Author: Trafficblast

Call of Duty: Black Ops Cold War and the battle royale game Warzone are celebrating 4th of July with a new DLC pack that comes with a series of patriotic items.

Available now from the in-game shop for Black Ops Cold War and Warzone is the “Fireworks” bundle headlined by a new skin for Adler called “Life Guard.” The skin gives Adler a Captain America makeover with American flag sunglasses and pants, as well as a Lifeguard shirt.

The bundle also comes with the Blasting Star assault rifle, the Barrage submachine gun, the Firework charm, and the Sparkler gesture, all of which are themed around America and general jubilation. This is a Tracer pack, so the new guns emit red, white, and blue rounds to help you stand out on the battlefield. You can see the items in the video below from CharlieIntel. The DLC costs 2,400 Call of Duty Points.

In other news, Activision is celebrating the long weekend with a double XP event now through July 6 at 10 AM PT / 1 PM ET. This applies to both standard XP and weapon XP, spanning Black Ops Cold War and Warzone.

Call of Duty isn’t the only series celebrating America’s birthday. Doom Eternal has its own 4th of July event going on where you can, while Grand Theft Auto Online is once again ringing in the American holiday with a number of patriotic goodies like beer hats.

Additionally, there are a number of 4th of July sales going on now, covering gaming laptops and monitors to games and more. You can read GameSpot’s rundown of the best 4th of July deals to learn more.

For decades there’s been one particularly colored screen you never want to see appear on your PC; the Blue Screen of Death. Microsoft’s famous screen has been a familiar indicator for a big problem with your hardware also since the inception of the OS, but it’s getting a facelift with Windows 11.

Or at least its recognizable color is getting changed. With Windows 11 there will no longer be a blue screen accompanying a critical crash, with a new black screen taking its place (via The Verge). This saves you from having to remember another acronym and is likely a result of Microsoft’s shift towards similarly styled screens for start-up and shutdown.

Curiously, the color is really the only facet of the screen that is changing. The ASCII sad face is still there, as well as the error logs and handy QR code that can help you diagnose whatever issues you’re having. Microsoft changed to this design with Windows 7, making the error dump a little easier on the eye, and hasn’t changed it drastically since.

Given all the other UI elements that Windows 11 is overhauling–from the center-justified taskbar, new application icons, and more–it’s strange that the BSOD will remain as an old-looking relic from Windows past. Then again, Microsoft is likely hoping you won’t see it enough to have it be a bother anyway.

Windows 11 launches later this year and features some exciting features for PC gaming, including Auto HDR, Direct Storage, and a new Xbox app for Games Pass titles.

James Gunn’s The Suicide Squad is only about a month away from releasing in theaters. As a Warner Bros. movie, though, you can also stream it on HBO Max on release day, August 6. The Suicide Squad falls somewhere between a reboot and sequel, but the trailers thus far have shown a lot more promise than the 2016 original. If you’re looking forward to DC’s next movie, we have all of the streaming details you need to know below.

How to watch The Suicide Squad on HBO Max

All HBO Max subscribers can stream The Suicide Squad as part of their subscription. If you don’t already have an HBO Max subscription, there are two plans available. The standard $15 per month (or $150 per year) subscription has been the default option since the service launched last May. But if you don’t mind ads, HBO recently added a $10 per month (or $100 per year) ad-supported subscription. HBO Max doesn’t have a free subscription, so you’ll have to subscribe for at least one month to watch The Suicide Squad.

If you’re planning to see The Suicide Squad at your local theater, presale tickets should be live at Fandango and Atom Tickets in the next couple of weeks.

The Suicide Squad release date

The Suicide Squad releases on August 6 in theaters and on HBO Max. While you can watch it on HBO Max at release, it will only be on the service for a limited time. All Warner Bros. movies with simultaneous theatrical and streaming releases are only available for 31 days. The Suicide Squad will leave HBO Max after September 6.

The Suicide Squad premise

It’s understandable if the idea of The Suicide Squad sounds a tad confusing. It’s not a direct sequel to the 2016 film, nor is it an outright reboot. Even the titles are just about the same (this one adds a “The” in front). Numerous actors and actresses are reprising their roles from the first film, including Margot Robbie as Harley Quinn, Joel Kinnaman as Rick Flag, Viola Davis as Amanda Waller, and Jai Courtney as Captain Boomerang. They will be joined by newcomers such as Idris Elba as Bloodsport and John Cena as Peacemaker.

