Microsoft is continuing to work on its Project xCloud game streaming service, with the preview version now available in four countries. The Android version of the xCloud test, which now boasts well over 50 games in its library, is adding a new feature designed to help players find a new game to play.
Those in the xCloud preview will notice a set of five game trailers next time they open the app. As well as helping players to decide on their next game, xCloud will use the time the trailer is playing to load the game in the background, cutting down wait time if the player decides to jump in and play.
As Project xCloud is still in its beta phase, this new feature and many others in the preview may not make it to the finished app in the same state, or at all. “The Project xCloud preview is all about iterating, getting your input, and continuing to build great experiences,” the update reads.
If you’re in the preview already, the new feature will roll out today. If you want to get onto the preview–and you live in either the US, the UK, Korea or Canada–you can register here. To participate you’ll need a compatible Android device, a Microsoft account, an Xbox One controller with Bluetooth, and an internet connection with 10Mbps downloads.
xCloud is also available on iOS, but with fewer games and features currently available.
A video from PlayStation Access shows that, when you’ve won a match, a message pops up that is very much on-brand for Call of Duty. As you can see below, it says, “Get Some.”
But it doesn’t end there. After that, the winning team (Warzone only supports squad play) gets helicoptered out of the map as the names of all the deceased scrolls through the screen as part of an “In Memoriam” segment. The camera then zooms in on your character and your username pops on screen. This happens even if you die during the match, which is pretty weird but we’ll roll with it. Check out the screens below to see what happens when you win a match.
Warzone launches on Wednesday, March 10 for PS4, Xbox One, and PC. People who own Modern Warfare will get in starting at 8 AM PT, and everyone else can download the standalone free-to-play game client and start playing four hours later.
The download will weigh between 18-22 GB if you’ve installed Modern Warfare’s most recent update. If you’re a new player, Warzone can be downloaded directly from your console’s digital store and will be much larger, taking up between 83-101 GB.
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NFL star Tom Brady is partnering with the directors of The Avengers: Infinity War and Endgame for a new Hollywood production label that will create movies, TV shows, and documentaries.
Brady is launching 199 Productions, and so far it has already signed “a slate of development projects” covering stories about sports, entertainment, and health and wellness.
The first project from 199 Productions is a documentary called Unseen Football, which will be produced by Joe and Anthony Russo, the directors of some of the biggest movies in box office history. Deadline reports that the film is Brady’s “love letter” to football, and it will tackle multiple levels of the game, including high school, college, and the NFL.
Unseen Football will be directed by Gotham Chopra, who previously directed Brady’s Facebook documentary series, Tom vs. Time. The series tallied 100 million views on Facebook.
The Russo brothers are big fans of Tom Brady and are excited to work with him. “We want to bring his story, and the story of the game he loves, to the big screen in a way that gives audiences an experience of football that they’ve never had before,” they said to Deadline.
As for Brady, he said about Unseen Football, “I believe in the essence of teamwork, and I have no doubt, our team will create the most magical experience for people to enjoy.”
Brady said in a post on Instagram that the name 199 Productions comes from how he was drafted 199th in the 2000 NFL Draft. Brady would of course go on to become one of the most successful and celebrated QBs in the history of the game.
The New England Patriots superstar is entering free agency for the first time in his career later this month, meaning he is free to sign with any team he wants. Whether or not he stays at New England is one of the most discussed topics in football right now. Brady offered a tease in his Instagram post, saying, “Stay tuned.. exciting times are ahead, both on and off the field.”
Brady is not the first sports megastar to set up a Hollywood production company. NBA icon LeBron James launched SpringHill Entertainment, which has produced numerous TV shows and movies, and it’s also behind the upcoming Space Jam reboot that will star James in the lead role.
Randy Orton is a preternaturally gifted in-ring WWE performer, and thanks to him, the most hyped match headed into Wrestlemania 36 is between Edge and Orton–two aging guys from the Ruthless Aggression Era.
What Orton does–and what very few performers do consistently–is allow his character to inform every aspect of his performance. So many wrestlers rely on their mic work to define their allegiance. Meanwhile, their physical, non-verbal actions are decidedly neutral; you can’t tell whether the person is a good guy or a bad guy by the way he or she moves. But with Orton, the performance is seamless and all-encompassing. It’s in everything he does, from the way he walks to the way he hits the ropes to the way he pauses before launching into a signature move.
He has spent the majority of his career as a heel; traditionally, it’s the more difficult role to play, but it’s also the character type Orton is most comfortable with. He elaborated on his reasoning during a 2008 interview with the Herald Sun:
“Being a babyface sucks, unless you’re 300 pounds like Batista, or a character everybody wants to see live, like The Undertaker, or Hulk Hogan, who has charisma… It’s easy for me to go out there and be a pr*ck on the show because it’s me times 10. And even though you probably don’t like me anyway, give me five minutes, and I’ll make you not like me more. Being a heel is fun. It comes so natural[ly].”
