With movie theaters around the country remaining closed because of the COVID-19 pandemic, some movie studios have been releasing movies to on-demand instead of pushing back release dates, like Universal did with Trolls: World Tour. However, in the midst of this, Universal received backlash from Regal Cinemas and AMC. Now, WarnerMedia is the latest to go straight to on-demand with Scoob on May 15. However, the company is already attempting to calm the raging waters.
During a recent virtual webcast (via The Hollywood Reporter), John Stephens, CFO of WarnerMedia parent company AT&T, said that they will “continue to work with theater owners.” This comes days before the animated movie Scoob hits VOD.
“Our launch of Scoob took a different path than normal because of the virus, and we’ll learn from that,” Stephens said. “We understand the importance of … big theatrical releases. We are interested in new ideas, whatever is best for the consumer, but we will continue to work with our partners.”
“The results for Trolls World Tour have exceeded our expectations and demonstrated the viability of PVOD,” NBCUniveral CEO Jeff Shell said back in April. “As soon as theaters reopen, we expect to release movies on both formats.”
Because of Shell’s statements, Universal responded by refusing to play any movies from the studio in the future. Shell reiterated the fact that Universal movies will not all be digital releases, and the studio still work with theaters. Regal Cinemas owner Cineworld CEO Mooky Greidinger chimed in, echoing AMC’s statements.
Regardless of Stephens’ comments about working with theaters in the future, there will likely be blowback for going straight to on-demand for Scoob. AMC’s Adam Aron has been very vocal about this situation, which some find a bit preposterous.
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The Summer Game Fest, a season filled with game announcements and reveals lead by Geoff Keighley, has added a new stream on Wednesday, May 13. And according to Keighley, it’s one of the most important events of the season.
The stream was added to the Summer Game Fest schedule yesterday. The listing doesn’t reveal much, aside from the stream being a showcase followed by an interview session with Keighley. The stream will go live at 11 AM ET/ 8 AM PT.
Responding to a question on Twitter about whether this second event would be “fun and cool” in the same way that Keighley described today’s announcement, the host replied, “Wednesday is one of the more important moments this summer.”
Considering both Microsoft and Sony have new consoles on the horizon with the Xbox Series X and PS5 respectively, and many studios presumably have projects to announce for next-generation hardware, Keighley could be hinting at many possibilities.
Denis Villeneuve’s take on Dune is shaping up to be on of our most anticipated upcoming movies, thanks in part to a series of glimpses at its star cast.
We’ve put together a gallery of every official image so far (below) – the newest being a shot of Josh Brolin’s Gurney Halleck and Timothée Chalamet’s Paul Atreides clinging to the back of what may be a Carryall.
Villeneuve has made it clear that this movie will be the first of two, because Frank Herbert’s seminal sci-fi novel is “too complex” to fit into a single feature film.
Arnold Schwarzenegger is coming to Predator: Hunting Grounds as DLC later this month.
Announced today on PlayStation.Blog, this paid DLC arrives on May 26 and will see Schwarzenegger’s Dutch character from the original 1987 Predator movie added to the game. Considering Predator: Hunting Grounds is a game based on the universe of that movie, Dutch joining in on the hunt only makes sense.
You can check out what Dutch will look like in the game below.
“Yes, Arnold Schwarzenegger has reprised one of my favorite roles from childhood for this game,” IllFonic Chief Creative Officer Jared Gerritzen said. “We got to spend a day in sunny California recording with Arnold.”
As indicated by Gerritzen, Schwarzenegger himself returned to the role to voice lines for Dutch. In order to introduce Dutch into the game, IllFonic will add cassettes to the game for players to earn that allows them to “learn where Dutch has been all these years and hear his story in his own words through a series of voice tapes that you earn as you level up.”
When the DLC is released on May 26, players will get access to the Dutch character and the QR5 “Hammerhead” Rifle, as well as Dutch’s knife. The rifle and knife will be made available to all players, free of charge, later in June.
The Dutch DLC pack is the first of at least four paid DLCs with the second coming in June, the third coming in July and the fourth in August. The blog post does not mention a price for this DLC.
I’ve got some news for you, are you sitting down? If you’re not, the news is actually related to being seated, so this works out well. Gaming chair maker Vertagear has one of its best chairs on sale right now, meaning you can sit yourself down in comfort while you game or work. You can also save on its chair RGB conversion kits to take your chair to extremely ridiculous levels of awesome. Or am I the only one who demands RGB lighting everywhere?
