Author: Trafficblast

The Walking Dead returns to screens next month for the second half of Season 9, and a new teaser has been released. With Rick (Andrew Lincoln) and Maggie (Lauren Cohan) having now left the series, this will be the first batch of episodes without them as main characters. However, the upcoming episodes will feature the arrival of villains that fans have been waiting a long time to see–The Whisperers.

The Whisperers wear the faces of the dead to blend in with zombies, and the new trailer gives us our first good look at them. There’s also a hint at the arrival of Samantha Morton, who will play the Whisperer leader Alpha. While we don’t see her, her daughter Lydia teases how scary she is. “My mom, you don’t mess with her,” she tells Darryl (Normal Reedus). Check the trailer out above.

In a recent interview with Entertainment Weekly, Kang spoke about the upcoming conflict between The Whisperers and the show’s heroes. “It’s this amazing idea from the comics and we really delve deep into what that means,” she said. “It really takes a pretty brutal philosophy to believe that it’s not even worth trying to be something that approximates human in the way that we think of it.

“I think that really brings them right up against the things that our people are thinking about as they’re trying to rebuild something that’s like a civilization, and just the fact that this group just doesn’t even think any of that is worth preserving.”

Although Andrew Lincoln will no longer appear in the show, he is not finished with it entirely. In November it was announced that he will reprise his role as Rick in a Walking Dead movie. AMC is currently developing three spin-off films that the franchise’s chief content officer Scott Gimple described as “big, epic entertainments.”

A controversial bit of Assassin’s Creed Odyssey downloadable content will be changed in a future patch following a backlash from fans. Spoilers follow for the Shadow Heritage episode of Odyssey’s DLC.

At the end of the Shadow Heritage episode, your character has a child from a heterosexual relationship. Those who had spent hours playing their Kassandra or Alexios as LGBTQ–or simply not interested in relationships at all–felt forced into a plot development.

The backlash was enough to prompt an apology from Ubisoft, and now the company is taking it a step further. In a production update, the studio said that it will change a cutscene and dialogue choices for those who don’t want the storyline to go in that direction, and it will also change to the name of the associated trophy/achievement. All this will be coming in an upcoming patch, and Ubisoft is looking into the next episode, called Bloodline, to make sure that it doesn’t create a similar issue.

The bloodline aspect was the given reason for the controversial ending in the first place, as creative director Jonathan Dumont said that the idea was to show how “your character’s bloodline has a lasting impact on the Assassins.” At the same time, he acknowledged the problem.

“We want to extend an apology to players disappointed by a relationship your character partakes in,” he said. “Alexios/Kassandra realizing their own mortality and the sacrifice Leonidas and Myrrine made before them to keep their legacy alive, felt the desire and duty to preserve their important lineage. Our goal was to let players choose between a utilitarian view of ensuring your bloodline lived on or forming a romantic relationship. We attempted to distinguish between the two but could have done this more carefully as we were walking a narrow line between role-play choices and story, and the clarity and motivation for this decision was poorly executed.”

The LGBTQ organization GLAAD celebrated the move in a tweet, saying it is pleased with Ubisoft’s decision and that the change is “an important first step toward mitigating the damage done by the game’s latest DLC.”

While Assassin’s Creed Odyssey received a mostly positive reception, including in GameSpot’s review, the romance options were criticized as shallow.

“Romancing side characters is also possible in Odyssey. While some of these scenes can be amusing, they’re mostly just bizarre shows of affection that have no real purpose,” wrote critic Alessandro Fillari. “These scenes almost always result in a shallow aside during the conversation, with the characters slinking off-screen before returning to the conversation without skipping a beat. Most often, these awkward romance opportunities appear immediately after (or during) otherwise harrowing events. Aside from seeing some additional scenes with certain characters, there’s really no benefit to engaging in romance at all. The inclusion of these scenes feels cheap and can sully otherwise interesting conversations.”

Nintendo has provided an update on the state of Metroid Prime 4. In a video, senior managing executive officer Shinya Takahashi admitted that development of the game thus far hasn’t reached the standards the publisher wanted and the project has been rebooted. Additionally, Retro Studios, the Texas-based team that developed the three previous entries in the series, has been brought back to work on the sequel.

“Although this is very regrettable we must let you know that the current development progress has not reached the standards we seek in a sequel to Metroid Prime series,” Takahashi said. “Nintendo always strives for the highest quality in our games and in our development phase, we challenge ourselves and confront whether the game is living up to that quality on a daily basis.

“From this perspective, we have determined that the current development status of [Metroid Prime 4] is very challenged, and we had to make a difficult decision as a development team. We have decided to re-examine the development structure and change it.”

Takahashi went on to confirm Kensuke Tanabe, producer on the game, will work “in trust and collaboration with the studio that developed the original Metroid Prime series, Retro Studios … and restart development from the beginning.” This collaboration, he said, will allow Nintendo to make a sequel that will meet the expectations of fans.

Takahashi also attempted to reset some of these expectations, particularly around how soon people will be able to see and hear more about Metroid Prime 4. “This change will essentially mean restarting development from the beginning,” Takahashi reiterated, “So the completion of the game will be delayed from our initial internal plan.

“It will be a long road until the next time we will be able to update you on the development progress, and development time will be extensive. However, we will continue developing the game so that when it is completed, it will stand shoulder to shoulder with the past Metroid Prime series titles.”