In The Suicide Squad, the convicts are released from Belle Reve penitentiary to embark on a mission to destroy a prison and lab on a South American island that held prisoners during World War II. The story was inspired by Suicide Squad comics published in the 1980s and war films.

If you haven’t preordered Monster Hunter Stories 2: Wings of Ruin yet, Walmart is offering a $10 discount right now. Walmart’s Monster Hunter Stories 2 preorder deal comes with free shipping, but the retailer says copies won’t ship until launch day on July 9, with orders arriving by July 13. That said, if you’re willing to wait a few extra days to dive into the latest Monster Hunter game, this is the first discount we’ve seen on the Nintendo Switch edition.

Like its 3DS predecessor, Monster Hunter Stories 2: Wings of Ruin features a turn-based battle system and a gameplay loop that can be compared to mainline Pokemon games. You play as a new Rider who accompanies a Wyverian girl named Ena on her quest to protect a Rathalos egg. The central mystery in Wings of Ruin revolves around the disappearance of the iconic Rathalos species. Over the course of the adventure, you can befriend monsters you find and recruit them to your party.

Monster Hunter Stories 2: Wings of Ruin also releases on PC the same day, and you can grab a Steam key for $51 at Fanatical.

All preorders come with the Kamura Maiden outfit for Ena. For more details on editions and the trio of Amiibo figures releasing alongside the game, check out our Monster Hunter Stories 2: Wings of Ruin preorder guide. If you want to learn more about the game, check out our recent interview with the development team at Capcom. A free demo is available now on the eShop, and progress carries over to the full game.

If you’re a fan of niche Japanese fare on PC, you may want to pick up as many NIS America games as you can in the next few days, because their prices are about to go up. The publisher announced recently that it will soon increase the prices on its PC games following the conclusion of summer sales on storefronts like Epic Games Store, Steam, Microsoft Store, and Stadia.

These price hikes are pretty significant, with the normal price of Suda 51’s The 25th Ward: The Silver Case increasing from $10 to $20, and Ys VIII: Lacrimosa of Dana increasing from $40 to $60. Of course, because of the current sales, all of these games are significantly discounted. According to NIS America’s website, the price changes will go into effect on July 19.

Needless to say, some fans were not happy with this move and took to forums like ResetEra to express their displeasure. Some speculated that the price hikes were caused by financial problems, though there doesn’t seem to be any direct evidence of this.

Generally speaking, publishers rarely increase the price of games once they’re released, but it does occasionally happen. For example, Yacht Club Games increased the price of the Shovel Knight: Treasure Trove bundle from $25 to $40 in late 2019 because they added two new games to the bundle. Back in 2020, many players perceived the fact many triple-A games will now cost $70 as part of the next generation of gaming as a price hike from the usual $60, though analysts have said that it’s unlikely to impact the demand for games.

NIS America PC Games Affected By Price Hike

• The 25th Ward: The Silver Case — $20
• Birthdays The Beginning — $20
• The Caligula Overdose — $50
• Cladun Returns: This Is Sengoku! — $20
• Cladun X2 — $10
• Criminal Girls: Invite Only — $20
• Disgaea PC — $20
• htol#NiQ: The Firefly Diary — $10
• Labyrinth of Refrain: Coven of Dusk — $50
• Phantom Brave PC — $20
• Psycho-Pass: Mandatory Happiness — $20
• A Rose in the Twilight — $20
• Yomawari: Night Alone — $20
• Ys VIII: Lacrimosa of DANA — $60

World of Warcraft’s biggest streamer, Asmongold, will be playing and streaming rival MMORPG Final Fantasy XIV for the first time starting this weekend.

Asmongold, who has 2.1 million followers on Twitch, says he wants to give the game an honest shot and will start playing July 3. He plans to forgo using a level boost and wants to play through the game’s story from the beginning, and eventually hopes to participate in some of the game’s most difficult endgame challenges.

