Author: Trafficblast

For the first time in a few years, it seems like Call of Duty has stopped peeking at other shooters’ homework for inspiration. It’s not to say it hasn’t been successful with taking on trending modes and mechanics, like when Treyarch’s Black Ops 4 ditched the campaign and introduced an amazing battle royale mode. This year, though, Infinity Ward pulls from its own history for Call of Duty: Modern Warfare. And as a result, it’s delivered excellent gunplay to pair with an intense and effective campaign and a fantastic weapon customization system in multiplayer. Something it didn’t learn, though, is that even a great arsenal can’t make up for poor map design, especially when there’s such a limited selection available at launch. Missteps in multiplayer and Spec Ops are like suppression fire that keep Modern Warfare from taking the high ground of its classic namesake, but everything else suggests that the series is now heading in a promising direction.

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This is a non-spoiler review for David Michôd’s The King, which starts streaming Friday, November 1 on Netflix. It’s currently playing in limited theatrical release.

The King is a sometimes riveting, sometimes rickety retelling of Shakespeare’s Henry V, starring Oscar-nominee Timothée Chalamet as a young reluctant king who’s quickly steered into a war with France by a retinue of advisors with questionable loyalties.

Directed by David Michôd (Animal Kingdom, The Rover), and written by Michôd and Chalamet’s co-star Joel Edgerton (Black Mass), The King attempts to take what’s commonly known about the famous play — that King Henry (given the common name “Hal” here) was pushed into a war by a self-serving council — and tether it to larger, modernly relevant themes about power and inherited violence.

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Australia’s top consumer law regulator has announced that some people who bought Fallout 76 will be able to request a refund after ZeniMax acknowledged missteps related to the game.

The Australian Competition and Consumer Protection Commission (ACCC) said in a news release that ZeniMax, which owns Bethesda, “acknowledged they were likely to have misled consumers about their consumer guarantee rights in relation to the online action game Fallout 76.”

ZeniMax’s European and Australian divisions “accepted that their actions were likely to have contravened the Australian Consumer Law.” Some people complained to the ACCC that ZeniMax staff denied them refunds after they experienced bugs and other network issues with the controversial always-online Fallout game. This runs against Australian Consumer Law.

“ZeniMax has acknowledged that they are likely to have misled certain Australian consumers about their rights to a refund when they experienced faults with their Fallout 76 game,” ACCC Commissioner Sarah Court said in a statement.

ZeniMax will offer refunds to Fallout 76 purchasers in Australia who requested refunds between November 24, 2018 and June 1, 2019. Players will lose access to Fallout 76 once they accept the refund.

“When a consumer has purchased a product that has a fault which amounts to a major failure, the Australian Consumer Law provides them with the right to ask for their choice of either a repair, replacement, or refund,” Court said.

In addition to paying out refunds, the ACCC said ZeniMax is updating its customer service documents to better reflect Australian consumer protections.

Fallout 76 was released in November 2018 on PS4, Xbox One, and PC, and the reviews were generally unkind to the role-playing game. Unlike previous entries in the series, Fallout 76 adopted an always-online, multiplayer-focused approach, which did not resonate with everyone.

Bethesda continues to update and support the game with new content and features, including a battle royale mode. Most recently, Bethesda spurred more controversy when it launched a $100-per-year subscription service for private servers.

At E3 this year, Bethesda boss Todd Howard spoke candidly about Fallout 76’s struggles, saying the game “missed the mark.”

A brand new shift code just dropped and it will give you 3 golden keys! It’s active from now until Monday, November 4th so use it while it lasts.

Amazon is having a huge movie and games sale ahead of Black Friday. The promotion states”Buy 3 item(s) Get 1 item(s) Free“, but what they mean is if you buy 3 items, one of the 3 items is free. This is an outstanding deal because it includes newly released games like Call of Duty: Modern Warfare and newly released movies like Spider-Man: Far From Home. You can mix and match any eligible item, so you could potentially have a board game, movie, and video game all in the same bundle. Some of these prices are so good, and the releases so recent, that they’ll unlikely to be matched even on Black Friday.

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The news that Game of Thrones showrunners David Benioff and D.B. Weiss have exited their planned Star Wars trilogy at Lucasfilm was surprising… and yet not all that surprising. Not only had the pair recently inked a very lucrative contract with Netflix, which would seem to conflict with making three Star Wars movies in terms of the duo’s schedule, but also the execs behind our beloved galaxy far, far away have established at this point quite a history of hiring and then firing or otherwise losing directors for their films.

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Welcome to a spooky edition of NVC, IGN’s weekly Nintendo show! This time, join the crew for an in-depth discussion of Luigi’s Mansion 3, including all of the Gooigi goodness you could ever ask for. Then in the news, hear about the PlayStation 4 passing the Wii’s lifetime sales, a Halo artist joining the Metroid Prime 4 team, how Pokemon Sword and Shield won’t support cloud saves, and more. Finally, the panel tackles your questions on a Halloween-themed entry of Question Block.

Timecodes!

• 00:00:00 Welcome!
• 00:02:25 Luigi’s Mansion 3 discussion!

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Following its October 15 launch on PC, ZA/UM’s detective RPG Disco Elysium is preparing to make the jump to PlayStation 4 and Xbox One sometime in 2020.

USgamer sat down with designer and writer Robert Kurvitz, who confirmed the in-development console port. “[W]e are going to port the game to consoles so you can play on your PlayStation and Xbox. So, you know, that’s my message to you guys for 2020,” Kurvitz said. “It plays really, really nicely on a controller because […] you don’t need to click around and give specific tactical commands, which the controller isn’t very good at.”

Bringing Disco Elysium to consoles isn’t the only job developer ZA/UM is currently working on. In conjunction with the console port, a Chinese localized version of the game is also in the works. Further, an art book with new behind-the-scenes art is in development, as well as an official release of the game’s soundtrack.

Disco Elysium launched on GOG and PC earlier this month. The game puts you in the shoes of a detective tasked with interrogating characters, cracking murders, and solving mysteries. It allows you to construct your own detective persona. You can be a hero, a prophet, or a madman, with plenty of choices to make and copious mistakes to contend with.

Here is a look at cumulative global console shipments for key consoles (Launch aligned).
After 31 months on the market, the Nintendo Switch has sold in 41.67 million units and is tracking alongside PS4 and PS2 which were at a similar total in the same timeframe. Wii was ahead. pic.twitter.com/Hd4ZKDXEkG

— Daniel Ahmad (@ZhugeEX) October 31, 2019

Same chart as above, but this is the Switch compared to key Nintendo platforms when launch aligned.
At this point in its lifecycle, the Switch is doing considerably better than the 3DS was and more in line with the original DS. Will be tough to keep up with DS next year. pic.twitter.com/s0Hw5aMEBD

— Daniel Ahmad (@ZhugeEX) October 31, 2019