Metroid Prime 4 was first announced at E3 2017, with a very short teaser that simply showed a logo and a message that read “Metroid Prime 4 – Now in development for Nintendo Switch.” Shortly after its reveal, it was confirmed that Retro did not have any involvement in the project. Reports later suggested that Bandai Namco was working on the game in some capacity. Bandai Namco has collaborated with Nintendo on multiple Smash Bros. games, but its involvement with Metroid Prime was never confirmed.

The return of Retro Studios will no doubt come as good news for fans of the Metroid Prime series. The team itself has changed somewhat since it was last working on Metroid, with key members of the Prime development team leaving to establish Armature Studio. Retro Studios has maintained a strong relationship with Nintendo, developing Mario Kart 7 for Nintendo 3DS and various Donkey Kong Country games for Wii, 3DS, Wii U, and Switch.

Epic Games is giving away a free PC game every two weeks this year via its new Store, and the next of those titles has now been announced. From February 7 until February 21, Axiom Verge will be available for the low, low price of nothing.

All you need to do is create an Epic account on the company’s Store and claim the game within those dates. You’ll then be able to play it for free whenever you like, even after February 7. Currently, the free game is the Jackbox Party Pack, but that promotional price will expire on February 7.

Axiom Verge is a Metroidvania-style platformer that launched in 2015. “Axiom Verge is a game that’s easy to fall in love with because it hits so many high notes,” wrote Peter Brown in our Axiom Verge review. “It takes the Metroidvania model and adds layers of ingenuity that are in a league all of their own, the most notable being the Address Disruptor.

“Yes it’s occasionally drab looking, and some enemies may not fit in with the rest of the world, but when a game is this good, these blemishes quickly fade into the back of your mind. The chilling sci-fi setting, mysterious plot, and a seemingly endless number of abilities keep your mind busy, and your curiosity at fever pitch. It’s not a stretch to say that Axiom Verge is better than the games that inspired it, because it’s so inventive and thoughtfully crafted. There’s no excuse to hold onto the past when the present is this amazing.”

PlayerUnknown’s Battlegrounds developer PUBG Corp. has announced a new version of the PC game. Titled PUBG Lite, the new product is a standalone free-to-play edition of the hit battle royale game that’s now in beta in Thailand.

PUBG Corp. says PUBG Lite is designed for “players in areas where the core game’s required specifications are more difficult to achieve due to the hardware available.” This free-to-play version is therefore playable on lower-spec PCs.

The beta includes the first PUBG map, Erangel, though PUBG Corp. says the free-to-play title has “its own dedicated dev team that will create exclusive content and quality of life features while also adding maps and content familiar to PUBG players.”

Thailand is the only confirmed territory for PUBG Lite’s beta “for now.” The beta will help PUBG Corp. “determine if this is a viable product for other regions,” so it remains to be seen if the free-to-play edition makes its way to the west in the future.

PUBG’s PS4 and Xbox One versions, meanwhile, recently added the new Vikendi map, the game’s fourth map to date. Vikendi is a snow-covered mountainous region that includes a new vehicle, the snowmobile. Arriving alongside Vikendi is the Vikendi Survivor Pass. Much like Fortnite’s Battle Pass, it gives players a variety of challenges to complete over 10 weeks. Doing these challenges will level the pass up, which in turn will unlock cosmetics and other rewards.

The original Resident Evil 2 was notorious for bonus characters that were difficult to obtain. For the Resident Evil 2 remake, Capcom has eased off the difficulty of gaining those extra characters, making them much more obtainable for the average player.

The two hidden bonuses are the 4th Survivor scenario, in which you play as Hunk, and Tofu Mode, starring a squishy block of the soy-based meat substitute. Those characters used to require finishing both scenarios and finishing them in a very particular pattern, respectively. The remake, on the other hand, unlocks the 4th Survivor simply by finishing the game, and then completing the The 4th Survivor scenario unlocks Tofu.

That’s still a time commitment, of course, but the method is a lot less complex and would probably naturally show up for most people in the course of a regular play. This is probably a sign of changing times, as nowadays the Internet has rendered obscure hidden secrets largely obsolete.

If you feel a little rusty on your Resident Evil lore, you can catch up with all the story you need to know to prepare yourself for this remake. And while you’re at it, read up on our pre-order guide to see which bonuses you might want to take advantage of.

Earlier this month, Project Cars 2 developer Slightly Mad Studios announced its plans to create its own standalone game console called the Mad Box. While the system is still very much in the early phases of development, company CEO Ian Bell shared some of its possible designs, and now he’s given us a look at its potential controller.

On Twitter, Bell shared several mock-ups of one potential design for the Mad Box gamepad. This concept bears a cursory resemblance to an Xbox controller, albeit with more angular grips and a display in the center of the pad. In a follow-up tweet, Bell shared another image that showed off rear paddles. You can see the mock-ups below.

When the Mad Box was first announced, Bell claimed it would be “the most powerful console ever built” and feature specs that “will be equivalent to a very fast PC two years from now.” He also said the system will offer 4K visuals, support “most major VR headsets,” and allow up to 90 frames-per-second “per eye” for virtual reality play.

Beyond that, not much else has been revealed about the Mad Box. Bell says the company is in the process of making deals with component makers, and he estimates the system is still three years away from release, assuming the project makes it that far.

To drum up excitement for the Mad Box, Bell has asked fans to come up with a slogan for the console, offering money and free games to the person who comes up with the best one. He also said the company will provide a free game engine to studios who want to develop games for the system.