitious Groundhog Day murder marathon, as it’s a little different to what I expected.

Deathloop’s grimy, retro-futuristic ’60s espionage aesthetic makes a fabulous first impression, and it’s well-supported by some immediately excellent music and some great voice work from Colt actor Jason E. Kelly. Kelly’s dialogue needs to do a fair bit of heavy-lifting – particularly as Deathloop sets up its main mystery – and imbuing his delivery with a cocktail of indignant confusion mixed with otherwise gung-ho enthusiasm successfully put me in Colt’s corner straight away. I like him, and that’s always a good first step.

Deathloop’s premise is simple: to break out of a 24-hour time loop, main man Colt must kill the eight enigmatic ‘Visionaries’ that run the creepy island of Blackreef in a single day. Die, or fail to get all eight, and the day starts all over again – and everyone you’ve shot, stabbed, or kicked off a cliff is resurrected. IGN’s detailed hands-on preview of this initial slice of Deathloop features a spoiler-free discussion regarding the hunt for one particular target.

Either way, after roughly five hours with the game it’s now very clear that killing all eight targets in one day isn’t going to be quite as straightforward as it sounds. Four times of day and four different environments – but double the targets – means Colt needs to uncover ways to bop off multiple targets in each location on a single visit.

The fact that there’s no way to save your progress while mid-mission is an interesting way to force players to truly lean into the experimentative world of a hypothetical time-loop. Messed up? Deal with it and keep going, or give up and try the day over again. Colt’s special ability to die twice in a level before a third death resets the day for good blunts just enough of the risk to allow me to use a little trial and error, but it only takes two small mistakes to leave Colt skating on very thin ice until I decide to leave a map.

However, it didn’t take long for Deathloop to begin to depart from some of the more common press comparisons I’ve heard to date – especially with Io Interactive’s Hitman series. It’s true that both thrive on repetition within their murder sandboxes; Hitman encourages return visits to its maps via its fun reward system, and Deathloop bakes them into the narrative itself (multiple visits to the maps are required to uncover clues, hidden locations, plus upgrades and other powerful weapons). At the five-hour mark they’re otherwise quite different, especially in terms of their approaches to stealth and the density of NPCs. I’ll stress none of this really seems to reflect poorly on Deathloop, which seems very good so far. Movement and combat in particular feels very refined and I love Colt’s violent kick move. It’s just not as closely aligned with Io’s assassination classics as some of the initial reporting led me to believe.

Of course, another element of Deathloop is the ability to play not only as Colt, but as his rival Julianna. While Colt’s wish is to break the loop by killing the island’s eight Visionaries, Julianna’s role is is to kill Colt.

According to Arkane, choosing to play as Julianna will inject you into someone else’s game, allowing you to hunt down and kill them while they’re busy trying to unravel Deathloop’s central mystery as Colt. For the purposes of this preview, only Colt could be used, and human players were unable to enter our games as Julianna. Only AI-controlled Juliannas invaded my playthrough, and she appeared as a target just twice in the roughly five hours I played. The AI Julianna doesn’t seem too tricky to take down with a potent weapon; she’s a little tougher than standard enemies but not egregiously so.

It is very important to note that Deathloop can be played entirely solo, blocking strangers (or friends) from gategrashing your game and ruining your session. So, yes, you can most definitely play Deathloop and exclusively only ever deal with an AI-controlled Julianna. What’s confounding me a bit, however, is that I can’t really fathom why anybody would choose otherwise. That is, after a decent stint of Deathloop – including a couple of consecutive runs that ended in slightly irritating deaths achingly close to the objective I’d set for myself – it’s entirely beyond me why anyone would ever opt to allow strangers to enter their game.

While I’ve enjoyed picking at the initial threads of Deathloop’s mystery and patiently skulking through the environments, I can just see no joy whatsoever in letting Arkane airdrop a total stranger into my game to potentially wreck everything I’d achieved that day – especially if it meant losing weapons and power-up trinkets I hadn’t yet protected from vanishing when the loop resets. I also can’t see how it would be fun to do it to someone else – especially a friend. Granted, I’m a strict single-player evangelist, but it seems roughly equivalent to bursting into a mate’s house and pulling their PS5’s power plug out of the wall before they have a chance to save their progress. Arkane has established that Deathloop’s PvP wasn’t really conceived with competitive play in mind, so I’ll wait until I’ve seen the PvP in action, but I’m not quite grasping the appeal of this second pillar of Deathloop’s package. Maybe I’m not a big enough jerk.

Fortunately, there isn’t long to wait – Deathloop arrives on PC and PS5 next month, on September 14 – but for now I feel like this may be a mystery I’ll seek to solve solo.

Luke is Games Editor at IGN’s Sydney office. You can find him on Twitter every few days @MrLukeReilly.

Full SPOILERS ahead for Candyman!

Nia DaCosta’s Candyman is both a sequel and a relaunch. While it pays homage to the original films, it also breaks from the trends they established, and builds to a thrilling conclusion that feels both unexpected yet completely fitting.

What happens in the climax might seem complicated at first, given the surprising way it’s set in motion. The film is far from straightforward, but the way its thematic pieces fall in place results not only in a great ending to the movie but a great new beginning for the Candyman series.

Candyman: Why Does Burke Kidnap Anthony?

