Wasteland 3 has been set for a May 19 release date on PC, PS4, and Xbox One, but the difficulties introduced by remote work caused by the COVID-19 outbreak has pushed the game back to late summer. In a development update posted on Twitter, studio head Brian Fargo said that it will now release on August 28, 2020.
“As with most companies, we moved to a work-from-home environment some weeks ago, and that’s of course introduced new challenges that many of us throughout the world have been learning to manage,” Fargo said. “We’ve been excited to see the Wasteland 3 Beta so well received, but the reality is that with these new logistical challenges our release was going to be impacted.”
He said the extra time will allow the studio to react to beta feedback, and generally optimize and polish the game. In particular, he said the extra time will allow for extra work on the co-op experience. “We’re pouring our hearts into this game, and the last thing we want is to have anything but an amazing launch for a product we truly believe in.”
Epic Games is offering a $1 million reward to the first person who can prove that a commercial smear campaign targeted at Houseparty, a social network Epic owns, has been put together.
Houseparty is a “face-to-face” social network that allows users to group video chat and play games together. Epic Games purchased Houseparty last year. Originally reported by the BBC, Houseparty believes it’s under attack by a “paid commercial smear campaign” meant to harm the company.
Wanting to discover if that’s really the case, the company has offered a $1 million bounty to the first person to provide evidence that such a campaign is taking place.
We are investigating indications that the recent hacking rumors were spread by a paid commercial smear campaign to harm Houseparty. We are offering a $1,000,000 bounty for the first individual to provide proof of such a campaign to [email protected].
This bounty for evidence comes after a a slew of online rumors that allege the Houseparty app exposes vulnerabilities to personal information found on other services like Netflix and Spotify. BBC reported that several Twitter users posted screenshots claiming to show that after downloading the Houseparty app, they were locked out of things like Netflix, Spotify, and personal bank accounts.
The Houseparty app does not request access to personal information on your phone like you’d find after downloading something like Facebook, which requests access to your phone’s microphone and camera. Epic Games has since released a statement on the matter declaring that no evidence has been found.
“We’ve found no evidence to suggest a link between Houseparty and the compromises of other unrelated accounts,” an Epic Games spokesperson told BBC. “As a general rule, we suggest all users choose strong passwords when creating online accounts on any platforms.”
Houseparty’s popularity has risen with the onset of the COVID-19 pandemic, rising from an average of 130,000 downloads a week in February to two million a week in March, according to BBC.
It’s crazy to think that we’re already a quarter of the way through 2020, and the new month has another batch of video games to feast on. April brings us some sizzling hot remakes: the survival horror outing Resident Evil 3, the sword-slashing tale of Final Fantasy 7 Remake, and the reimagined retro RPG Trials of Mana. Movie fans can also get a taste of nostalgia with Predator: Hunting Grounds, and the Gears of War crowd gets a new strategy-heavy campaign with Gears Tactics.
Resident Evil 3 — April 3
Available on: PS4, Xbox One, PC
Resident Evil 3 is getting the same treatment as 2019’s Resident Evil 2 remake, which is appropriate since the two games overlap. RE 3 sees Jill Valentine exploring a zombie-filled Raccoon City, where she and other S.T.A.R.S. agents are being hunted down by the nasty Nemesis. That’s just the single-player component–this remake also includes Resident Evil Resistance, an asymmetrical multiplayer mode. Four players control survivors, while a fifth mastermind tries to take them out with zombies, Lickers, Tyrants, and all sorts of tricks and traps.
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Final Fantasy VII Remake — April 10
Available on: PS4
Final Fantasy 7’s remake is also coming this month–well, part of it. This particular release only tells Cloud’s story through the Midgar story arc, but Square Enix says the side quests and other content still makes the game size comparable to that of other mainline Final Fantasy titles. Combat in the remake has also been reimagined. It plays out in real time, but when your ATB gauge fills, you can pause the action to select items, cast magic, and pull off special attacks.