The SL2000 on sale is for preorder with an estimated ship-date of June 21. The RGB kits are available right now, if you’re looking to turn your chair into a wireless light-up beacon of hope in these troubled times. There are other discounts advertised on the Vertagear website, but unfortunately the other deals are out of stock at the moment.
If you’re unfamiliar with Vertagear, it works with FaZe Clan for their chairs, and two of its seats are on our list of the best gaming chairs, so they’re top-notch.
VPNs are a hot commodity these days. Short for Virtual Private Network, VPNs offer the promise of privacy online – or just access to another country’s Netflix catalog. But they tend to cause as many problems as they solve when it comes to gaming online.
IGN and its sister site PCMag recently surveyed our readers on VPN usage with PC Gaming. 58% of respondents said they use a VPN to protect their privacy online, while gaming-related uses such as accessing games from another region or to play with people in different countries together accounted for just 15%.
There’s a reason gamers tend to not like VPNs either: of those who do use a VPN while gaming, more than 75% reported performance issues or lag. Not exactly what you want when trying to land headshots in a fast-paced shooter.
This matches with another survey question, which indicates that prospective VPN users care most about speed when choosing a service.
For more insights from the survey, check out PCMag’s analysis as well.
This month marks the 10th anniversary of the PC game retailer Green Man Gaming. To celebrate the milestone, the site is running a big sale, but it’s also throwing in a fun bonus. When you purchase select titles, you’ll get to spin the GMG Birthday Wheel, which will reward you with a free mystery game. You can check out the full sale here or read on to see some of the highlights.
The titles that qualify for a free mystery game have a green “X” in the corner of their icons. Each account is limited to receiving 10 free games. Some of these deals go away today, so don’t wait too long to make your purchase.
Purchasing any edition of the above titles qualifies you for a free game, so feel free to pick up the deluxe, gold, or ultimate edition if that suits you better. And these games just scratch the surface of what’s on sale, so check out the full sale for more PC game deals.
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Chris Reed is IGN’s shopping and commerce editor. You can follow him on Twitter @_chrislreed.
Sony has announced that it has created a new umbrella brand, PlayStation Studios, that will unite all its first-party titles and launch alongside PlayStation 5.
As reported by GamesIndustry.biz, this new branding will only be used on those games that are developed and managed by Sony. A new opening video for PlayStation Studios was also revealed that includes characters from The Last of Us, God of War, Uncharted, Ratchet & Clank, Horizon: Zero Dawn, and LittleBigPlanet.
PlayStation 4 games will also have the PlayStation Studios branding, but such games as The Last of Us Part 2 and Ghost of Tsushima will not feature it as it won’t be quite ready for launch.
This branding will also be making the jump to PC, as Sony’s senior vice president and head of global marketing at Sony Interactive Entertainment has said “any future games it releases on other platforms will also carry the branding.” However, it will not be ready by the launch of Horizon Zero Dawn on PC this summer.
“Over the last few years — and even the last decade — the strength of the titles coming out from our studios has been stronger than ever,” Lempel said. “We have been thinking about how we unite all of these great games under one brand, and really the purpose of that is to make the consumer understand that, when they see this brand, they’re getting ready for a robust, innovative, deep experience that they’ve come to expect from games coming from PlayStation. So we came up with PlayStation Studios.”
There will also be variations on the opening video seen above, and although it appears similar to what one would see before a Marvel Cinematic Universe film, Lempel says “the inspiration for the branding came from the games themselves.”
“What we really wanted to do was create a way to bring the consumer into the world,” Lempel says. “When they play our games that’s the nice robust piece that happens, and then you’re transported into an adventure with rich worlds, old characters, and really captivating stories. We’re all huge Marvel fans. One of our biggest games of all time has a Marvel character in it with Spider-Man. But this is really about doing something specific for our games and our industry.
In addition to PlayStation Studios including titles from such studios as Naughty Dog, Insomniac, Santa Monica Studio, Media Molecule, and Guerrilla Games, the brand will also “apply to games made by work-for-hire developers under Sony’s direction.”
It’s funny to think about now, but there was a time when fans had a wide variety of baseball games to choose from. If you didn’t want a complex simulation of the real thing like MLB The Show, you could find baseball games featuring robots, little kids, or even living bobbleheads. Most of those have gone the way of the dodo now, but Super Mega Baseball 3 throws it back, not only by offering a less serious option but by recapturing some old favorite retro-style pick-up-and-play gameplay and features.
