Author: Trafficblast

Geoff Keighley has revealed that Ghost of Tsushima is The Game Awards Player’s Voice Award winner this year after three rounds of voting from fans.

The Game Awards will take place on December 10 and it’s there that awards like Best Narrative, Best Direction, and of course, Game of the Year, will be announced. These awards are voted on by both a curated voting jury and fans, but in those instances, the voting jury accounts for 90% of the vote while the fan vote accounts for the other 10%. That’s not the case in the Player’s Voice Award – which is entirely decided upon by fans, or really anyone who signs in to The Game Awards to vote.

The results are in! Congratulations to GHOST OF TSUSHIMA, the winner of the Player’s Voice Award at #TheGameAwards https://t.co/NKXNht6F8X pic.twitter.com/Nfy6TOEm6K

— Geoff Keighley (@geoffkeighley) December 8, 2020

There’s no vote weighing involved with this award so Ghost of Tsushima is the game that got the most total votes out of all the other nominees. It beat out other 2020 releases like The Last of Us Part II, Hades, and Doom Eternal.

Ghost of Tsushima saw its placement in the rankings shift each round. It had a 3% lead over TLOU2 during the second round of voting – 14% and 11% of the votes respectively – and then when the final round began on December 6, TLOU2 climbed to 43% of the vote while Ghost of Tsushima only had 31%.

Then, with just four hours to go before the closing of votes, Ghost of Tsushima jumped up to 47% and TLOU2 dropped to 33%. That was the last update Keighley gave of the voting percentages before announcing Tuesday that Ghost of Tsushima is the Player’s Voice Award winner for The Game Awards this year.

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Read our thoughts on the game in our Ghost of Tsushima review and then read about how multiplayer has always been a pillar of Sucker Punch’s plans for the game with Ghost of Tsushima: Legends. If you haven’t yet played the game, the PlayStation 5 is a great place to do so as the game runs at 60fps via Game Boost on the PS5.

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Wesley LeBlanc is a freelance news writer and guide maker for IGN. You can follow him on Twitter @LeBlancWes. 

The Pokemon series celebrates its 25th anniversary in February, and Pokemon Go developer Niantic is commemorating the occasion with a special in-game event. On February 20, the studio will host the Kanto Tour, a one-day event featuring exclusive Research tasks and all of the original Pokemon.

As was the case with Pokemon Go Fest this past July, Niantic will sell virtual tickets for the Kanto Tour event. These will cost $12 USD and will give players access to an array of exclusive content, including a Special Research story that will lead to an encounter with a “special Pokemon.” Those who complete the aforementioned Research line will unlock a second event-exclusive Special Research story. This line will be a longer-term commitment that will ultimately culminate in an encounter with Shiny Mew.

On top of that, Pokemon from the Kanto region will appear in the wild, Raids, and as Research rewards more frequently than normal throughout the Kanto Tour event, and ticket holders will have a chance to encounter Shiny versions of all of the original 150 Pokemon.

Version-Exclusive Pokemon

Ticket holders will also be able to choose between a “Red Version” and a “Green Version” of the event, which will influence what kinds of Pokemon appear in the wild. You can see some of the version-exclusive Pokemon below:

Red Version

Attracted to Incense:

• Ekans
• Oddish
• Mankey
• Growlithe
• Scyther
• Electabuzz

Possible Shiny encounters:

• Bulbasaur
• Charmander
• Squirtle
• Pidgey
• Ekans
• Pikachu
• Nidoran (F)
• Oddish
• Diglett
• Mankey
• Growlithe
• Ponyta
• Shellder
• Drowzee
• Krabby
• Hitmonlee
• Lickitung
• Scyther
• Electabuzz
• Eevee
• Kabuto
• Dratini

Green Version

Attracted to Incense:

• Sandshrew
• Vulpix
• Meowth
• Bellsprout
• Magmar
• Pinsir

Possible Shiny encounters:

