Author: Trafficblast

Following their surprise appearance in the wild last week, Azelf, Mesprit, and Uxie have made their way into Raid Battles in Pokemon Go. The Legendary Pokemon will appear in Gyms from now until May 27, but which one you’ll be able to catch will depend on where you live.

Just as when they first appeared in the wild, each of the three Legendary Pokemon is currently exclusive to a specific region. Azelf is appearing throughout the Americas and Greenland; Mesprit is available across Europe, Africa, and the Middle East; and Uxie is only spawning in the Asia-Pacific region.

Each of the Legendary Pokemon will appear in their respective parts of the world until May 27. It’s unclear if Niantic plans to rotate them after that point, as it has done in the past with other region-exclusive Pokemon. However, the developer teases that players will have a chance of coming across the Legendaries in the wild in their regions even after their Raid event ends–although you’ll need to be “extraordinarily lucky” in Niantic’s words, suggesting the odds of finding one will be incredibly low.

Azelf, Mesprit, and Uxie were first introduced in Pokemon Diamond and Pearl for the DS. Together the Pokemon are collectively known as the lake trio, so named due to the fact that each one guards a different lake in the Sinnoh region. All three of the Pokemon are pure Psychic-types, which makes them vulnerable to Dark, Bug, and Ghost Pokemon like Tyranitar, Gengar, and Scizor.

In other Pokemon Go news, Niantic is kicking off a Detective Pikachu event in the game this week to celebrate the live-action movie’s theatrical release. From May 7-17, Pokemon that are featured in the film, such as Bulbasaur, Jigglypuff, and Snubble, will appear in the wild and in Raid Battles. You’ll also have a chance of finding a Shiny Aipom and a special Pikachu wearing a detective’s hat.

Shortly after the Detective Pikachu event ends, Niantic will host Pokemon Go’s next Community Day. That event is set for Sunday, May 19, and will star the Gen 3 starter Torchic as its featured Pokemon.

With less than a month to go before Star Wars: Galaxy’s Edge opens at Disneyland, the excitement for the new section of the park is at an all-time high. The Walt Disney Company knows that and used this year’s Star Wars Day (May 4) to its advantage with the release of a new theme song for the theme park land.

The new song, “Star Wars: Galaxy’s Edge Symphonic Suite,” is written by composer John Williams, the man behind the scores of Episodes 1-8 of the Star Wars saga. At this point, it’s unclear how the song will be incorporated into the land. However, given Disney’s penchant for having theme music play throughout its parks, chances are the “Symphonic Suite” will be heard by visitors as they wander around Batuu, the planet Galaxy’s Edge is set on.

According to StarWars.com, the new track will “will complement the immersive world” that the land is set in, further bringing visitors into the Star Wars universe. That world will include themed food and drinks, a variety of interactive experiences, and–upon the grand opening–a new ride that lets guests pilot the Millennium Falcon on a mission.

There’s more in store for Galaxy’s Edge, though, as a secondary ride–Rise of the Resistance–will open later this year. A press release calls it “the most ambitious, immersive, and advanced attraction ever imagined, which will place guests in the middle of a climactic battle between the First Order and the Resistance and will blur the lines between fantasy and reality.”

Star Wars: Galaxy’s Edge opens at Disneyland on May 31. The land then comes to Disney World Resort’s Magic Kingdom on August 29. If you love theme parks but Star Wars isn’t your thing, don’t worry. There’s also a new Harry Potter roller coaster coming to Universal Studios and the Hagrid animatronic is a little too real.

Though Avengers: Endgame may be jam packed with Easter Eggs and references, and feature not one, not two, but three whole endings over the course of its three hour runtime, it turns out there were still scenes that wound up on the cutting room floor.

Directors Anthony and Joe Russo revealed on the Happy Sad Confused podcast that they cut the role of Katherine Langford (Love, Simon, 13 Reasons Why) from the finished film while simultaneously confirming she had been cast to play an older version of Morgan Stark, Tony’s five-year-old daughter.

