Author: Trafficblast

The Nintendo Switch’s Spring Eshop Sale is still going in full force, and now, a new publisher has entered the fray with a slate of discounts on its own games. Bandai Namco comes bearing deals on its large number of anime fighting games, action adventures, and much, much more. The Bandai Namco sale joins Ubisoft and Warner Bros. in the Eshop discounts, and it’s scheduled to run from now until April 28 at 12 AM PT / 3 AM ET.

Bandai Namco deals in a large variety of anime games, from those based on real series to original creations. Some of its most popular fighting games are featured in this sale, including Dragon Ball FighterZ for $15, My Hero One’s Justice for $19.79, and Naruto Shippuden: Ultimate Ninja Storm Trilogy for $20–all three Ninja Storm games are also available at a discount separately. Dragon Ball FighterZ recently started a new season of DLC characters with the fused Saiyan Kefla kicking things off. Other anime games on sale include Digimon Story Cyber Sleuth: Complete Edition for $30, One Piece: Pirate Warriors 3 Deluxe Edition for $12, and Doraemon: Story of Seasons for $35.

The fast-paced, intense action game God Eater 3 is discounted to $30, while the horror platformer Little Nightmares: Complete Edition is $9.89; the quirky roll ’em up Katamari Damacy Reroll is $9.89; and the beloved RPG Ni no Kuni: Wrath of the White Witch is $30. Little Nightmares 2 is set for release later this year, so it’s the perfect time to jump into the first game and soak in its creepy atmosphere.

Spring game sales

There are plenty of other deals on the Nintendo Switch’s Eshop, so be sure to check out the full sale for all of the discounts. And if you’re looking for some games to play while you’re stuck at home, be sure to check out the best games, TV, and movies for social distancing.

• Digimon Story Cyber Sleuth: Complete Edition — $30 ($50)
• Doraemon: Story of Seasons — $35 ($50)
• Dragon Ball FighterZ — $15 ($60)
• God Eater 3 — $30 ($60)
• Katamari Damacy Reroll — $9.89 ($30)
• Little Nightmares: Complete Edition — $9.89 ($30)
• My Hero One’s Justice — $19.79 ($60)
• Naruto Shippuden: Ultimate Ninja Storm Trilogy — $20 ($40)
• Naruto Shippuden: Ultimate Ninja Storm — $10 ($20)
• Naruto Shippuden: Ultimate Ninja Storm 2 — $10 ($20)
• Naruto Shippuden: Ultimate Ninja Storm 3 Full Burst — $10 ($20)
• Ni No Kuni: Wrath of the White Witch — $30 ($50)
• One Piece Pirate Warriors 3 Deluxe Edition — $12 ($40)
• Taiko no Tasujin: Drum ‘n’ Fun! — $20 ($50)
• Tales of Vesperia: Definitive Edition — $20 ($50)

With Gears Tactics getting ready to hit PC on April 28, developers The Coalition and Splash Damage have shared a brand-new launch trailer that sets the stage for the spin-off’s story and gameplay.

The trailer, embedded below, shows some of Gears Tactics’ gameplay elements, including the classes, skills, and enemy encounters you can expect. It also introduces the game’s characters, as well as the rewards you can earn (without participating in microtransactions because Gears Tactics doesn’t have any). There’s plenty of customization, ways to extend turns, some lighthearted humor, and more in the trailer as well.

Subscribers to either Xbox Game Pass for PC or Game Pass Ultimate can pre-install Gears Tactics on Windows 10 PCs right now. Those who purchase Gears 5 before April 28 will save 15% on Gears Tactics.

The Coalition announced that Gears Tactics went gold earlier this month, signaling that the tactical spin-off is primed and ready for distribution. In a partnership with Intel, anyone who purchases the company’s microprocessors–such as the Intel Core i5 or higher–will receive Gears Tactics for free. The studio also noted that the game will launch on Xbox One sometime in the future.

For more on Gears Tactics, check out our hands-on preview that covers everything you need to know about the game.

With many people under shelter-in-place orders due to the coronavirus (COVID-19) pandemic, there are fewer ways to stay active and get in your daily exercise. Now more than ever, fitness-oriented video games like Ring Fit Adventure and Beat Saber have become crucial ways for people to get their body moving while they’re stuck inside day in and day out. Unfortunately, Ring Fit Adventure is currently sold out everywhere, and virtual-reality games like Beat Saber aren’t accessible if you don’t have a VR headset.

