The PlayStation community forums are being shut down. The brief announcement posted by community manager Groovy_Matthew encourages users to “continue the conversation via PlayStation.Blog, Twitter, Facebook, and Instagram” instead.
The PlayStation forums, which have largely served as help and support outlets for people who encounter issues with their PlayStation devices and accounts in recent times, will no longer be active from February 27.
It looks like Sony is closing support forums across all parts of their business, as the Sony Xperia forums are also closing.
With social media’s influence growing, forums are becoming less popular. While it was still surprising when BioWare closed their forums in 2016, few in the comments below this announcement seem shocked.
PlayStation is set to have a big 2020, with the launch of the PlayStation 5 planned for later this year. It’s not yet clear when we’ll see the console unveiled, though, especially since Sony is skipping E3 in 2020.
Doom (2016) composer Mick Gordon has signed a vinyl copy of the game’s soundtrack for an upcoming auction being held by Bethesda Australia to support bush fire relief. Gordon was asked to provide his signature, but he ended up giving a little more.
In a tweet, Bethesda ANZ showed off the album that will go up for auction, showing that the Doom Slayer is now rocking out with a silver guitar on the cover.
Gordon also sketched a pentagram beneath his name, and faces have been drawn onto several of the demons.
We’re awaiting further details on when the auction will be held, and how you can bid on this special signed copy of the album. On February 15, Bethesda and 2K teamed up to stream each other’s games–with Bethesda employees streaming Borderlands 3 and 2K employees streaming Skyrim–to raise money for Australian Red Cross.
The bushfires in Australia ripped through more than 12 million hectares of land, destroying thousands of homes and killing animals across the country. Estimates say 33 people died as a result of the fires. As of February 13, all bush and grass fires in New South Wales are contained. For more on the Australian bushfire crisis, check out GameSpot sister site CNET’s extended breakdown of everything you need to know.
A co-op Aliens game in pre-production was cancelled after Disney acquired 20th Century Fox.
3D Realms vice president Frederik Schreiber (via VG247) posted about the game on Twitter in response to a tweet from Cliff Bleszinski where he also revealed his former studio Boss Key Productions was potentially going to make an Aliens game.
Yup. Game was called Aliens: Hadleys Hope. We went quite far into pre-production before the Disney/Fox acquisition, and then we had to cancel it, and move on with something else.
Schreiber reveals the game was to be titled Aliens: Hadley’s Hope and would take place on a planet with numerous Alien Queens which could only be defeated after a few successful rounds of PvE against her protectors.
It boasted the use of teamwork and tactics where colonists and marines would fight together to defeat the Aliens and complete other objectives, like egg hunts, to unlock extra lore and loot.
The Last of Us and Uncharted developer Naughty Dog is helping raise money for the ongoing bushfire relief effort in Australia. The studio has announced a special livestream event featuring game director Neil Druckmann and Ellie actor Ashley Johnson.
The pair will play The Last of Us: Left Behind as part of Sony’s #Gaming4Life2020 charity campaign. The livestream begins at 10:30 AM PT on Wednesday, February 19. You can watch the livestream through Naughty Dog’s Twitch account.
It’s not just Naughty Dog that’s helping raise money for Australia. The Sony Foundation Australia charity campaign will also see Insomniac Games (Spider-Man) conduct a livestream event on February 20 featuring company founder Ted Price. Additionally, PlayStation games boss Shuhei Yoshida will appear on a stream on February 21. LittleBigPlanet and Dreams developer Media Molecule held its own livestream on February 14.
More details on the Gaming4Life2020 charity stream can be found on Sony’s website.
The bushfires in Australia ripped through more than 12 million hectares of land, destroying thousands of homes and killing animals across the country. Estimates say 33 people died as a result of the fires. As of February 13, all bush and grass fires in New South Wales are contained.
Millions of dollars have been donated from individuals and organizations around the world. The Fire Fight benefit concert in Sydney was held on Sunday, featuring acts like Queen and Alice Cooper, and it was a massive success with more than $9.5 million raised.
In what has been a very traumatic, exhausting and anxious bush fire season so far, for the first time this season all bush and grass fires in NSW are now contained. It has taken a lot of work by firefighters, emergency services and communities to get to this point. #nswrfspic.twitter.com/RhqmcYhJ1j
Ibb & Obb, a co-op puzzle platformer that was first released for PC and PS3 in 2013, is the sort of game that looks and feels like a perfect fit for Switch. Now, years after its initial, well-received release, it’s coming to Nintendo’s portable machine. It will release on March 5.
The two-player game will be playable with detached Joy-Cons, and while you can play the game alone, it’s designed to be played with someone else, as shown in the trailer below. The two characters need to stick together, and many of the puzzles involve dealing with changes in gravity.
The game is available for pre-purchase now at a 15% discount, meaning that you can get it for $12.69. It will sell for $15 after launch.
The game received a 7/10 in our original review, and reviewer Tom Mc Shea wrote that “Beneath the whimsical exterior lies a devious and clever puzzle game that makes you curse gravity for being so strict.”
The Switch has a huge range of games heading its way in 2020, of course–here are some of the highlights.
The sequel to 2018’s hugely successful Spider-Man spin-off Venom is currently in production, ahead of its October release. The movie stars Tom Hardy as reporter Eddie Brock, who is host to the titular alien symbiote, Venom. Woody Harrelson will play the character of Cletus Kasady, who has been possessed by the equally dangerous Carnage. The first image of Harrelson from the Venom 2 set has been posted by Hardy.
Fans of Venom will remember that Harrelson actually appeared as Kasady in that movie’s post-credit sequence, where he was sitting behind bars. Based on the new image, it seems that he’s out of jail in Venom 2 and has undergone a makeover.
