Author: Trafficblast

The Mandalorian Season 2 featured one of the biggest surprises yet, a character cameo so crazy that we can’t believe they even attempted it. Feel free to argue in the comments over here over whether they pulled it off, or if looking at his face is like staring deep into the uncanny void of death.

Regardless, the end of the episode featured one more surprise, and we’re about to spoil it–obviously. You’ve been warned.

a post-credits scene featuring Boba Fett and Ming-Na Wen’s character Fennec Shand. The scene opens with the dual suns of Tatooine (which would feel like a blast from the past if we hadn’t watched Rise of Skywalker last year). The camera pans over to Jabba’s Palace (which actually is a blast from the past). Inside, Bib Fortuna resides, until Boba and Shand arrive and shoot everyone there (except the Twi’lek slave, who they free). Boba sits down on Jabba the Hutt’s old throne, and Fennec grabs a bottle of blue something-or-other.

Cut to a title card: The Book of Boba Fett, coming December 21. And that’s all we know from the teaser itself, although Entertainment Weekly says it’s “yet another spin-off series.”

What exactly does that mean? Is The Book of Boba Fett a Boba-Fett centered TV show? Is it a crossover event with the other two just-announced Mandalorian spin-offs, Rangers of the New Republic and Ahsoka? Is it simply the name of The Mandalorian Season 3? Or is it an actual book? (We doubt that last one.)

What do you think The Book of Boba Fett will be? Let us know in the comments below–hopefully we’ll find out more soon.

The Mandalorian Season 2 has not been shy about bringing in elements and characters from around the Star Wars galaxy. These have largely been lesser-known characters (at least, compared with the likes of Darth Vader and Han Solo), like Rosario Dawson’s Ahsoka Tano, who’s familiar to those who’ve watched some of the Star Wars animated shows, and Katee Sackhoff’s character Bo-Katan. Boba Fett was the exception, although Mando’s version of that iconic character is grizzled and very different from the versions we’ve met before.

In the Season 2 finale, however, The Mandalorian finally went all-in and inserted the mother of all Star Wars cameos. If you haven’t seen the episode yet, go watch it before scrolling any further down the page, because we’re about to spoil it–obviously.

In The Mandalorian’s Season 2 finale, after the climactic battle, Mando and his crew encountered none other than Luke Skywalker (accompanied by R2-D2, of course), who appeared to take Baby Yoda–sorry, Grogu–away for training. And, of course, Luke appeared basically as he was originally portrayed by Mark Hamill–Mark Hamill of 40+ years ago, thanks to the tenuous magic of extremely uncanny CGI.

Naturally, the Mark Hamill of today, who played Luke Skywalker again in the newest trilogy of Star Wars films, can’t really pass as his younger self (understandably). So just as they did with Grand Moff Tarkin and Princess Leia in Rogue One: A Star Wars Story, Disney used a freaky-looking CGI puppet of young Luke.

The timeline makes sense; The Mandalorian is set following the events of the original trilogy, but before the events of the newest trilogy. Luke would have been in the prime of his Jedi mastery. We never considered the character would have made a cameo on this show, but it’s 2020, so we probably should have seen something like this coming.

According to the credits for the episode, Max Lloyd Jones was a body double for the Jedi, leading us to believe he stood in while Hamill’s face was added on top. So chances are the iconic actor wasn’t on set for the scene. Luke gets a few lines in, but it’s hard to tell whether it’s Hamill’s voice or just an impersonator. Either way, there’s no denying that it’s extremely weird.

Of course, there were more surprises in this episode, and we’ll be covering them shortly. Stay tuned.

Medal of Honor: Above and Beyond marks a return to the series’ historical roots as well as its first foray into virtual reality. It’s been a long time since we’ve stormed the beaches of Normandy or liberated Nazi-occupied France in a Medal of Honor game, but Above and Beyond strives to bring us back to that familiar WWII experience within the new technology. Being asked to answer the call of duty and return to the battlefield in a new Medal of Honor is an exciting prospect, but Above and Beyond is far too simple a shooter and far too restrictive to ever feel engaging like the series once was.