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Predator: Hunting Grounds — April 24
Available on: PS4, Xbox One, PC
Resident Evil 3 isn’t the only asymmetrical experience coming this month. Hunting Grounds pits four player-controlled soldiers against a lone Predator player. They can choose to hunt the fireteam as a Scout, Hunter, or Berserker Predator, each with their own abilities and alien weapons. The soldiers also have their own classes and loadouts, which they’ll need if they hope to complete their objectives and survive in the jungle.
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Trials of Mana — April 24
Available on: PS4, PC, Switch
The original Trials of Mana first launched in 1995, but it never came to the West until recently. While the action-RPG has been fully recreated in 3D, you’ll still carry out battles in real time in the field. Trials features six characters, each with their own stories that weave together. You form a party of three at the start, so you’ll have to replay the adventure to see all parts of the story.
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Gears Tactics — April 28
Available on: PC
Gears Tactics turns the Gears of War shooter formula into a tactics game, giving you a squad of customizable COGs who will carry out your orders against the Locust. It’s not just cannon fodder they’ll be facing, though: expect to encounter big Brumaks and Corpsers during the campaign too. Tactics is coming Game Pass for PC on launch day, but the Xbox One version will launch sometime later.
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This episode of New Releases looks at April overall, but next time we’ll take a closer look at some weekly releases. The next episode will dive into some upcoming releases that shouldn’t slip under your radar, like Disaster Report 4: Summer Memories and the console release of Convoy: A Tactical Roguelike.
In a joint statement to Gamesindustry.biz, German industry association game and Gamescom venue Koelnmesse said it’s possible there still could be an in-person event. Gamescom will be held as a digital event from August 25 to 29 at the bare minimum, and the organizers will make a decision in May to determine if it will take place in its normal home of Cologne, Germany. Regardless, they’re preparing to expand digital coverage to reach more viewers.
“If an on-site event is possible, there will also be more information at that stage with regard to which changes need to be made in order to fully ensure the health of all visitors,” the organizers added.
Gamescom is typically the second stage of summer game announcements, with publishers saving a few big games for their press conferences in August instead of E3.
Gamescom sees far more in-person attendees each year than E3, the latter of which was previously planned for June. Though E3 2020 itself was canceled, several publishers such as Ubisoft, Square Enix, and Microsoft are preparing their own digital press-conference-like events to deliver game announcements and news.
E3 2021 is also not expected to be affected by this year’s cancellation, though the list of participants has shrunk recently. Large publishers such as Electronic Arts and Sony were already planning to skip E3 2020 before it was canceled.
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Sports are canceled. It’s a massive bummer for millions of people looking to root for their favorite team or sports player to win the match/game/fight, but there is another way to get your sports fix in this time of sportslessness. ESPN+ has thousands of hours of sports-related content to help scratch that sports-itch (you should get that looked at, by the way).
If you’re having sports-withdrawals, I recommend getting yourself set up with an ESPN+ subscription. There’s just so much there. It’s almost overwhelming. Today I’m going to make a personal recommendation for you to check out some of the classic boxing matches available on-demand.
Boxing has mostly been overshadowed by the rapid rise of mixed martial-arts. In fact, ESPN+ has thousands of UFC matches, as well as exclusive pay-per-view events, so if you’re a UFC fan, you won’t be disappointed. But today I want to recommend checking out the classic boxing available to stream on ESPN+.
Foreman vs. Ali: The Rumble in the Jungle
Image: Wikipedia
Muhammad Ali is the greatest boxer of all time, and his fights are legendary. There’s the Thrilla in Manilla, pitting Ali against Joe Frazier in the Philippines and is largely considered one of the best boxing matches of all time. Then there’s Ali/Liston 2, a controversial fight from 1965 that produced one of the most iconic sports photos of all time. Those should also be watched (basically all the Ali fights are worth checking out), but Rumble in the Jungle hits the sweet spot for length of watch and seeing Ali in peak form.