The move comes at a time when jumping ship from WoW to Final Fantasy XIV has become a bit of an ongoing joke in the WoW community, as players unhappy with recent expansions or Blizzard’s decisions threaten to move over to Square-Enix’s increasingly popular MMO instead.

“Many people have moved over to Final Fantasy from WoW, and I understand why,” Asmongold said on a recent stream. “The truth is that WoW’s best release in the past 5 years has been a release that came out 15 years ago,” referring to Blizzard releasing WoW Classic, a recreation of the game as it was when it originally released in 2004.

Despite that, WoW will likely continue to be Asmongold’s primary game, even as he looks to branch out and play other MMOs in the near future.

“There’s been a lot of dumb things that have happened, but at the same time it’s still an enjoyable game for me,” Asmongold says about the latest version of WoW in a recently uploaded video. “I still play it pretty much every day, and by pretty much every day I mean literally every single day. I’ve taken breaks before, played Dark Souls, played Path of Exile, but I always come back to WoW.”

Asmongold says he is looking forward to more competition in the MMO genre, and also wants to play Amazon’s upcoming MMO New World as well as Kickstarted MMO Ashes of Creation in addition to Final Fantasy XIV.

“Now, so many games are coming out, we have actual competitors to WoW like Final Fantasy, even Elder Scrolls Online is doing quite well from what I know,” Asmongold says. “It’s just really nice to see those alternatives popping up because I think competition breeds excellence and hopefully every other game, WoW included, will rise to the occasion.”

Blizzard has recently taken a more hands-on approach to changes in regards to the recently released Burning Crusade Classic, such as testing same-faction Battlegrounds. WoW: Shadowland’s latest update, which added a new zone, raid, and mega-dungeon, released June 29. Final Fantasy XIV’s latest upcoming expansion, Endwalker, is slated to release this November.

A quarterback for the University of Wisconsin football team, the Wisconsin Badgers, has unveiled his brand-new logo–and it looks awfully similar to Horizon Forbidden West developer Guerrilla Games’ insignia.

Graham Mertz, who started his career as the Badgers’ quarterback in 2019, dropped his new logo on Twitter following a ruling approving of NCAA players’ ability to earn profits from their name, image, and likeness (commonly abbreviated to “NIL”). Mertz even opened an official merchandise store full of apparel emblazoned with this new emblem.

Twitter users were quick to recognize that Mertz’ logo resembles something else: Guerrilla Games’ trademark. While there are subtle differences–the lines form an “M” in Mertz’ image, something absent from Guerrilla Games’ emblem–there is no denying the two symbols look a lot alike.

Mertz’ image doesn’t just remind people of Guerrilla Games’ crest but other monograms as well, like anti-virus computer software McAfee or the Nintendo GameCube or even former pro footballer Calvin Johnson’s logo.

It’s unclear what Guerrilla Games thinks of Mertz’ mark. We’ve reached out to the developer for comment and will update this post if we hear back.

The NCAA recently approved a new policy letting college players make money for activities professional athletes perform, including endorsement deals, signing autographs, and social media content. Previously, college athletes had limited compensation packages through things like scholarships or other forms of educational payments.

The ruling might even affect upcoming college sports titles, with publisher EA saying it’s looking into the possibility of adding real player names to the EA Sports College Football game. No decision has been made yet.

The Boss Baby: Family Business is now in theaters. It will also stream on Peacock on the same day as its theatrical release date for 60 days.

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Ted and Tim Templeton are back and this time…they’re adults!

Er, and…also babies! And…it’s been, like, 30 years since the first Boss Baby movie? But also they drink a magic formula and get turned into babies again!

After a hit film and then several years as a Netflix series, the bossy babies of Boss Baby are back on the big screen with the kinetic, peculiar The Boss Baby: Family Business, in which a now-grown Ted and Tim are de-aged and ordered to infiltrate a suspiciously precocious school. The movie hits some nice, sweet notes, and has insanely busy action that will keep restless minds occupied, but overall it’s a mid-level animated distraction that doesn’t check off any exceptional boxes.