Medal of Honor: Above and Beyond’s campaign is composed of six major missions, each of which is broken into smaller sections, moving you from location to location as you make your way through the story. Each moment of gameplay has you moving through a small area and using a variety of WWII weaponry to take out Nazis. These moments can feature you walking around on foot or, at times, in the back of a vehicle.

Some of the action sequences can be a little too intense, including a sequence where my character was in the back of a moving truck and shooting enemies in the opposite direction, which made me especially motion sick. That said, Above and Beyond offers some great comfort options to help alleviate motion sickness. These include settings that let you tweak turning increments, turn on tunnel vision when sprinting, or even let you skip more intense action sequences entirely and continue through the story. These were enough to alleviate my own issues with motion sickness and made it possible for me to make it through every section without skipping through them. Starting up a new VR game without knowing how your mind and body will react to its movement can be intimidating, but Above and Beyond’s options help mitigate discomfort you may experience throughout its duration.

Using classic weapons, especially single-shot rifles like the M1 Garand, makes for some enjoyable shooting galleries between cutscenes. Shotguns or long-range rifles feel appropriately deadly, capable of taking out an enemy with a single shot and sending their lifeless body to the ground. Wielding the powerful Gewehr 43 sniper rifle or using the iconic Walther P38 pistol against an onslaught of enemies can deliver some exhilarating moments. Automatic weapons, however, don’t feel entirely accurate or powerful, even when you feather the trigger as you take aim at enemy threats.

Some of my favorite firearms to use in Above and Beyond include the lever-action repeater and the sawed-off shotgun. The repeater feels more like something out of a Western than a World War II epic; once you shoot down an enemy, you flick the right controller to reload it, causing the repeater to spin in your hands as if you were a Wild West trick shooter. Likewise, the sawed-off shotgun requires you to flick the right controller to flip the barrel open, throw your shells in with the left controller, and flick the right controller closed before you fire off another shot. Most of the guns have standard reload animations and functions, and while I really enjoyed these quirkier animations, they feel tonally disparate from a game featuring short documentaries of real veterans.

As you play through Above and Beyond, you unlock new documentaries that feature World War II vets telling their stories. Available in the Gallery section of the main menu, these videos are genuinely great, giving a platform to an important generation. It’s moving to hear these men speak of their past, and while I expected a bleak set of films, it was a very human and uplifting experience watching them–the introductory video starts with a veteran who notes that one of his medals is for his professional conduct but that it just means no one caught him, laughing like a grandfather being silly with his grandkids. So, it’s disappointing then that Medal of Honor: Above and Beyond never strives to do anything meaningful with its own story, sidestepping the reality of war and the humanity of those in it.

The campaign too often forces you to stand or sit still, watching the stilted characters and uninteresting stories play out around you. A lot of the dialogue and situations are standard WWII fare, and none of these moments carry much personality or weight. You’re often not a central player in any of these scenes, either, acting as more of a spectator than a character. A cutscene in any non-VR game is easy enough to sit through, but the dynamic changes when you’re plugged into virtual reality and literally standing around as characters talk about how they’re going to foil the Nazis’ latest plan.

During these scenes, there are moments when you’re asked to contribute, such as giving a thumbs up or choosing where squadmates will be for an ambush. However, these moments don’t feel particularly impactful when the events actually play out. And even if your choices and actions had more weight, the content of Above and Beyond’s setpieces is still bland and uninspired; as I stood there and waited for characters whose names I had forgotten to finish their conversations–sometimes pulling out my pistol to dump a few magazines into the air–I couldn’t help but get fidgety and want to stop playing altogether.

Conversely, Medal of Honor: Above and Beyond’s multiplayer is all action. Moving around a map, finding other players, and shooting them down is satisfying, especially when you’re on a good run. As fun as it is to shoot players in a non-VR game, there’s a sense of shocking immediacy when you see a real person running at you and a greater sense of accomplishment when you dominate the other team. Your own movements, accuracy, and reflexes get you that win. It’s exciting in these moments, but being on the other end of a dominant player’s iron sights can quickly turn frustrating, as racking up respawn timers means a lot of (literally) standing around and waiting to get back into the action.