He employed his legendary “rope a dope” technique, and for much of the fight it looks as though Ali is headed for an embarrassing loss, as he’s literally up against the ropes for much of the match. However, it was a calculated strategy to wear down Foreman, focusing his hits where they would maximize energy loss and minimize points scored. Once Foreman is sufficiently tired, Ali springs into action and it’s amazing to watch.
Tyson vs. Spinks
Image: Wikipedia
Where Foreman vs. Ali was a battle of calculated strategy, Tyson vs. Spinks is a match of pure brutality. At the time of the fight, both Mike Tyson and Michael Spinks were undefeated. Tyson had possession of three belts: World Boxing Council, World Boxing Association, and the International Boxing Federation, but Spinks was considered the lineal boxing champion. At the time, the purse was the largest ever offered for a professional boxing match, with Spinks guaranteed a $14 million prize just for showing up.
What’s most interesting about this fight, to me, isn’t that it lasted a mere 91 seconds before Tyson’s brutal onslaught sent Spinks to the mat, but rather you can see in Spinks’ eyes he’s already lost before Tyson even made it to the ring. As Tyson’s industrial entrance theme rattled the Atlantic City Convention Hall, more noise than song, Spinks looked like a man questioning whether or not $14 million was worth taking a flurry of devastating punches from one of the sport’s fastest, hardest-hitting, and most brutal ringsmen to ever lace up a pair of gloves.
A minute and a half after the bell, Spinks earned his $14 million, and never fought again.
Boxing is just one small part of the overall ESPN+ package, and while there are dozens of famous historic matches to watch from legends like Rocky Marciano and even Jack Dempsey, there’s a ton of modern coverage, too. That’s in addition to the 30 for 30 documentaries, original shows, rebroadcasts of NHL hockey, MLS and other professional leagues, E60 segments and more. If you’re jonesing for sports right now, an ESPN+ subscription is just $4.99 a month, or you can bundle it with Disney+/Hulu for $12.99. It’s a treasure trove of sports content.
One of the best video game movies to date, right behind Detective Pikachu, is now available. Sonic the Hedgehog follows the titular character as he escapes his home planet, comes to Earth, befriends a cop, and spends his time running from Dr. Robotnik while trying to collect his magic rings in San Francisco.
The movie was an exceptional amount of fun with plenty of Easter eggs for fans of the video game series. In GameSpot’s Sonic review, Phil Hornshaw said, “As video game adaptations go, Sonic the Hedgehog is among the stronger ones. It’s smart enough to stand on its own, making use of longstanding aspects of Sega’s supersonic mascot and his franchise, while making sure that what really shines through are its characters. That restraint goes a long way to making Sonic the Hedgehog a light, funny movie, and while it definitely skews young, longtime Sonic fans should have just as much fun finally seeing the Blue Blur on the big screen.”
Will Smith and Martin Lawrence return as police officers Mike and Marcus, respectively, on one last mission as they deal with getting older, working with younger officers, and of course, watching things blow up. It wouldn’t be a Bad Boys movie without a slow motion rotoscope as things blow up.
In GameSpot’s Bad Boys For Life review, Chris E. Hayner said, “Ultimately, Bad Boys for Life is better than practically anyone could expect. While it would have been easy to rely on the nostalgia of seeing the iconic trio of Smith, Lawrence, and explosions on-screen together again, the new film strives to be so much more and manages to pull it off. And what’s more, it also provides a blueprint for what the franchise could become in the future, should audiences want to see more.”
Below, you’ll find everything new coming out on the digital market this week through services like Google Play Movies, Vudu, iTunes, Amazon Prime Video, and more. All of them are available now. And if you’re looking for more ways to kill time while you’re at home, check out some great Blu-ray deals.