Enter: Just Dance, a motion-based dancing game available on Nintendo Switch, PS4, Xbox One, and even Stadia. For a limited time, you can get a free month of Just Dance Unlimited, the game’s subscription service that unlocks over 500 songs from previous games, so there’s honestly no better time to grab the game and get moving.

To get a free month of Just Dance Unlimited, you need to own a copy of Just Dance 2020, the latest game in the series. Fortunately, Just Dance 2020 is on sale on PS4, Xbox One, and Nintendo Switch right now, and Google happens to be offering two free months of Stadia Pro.

Just Dance 2020 deals

A new copy of Just Dance also comes with one free month of Just Dance Unlimited. If you buy on Nintendo Switch or Xbox One, you’ll get the additional free trial on top of the one that comes with the game, netting you two months free. If you already subscribe to Just Dance Unlimited on Switch or Xbox One, you’ll get one month free anyway, which will push your expiration date back by one month.

If you’re currently doing a free trial on Stadia, you can stack the extra free month from this limited-time offer, but unfortunately, if you have an ongoing Just Dance Unlimited subscription on Stadia, you can’t tack the free one month on directly. And on PS4, you can’t claim the additional free month if you’re doing a trial or have an ongoing membership. To claim the deal, you may need to cancel your current membership first or, if you’re buying the game, claim this free trial and let it run out before redeeming the code that comes with your game. For more info on claiming the free month on each platform, see the offer page at Ubisoft.

Ubisoft also announced it’s making some Just Dance videos free on YouTube for the next month, including kids’ dance songs, dance workouts, family fun songs, and more, so consider checking those out for a taste of what Just Dance offers. There’s also a free demo of Just Dance 2020 available on Switch, Xbox One, and PS4. For more freebies to keep you busy during this isolating period, check out our regularly updated guide to all the free games you can claim and keep right now.

Riot Games’ new shooter Valorant is only in closed beta, but the game is already tearing up the charts on Twitch. As part of a continued rollout of updates, Riot has uploaded a developer diary that examines how the studio is putting a great degree of care into the game’s netcode, which is often a sticking point for hardcore first-person shooter fans.

In the video, technical director Dave Heironymus and technical engineering lead David Straily demonstrate the contrast between 64-tick servers and 128-tick servers by using hitboxes to show the difference between how the client and server see any given gun-shot. They also discuss how laggy netcode can lead to what they term “peeker’s advantage,” where a player peeking around a corner has more time to attack an opponent that they see due to the latency between their client and the opponent’s client.

The developers also mention Riot Direct, which is a program that they describe as “Riot’s own ISP.” Essentially, over the past few years, Riot has made a concerted effort to make deals with existing ISPs and communications companies like Zayo Group in order to make their games work better at a network level. While the video doesn’t go into much detail, there are several blog posts that discuss the technical details on Riot’s site.

Often described as a mix of Counter-Strike: Global Offensive and Overwatch, Valorant is poised to be the next big thing in the FPS space. Currently, to get an invite to the closed beta, players must link their Riot account to Twitch, watch “drop-enabled” streams, and hope for the best. This led Valorant to break the single-day viewership record for a single game, with 12.2 million total hours watched.

Chapter 8 of Final Fantasy 7 Remake gives you a break from the main story to expand on Cloud’s clientele as a mercenary. Like Chapter 3 before it, the section has a bunch of side-quests for you to complete, if you so choose (and your performance will actually have effects on Aerith’s look in Chapter 9). One of the more confusing side-quests is “Weapons on a Rampage,” because it requires you to hunt down some specific enemies in the large, maze-like area known as Nuts ‘n’ Bolts Hills.

Below is everything you need to know to find the wayward Shinra weapons, take them down, and complete “Weapons on a Rampage” in Chapter 8.

If you need more help, check out the rest of our Final Fantasy 7 Remake guides. You can also read our Final Fantasy 7 Remake review, which gave the game a rare GameSpot 10.

Weapons On A Rampage Walkthrough

Head north of the hideout to find a man talking about some Shinra “floating eyeballs” that are rampaging around town. You’ll need to hunt down five of them in the Nuts ‘n Bolts HIlls area that you came through after meeting Aerith at the church. Equip some Wind materia and head out.

