Although no more movies in the Marvel Cinematic Universe have been announced beyond July’s Spider-Man: Far From Home, the next phase of the MCU is taking shape behind-the-scenes. One film that is definitely happening is the long-awaited Black Widow movie. It’s set to start shooting this year, and now two big names are reportedly being lined up to star alongside Scarlett Johansson.
According to Variety, Rachel Weisz and Stranger Things star David Harbour are both in talks to play roles in Black Widow. The site states that deals have not been made for either actor yet, but that Weisz will play a “key role” and that there is “strong interest from both sides of negotiations.”
Weisz is best known for movies such as this year’s Oscar-nominated The Favourite, The Bourne Legacy, and the 1999 film of The Mummy. Harbour will next be seen in the reboot of Hellboy, which releases this month, and returns for Stranger Things Season 3 in July.
Black Widow will be directed by Cate Shortland, who previously helmed the thriller The Berlin Syndrome. Last month it was reported that Fighting with My Family star Florence Pugh will play the second lead in the film. It doesn’t currently have a release date.
Before we get to her standalone movie, Johansson will be seen as Black Widow in Avengers: Endgame, which hits theaters on April 26. The latest promo video revealed loads of new footage–check out GameSpot’s breakdown of this new video. In addition, tickets for Endgame are now available. The pre-sale has broken records and caused several ticketing sites–including Fandango and AMC–to crash.
Respawn has provided another update on the Apex Legends bug that emerged on Wednesday. In a post on Reddit, it explained that “players were unintentionally moved to the wrong servers that didn’t have their persistence and this caused players accounts to appear reset with all progression lost.” It confirmed that it hadn’t actually lost players’ progress and that it shut down live servers intentionally in order to get things back on track.
Because of this, Respawn said your progress should be intact–that is, up until update 1.1 went live at 10 AM PT on Wednesday. Anything you did after that, assuming you did install the update, has been reverted, however. Here’s what Respawn said exactly:
Any in-game purchases and progress acquired during the time between 1.1 going live and the fix will be reverted – levels earned, items unlocked, packs opened, and spent currency. If you continued to play and didn’t patch then this will not affect you.
Any currency purchased, spent or not, will be carried back over to their original account state. i.e. – if you bought $20 worth of coins, and spent $18, then you will get $20 after the fix.
With all of this sorted out, you can now go about checking out what’s new in the latest patch. The highlights, as noted below, include a way to party up with squadmates you’ve matched up with, among other things. The original story follows.
Respawn has put out a warning that there’s a pretty serious bug in Apex Legends right now. It’s tied to the battle royale title’s latest update, patch 1.1–which is live now–and it deletes your in-game progress. Meanwhile, the game’s servers appear to be down at the time of this writing.
To stave off the bug, Respawn wrote a quick post on Reddit advising all players to “not buy or craft anything” until the issue is resolved. The post did not list any specific platform, so it’s implied the bug is affecting all versions of Apex Legends on Xbox One, PS4, and PC. There’s no time table for how long it will be before this is fixed, or if impacted players will be able to recover their lost progression
It also seems like players can no longer log in to Apex Legends’ servers either, regardless of platform. Specifically, players are getting an error stating “no servers found.” It’s possible that the servers have been deliberately shut down in order to stop players from logging in and losing their progress. However, Respawn has not issued an official statement in regards to the server shutdown.
The update in question, Patch 1.1, is (ironically enough) a quality-of-life patch for Apex Legends. Patch 1.1 adds a feature that allows you to invite the squadmates you just played with to join you in a party. So if there’s ever a random teammate you meet online that you want to play with again, you can easily find them. The update also implements a mute button on Apex Legends’ intro and character select screens, and creates an option to report players for cheating or “Other.” Octane’s jump pads no longer affect Wraith while she’s using her Into the Void ability as well.
Patch 1.1 implements a few bug fixes too. The three of them are outlined below. If you’re curious, Respawn has posted the full patch notes for Apex Legends’ latest update on Reddit.
Apex Legends Patch 1.1 Bug Fixes
Fixed issue where the Battle Pass rewards page would not have a default item selected, resulting in a mostly blank page.
Fixed bug for PS4 and Xbox One where sometimes attempting to use a keyboard to chat could cause a fatal script error.
Fixed bug with Banner Cards not showing up during and at the end of a match.
It’s been about 25 years since Goichi “Suda51” Suda had a hand in a Fire Pro Wrestling game, but he’s coming back to lend his storytelling chops to the retro-style wrestling series–it’s where he got his start, after all.