The week’s new releases
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If you enjoyed the recently-released Netflix original series V-Wars or October Faction, you’ll be disappointed to know that they’ve both been canceled, according to a report from Variety. Neither of these shows had been on the service for more than four months.
Debuting in early December, V-Wars was based on the IDW comic series of the same name. The Netflix original follows scientist Dr. Luther Swann and his friend Michael Fayne, as they deal with a deadly outbreak that turns people into vampires. As this is happening, a war between humans and vampires breaks out. The series starred Ian Somerhalder and Adrian Holmes. The first season consisted of 10 episodes.
Additionally, October Faction has been cancelled, after debuting in January. The series follows a couple, Fred and Deloris Allen, that spends their days hunting monsters, and they become members of a secret organization. Starring Tamara Taylor and J.C. MacKenzie, the first season consisted of 10 episodes as well.
This news arrives just as the fantasy-horror series Locke & Key gets greenlit for a second season. The official Locke & Key Twitter account revealed the information in a short video to excite fans. In his review of Season 1, GameSpot’s Michael Rougeau said, “if the Netflix version is your first introduction to Locke and Key and you don’t mind some cheesy writing, you’ll probably enjoy the show just fine, without all the baggage of the high expectations that fans have been lugging around for the decade-plus since Joe Hill and Gabriel Rodriguez’s masterful horror comics series debuted.”
Dwayne Johnson has confirmed that a sequel to 2019’s Fast & Furious Presents: Hobbs & Shaw is in active development.
Screen Rant reports that Johnson, who starred alongside Jason Statham in the Fast & Furious spin-off last year, firmed up early sequel plans while responding to his fans on a recent Instagram Live Q&A.
“We are developing now the next film, the next [Hobbs & Shaw] movie, and I’m pretty excited about it,” the actor confirmed. “[We] just gotta figure out the creative right now, and the direction we’re going to go.”
In our review of Hobbs & Shaw, we said the film proves the “franchise still has places to go and people to see” despite being “the most removed stylistically and thematically from the first Fast & the Furious.” We praised Dwayne Johnson, Jason Statham, and Vanessa Kirby for ensuring that there’s still fun to be had in a F&F movie “not centred around cars or racing.”
“I’d love to see Ryan Reynolds come into the next Hobbs & Shaw. I think he would be a great team member,” Johnson previously told IGN. “I’d love to see Kevin Hart come into the next Hobbs & Shaw. The goal in this one was to set up what the future teams would look like. And who I felt people would find it really appealing to see Hobbs with and create this new unique team.”
While April’s PlayStation Plus freebies for PS4 leaked early, Microsoft’s Games with Gold lineup announcement arrived at basically the latest possible moment. As always, the newest batch of four games will be staggered across the month, with the first two games unlocking tomorrow, April 1. Xbox One users get to keep Games with Gold free games in their library as long as they have an active Xbox Live Gold or Game Pass Ultimate subscription.
Slightly Mad Studio’s 2017 racing sim Project Cars 2 will be free throughout the whole month of April. Project Cars 2 features a staggering collection of more than 180 vehicles to choose from and 140 tracks across 60 locations. The realistic sim earned a 7/10 in GameSpot’s Project Cars 2 review for its fine-tuned physics, dynamic weather system, and sheer variety of racing formats, which includes off-road contests with rallycross cars.
Xbox 360 title Fable Anniversary is also up for grabs on April 1. A remastered version of the original entry in the Microsoft series, the action-RPG also earned a 7/10 in GameSpot’s Fable Anniversary review. While the original Fable never truly lived up to its pre-release hype, it’s still a fun game that’s worth checking out if you’ve never visited Albion. Fable Anniversary will be free for subscribers through April 15.
Come mid-month, members will be able to pick up Knights of Pen and Paper Bundle and Toybox Turbos. Knights of Pen and Paper bundle includes both of the well-received games in the series, which feature gorgeous pixel art and interesting turn-based combat. Meanwhile, Toybox Turbos is a top-down tabletop racing game with 35 customizable vehicles and 18 zany tracks.