Despite the double-superlative name, this isn’t an “extreme” arcade sports game in the vein of the cartoony NFL Blitz or NBA Jam. There are no over-the-top power-ups or zany circus catches. Instead, the Super Mega Baseball series features accessible and grounded gameplay, with hits that come off the bat in authentic ways and fielders who play to their abilities based on their stats. Batters produce a satisfying variety of bloop singles, sinking line drives, and lazy popups, all dependent on the location of the pitch and timing of the swing. Defensively, diving fielders more often than not knock the balls down rather than come up with miracle snags. While the player’s appearances border on the surreal, the baseball is certainly real enough. Super Mega Baseball 3 continues the tradition of realistic and refined baseball gameplay that’s more simulation than arcade, yet with simple controls that even younger players can grasp.
Everything I liked about Super Mega Baseball 2’s gameplay returns in Super Mega Baseball 3, including the ultra-customizable difficulty system and performance-based player confidence. The ability to use power swings and pitches is back with some nice tweaks to increase the risks and rewards of proper timing. During games, the option exists to expertly time a pitch or swing, potentially adding the little extra oomph needed for a home run or strikeout. However, overthrow a power pitch and expect that ball to not go where you want it to. With a power swing, your odds of hitting a home run go up… but your ability to simply make contact goes down. In the past, using the power options during crucial situations created some memorable moments; the increased risk/rewards only serves to sweetly ramp up the tension. I also like that AI batters seem less robotic and more likely to swing at pitches outside of the zone. I was able to generate more strikeouts than in the past by throwing junk in and off the plate.
Super Mega Baseball 3 also takes its best swing at filling in some key baseball elements that were missing in SMB2, and the result is a more realistic baseball experience. In particular, the battle between baserunners and catchers has been intensified. In the past, when you wanted to steal a base you’d give the command and watched as the runner waited until the pitch was thrown. Guessing when to steal – optimally during anticipated off-speed pitches – was the only true decision for the offensive player. On the other side, there was little an opposing pitcher could do other than hope the catcher had time to make a throw. Whether the runner was safe or out was largely dependent on luck.
[poilib element=”quoteBox” parameters=”excerpt=I%20love%20the%20way%20it%20puts%20focus%20on%20an%20often-underappreciated%20aspect%20of%20the%20real%20sport.”]In Super Mega Baseball 3, runners leave as soon as the steal button is pressed, creating a fascinating timing mini-game that duplicates the tension of stealing a base in the real sport. Leave too early and the pitcher only needs to step off the rubber and throw to the bag; leave too late, and a good catcher should gun you down every time. Situation and timing now determine stealing success, and this minute change really makes swiping a bag a much more fun and interactive aspect.
To combat this new level of runner control, pitchers can now perform pickoff moves with a simple press on the d-pad – pickoffs aren’t quite as nuanced as stealing. In fact, they feel more like the luck-based decisions of the past. If you try to pick off the runner and he actually is stealing… good job, you got him. But, if the runner isn’t going, he will automatically dive safely back to the bag. It’s disappointing to not be able to catch bad baserunners who are simply slow to react.
Finally, added to this mix are catchers’ fielding abilities. Bad defensive catchers will see passed balls and dropped third strikes get by them, which love for the way it puts focus on an often-underappreciated aspect of the real sport. Collectively, the interplay between baserunners, pitchers, and catchers really elevates the excitement between pitches and inches Super Mega Baseball 3 toward a more complete and authentic baseball simulation.
If stellar gameplay is the first thing I think of when recalling the Super Mega Baseball series, weird-looking players might be the second. Super Mega Baseball 3 brings back the exaggerated cartoony player models, to mixed results. While I appreciate the diversity and range of players, too many look unnaturally Frankensteined together from random parts.
Outside my issues with some of the player models, Super Mega Baseball 3 is a great looking game. Players are full of personality thanks to creative and humorous animations. The 12 whimsical stadiums showcase beautiful new lighting options, including twilight, mist, and summer haze. All of this seems to come at a slight cost of longer-than-expected loading times. Also of note is the very accessible customization tools, including what might be the best logo designer in any sports game. It is so easy to create fun and imaginative logos that look real enough to grace the caps of a minor league team.