The scene, the Russos explained, was supposed to mirror the moment back in Infinity War where Thanos was confronted by baby Gamora after he first snapped his fingers. The directors called the place where this scene took place a “metaphysical waystation,” rather than the Soul World like some fans had theorized the space to represent. Apparently, Langford and Robert Downey Jr. recorded a scene together in which an adult Morgan Stark forgives her father for leaving her behind as he sacrifices him with with the Infinity Stones. However, after being shown to test audiences, who found the moment confusing, the scene was cut entirely.

“What we realized about it was we didn’t feel an emotional association with the adult version of his daughter. It wasn’t resonating with us on an emotional level, which is why we moved away [from] it,” The Russos said. “The intention was that his future daughter forgave him, and gave him peace to go. And the idea felt resonant, but there were just too many ideas in an overly complicated movie.”

Avengers: Endgame stars Chris Evans, Robert Downey Jr, Scarlett Johansson, Paul Rudd, Jeremy Renner, Karen Gillan, and Josh Brolin. It is is rapidly closing in on the record currently held by James’ Cameron’s Avatar as the highest grossing movie of all time.

Ubisoft is getting ready to pull back the curtain on something new for Tom Clancy’s Ghost Recon. The publisher announced it is hosting a Ghost Recon World Premiere event this Thursday, May 9, beginning at 11:30 AM PT / 2:30 PM ET / 7:30 PM BST, which will give fans around the globe their first glimpse at what’s next for the series.

Beyond the date and time of the event, Ubisoft hasn’t shared any other details about its Ghost Recon stream, so it remains to be seen what it’ll reveal. The fact that the publisher isn’t linking the event to 2017’s Ghost Recon Wildlands, which it has supported since launch, indicates the reveal could be something entirely new. Curiously, the link associated with the upcoming stream leads to a Skell Technology website, which fans will recognize is the recurring tech company that has appeared in various Ubisoft games, including the aforementioned Wildlands.

The Ghost Recon World Premiere announcement arrives on the heels of Wildlands’ latest expansion, Operation Oracle. That content update notably added two new missions to the tactical shooter, which involve extracting a Skell Tech engineer who was arrested by Unidad–potentially tying it to this week’s upcoming Ghost Recon event, although that remains unconfirmed.

In addition to the two new missions, Operation Oracle introduced a new Ghost Team Leader, Major Cole D. Walker. Players who complete the operation will also earn two new rewards: Walker’s Bracelet (which equips a new CQC Finisher) and Walker’s Tattoo for your arm. You can find the full patch notes for Operation Oracle on the official Ghost Recon Wildlands website.

Ghost Recon Wildlands is available for PS4, Xbox One, and PC. GameSpot called it “a squad based Tom Clancy game that plays by the numbers” and gave it a 7/10 in our original Wildlands review, writing, “While its main strength is its mission diversity, it doesn’t take long to lose the motivation after reaching El Sueno’s doorstep. Even with a foursome of highly trained friends, Wildlands eventually reveals its diminishing returns.”

Last year, five lawsuits were filed against Riot Games for the company’s violation of the California Equal Pay Act, citing how in-house sexism was affecting the workplace and creating a “bro culture.” According to Kotaku, this past April, Riot filed a forced arbitration for two of them. In response, Riot Games’ employees are preparing for the first of several planned walkouts.

An estimated number of 100 employees are set to participate in the walkout today. To Kotaku, one employee said, “I’m walking out as a symbolic action to signal to leadership that I care about this issue. I hope leadership takes the time to seriously listen to the issues.”