• Bulbasaur
• Charmander
• Squirtle
• Pidgey
• Pikachu
• Sandshrew
• Nidoran (M)
• Vulpix
• Meowth
• Psyduck
• Bellsprout
• Geodude
• Exeggcute
• Hitmonchan
• Koffing
• Tangela
• Horsea
• Magmar
• Pinsir
• Eevee
• Omanyte
• Dratini

Early Purchase Bonuses

In addition to exclusive event content, those who purchase a Kanto Tour ticket by a certain date will get a couple of in-game bonuses. If you buy a ticket before the end of January 13, you’ll also receive virtual tickets for January and February’s Community Day Research stories. If you miss that deadline, you can still receive a ticket for February’s Community Day if you purchase a Kanto Tour ticket before the end of February 3.

Non-Ticket Content

Even if you don’t purchase a ticket for the Kanto Tour, you’ll still be able to join in on the festivities. Throughout the event, all players will have a chance to encounter Kanto Pokemon in the wild and in Raids, whether or not you’ve purchased a ticket. You will also be able to complete event-exclusive Timed Research tasks, and the Legendary Pokemon Articuno, Zapdos, Moltres, and Mewtwo will all be available in five-star Raids with exclusive moves.

Event Hours

The Kanto Tour event takes place on Saturday, February 20, and runs for 12 hours, from 9 AM to 9 PM local time.

Call of Duty: Black Ops Cold War received a major update today ahead of its huge Season One content drop – but some Xbox players are suffering from a strange bug that seems to be a holdover from the last game in the sub-series, Black Ops 4. The ‘Blackout Trial’ bug seemingly locks players out from the game, despite them owning the full version.

CharlieIntel points out that, following the update, many players on social media have reported booting the game to find an error screen saying “Blackout Trial has ended”, with the only options being to leave the game or buy the full version. These players own the full version of the new game, and are given no option to bypass the screen, meaning the game is unplayable.

Updated Cold War this morning, now I’m getting this message and can no longer access Multiplayer or Zombies?

…and yes, I have the full version.@charlieINTEL pic.twitter.com/jQ8styfzkR

— (@MolyneuxLuke) December 8, 2020

Blackout was the battle royale mode included in the last Black Ops game, 2018’s Black Ops 4. While Blackout’s map does seem to be returning to Call of Duty: Warzone in some form, Blackout itself is not currently a part of Black Ops Cold War, making this a strange bug to encounter in the new game.

We’ve contacted publisher Activision for comment on the bug. For now, there’s no official fix, although some players are reporting that heading to Xbox’s “Manage Game and Add-Ons” section for Black Ops Cold War and making sure that all content packs are correctly installed and applied can fix the issue. Others, however, are reporting that the fix isn’t 100% effective.

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Joe Skrebels is IGN’s Executive Editor of News. Follow him on Twitter. Have a tip for us? Want to discuss a possible story? Please send an email to [email protected].

Cyberpunk 2077 is almost here, and if you pre-purchased the game through CD Projekt Red’s digital storefront GOG, a special Easter egg awaits you. Once Cyberpunk 2077 has been pre-loaded ahead of its December 10 launch, the urge to open the installed game and hope for a glitch that allows you to start playing early might be strong, but doing so will result in Johnny Silverhand appearing to remind you that you’re going to have to be a little bit more patient.

Reddit user Jmendo02 shared a screenshot of what will happen if you’re too eager, as Silverhand will tell you: “Go back to sleep, Samurai. It’s not December 10th yet!”

That’s the inverse of what the character–who is played by Keanu Reeves–said in the Cyberpunk 2077 E3 2019 trailer while using saltier language.

If you have pre-loaded Cyberpunk 2077 through GOG, the Epic Games Store, or Steam, it’s worth checking to see if you have the latest patch installed as that will bring the game’s total install size to over 100GB. Another patch on top of that will arrive on launch day. Cyberpunk 2077 is now also available for pre-load on Xbox One and Xbox Series X/S, and PlayStation owners can head to this link to see when they’ll be able to install Cyberpunk 2077 on those consoles.