Suda’s made a name for himself and the team at Grasshopper Manufacture with bizarre concepts for unconventional narratives that have turned into cult hits, such as Killer7, Shadows Of The Damned, and the No More Heroes franchise. If you’ve been paying attention to games he’s worked on, you’ve seen the love of professional wrestling throughout his body of work; Travis Touchdown suplexes enemies to finish them off and Mask de Smith’s whole persona was based on a luchador-masked wrestler with the proper moveset to fit. All that can be traced back to Fire Pro Wrestling.
Tap To Unmute
Fire Pro Wrestling World – Official Overview Trailer
Want us to remember this setting for all your devices?
Back in 1994,Super Fire Pro Wrestling Specialhit the Super Famicom in Japan, and in addition to its intricate gameplay, it had a surprisingly involved and twisted narrative called Champion Road. As director and writer, Suda hit us with an unexpectedly dark scenario that involved a series of devastating character deaths blending into the story’s wrestling events (it also featured a Ric Flair stand-in named “Dick Slender”). It concluded with the main character eventually becoming champion. However, the final scene cut to a frame of his house and an audible gunshot, implying that he had committed suicide. It’s a grim premise to begin with and a difficult one to build from, but that’s what Suda is doing. And this time around, it seems to be more hopeful than what he wrote over two decades ago.
This new scenario–that’s coming as DLC for last year’s Fire Pro Wrestling World–was born out of the idea: what if the main character from the original story had a kid? It’s sort of a sequel, essentially Champion Road 2 in spirit, starring the son who is now 24 years old and in a tag-team called The Vanishing. When I had a chance to talk with Suda briefly about it, he said, “I’d been kind of mulling it over for a while and it’s been 25 years since the last scenario, and now it’s kind of the right time. I decided, okay, I’m going through with it. That’s how this character came about.”
The teaser image for the Fire Pro Wrestling World DLC, a story scenario starring the tag-team The Vanishing.
A lot has changed in the years since. With the original story being brutally dark and utterly ridiculous, and Suda’s body of work built from unconventional, experimental types of games, there are so many directions this could go. What kind of tone should we expect from a new Fire Pro story? How does Suda feel about the original story; did it go too far, or did he wish he’d done it differently, in retrospect?
“The original scenario was pretty traumatic: the main character rises up to the top and then ends up dying, you know?” Suda said. “When thinking about what to do with this one, I do have a general idea of where to go and what to do with it. But put simply, it’s sort of a story of his growth and development. As I started writing it, the character started coming to life on his own. And to be honest, at this point, I’m not sure where this character is going to go. I don’t know how it’s going to end until I actually finish it!
What I want to portray is sort of the inner-mind of a pro wrestler. When he’s fighting, what is he feeling? What is he thinking? What kind of stuff is he struggling with? It will be a bit more serious and a lot more introspective. – Suda51
“I hit the original Champion Road with my unbridled passion for the sport and the result was intense and over-the-top in a way only pro wrestling can be. Reading it now, the prose is pretty rough, so I’d like to rewrite it given the chance.”
Suda’s latest game, Travis Strikes Again, channeled a lot of what made No More Heroes stand out with fourth-wall breaking and self-references, some very on-the-nose, but thematically fitting. They almost gave a sense that he was trying to talk the player through the game. But it seems that the new Fire Pro scenario is aiming to be a bit more measured for now.
“With [No More Heroes’] Travis, he’s always kind of been like that,” Suda said. “He’s got a really deep connection with video games, so I felt that he was that sort of character that would talk directly to the players. For this game [Fire Pro], I mean obviously it’s a pro wrestling game, and thematically it is a bit different. And rather than have, for example, the wrestlers speak directly to the player or laying out the central themes, what I want to portray is sort of the inner-mind of a pro wrestler. When he’s fighting, what is he feeling? What is he thinking? What kind of stuff is he struggling with? It will be a bit more serious and a lot more introspective.”
With Suda in full control over the scenario writing, it’ll be nice to see him have a hand in gameplay elements for The Vanishing tag-team, especially having directed Fire Pro in the past. But that aspect may have to be left to Spike Chunsoft’s development team.
“Since I haven’t finished writing the first scenario yet, I’m not sure if stuff like that might pop up, but basically I’m thinking of just leaving the gameplay stuff all up to the studio,” Suda explained. “There are a few things, these wrestlers are going to have their own unique special moves and stuff. For things like that I’m going to put in requests like, ‘okay I want them to have these moves that work this way.’ But apart from that, I’m planning on pretty much just leaving it up to the studio.”