[poilib element=”quoteBox” parameters=”excerpt=My%20favorite%20new%20feature%20lies%20within%20the%20players%E2%80%99%20internal%20makeup%3A%20situational%20traits.”]Aesthetics aside, my favorite new feature lies within the players’ internal makeup: situational traits. In addition to typical stats, players can now have up to two traits that trigger depending on the circumstances of a game. For instance, the RBI Man trait grants contact and power boosts when batting with runners in scoring position. The K Man trait gives a pitcher better control when facing two-strike counts. Some traits are even negative, such as runners who suffer a speed penalty when trying to steal or batters who wilt under the pressure of an RBI opportunity.
These traits offer a new level of strategy when setting lineups or handling opposing teams. For instance, I chose to start a bench player whose trait gave him an edge against lefty pitching when facing a southpaw. Pitching against a batter who crushes inside pitching made me nibble on the outside corner, producing an untimely walk. These traits also help to differentiate players outside the traditional stat bars (Contact, Power, Speed, etc), breathing life into a roster of fictional players.
Super Mega Baseball 3 not only adds these new traits but makes them easy to see in action. When a trait is triggered, a little audio cue alerts you that someone’s trait is active. Holding the right trigger, whether batting or pitching, brings up a list of active traits and their implications. It’s very handy that these traits not only enhance the gameplay but are so easy to recognize and use to your advantage.
Perhaps the biggest addition is the new multi-year Franchise Mode, which is very welcome after Super Mega Baseball 2 limited us to single seasons. While it won’t compete with the depth found in games like MLB The Show, I like that this streamlined take puts emphasis on finding and developing unique players.
During the course of multiple seasons, various development opportunities pop up that allow managers to spend money for stat increases and/or trait gains. Seemingly simple, these chances lead to some really interesting choices. For instance, putting a batter on a red meat diet may increase their throwing strength significantly, but the added bulk will also slow their running speed. And since most of the development choices have some degree of randomness, any one outcome isn’t guaranteed. Eating all of those steaks might lead to a bigger jump in throwing ability than expected or it could grant the “Bad Jumps” negative trait… or both. I enjoy the coin-flipping animation that communicates what happens after the agonizing decision is finally made.
[poilib element=”quoteBox” parameters=”excerpt=Small%20descriptions%20help%20tell%20a%20story%20instead%20of%20just%20increasing%20or%20decreasing%20a%20numerical%20stat.”]Even though most of these decisions are simply new numbers, like “+4 to Contact skill,” I love that they are themed with a touch of humor. Players can jazzercise, join a reality show, or explore Black Market Acupuncture. Age-related events are similarly narrated; I had a young player master a yoga pose while my older infielder started suffering leg cramps. These small descriptions help tell a story instead of just increasing or decreasing a numerical stat.
These training options are woven into a fairly light economic model that also includes player salaries – but, disappointingly, no trading. Instead, there is one giant free agent pool that you can use to replace players one for one, paying or gaining the difference in salary. It’s a relatively simple system that sees players move through this free agent pool until they eventually retire. While trading would have been nice, not relying on a heavy economics system puts the focus on the players, not managing mundane details like contracts, roster size, or ticket prices.
Franchise rounds out a healthy set of modes, including exhibition games, single seasons, elimination brackets, and a ranked online “Pennant Chase.”
Like the previous two games in the series, the sound design remains unimpressive. While crowd noise enhances the gameday atmosphere, the background and walkup music is pretty vanilla. I do like the addition of an announcer; hearing the goofy names like “Junior Young Sr.,” “Lacky Luster,” or “Nacho Crisp” makes me smile.
Japanese developer Natsume announced its newest farming sim game today titled Harvest Moon: One World for the Nintendo Switch. The new Harvest Moon game will be released later this year.
Harvest Moon: One World will feature a new world with both new and returning characters, unique villages, and new challenges as you grow your farm. The new game will explore a world where vegetables and fruits don’t exist, and they must venture beyond their towns and into the world bring back produce into the world.
Although Natsume didn’t provide screenshots, the developer promised that Harvest Moon: One World is being developed with a new engine and graphics.
In a press release, Natsume president and CEO Hiro Maekawa say, “Harvest Moon: One World features a brand-new way of exploring Harvest Moon that seasoned players and new generations will both enjoy.”
The last Harvest Moon game, not counting a 2019 runner spinoff, was Harvest Moon: Light of Hope released in 2018 for PS4 and Switch. Considering how popular Animal Crossing: New Horizons proved to be, there might be a market for players hungry for more farm and life sims.