More specifically, the terrible wig that Harrelson was wearing has thankfully gone, and he’s now wearing a very colourful shirt. Check Hardy’s Instagram post out below:
Venom 2 is directed by Andy Serkis, who takes over from the first movie’s Ruben Fleischer, and also stars Michelle Williams, Stephen Graham, and Reid Scott. In October, it was reported that Bond star Naomie Harris was in talks to join the cast as the villainous Shriek, but this is yet to be confirmed. The film hits theaters on October 2.
Venom is one of several characters from Marvel’s Spider-Man comic books that Sony is basing new movies on. The next release will be Morbius, which hits theaters in July and stars Jared Leto as the “living vampire” of the title. The first Morbius trailer was released in January. For more, check out GameSpot’s guide to everything we know about Morbius.
Update: A third teaser (below) has now appeared, showing the first half of a previously redacted line. It says “Origin,” suggesting that we’ll see the other half of that line sometime soon. Original story follows.
Fortnite‘s new season, Chapter 2 – Season 2, is launching on February 20, and Epic has started to tease the big seasonal changeover with a continent-spanning alternate reality game that seems to be hinting at spycraft plot elements.
The teasers began on Sunday, February 16 with posters and digital ads across the globe, in countries including the US, Brazil, Russia, France, and Italy. Those give a phone number to call, which deliver various messages about agent recruitment and missions. One data miner compiled the messages from various locations. Then, the official Fortnite Discord saw some activity, with a bot called “The Agency” recruiting members.
That has led to today, February 17, when the official Fortnite account began tweeting teasers with redacted data and some espionage imagery. The first teaser simply said “Transmission intercepted,” while the second references “FN.CH02.S02”–or Fortnite Chapter 2 Season 2. There are still three more redacted blocks to be uncovered.
What all this means for the new season isn’t clear yet, but with only a few days until launch it’s bound to be announced pretty soon. In the meantime, you only have a few days left to finish some challenges.
Multiple events related to the James Bond movie No Time To Die have been canceled in China amid the Coronavirus outbreak. Deadline reports that promotional events for the movie, including premieres in Beijing and other cities, have been canceled in the wake of the virus that has already killed more than 1,600 people in China alone.
Star Daniel Craig and other members of the No Time To Die cast were reportedly set to appear at the Beijing screening and other promotional events in China, but those plans have been scrapped “because of uncertainty surrounding the evolution of the epidemic.”
China is the world’s second-largest movie market, following the United States, and the Coronavirus has already impacted the country’s movie scene. Numerous theatres have closed indefinitely, and there is no word on when operations will resume.
The last James Bond movie, Spectre, made $84 million in China alone, which represented about 9.5 percent of its $881 million worldwide box office.
No Time To Die is directed by Cary Joji Fukunaga (True Detective). The film stars Daniel Craig as Bond, Ralph Fiennes as M, Ben Whishaw as Q, and Naomie Harris as Miss Moneypenny. Joining them for the first time will be Rami Malek, Billy Magnussen, and Ana de Armas.
Like many other beacons of ’80s nostalgia, such as Ghostbusters, fans have clamored for a reboot or sequel to the 1985 adventure film The Goonies for decades now. While Fox has finally ordered a pilot for a Goonies-related TV series, according to Variety, it’s probably not exactly what fans had in mind. The untitled project will follow a substitute teacher named Stella Cooper who helps three students make a shot-for-shot remake of their favorite movie, The Goonies.
Writer Sarah Watson–best-known as the creator of the acclaimed feminist TV drama The Bold Type–will helm the production. Goonies director Richard Donner will serve as executive producer. The plot of this new effort shares certain similarities with that of ambitious real-life fan-films, such as a shot-for-shot remake of Raiders of the Lost Ark created by three Mississippi teenagers in 1989.
Over the decades, there have been many, many rumors about a potential Goonies 2, including a shelved animated series for Cartoon Network, and several scripts in varying levels of completion. Several cast members have previously indicated their lack of interest in reprising their roles, but it’s unclear if any of them will appear in this new TV series. Regardless of how that shakes out, as far as we’re concerned, there’s only one true Goonies 2: the 1987 NES game from Konami.
VGC reports that the mode is targeting an early March release, which would most likely mean either March 3 or March 10 since Modern Warfare updates hit on Tuesdays. The release will replace the currently gray-redacted area that was added to the main menu upon the Season 2 launch.
At the same time, the battle royale mode will reportedly be released as a free standalone game, which will give players the option to upgrade to the full Modern Warfare. The report also claims it will use the same battle pass as the main game, letting you progress through and earn cosmetics in any of the game’s modes.
In-game, Warzone is said to support up to 200 players in a game, broken into squads. Similar to Apex Legends, it will use a ping mechanic. Existing Modern Warfare players will recognize some areas of the map from its large Ground War mode.
It will also reportedly include a new “Plunder” currency that can be spent for gear, but you’ll also drop your own plunder if you’re holding when you’re taken down. You can bank Plunder to save the loot for future matches, but starting the process will alert other players that you’re a rich target. Death doesn’t count you out of a match entirely and instead puts you into a “Gulag” where you’ll fight 1v1 against another player to return to the match.
GameSpot has contacted Activision Blizzard for clarification.
Call of Duty: Modern Warfare recently kicked off its Season 2, with a huge patch that prompted an apology from the developer. The new season brought back the popular character Ghost, but the bigger surprise was a story trailer that showed Ghost calling for backup in a crowded battlefield. That was the first clue of a battle royale mode, though players appearing to glitch into the menu and map have added much more fuel to the fire since then.