Most multiplayer rounds turn into games of deathmatch, even if it’s an objective-based match type. This is typical of many first-person shooters, but it feels exacerbated here by a lack of explanation for modes like Mad Bomber. Above and Beyond tells you that you score points by planting your bombs and defusing enemy bombs, but that’s it. This vague direction devolves each match into who can get the most kills, which gets you points anyway and almost always decides the winner.

This wouldn’t be as disappointing if not for the low player count. In the majority of my matches post-release, I’ve only been up against one real player. Above and Beyond fills each match with bots, so you’re never left without a full game, but they’re still bots and can’t pose the same challenge or satisfaction as having to outplay a real person. And while the guns are exciting to use, I found my personal favourite to be overpowered. The Repeater has a fast reload speed and is always a one-hit kill. It’s not so bad when you’re facing another player who can easily take you out if you miss your first shot, but when it’s you in a match with mostly bots, it becomes a relatively simple shooting gallery.

Medal of Honor: Above and Beyond is a disappointing return to the classic series. While its gunplay is satisfying, the moments where it shines are all too brief, stunted by cutscenes that force you to stand in place and spectate a story that rarely includes you or your character. On the other hand, the multiplayer has potential but is in need of more players and some balance tweaks. There are some incredible World War II games that are worth playing even today, but Above and Beyond falls short in far too many ways to be considered among them.

Sephiroth, the new character in the Super Smash Bros. Ultimate roster, is available now for anyone who has purchased the Fighters Pass Volume 2. However, unlike previous DLC fighters, you need to defeat Sephiroth to unlock him, otherwise he remains locked for another week. The fight is live now, and thankfully, unlocking him is very easy.

When you start the game up, if you have the Fighters Pass, the Sephiroth Challenge will appear on the main menu, and you can start it by pressing the + button.

The Sephiroth Challenge is a HP battle on his new stage, Northern Cave, and there’s three difficulty settings you can fight the Final Fantasy villain at. Doing so is not much of a challenge, especially on Easy, meaning that Sephiroth is effectively available today for players of almost all skill levels.

On Easy, Sephiroth will have 100HP, on Normal, he’ll have 150HP, and on Very Hard he’ll have 200HP. The description for “Easy” difficulty reads “For players who want a near-certain victory,” which is more or less accurate, as your attacks do more damage at this difficulty, too. On Normal, I was able to defeat Sephiroth with ease as Cloud, taking just 4% damage. Very Hard is much more of a challenge, although Smash Bros. pros are unlikely to break too much of a sweat.

Defeat Sephiroth on any difficulty and the character, as well as the Northern Cave stage and all of its associated music tracks, will be unlocked immediately.

There are also new Final Fantasy Mii Fighter costumes releasing, but you’ll need to wait until Sephiroth’s official launch on December 22 to get these.

GameSpot may get a commission from retail offers.

Some people make TV watching an event, complete with refreshments, dimmed lights, and a snuggly pet. Others treat it like background noise, something to fill their ears while they work or do other things. Netflix is testing the perfect feature for those background-noise watchers: an audio-only mode.

Netflix is currently testing an audio-only mode on Android phones, Android Police reports. The feature is not yet available even to all Android subscribers, so you’ll have to check if you have it. If you do, the screen will show a “Video Off” button when you tap the screen in full-screen mode. Tapping the button turns on the audio-only mode, which just has a blank screen beneath the Netflix menu items.

This feature is, again, in testing. It may never roll out completely. If it does, though, it could pair well with the huge library of shows that offer Audio Description, in which a narrator describes what’s happening in between character dialogue. Together, these two features would turn a show like The Queens Gambit into a high-production-value audiobook. The mode will definitely save battery life since it’s not showing images, and we’re betting it’ll save on data, though we’re not able to verify that at this time.

Netflix has not yet commented on the future availability of this feature on other platforms or to all users.

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