In our Cyberpunk 2077 review, critic Kallie Plagge had plenty of praise for the game’s sidequests and characters but noted that the experience took place in a world that felt superficial, and contained numerous bugs.

“But then it’s hard to get into Cyberpunk 2077’s world in general,” she wrote. “So much of it is superficial set dressing, and there’s so much happening all around you–ads going off at all times, gunfights breaking out in the streets, texts coming in about cars you’ll never buy–that a lot of the game feels superfluous. The side quests and the characters they showcase are the shining beacon through the neon-soaked bleakness of Night City, and they give you room to explore the best the core RPG mechanics have to offer. These are what carried me through an otherwise disappointing experience.”

This article contains spoilers for Netflix’s Extraction.

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The Russo brothers have revealed that they are working on building out an entire cinematic universe from Netflix’s Extraction.

In conversation with Collider, Joe and Anthony Russo, who produced Extraction, with Joe writing the script, shared an update on the upcoming sequel and discussed the potential development of future projects in the franchise, as they shared their plans to create an entire Extraction cinematic universe, exploring some of the characters’ stories further.

“I will say this: we are working at building out a universe of films that could potentially explore some of the other characters from the first movie and some new characters, and see more historical interaction between the characters,” Joe admitted. “So if you’re interested in David Harbour’s character, you just may get to see him in a future Extraction movie.”

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In the first film, Harbour portrayed Gasper, a former squadmate of Chris Hemsworth’s Tyler Rake, but the film ends with both characters supposedly dying. While the audience never actually witnessed Tyler’s last breaths, he did appear to suffer a fatal injury. Russo explained how telling stories at different points in the timeline could potentially allow them to revisit these characters.

“We’re trying to find more interesting ways to tell these stories and cross-pollinate them,” Joe added. “We’re big fans of just forging new paths in narrative. Can we go backwards and forwards at the same time? Can things that happened in the past affect the movies in the present? What are new ways to tell those stories? And can we see different points of view?”

He added: “Every antagonist is the protagonist in their own story, so can we see their point of view? How do they perceive the world? What makes them empathetic? I think what makes that a compelling element to the Extraction universe is it is a global franchise telling global stories, and we’d like to diversify the point of view in those movies.”

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Shortly after its release, Extraction was unveiled as one of the most popular Netflix original films of all time, attracting 99 million viewers in its first four weeks on the platform, according to figures released by Bloomberg. Russo previously confirmed that a sequel to the film is in the works, with production now scheduled to start sometime next fall. Check out our review of the first film here.

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Adele Ankers is a Freelance Entertainment Journalist. You can reach her on Twitter.

World of Warcraft has been around for a long time, but its popularity shows no sign of abating. In fact, according to Activision Blizzard, the game’s latest expansion comes as the game’s number of long-term subscribers is cresting higher than ever before. In a statement, the publisher claimed that Shadowlands is the fastest-selling PC game ever, selling more copies in one day than any other game the company has records for.

According to Activision Blizzard, Diablo 3 was its last PC game to sell more than 3.5 million copies on its day of release, and Shadowlands has surpassed that milestone with 3.7 million sold. The statement also says that players have spent more time in WoW’s fictional world of Azeroth this year than in any others, and that total player time in-game has doubled compared to 2019.

Shadowlands is World of Warcraft’s eighth expansion pack, and it was released back on November 23. WoW recently celebrated its 16th anniversary, which probably makes some of you feel as ancient as an Old God. Activision Blizzard also announced plans to crack down on “multi-boxing,” which is a popular way to grind faster via multiple game clients.

Minecraft with RTX is now available for all Windows 10 players. You can download it and still play games with players on other platforms while enjoying the visual improvements that RTX brings to the table.

The feature has been available via an official beta since April, but now it’s available in the main Minecraft client. Microsoft and Nvidia are releasing two new worlds that are compatible with RTX to celebrate.

“Using the power of ray tracing and Physically Based Rendering, you can build incredible scenes with lighting, shadows and effects running at previously-unseen levels of detail and accuracy,” reads a post on Nvidia’s official site. “Helping you craft wondrous worlds that’ll make jaws drop.”

