Author: Trafficblast

Kingdom Hearts 3: ReMind’s Ending Looks A Lot Like An Old Final Fantasy 15 Trailer

Re:Mind, the newest DLC for Kingdom Hearts 3, launched today, January 23 on PlayStation 4. Fans and Square Enix enthusiasts who complete the expansion, however, may notice something eerily familiar about the DLC’s ending–it looks a lot like an old Final Fantasy XV trailer from back when it was Final Fantasy Versus XIII.

Upon finishing the Re:Mind expansion, a cutscene shows Yozora sitting in the back of a car as the chauffeur drives through a cityscape. For those who remember, back in 2011, Square Enix cut together a similar trailer for the then-named Versus XIII: Noctis sitting in the back of a car driven by a chauffeur. It was one of many early trailers the company debuted when talking about the spin-off, which was then in development exclusively for the PlayStation 3.

YouTuber Ouji uploaded a side-to-side comparison video showing the similarities between the FFVXIII and KH3 clips–and they look very identical to each other. You can check out the comparison below.

The common factor between the two games is Tetsuya Nomura, who is the director of Kingdom Hearts 3 and was originally heading up Final Fantasy Versus XIII’s development. Nomura would eventually relinquish his Versus XIII duties to Hajime Tabata so that he could focus entirely on Kingdom Hearts 3.

Alongside the new DLC, Square Enix delivered a free update for Kingdom Hearts 3 across all platforms. Tne new update, patch 1.07, adds new abilities and keyblades, new story mode content, and more.

Kingdom Hearts 3 was received warmly by critics when it launched on January 29, 2019. The game got an 8/10 rating in our Kingdom Hearts 3 review, with editor Tamoor Hussain writing, “In 2002, as Sora, I left Destiny Islands to travel across the universe and make new friends. In 2019 I brought old ones home, and I had so much fun doing it.”

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Revisiting Smash Bros. and Tokyo Mirage Sessions – NVC 491

Welcome to Nintendo Voice Chat! First up, learn about Nintendo’s new patent for a Joy-Con stylus attachment for Nintendo Switch. Then, the NVC crew is playing lots of Tokyo Mirage Sessions on Switch, and some of the panel has fallen back in love with Super Smash Bros. Ultimate. Finally, the panel tackles your listener questions on a supersized edition of Question Block.

Timecodes!

  • 00:00:00 Welcome! Quick news time
  • 00:09:55 Games out this week
  • 00:20:51 We’re playing Tokyo Mirage Sessions and Smash!
  • 00:41:45 Mega Question Block!
  • 01:12:50 Wrap up

NVC is available on your preferred platform!

You can also Download NVC 491 Directly Here

You can listen to NVC on your preferred platform every Thursday at 3pm PT/6pm ET. Have a question for Question Block? Write to us at [email protected] and we may pick your question! Also, make sure to join the Nintendo Voice Chat Podcast Forums on Facebook. We’re all pretty active there and often pull Question Block questions and comments straight from the community.

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Logan Plant is the Production Assistant for NVC. You can find him on Twitter at @LoganJPlant.

Ewan McGregor Addresses Obi-Wan Shooting Delays

Earlier, reports emerged suggesting that the Obi-Wan Disney Plus series, announced last August, was running into problems. Insiders close to the project said that the series was on indefinite hold, and that crew was being sent home. Now, the series’ star has dismissed the rumors that this had anything to do with the show’s quality.

The Disney Plus series will see Ewan McGregor return to the role of Obi-Wan Kenobi, which he previously played in the Star Wars prequel trilogy. GameSpot managed to catch up with Ewan McGregor at an event promoting the upcoming Birds of Prey, which he stars in as bad guy Roman Sionis, aka Black Mask. Naturally, we asked him about what’s happening with the Obi-Wan series, denying that anyone was unhappy with the scripts.

“The scripts were really good,” McGregor says, calling claims that they weren’t good “bullshit.” He says, “none of it’s true; they just pushed the dates…they wanted more time to read the stuff that had been written, and they felt like they wanted to do more work on it.” Everything is, McGregor says, “less dramatic” than the initial news made it seem.