Orton has brought these considerable, natural talents to bear on his current angle with Edge, which began on the January 27 episode of Raw. The day prior at the Royal Rumble, Edge, who entered at #21 in the men’s battle royal, wrestled for the first time in nine years. His entrance and the subsequent emotional reaction of the crowd will go down as one of the greatest moments in WWE history.
It’s important to note that no one, least of all Edge, expected this to happen; at the time he was diagnosed in 2009, the message was dire: one errant bump, and Edge could end up in a wheelchair. Clearly, a convergence of modern medicine and luck have defied those odds. Still, we were told about the impossibility of this return so many times, that one couldn’t help but think of the warnings against it.
So when Orton came out on Raw to congratulate Edge on his return, and then proceeded to bash him about the head, first with an RKO, and then with a hellacious Con-Chair-To, it was the sort of meta storyline that WWE excels at. They’re giving voice to those nagging questions in the back of many fans’ minds: Is this a good idea? At what cost is he coming back? What if his opponent doesn’t protect him as carefully as he should?
WWE is addressing the elephant in the room by smashing it with a folding chair, and Orton is the perfect messenger to convey that discomfort. He has a longstanding, in-storyline history with Edge as the Rated-RKO tag team. He ascended to the top of the card around the same time Edge retired. And his heelish demeanor has been menacing, self-serious, and consistent over a 15-year period.
It’s difficult to think of another wrestler who could have destroyed Edge and gotten the kind of reaction that Orton did. The man knew to take his time. Horror–good horror–is about the buildup to the violence, rather than the violence itself. By standing around admiring his handiwork, Orton prolonged the feeling of helpless dread. Everyone knew exactly what was coming and was powerless to stop it.
On the March 2 episode of Raw, Orton explained his actions to Beth Phoenix, who was on the show to give us a medical update on her husband’s condition. Orton said he loves Edge like a brother–that by injuring him in the short term, he was saving him from a longer career where he would cripple himself, permanently this time. He suggested that Phoenix should be thankful to him–for sending her husband back into retirement, where he could be with his wife and kids again. He then blamed Phoenix for being an “enabler” before giving her an RKO for good measure.
The best characters are those with a basis in reality. And perhaps that’s why Orton is so effective in his current persona. His prior “Apex Predator” persona was an antisocial loner and psychopath who didn’t trust or care for anyone. But his current character is a more intimate, creepy type of crazy that’s rooted in who Orton really is: a husband and father of two who’s friends with Edge off-camera. In his character’s mind, his only flaw is that he “loves” his friend too much–so much that he’ll try to cripple him to save him.
It’s deeply unsettling, contradictory logic, but it’s also a contradiction that most wrestling fans struggle to reconcile. We pay money and invest emotion in watching these people beat each other, injure each other, and do long-term damage to each other. We care about these performers, but we also encourage them to bleed and throw themselves off ladders for our entertainment. And then, we also demand they do it “safely.”
Yes, there is a right way and a wrong way to take a piledriver. But the safest way to take a piledriver is to not take one in the first place. The fans are mad at Orton, but he gave them what they were paying for. Are they not entertained? In accusing Phoenix of complicity, Orton interrogates the audience’s complicity as well.
Edge will appear on the March 9 episode of Raw, where he will respond to Orton for the first time. It’s a fascinating, precarious contradiction; he needs to reassure a jittery audience that he’s healthy enough for a match at Wrestlemania, But he also needs to promise that he will beat Orton into the ground, which will expose him to the very things that injured him the last time.
It’s a balancing act, for sure. But it’s a balancing act that he, Orton, and every WWE Superstar have been doing, implicitly, for their entire careers. That they’re doing it explicitly is what makes us uncomfortable, but we’ve been an accomplice to it for years.
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The Guardians of the Galaxy might be joining the fourth Thor movie, Thor: Love and Thunder, according to Groot voice actor Vin Diesel.
“I am waiting and excited for my friend James Gunn to knock this next one out of the park,” Diesel told Comicbook.com in a recent interview. “He took The Suicide Squad so he’s about to embark on it. Thor will also, the director talked to me about Thor will incorporate some of the Guardians of the Galaxy.”
The last we saw of Thor, it seemed that his next departure would be by way of the Guardians of the Galaxy, with speculation that he would appear in Guardians of the Galaxy Vol. 3. Guardian star Chris Pratt said there’s no definitive yes or no to that speculation during IGN’s red carpet event for Pixar’s Onward, but it would seem that this Thor and Guardians of the Galaxy team-up might be happening in Love and Thunder.
Diesel seemingly recognized that this information wasn’t yet known during the interview.
“That’ll be very interesting, nobody knows, maybe I shouldn’t have said anything,” Diesel said, as neither Love and Thunder director Taika Waititi nor Guardians director James Gunn have yet to confirm this information.