Suda helped promote Fire Pro Wrestling World before it launched in 2017, but now he’s actively developing the DLC.
For those not familiar with Fire Pro Wrestling, its had a storied history that began in 1989 as a PC Engine game by a now-defunct studio called Human Entertainment. Former members of Human eventually formed Grasshopper Manufacture which Suda heads up as CEO. As for Fire Pro Wrestling, Spike Chunsoft picked up the reins in 2000, and in total there have been more than 20 releases within the franchise–most of which are only available in Japan, where pro wrestling had breakout success, coinciding with the popularity of the games.
“Human had actually been putting out the game since before I joined the company, but originally it started out as a straight up wrestling simulator,” Suda said. “And so I decided that, kind of like the scenario I wrote for [Super Fire Pro Wrestling Special (1994)], I wanted to do something similar where it wasn’t just a simulator but really giving it proper themes and giving it a sense of story. The originals came out, and they were the sort of games where you don’t really have to be into pro wrestling to get into it. There were a lot of gamers that didn’t know anything about it who tried the game and were like, ‘oh, this is actually pretty cool, I kind of like pro wrestling now,’ and that was a pretty big thing in Japan at the time.
“With this latest one, I feel like it’s the same type of game, where you don’t need to know anything about pro wrestling, you don’t have to really be into it; just try playing it as a game. People who just chekc it out just as a game will hopefully get into pro wrestling through this! The scenario that I’m writing up again is a proper story, so it’s not just about men as wrestlers. It’s got this realness as well, and I’m hoping it will help people get more into the game and then, by extension, pro wrestling.”
If you dig the games that Suda and company have made over the years, you may owe it to New Japan Pro Wrestling (NJPW), but he called back to how he used to despise the sport. It wasn’t until the break out of a particular persona in the NJPW scene–who’s based on an old Shonen Jump manga series–sparked something in Suda and sort of set things in motion.
“I actually used to hate pro wrestling,” Suda admitted. “I thought it was really gritty, people always bleeding all over the place and stuff. But the moment I saw Tiger Mask debut on NJPW, I was like ‘wow, this is something different.’ It was pretty much that moment I got really into it, just from seeing that guy. If Tiger Mask hadn’t made his debut, I probably wouldn’t even be into pro wrestling.”
And if it wasn’t for the break out of Tiger Mask, he probably wouldn’t have worked on Fire Pro all those years ago.
Editor’s Note: Translation for the interview with Goichi Suda was done by Spike Chunsoft.
As its title suggests, CinemaCon is the annual convention for the National Association of Theatre Owners, and in recent years has become a vital part of early movie publicity. Unlike San Diego Comic-Con, it isn’t a public event, but studios clearly realise that screening early footage for the industry and media can be a major help in building buzz for new films.
Warner had a major presence at this year’s CinemaCon, which is currently underway in Las Vegas. The studio previewed three of its highly anticipated upcoming DC movies, namely Joker, Birds of Prey, and Wonder Woman 1984.
According to The Hollywood Reporter, the first Joker trailer was introduced by director Todd Phillips, who explained that rumors about the film’s tone and plot “[haven’t] been accurate.” Phillips then described the movie as a “tragedy.” As for the trailer, THR states that it includes footage of Joaquin Phoenix’s lead character being attacked before trying on various costumes to find his iconic Joker look. [UPDATE: the Joker trailer is now online.]
Unlike Joker, early footage of Birds of Prey was officially released in January, but CinemaCon attendees got see more of the movie, which arrives in February 2020 and sees Margot Robbie reprise her Suicide Squad role as Harley Quinn. Slashfilm described the new footage as “bright, bold, and bursting with neon colors,” and it included a shot of Harley Quinn roller skating behind a moving vehicle. In addition, the Birds of Prey presentation revealed that Harley isn’t actually a full-time member of the titular female superhero team.
As for Wonder Woman 1984, although the movie isn’t due for release until July 2020, it was shot before both Joker and Birds of Prey. According to Variety, there were several scenes shown, including footage of Diana (Gal Gadot) and Steve Trevor (Chris Pine) walking through Washington DC, Diana getting involved in some action in an ’80s shopping mall, and Kristen Wiig’s villainous Cheetah.
In honor of the eighth and final season of Game of Thrones, IGN is taking a look back at some of the iconic characters who’ve fallen along the way, and the lasting impact they had on the story. These heroes and villains may not have made it to the end of the road, but their lives weren’t in vain – they stand as a fitting reminder that when you play the game of thrones, you win, or you die.