He says they’ll start shooting in January next year, and they don’t want to move the release date.

We’ll continue to follow this as it develops.

Now Playing: Disney Plus: 15 Of The Best ’90s Movies To Watch At Launch

Knights And Bikes Is Coming To Switch Soon

Knights and Bikes, which launched on PS4, Xbox One, and PC in August last year, is now making its way to Nintendo Switch. The action-adventure game, which sees two kids team up to explore an island, and which can be played entirely in co-op, will come to Nintendo’s portable system on February 6.

The game is available to preorder on the Eshop now, and doing so before the game’s release will net you a 10% discount. You’ll be able to play the game with just one Joy-Con, which is ideal for playing the game in co-op on the go.

The Switch is getting a lot of games lately, including forty next week, but Knights and Bikes stands out. It got an 8/10 in our review, and reviewer David Wildgoose called it a “wonderfully warm, effortlessly inviting experience that’ll make you feel young again.”

Knights and Bikes was published by Double Fine, which is unlikely to publish more games now that Microsoft owns the studio.

Now Playing: Biggest Nintendo Switch Exclusives Of 2020 So Far

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Super Monkey Ball: Banana Blitz HD’s Weird New Update Does Away With The Ball

Super Monkey Ball: Banana Blitz HD for Steam has received a strange new update that lets you ditch your ball for three other shapes. The game, which first released on the Wii back in 2006 before eventually getting a HD remaster on consoles and PC in 2019, will now let you ditch the ball on PC–but you can’t just control the monkey directly.

On the character select screen, you can now alter what plastic shape AiAi is rolling around in (it’s seemingly not possible for the other monkeys). Type in “cube” and you’ll end up in a cube-shaped lump of plastic; the same is true if you type in “triangle” or “star”. This will also affect how you move, it seems, as the physics differ between shapes.

In a follow-up tweet, it’s been clarified that this update is only coming to the Steam version, and that while you can use it on every level, it’s not guaranteed that you can actually beat all of them in these other forms–you might need to turn back into a ball to finish the game.

The Super Monkey Ball series could return if Banana Blitz HD does well. The game earned a 5/10 in our review, in which I wrote that it is “not a good showcase of what made the series work.”

Now Playing: Super Monkey Ball: Banana Blitz Video Review

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Star Trek: Picard Episode 1 “Remembrance” Breakdown & Easter Eggs

Warning: SPOILERS! In Episode 1 of Star Trek: Picard, we are reunited with Jean-Luc Picard (Patrick Stewart) 14 years after his retirement from Starfleet. He is living a peaceful life at his family vineyard, Chateau Picard, in France with his dog, Number One. Picard still has dreams about the USS Enterprise and his friend, Data. A mysterious young woman named Dahj appears and asks him for help, and Picard realizes she may have a personal connection to him.

In the video above, we recap and break down all the important plot points, Star Trek references, and TNG Easter Eggs from the series premiere of Star Trek: Picard. If you haven’t watched the episode yet, you can watch Star Trek: Picard Episode 1 here on CBS All Access.

You can also read about everything you need to know about Data’s role in the first episode of Picard, and how Patrick Stewart asked Whoopi Goldberg to join Picard Season 2.

Disclosure: ViacomCBS is GameSpot’s parent company.

Star Trek: Picard News and Features

Apex Legends Season 4: Everything We Know In Under 3 Minutes

During a Devstream, Respawn announced the first official details for Apex Legends Season 4: Assimilation. The upcoming season introduces several notable changes to how Ranked will work and also adds new content.

In the video above, Tamoor Hussain details the most noteworthy announcements from the Devstream. Season 4: Assimilation introduces a new playable character, Forge, and weapon, the Sentinel. The new season will also see the return of fan-favorite Kings Canyon, Apex Legends’ original map, but World’s Edge isn’t going anywhere anytime soon–Season 4 will have opportunities for you to play on both maps. Though there are numerous changes to Ranked Mode in Season 4, the one that you need to know about only concerns high-tier play. The Apex Predator rank will be renamed Master in Season 4, while the title of Apex Predator will only be given to the highest ranking players in the world. Only those in the top 500 for each system (Xbox One, PS4, and PC) will be able to hold the title of Apex Predator.