Thor and the Guardians of the Galaxy interacting on screen in an upcoming MCU movie wouldn’t be surprising considering where we last saw these characters, but we do wonder how the two will interact under the direction of Waititi. We do, however, know that Love and Thunder will be “bigger and louder and more bombastic,” according to Waititi.
Devs focuses on software engineer Lily Chan (Sonoya Mizuno), who works at a Silicon Valley quantum computing company called Amaya, which she believes is behind the murder of her boyfriend. Devs also stars Nick Offerman as Forest, the CEO of Amaya, and Alison Pill as Katie, Forest’s second in command. This sci-fi thriller is created, written, and directed by Alex Garland, who also wrote and directed the films Annihilation and Ex Machina, and wrote the screenplays for 28 Days Later, Sunshine and Dredd, among others.
In episode 1, we meet Lily and Sergei. Sergei also works for Amaya, in the AI division. Forest promotes Sergei to the mysterious Devs division at Amaya. But on his first day in Devs, he disappears. Lily feels that something is wrong and tries to find answers.
In Devs episode 2, we learn about Forest’s tragic past involving his daughter, who he named his company Amaya after. Lily seeks help from her ex, Jamie (Jin Ha) to find answers after the mystery of Sergei’s death. With his help, Lily learns a secret about Sergei.
Dominique “SonicFox” McLean won first prize at the Mortal Kombat Final Kombat 2020 tournament and managed to get out an endorsement to democratic primary candidate Bernie Sanders.
SonicFox really just won the Mortal Kombat world championship, came out in fursuit wrapped in the trans flag, grabbed the mic and said “Vote Bernie”
McLean wore their SonicFox fursuit and a transgender pride flag during their trophy acceptance, which came with a large commemorative hammer because this is Mortal Kombat. While they were unable to offer a full acceptance speech, McLean was able to get the mic briefly to tell the audience at home to ‘Vote Bernie.’
The 2020 Final Kombat tournament was not held in front of a live audience due to coronavirus concerns. The open qualifiers meant to be held a week before Final Kombat was also canceled, with the spot being awarded to Zoulfikar ‘Kombat’ Dayekh.
SonicFox was able to win using their Injustice 2 and Mortal Kombat 11 main, Joker, and earned a $40,000 prize.
McLean, who identifies as non-binary, is a proud proponent of LGBTQ+ rights and has used their platform to show support for the community. During the 2018 Game Awards after winning Esports Player of the Year, McLean said on stage, “I’m gay, black, a furry — pretty much everything a Republican hates.”
They’re also now world champion of both NetherRealm’s fighting games, Mortal Kombat 11 and Injustice 2. Meanwhile, Mortal Kombat 11 finally revealed its latest guest character, Spawn, which you can check out here.
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Matt Kim is a reporter for IGN. You can reach him on Twitter.
Call of Duty: Warzone is a standalone, upgraded version of Black Ops 4‘s Blackout mode. Its Battle Royale mode is very similar, where players compete to be the last person standing, but this version supports 150 players in squads or solos. Warzone also features Plunder, where the goal is to earn the most money via looting, eliminating other players, and completing new objectives called Contracts.
Warzone is free-to-play, and you can download it even if you don’t already own Modern Warfare. However, if you do own the most recent Call of Duty game, your Battle Pass items, Operators, and progression will transfer over to Warzone. The inverse is also possible: if you download Warzone and decide to pick up Modern Warfare later, your progress will transfer too.
Call of Duty: Warzone’s release date is March 10 on PS4, Xbox One, and PC. Activision will be setting the game live at 12 PM PDT. Modern Warfare owners can jump in earlier by downloading the Warzone update; that will go live at 8 AM PDT.
Season 4 of Netflix’s Stranger Things will be bigger than its previous seasons, according to Netflix Vice President of Physical Production Momita SenGupta (via Deadline).
SenGupta and another Netflix physical production vice president, Patty Whitcher, sat down for a fireside chat with Deadline’s Mike Fleming Jr., and SenGupta teased some of what Stranger Things fans can expect in the upcoming season.
“Season 4 is bigger, bolder and more intricate than ever,” SenGupta said. “So this is the first time the show will be traveling beyond Atlanta.”
The first three seasons of Stranger Things were shot in Atlanta, but portions of Season 4 were shot in New Mexico, Deadline reports. According to Deadline, Netflix purchased Albuquerque Studios in New Mexico in 2018, committing to spend more than $1 billion on production on Netflix movies and shows there over the next decade. The company has already spent over $150 million, Deadline reports, and has employed 2000 vendors alongside 1600 cast and crew members.
She did share, however, that Netflix’s new facilities in New Mexico “lent themselves to the story” being told in Season 4. A release date for Season 4 of Stranger Things is currently unknown, but we have some theories on when the show will return.