Nvidia worked with two creators to “demonstrate the possibilities of Minecraft’s ray tracing” by releasing new worlds that players can download in Minecraft’s Marketplace. The first is a recreation of Rome’s Colosseum while the second, unreleased world is a dungeon crawler set in a “beautiful medieval countryside.” You can see images of each world with and without RTX on Nvidia’s site.

Mojang released Minecraft Star Wars DLC last month. It includes Baby Yoda, other content from The Mandalorian, as well as characters and content from A New Hope, The Empire Strikes Back, and Return of the Jedi. You can purchase it at the Marketplace for 1340 minecoins (roughly $8).

After a leak last week that revealed its Western launch date and trailer, Persona 5 Strikers has been officially announced and its February 2021 release date has been confirmed. The game is a continuation of the story that concluded in the original Persona 5 (not Royal) and sees the return of its cast of characters in the Phantom Thieves along with some new faces. It’s also an action-RPG musuo-style take on the traditional Persona formula, as its being developed by Omega Force, the studio behind the Dynasty Warriors games and several other adaptations (such as Fire Emblem Warriors and Hyrule Warriors).

Persona 5 Strikers maintains its party-based dynamic in combat and elemental affinities along with some Persona trademarks like all-out attacks, persona abilities, spell casting, and its lavish art style. Strikers also includes the social simulation side of things as you’ll get explore cities across Japan (and beyond Tokyo this time) and spend time with your fellow Phantom Thieves. We got hands-on with the Japanese demo earlier this year and you can watch our impressions and gameplay in the video below.

Like the original RPG, Strikers will include Japanese and English audio with the return of the original voice casts. New characters get involved in the mix, such as a detective from Kyoto named Zenkichi Hasegawa and mysterious girl from the metaverse named Sophia, and become playable characters as well as, which can be seen in the pre-release materials from the Japanese version.

Two versions of the game will be available; the digital deluxe edition gives players early access to the full version of the game on February 19, 2021 while the standard edition launches on February 23, 2021. Along with getting to play the game four days early, the digital deluxe version comes with bonus content like a digital artbook, the soundtrack with over 40 songs, behind the scenes videos, Persona legacy soundtracks for the game (Persona 1 through 4 Golden), and in-game items. Physical versions from GameStop include a pin and Steelbook copies will be available at Best Buy for the Switch version.

This will be the first time a Persona 5 game releases on Nintendo Switch and PC (via Steam), and the PS4 version will be backwards compatible for PS5. Atlus has been making a push to port its games to PC as we’ve seen with Persona 4 Golden earlier this year and Catherine back in 2019.

For more on Persona 5 Strikers, be sure to read my impressions of the action-RPG combat system and how it’s a great fit for the series based on my time with the Japanese demo. You should also be excited for more Persona music as Strikers will feature remixes of original songs and new tracks, too–I even said that “The Last Surprise” remix in P5S might be better than the original song. You can also check out the official Western reveal trailer below.

A free update for Forza Horizon 4 is out today, adding stunt races to PlayGround Games’ recreation of the British countryside. Titled Super7, the new mode is all about leaping off big ramps and hurtling around obstacle courses.

The free update was announced during the latest Forza Monthly developer stream. While rumours swirled before the stream that PlayGround Games was set to reveal the next Forza Horizon game, it ended up being about more Forza Horizon 4.

Super7 builds upon the game’s existing track creator by allowing players to create challenge courses featuring air, drift, and speed sections. The new Blueprint Builder lets you can design stunts and place a number of structures throughout the course, which can be placed anywhere on Forza Horizon 4’s expansive map.

As the name suggests, there are seven curated stunts that greet you when entering the mode for the first time. These consist of randomly selected challenges and completing all seven will reward you with new in-game rewards, including the 1924 Austin Seven and 1979 Triumph TR7 Roadster.

If you’re playing on Xbox Series X|S, Forza Horizon 4 also received a number of next-gen enhancements last month. The racer now runs at 4K and 60 frames per second, and has dramatically improved load times.