The first group of three enemies–Monodrive Mark IIs, they’re called–are in the north end of the area, in the Scrapyard Back Alley section. Head toward the train station and take the path north just before you hit it to find a dead end where the first group is hiding.

Monodrive Mark IIs are weak against Wind magic, but there’s a caveat to dealing with them: they use barriers that make them immune to specific kinds of attacks, which can make them pretty formidable. If their barrier is a round white shell, switch to Aerith and lay into them with her regular magic attacks, or hit them with Wind spells. If they fire up a green barrier that looks more like electrons flying around an atom’s nucleus, switch over to Cloud and hit them with physical melee strikes.

Watch out for the Monodrives’ attacks that send them burrowing under the ground or shooting through the air like flying drills; keep your guard up and focus on one enemy first to knock it out. With a few rounds of magic spells and some of Cloud’s melee attacks, you should be able to stagger and kill one, then repeat the process for the other two. The best thing you can do is try not to over-commit on melee attacks, though, as the Monodrives will hit you pretty hard and can interrupt your spells if you’re not paying close attention. When you’re done, sneak out into the train station and use the blue bench there to heal yourself up.

The last two Monodrive Mark IIs are back on the path you took to bypass the locked gate when you first came through here. Head north on the path from the locked gate into the Twilight Valley area; you’ll find the last two enemies pretty quickly along the path.

With games like The Last of Us Part 2 being delayed and everyone spending more time at home, it’s a great time to dig through your backlog. It’s also a good opportunity to revisit classics and perhaps introduce them to younger players for the first time, too. If you haven’t snagged one yet, the Sega Genesis Mini is on sale for $50 at Best Buy, which is $30 off its retail price.

Though the Genesis Mini has been discounted to as low as $35 (very briefly), we rarely see it for less than $60. The Genesis Mini released last year as Sega’s answer to the wildly popular NES and SNES Classic Editions from Nintendo.

The Sega Genesis Mini comes with 42 games, including memorable classics such as Sonic the Hedgehog, Streets of Rage 2, and Gunstar Heroes. You also get a pair of Genesis controllers (three-button models), an HDMI cable, USB power adapter, and power cable. The whole setup process takes less than a minute.

Like many other retro consoles, the Sega Genesis Mini has save states and numerous video settings, including 4:3, widescreen, and a CRT filter that can be added to both aspect ratios. It is, however, missing a rewind feature, which was included in both of Nintendo’s miniature consoles. That said, renowned emulation studio M2 did an excellent job bringing authentic versions of some of the Genesis’ most popular games to this adorable little console.

In our Sega Genesis Mini review, critic Peter Brown praised the plug-and-play system. “While the Mini isn’t without a few quirks, it’s heads and tails above previous software-emulation-based Genesis offerings that have plagued Sega fans for years. If you want to play Genesis games but can’t afford the real thing and a stack of cartridges, the Genesis Mini should be at the top of your list.”

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Ever since I first introduced the fictional fast food joint in my films, folks have said “You suck at movies, so open a Mooby’s!” Now the folks who did @savedbythemax is building the @moobyspopup – an IRL eatery in Los Angeles that opens later this year, pandemic depending! But as a preview of what’s to come, a Mooby Meal will be available for delivery in L.A. via @postmates starting THIS SUNDAY and running til 4/25! Our takeout Mooby Meals include “Mooby’s Messy Lasagna Sandwich” with a side of “Hater Totz” and “Chocolate Covered Pretzels” for dessert! And for your “toy surprise”, we include an autographed Reboot card from me, that will also entitle the bearer to front row slots when the pop-up is finally open to the public! And we’re donating the proceeds to @nouswithoutyou (providing meals to families in need effected by Covid 19). If you’ve ever seen #dogma, or #jayandsilentbobstrikeback, or #clerks2, or #jayandsilentbobreboot, you’ve seen fake people eat at a fake fast food joint! Now, BE a fake person eating actual food from a real restaurant! Many thanks to @heyitsderekberry and the #savedbythemax folks for making a dopey dream come true! Follow @moobyspopup and on the high holiday of 4/20, live the Mooby’s slogan “I’m Eating It!” (Mooby Meals will be prepared by Chef @royce_burke and the @secret_lasagna team. Limited amounts daily, all of which will be offered first come, first serve. Hours 12pm-8pm. Follow @MoobysPopUp for more info!)

A post shared by Kevin Smith (@thatkevinsmith) on Apr 13, 2020 at 7:49am PDT