Slasher movies are no strangers to last-minute villain reveals, and Colman Domingo’s Burke is a sure candidate, between his eerie entrance and his in-depth knowledge of Candyman. Towards the end of the film, he finds Anthony McCoy (Yahya Abdul-Mateen II) in a fugue state and decides to turn him into a version of Candyman in full view of his girlfriend Brianna (Teyonah Parris) by sawing off his arm, replacing it with a meat-hook, and dressing him up in a familiar brown coat before calling the police. However, his reasons aren’t as simple as bloodlust or cult-like villain worship.

DaCosta’s soft reboot returns to the setting of the first film — the now condemned Cabrini-Green housing project — whose poor Black community has been forced out so developers can swoop in. Burke is one of its last remaining residents, and framing Anthony is his last-ditch attempt to prevent it from being gentrified. According to Burke’s twisted logic, if there turns out to be another Candyman killer in the project, people might sour on the neighborhood and keep their distance.

Burke is a keeper of myths, and while Candyman has fallen out of the collective memory, he carries the story with him. Before the film cuts to the Church where he holds Anthony and Brianna captive, we’re shown a flashback in which he watches his sister die after summoning the “original” Candyman — Daniel Robitaille (Tony Todd), who was lynched in the 1890s for loving a white woman — by saying his name in a mirror. As a child, Burke also witnessed the police beat an innocent man to death, Sherman Fields, who resembled Candyman and who was accused of putting razor blades in children’s candy. Burke was the only bystander in either case, but as he prepares to mold Anthony in Candyman’s image, he tells Brianna: “Now we have a witness.”

Burke knows both these stories intimately — the supernatural bloodshed and the real violence that permeates his community — though he’s had to shoulder their trauma alone. To him, they’re part of the same legacy, and a story that keeps repeating itself throughout history, with different “Candymen’” becoming victims of racist violence, and that violence returning from beyond the grave to kill innocent people, like his sister. Burke has, in a way, succumbed to this cyclical reality, and to him, perpetuating the urban legend is the only way to shield his neighborhood from a vicious outside world.

Candyman: What Happened to Anthony?

Anthony, upon being framed by Burke, is shot dead by Chicago PD in front of Brianna. As the cops intimidate Brianna into telling their version of the story, she summons Candyman by saying his name five times. When this spirit first appears, he’s surrounded by a swarm of honeybees — the way Robitaille was tortured before being killed — but he looks and sounds like Anthony.

Anthony, who was abducted by Robitaille as a baby in the original Candyman (1992), spends most of the film rediscovering his own history. At first, the myth is just material for his canvas, but it soon begins to consume him, not just artistically, but physically too. As his body starts to rot, he begins to resemble Robitaille’s grotesque, corpse-like appearance in previous films. Whether he likes it or not, he is part of the Candyman story — not just because he appeared in the first film, but because he’s tethered to America’s deep history of racism no matter how much he tries to escape it.

When Anthony returns to Cabrini-Green, where he lived as a baby, Burke considers this to be “perfect symmetry” — an inevitable echo, in which Burke also plays a part by kidnapping Anthony, the way Candyman once did. Burke and Anthony wear similar brown coats, just like several Black characters who made up different “versions” of Candyman over the years, all of whom suffered at the hands of white supremacy. By the end of the film, both Burke and Anthony symbolize the legacy of Candyman, and the pain it represents for the people of Cabrini-Green. Anthony is even absorbed into this history, and he becomes one with Candyman’s vengeful form.

Will There be a Candyman Sequel?

After Candyman kills the officers responsible for Anthony’s death, he briefly reveals his face to Brianna. We then see a returning Tony Todd in all his terrifying splendor, as he instructs her: “Tell everyone.”

The new sequel doesn’t discard any of the series’ mythology, but it builds on it from a new perspective. DaCosta is the first Black filmmaker to helm Candyman, and while previous films all centered on Robitaille haunting white women, the 2021 movie takes closer aim at the story of his murder — and of similar murders over the years — and re-works him into a spirit of vengeance. Candyman still takes innocent lives, but when he flays the police officers in the climax, Anthony’s voice emanates from behind the swarm; “They will say I shed innocent blood,” he whispers. “You are far from innocent.”

These updates to the character don’t retroactively change the previous films — in which white filmmakers told stories of white protagonists, who were outsiders to the racism in Robitaille’s past — however, the new movie captures Candyman’s actions from a brand new perspective. When Robitaille killed a policeman in the second film, Candyman: Farewell to the Flesh (1995), no thematic connections were drawn between white supremacy and structural police violence. However, a story in which Black perspectives are central, and in which white supremacist violence is still alive and well, is a vital realignment of what Candyman is, and perhaps, what he should have always been. When Robitaille tells Brianna to “tell everyone,” he not only wants his legend to live on and for people to summon him as they did in prior films, but he also wants this version of his story told, one that harkens back to his painful origins.

When the film ends, Candyman is neither just Daniel Robitaille nor just Anthony McCoy. He is both of them — and more. He is a symbol of all the Black victims Burke mentions, who died at the hands of white supremacy, and if the series continues under Jordan Peele’s Monkeypaw Productions, this is who Candyman is likely to be. The character was always designed to reflect a violent past, but now, he embodies the full scope of that history as it bleeds into the present and he kills with righteous fury.

What did you think of the new Candyman movie and its ending? Let us know in the comments. And for more on the film, check out our Candyman review and watch the director and cast on the legacy and meaning of Candyman.