The Coalition is preparing the next big update for Gears 5, which will introduce Operation 3: Gridiron. The extensive patch notes for PC and Xbox One cover everything coming in the update, from new character drops, achievements, and changes to ranked playlists.
The biggest deal is the arrival of new additions to the roster: Cole, Clayton, Myrrah, and the Theron Guard. As a former Thrashball player, Cole gives the update its gridiron namesake. In response to player feedback, the studio has reduced the requirements to unlock the new characters. They’ll only take half as much character XP to earn as previous ones–30,000 down from 60,000–and they will no longer need to fulfill challenge requirements. Previous Operations characters will retain their old requirements, out of fairness to those who already earned or bought them.
If you’d rather just unlock all the new characters at once, you can buy the Gridiron Bundle for $20. That will grant you the four new additions, the Hot Rod weapon skin set, 1000 iron, and 30 days of boost. You can always buy individual characters for 500 iron apiece.
The update will also introduce a new Escape Hive, called the Barracks, and changes to ranked playlists. You can check out the full patch notes below.
Ranked: Users now need to be level 30 or above to play in Ranked unless joining as part of a Level 30+ player’s squad
Ranked: Split-screen users can no longer play in Ranked, except for 2v2 Gnashers
Bot behavior improvements across every difficulty
Bots will less frequently follow the same path/clump together in packs
Bots will less frequently use long-range weapons in situations where short range weapons are appropriate (and vice versa)
Bots will now make use of cover more frequently
Beginner bots will now roadie-run when appropriate
Bots will no longer backfill for players in TDM Quickplay
Round timeouts will no longer cause King of the Hill matches to end on the first round
Meatshields should now more consistently protect the user from explosive damage
Improved consistency of finishing off DBNO opponents with melee when holding a meatshield
Addressed an issue where pulling back on the analog stick at certain angles could sometimes cause cover slides to not be cancelled
Addressed an issue that could cause cover slip animations to sometimes not replicate smoothly between clients, making them appear like they are moving at much higher speeds
Players can no longer be chainsawed mid-roll
Players will no longer receive a prolonged stagger if hit with melee by a player slightly above them.
Players can no longer end up in an unarmed state by trading and dropping weapons at the same time
Fixed an issue that allowed a player to ignore being into a DBNO state by being grenade tagged by a Smoke or Flashbang by entering the slide animation
Fixed an issue where a player grenade tagged in the back could no longer take cover
Fixed an issue that could cause severe server corrections if a player initiates a swat turn or roll immediately after having a cover move blocked by a player
Fixed an issue that could cause a Retro Lancer charge to cancel instantly if performed shortly after cancelling/finishing the initial one
Resolved an issue where, sometimes, players could teleport if staggered while wall-bouncing
Fixed an issue that allowed sidearms to be traded after dropping both primary weapons, which could also cause the player to end up in an unarmed state
Fixed an issue that caused the Lancer GL to be stuck in grenade firing mode with no laser if the user pauses while holding the grenade firing button
Escape specific weapon tuning updates (on top of the additional changes listed in Horde Weapon Tuning)
Longshot: Increased headshot damage
EMBAR: Increased headshot damage
Boltok: Increased starting magazine size from 1 to 2
Snub: Increased starting magazine size from 1 to 3
Talon: Increased stating magazine size from 1 to 3
Jackbot now has HUD indications for when he is flash banged
Jackbot can now be more reliably revived when near a boss
Reduced Imago enforcer damage per bullet to 15 (was 20) to reduce instances of players being instantly downed with 5 modifiers enabled and up
Fixed an issue where the Dropshot may break or be unable to fire when Hijacking a Dropshot Scion
Fixed an exploit that allowed players to drop grenades and have Keegan pick them up to gain 7 with the Grenade Pouch card
Horde Frenzy: Fixed an issue that could cause the last boss wave to sometimes only have 2 mini bosses on Exhibit
The Detour: Leeches will no longer sometimes die immediately after spawning in the last wave of reinforcements
The Trap: Players can no longer get stuck in the top of the door if they are in the doorway when it closes
Players will now see the outline of a Flock update in real time when marked but not visible to the player (ie. seen through a wall)
Players that die will their Ultimate is active will no longer have their Ultimate fully recharged after being revived
Crawlers will no longer initiate self destruction after spawning in as reinforcement in Escape
Sires will no longer initiate a Sire Grab when a player is on a different elevation
Maps and Tiles
Icebound: The mantle cover on top of the slides have returned for Horde only. This will provide a more comfortable defensive position in the towers for players
Icebound: The side windows in the trading post are now always blocked off except for Horde. These changes are to reduce rifle suppression towards the spawn areas and allow more traversal across the map
Icebound: The blizzard is now denser and lasts for 30 seconds rather than 15. This change is to allow more opportunities to traverse across the map. In Horde, the timing remains the same but the blizzard will also be denser.