There’s nothing inherently wrong with the underlying premise of the Boss Baby franchise, but it can’t be denied that it’s all mildly unsettling. “Creepy” might be a strong word, but there’s definitely a meager discomfort involved in watching animated toddlers “adult” everywhere. Family Business adds an extra layer of oddball unbalance by having a grown Tim (voiced by James Marsden, who sounds a lot like Andy Samberg while doing this heightened animated voice) become a young kid who befriends his own daughter, Tabitha (Ariana Greenblatt), at her advanced elementary school. Sure, Tim’s on a mission for BabyCorp but his secondary, more personal op is to spy on her. He even gets himself invited over to his own house, by his own wife (Eva Longoria), so that he can be shown around her room as a child peer. It’s bizarre and off-putting.

But the Boss Baby saga as a whole is kind of gently icky, so what’s one more layer of uncomfortableness, right? The film just eventually becomes a whirring blur of chaotic colors, creating perfectly fine fare for young kids looking for content and parents yearning to not watch something totally atrocious. It’s clever enough, and the sentiment — involving Ted and Tim reconciling after years of estrangement — is pronounced enough to pack a soft and noble punch.

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Jeff Goldblum and Amy Sedaris liven up this funky follow-up as the villain and new Boss Baby, respectively. Goldblum works his Goldblum magic here, just doing his own thing (which is basically a form of self-parody that we’ve all come to love) as Dr. Armstrong, the head of the prestigious Acorn Center for Advanced Childhood – a kid academy hatching a nefarious plot to turn adults into controllable puppets. Again, Goldblum isn’t doing anything we’re not used to, but the film also noticeably perks up whenever he’s yukking it up.

Sedaris too is a great addition, as Tina, Tim’s youngest, who acts as the talking BabyCorp catalyst for this new parade of mischief. She and Ted, while both BabyCorp superstars differ in opinion over corporate climate, with Tina valuing teamwork over cutthroat climbing. Alec Baldwin is the big returning star here (though Jimmy Kimmel and Lisa Kudrow also pop back in a grandparents role) and he still provides some very dry, droll Jack Donaghy-style laughs. Especially when baby Ted finds himself saddled with other regular-brained babies and must work to “Shawshank” himself out of their daycare clutches.

Ariana Greenblatt, who’s seemingly in everything right now, from In the Heights to the upcoming Borderlands movie, provides the bulk of the film’s heart as Tabitha, Tim’s Ted-leaning daughter. Tim mistakenly feels she’s pulling away from him, but in reality, it’s because she’s ashamed she didn’t inherit her dad’s caring creativity. At times, the movie goes way overboard with its presentation of parenthood, as stay-at-home dad Tim sees himself as an immediate failure whenever anyone in his family experiences sadness, but the general message is in the right place. Again, this is a satisfying, though not outstanding, family adventure. For a bit of leveling-up, catch Netflix’s The Mitchells vs. The Machines.

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NetherRealm took to Twitter this morning to announce that it has started work on its next project. As a result, there will be no further DLC for Mortal Kombat 11.

In a tweet, the Chicago-based studio has announced that it is “now focusing on its next project.” What is this project? NetherRealm hasn’t announced it, but the studio is primarily known for either Mortal Kombat or the Injustice series, a fighting game based on a darker version of the DC Comics universe.

NetherRealm is now focusing on its next project and after more than two years of supporting Mortal Kombat 11, DLC for the game, including characters, has come to an end.

— Mortal Kombat 11 Ultimate (@MortalKombat) July 2, 2021

Unfortunately, this means that DLC support for Mortal Kombat 11, NetherRealm’s 2019 fighting game, and the most recent mainline Mortal Kombat game, has ended. 

Mortal Kombat 11 enjoyed robust DLC support post-launch receiving new characters like Shang Tsung as well as a library of guest characters that include the T-800 from Terminator, the Joker, Robocop, Spawn, and John Rambo.

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An expanded edition full of DLC and new storylines titled Mortal Kombat 11: Aftermath was released in 2020.

IGN gave Mortal Kombat 11 a 9, calling it the “best game in the 27-year-old series.” DC also recently announced that Injustice: Gods Among us will be adapted into an official DC Animated movie.

WB also recently released a Mortal Kombat reboot film, which IGN reviewed here, calling it a fun film for fans, despite some pacing issues.

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Matt T.M. Kim is IGN’s News Editor.