In response to the walkout, a Riot representative told Kotaku, “While we will not make a change to our policies while in active litigation, last Thursday we announced that we’ve made the call to pivot our approach. As soon as active litigation is resolved, we will give all new Rioters the choice to opt-out of mandatory arbitration for individual sexual harassment and sexual assault claims. At that time, we will also commit to have a firm answer on potentially expanding the scope and extending this opt-out to all Rioters. We are working diligently to resolve all active litigation so that we can quickly take steps toward a solution. As we have been for the past week, we will continue to listen to Rioters regarding their thoughts on arbitration and we’re thankful for everyone that has taken the time to meet with leadership about this issue.”

“It’s been eight months since the original [Kotaku] article was released and so far I haven’t seen a single outcome of our diversity and inclusion efforts at Riot,” one Riot employee told Kotaku. “I haven’t seen a single metric or number to indicate things have improved and I haven’t seen a single project get finished.”

Another employee told Kotaku, “I think having executives get up for two hours and do the classic, roundabout series of denials helped other Rioters wake up to the fact that this is actually happening here. The impression most Rioters got is that [the executives] do care about it, a bit. They care about being publicly humiliated.”

This walkout is the first major protest seen in the game industry since the bulk of Crytek USA quit for being underpaid back in 2014. The gaming landscape of today is very different from previous years, as talk of studio employees unionizing has become a larger focus amongst the many reports of crunch and other poor working conditions within the industry. The shift has put many studios under the microscope, including big names like Fortnite‘s Epic Games and Mortal Kombat 11‘s NeatherRealm. In response, numerous teams, such as Apex Legends‘ Respawn, are sticking to certain development practices in regards to updating their games in order to avoid putting their employees through crunch.

Fortnite is known for its big in-world seasonal changeover events, but the one this weekend didn’t quite go as expected. While many players got to see the event unfold just as Epic intended, some players were unable to attend and participate in a community vote for a new item.

The May 4 event had players gather for the Unvaulting, which finally opened the mysterious vault underneath Loot Lake. Players could then enter the vault and choose to “vote” on an item by striking it with a pickaxe. Once one item–a Tommy Gun–was freed, players were ejected and got to witness the smoldering volcano finally erupt and destroy Tilted Towers.

Players who were locked out of the event, however, saw none of that. They didn’t get to vote on the item that was eventually freed, and they didn’t get to see Tilted get wrecked. To make up for the error, Fortnite has set up an open folder with a replay file, and instructions in various languages for how to use it. Essentially it involves downloading the file, dropping it into the Replay menu, and then refreshing to view it.

As an extra freebie for your troubles, Epic is also giving away the Arcana Glider. If you’ve already bought the glider, you’ll get refunded the 1200 V-Bucks so you can use it on something else.

All of this was to set the stage for Season 9, which will kick off on May 9. The studio teased a theme as usual, with the tagline “The Future Is Unknown.” It also shows a new skin, presumably one you’ll be able to earn through the next season’s Battle Pass. The future would be a big departure from its current season, which is themed after pirates and treasure hunts, but there’s no telling just what it means until the update goes live.

We love a good freebie, and here’s one Steam players won’t want to miss out on: point-and-click adventure Kathy Rain is currently free to own. Once you click “install game,” the title will be added to your account, and it’ll be yours forever. However, this flash deal won’t last long–the giveaway ends tomorrow, May 7, at 10 AM PT / 1 PM ET.

Set in the ’90s, the game follows Kathy, a bold, sassy journalism major who’s investigating the mysterious death of her grandfather and uncovers the sinister secrets of her hometown in the process. Eerie and compelling, Kathy Rain features gorgeous pixel art graphics, hand-drawn environments, original music, and complete voice-acted dialogue. While GameSpot hasn’t reviewed the game, Kathy Rain has over 1,000 reviews and a “Very Positive” rating on Steam–and at the low, low price of $0, you might as well pick it up and dive in.

If you’re into story-driven indie games with dark themes, you might also consider picking up the Dark Dames in Adventure Games bundle, which is 20% off (now $40) and includes Kathy Rain and four other games.

Claim Kathy Rain for free at Steam »

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