Icebound: The blizzard still triggers every 2 minutes for all PVP modes except for Gridiron. In Gridiron, the blizzard triggers at the 1-minute mark and will only trigger that one time per round
Allfather’s Arena: Fixed an issue where users could end up on top of cover
Vasgar: Spectator camera will no longer shake when players are moving against certain high cover pieces
The Pit: Fixed an issue where rolling onto a slide could cause sporadic movement
Tiles: Fixed an issue that could cause a Pouncer’s tail to get caught and stretch
Tiles: General improvements to some tiles to improve cover, reduce clipping or address camera issues
Tiles: Fixed an issue that could cause a player to fall through the map when tagged with a flash grenade while in a struggle with a Sire
PC
Keyboard and Mouse: Returning to the previous menu via back/thumb button on the mutator selection screen for matchmaking now responds consistently to input
Split-Screen: Setting dynamic shadows to ultra will no longer add a layer of fog/atmosphere over player two’s screen
Fixed an issue causing Escape Map The Hive’s ambient lights to be too dark, causing players to be unable to see properly
Other
Accessibility: Numerous improvements and bug fixes for the Narrator feature
Accessibility: Toggle Aim will now reset to off when putting accessibility options to default
Audio: Reduced volume of Escape Snatcher intro
Audio: Team announcer will now announce when pistols are placed in loadout
Audio: Fixed an audio starvation issue when multiple Trishots are being fired
UI: Fixed an issue causing players to see a black screen instead of an Omen on death if they are killed before transitioning to the end of the match
UI: Free For All weapon icons are now more accurately aligned to their in-game location on the overhead
UI: Player column on the right no longer cuts into the overhead map
UI: Fortification health and ammo bars will no longer extend beyond the limit
UI: Completing a match with Tac-Com open will no longer cause the MVP screen to appeari n Tac-Com
Campaign: Fixed an issue that could cause Del to fall out of world in an Act 2 cinematic under very specific conditions, blocking progression
Campaign: Fixed an issue where suiciding as the player kills the Act 2 boss will cause cinematic audio to play when the checkpoint is restarted
Co-Op Campaign: Fixed an issue that could cause the game to enter a broken state if a user loaded in while reloading the checkpoint during the first combat encounter
Co-Op Campaign: Fixed an issue that could cause Jack’s abilities and components to be missing / unusable when players stop playing as Jack
Campaign Lobby: Host can now select Customization when opening the menu from the Campaign Lobby while a second controller is signed in locally
Split Screen: Split screen players can now see each other’s Gears Allies card.
Players can no longer force a Swarm model on COG team and vice versa
Fixed severe clipping when grenade tagging a meatshield
Fixed an issue that allowed other weapons to Chainsaw if a player dropped a Lancer while chainsawing
Explosions in water will now produce splash VFX on Multiplayer Maps
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