Season 4: Assimilation is scheduled to begin on February 4. If you want more detailed breakouts on all the information discussed in the video, check out our roundup of everything that was announced during the Season 4 Reveal Devstream.

The Sonic The Hedgehog Movie Is Expected To Open Strong

The Sonic the Hedgehog movie releases on February 14, 2020, and it’s expected to perform reasonably well. The film, which carries a budget of $95 million, is expected to open north of $40 million.

The Hollywood Reporter is tracking the movie at opening between the range of $40-45 million for the four-day weekend (Monday is President’s Day). Deadline believes it could go higher, with a range of $41-47 million.

There’s the chance of the movie finishing above or below these figures, of course, but tracking tends to be a good indication of how a movie will do. How reviews turn out could also influence the movie’s opening. Traditionally, video game movies have performed better internationally than they have domestically, too–it’s fair to expect this will be the case with Sonic the Hedgehog as well.

If it hits the high-end of estimates, it could end up having the second best domestic opening weekend of any video game adaptation, although its direct competition opened over three days rather than four. Lara Croft: Tomb Raider opened to $47,735,743 back in 2001. It will likely finish below Detective Pikachu, though, which earned $54,365,242 in its opening weekend (both figures via Box Office Mojo).

The Sonic the Hedgehog movie has gone through a turbulent production, with a full character redesign being commissioned after the film’s disastrous first trailer. Thankfully, a team led by Sonic comic illustrator Tyson Hesse gave gaming’s premiere hedgehog a much more lovable look.

Sonic is gearing up for a big 2020, with Sega planning on announcing Sonic news on the 20th of every month.

Now Playing: Sonic The Hedgehog – Official New Trailer

2020 Gran Turismo Championships Begin in Sydney, Australia Next Month

PlayStation has confirmed the first event of the FIA certified Gran Turismo Championships 2020 season will take place in Sydney, Australia on February 15-16

The event promises 50 of the world’s fastest Gran Turismo racers from Europe, the Americas, and Asia going wheel-to-wheel with Australian and New Zealand competitors, including Cody Nikola Latkovski (who grabbed second in both the Nations Cup and Manufacturer Series at the 2019 World Finals in Monaco in November) plus Adam Wilk and 2015 GT Academy winner Matt Simmons.

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“I’m deeply moved to be able to host the FIA-Gran Turismo Championships in Australia,” said GT creator Kazunori Yamauchi in a statement supplied alongside the announcement. “I felt from way back during the first Gran Turismo that Australia is home to some of the most passionate GT fans of the world. Australia is also a very forward thinking country that took notice of the Japanese sports car culture which ultimately led to the creation of Gran Turismo, with cars like the iconic Nissan GT-R, which even became a part of their own sports car culture.”

“Not only that but the Bathurst (Mount Panorama) Circuit is one of the most unique tracks in the world, with its beautiful scenery and frighteningly difficult course lay out. I think it’s the robust car culture of Australia that nurtured fans of Gran Turismo over the last 20 years and led to the birth of top Gran Turismo athletes such as Cody Nikola Latkovski and Adam Wilk. I’m looking forward to seeing them perform well in this world class championship which is being held for the first time on their home turf.”

Australian GT challenger Cody Nikola Latkovski.
Australian GT challenger Cody Nikola Latkovski.

Tickets are free and are available now on a first come, first served basis. Those who can’t make it to the event at Luna Park’s Big Top event will be able to watch the coverage online via GT’s official channels.

Managed by GT developer Polyphony Digital and FIA, the Gran Turismo Championships were established in 2018 and have previously visited Tokyo, Monaco, New York City, Paris, Nürburg, and several other cities across the globe.

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Luke is Games Editor at IGN’s Sydney office. You can find him on Twitter every few days @MrLukeReilly.