Renly Baratheon had the loyalty of his people, the backing of the powerful Tyrell family, and a loyal Kingsguard behind him, but that wasn’t enough to save him. While Renly’s many years in King’s Landing might have prepared him for the conniving schemes of the Lannisters, he never could have predicted the manner in which his ambitious brother Stannis and the magical Red Woman Melisandre plotted against him — and neither could we.
Join Chris from the Warhammer: Chaosbane development team as he walks you through some gameplay of Elessa, the wood elf class in the upcoming Diablo-style action-RPG.
If you enjoy the video above, there’s more! Chris has also done a similar video for the high elf class. Check that out below:
For more on Warhammer: Chaosbane, stick with IGN!
Ryan McCaffrey is IGN’s Executive Editor of Previews. Follow him on Twitter at @DMC_Ryan, catch him on Unlocked, and drop-ship him Taylor Ham sandwiches from New Jersey whenever possible.
In a recent interview with Total Film magazine, directors of Avengers: Endgame, Joe and Anthony Russo, explain why the film came in at just over three-hours long, as reported by GamesRadar.
“It’s 10 years of one of the greatest experiments in movie history coming to a close, and you know, it’s an epic narrative that’s fitting right around three hours,” Joe Russo said.
In terms of being pressured to cut the minutes down, Anthony Russo said the two of them are usually the ones to put that pressure on themselves.
The listing for Borderlands 3 on Microsoft’s store page claims that the game will support cross-platform co-op.
So far in the game’s short-but-loud marketing campaign, developer Gearbox has yet to say anything about cross-platform play. And yet here it is, in black and white, under the ‘Capabilities’ section of the Microsoft store listing.
We’ve reached out to Gearbox for comment. Hopefully it refers to full cross-platform compatibility, but chances are it more likely refers to co-op play between PC and Xbox One. A recent example of this kind of co-op is Sea of Thieves, although it should be noted that Rare’s pirate sandbox is a Microsoft exclusive, and thus would naturally be limited to Microsoft platforms. Still, there’s significantly less corporate mess to untangle with PC to Xbox cross-platform play than there is when Sony is involved.
If you buy something through this post, IGN may get a share of the sale. For more, read our Terms of Use.
As more hardware manufacturers release laptops with Nvidia’s RTX 20-series of GPUs, a clearer picture of what kind of performance we can expect from the RTX line and its various models has begun to take shape. The first GeForce RTX 2080 laptop I reviewed was the ROG Zephyrus S from Asus, and it was ludicrously powerful. Then I had a chance to test out the Razer Blade 15 (2019) with an RTX 2060, which showed modest improvements over last year’s GTX 1070-equipped model. Next up is the MSI GS75 Stealth with an RTX 2080 Max-Q inside. It’s available in seven different configurations, and the configuration I was sent sells for $2,999 (See it on Amazon). If you’re on a tighter budget, MSI offers a similarly spec’d GS75 variant with an RTX 2060, 16GB of memory, and a 256GB SSD for a mere $2,099.
A new in-game event is now underway in Pokemon Go. Coinciding with the debut of Giratina Origin Forme, Niantic has kicked off the game’s first Bug Out, a week-long event featuring increased Bug Pokemon spawns and other bonuses–including a new Shiny Pokemon.
From now until April 9, Bug-types such as Scyther, Paras, Wurmple, and Yanma will appear in the wild more frequently than normal. Not only that, but players will have their first chance to encounter a Shiny Scyther during the event, and Bug Pokemon like Shuckle and Ninjask will appear as Raid bosses.
In addition to increased Bug Pokemon spawns, Incenses will last twice as long as they normally do during the Bug Out event, and they’ll attract more Pokemon than usual. Players will also be able to obtain special Field Research tasks focusing on Bug Pokemon from Poke Stops. You can read more details about the event on the Pokemon Go website.
Beyond the Bug Out event, Pokemon Go players now have their first chance to capture Giratina in its Origin Forme, the serpentine appearance it takes in Pokemon Platinum. This variant of the Legendary Pokemon will appear in Raid Battles until April 29 and has more offensive stats than its Altered Forme. You can find tips on how to catch Giratina here.
Shortly after the Bug Out event end, Niantic will host Pokemon Go’s next Community Day. This month’s event is scheduled to take place from 3-6 PM local time on Saturday, April 13. During those hours, players will have an easier time finding the rare Dragon Pokemon Bagon. Also happening this month is Niantic’s second annual Earth Day campaign. If enough players participate in their local cleanup events, the developer will add Shiny Diglett to Pokemon Go as a reward.
