Fall Guys Season 4 is introducing Squads mode, a new way of playing the game with a 4-player team who win (and probably more often lose) together.
Initially available for two weeks to judge player reaction, Squads mode will bring together 15 teams (which can be put together manually, or matchmade), and will include almost all of the game’s existing events – although they’ll be scored differently to their normal versions.
“The crucial difference between Squads Mode and normal Fall Guys,” explains lead game designer Joe Walsh, “is that being eliminated does not completely eliminate you from the game. You only get eliminated if your entire Squad perform poorly on any given Round. We’ve all been in that situation where our teammate gets eliminated in the first Round and they have to sit there and watch you compete. And there’s this pressure to be like ‘Well, maybe we should all just back out and go to the main menu and have another go.’ This allows you to basically all perform as a team.”
Squads mode will institute a scoring system for most of the game’s rounds. In Race rounds, players will be scored depending on what position they cross the finish line in, with the lowest-scoring teams overall eliminated after all players have finished. Survival rounds will award players a point for every second they survive, again eliminating the lowest scoring teams.
Fall Guys’ developers are very excited about how this might change the strategies for playing some rounds. Walsh gives us an example: “If one of your players on your Squad manages to screw up on Perfect Match and it’s the first person to fall off, you essentially know that if you guys don’t get some other people eliminated, you are going to get eliminated, because you are now hamstrung for the rest of the Round. So it’s really interesting because then your team kind of has to go on the offensive and try and eliminate other people. Because if you can push two players of another Squad off the side, suddenly you guys are going to be earning more points. So it’s going to be really interesting to see how that develops over time.”
Perhaps most interesting will be Final Rounds – these will still give the victory to the last player standing, or the first to cross a line, but that victory now goes to a whole team. That obviously incentivises teams to work together to get one player to the end of the round: “So,” says Walsh with a grin, “if there’s three of you left versus two other players, and you’ve got strong presence in Hex-a-gone, it might be worth two of you just going out there to sabotage, basically throwing yourself off and grabbing other people to their doom.”
The team element also means that some normal Fall Guys rounds have been converted into tense Final Rounds. Fall Ball, for example, now pits two teams against one another in an oversized football match final. “Season 4 is actually going to have three times as many Final Rounds as any other mode,” says Walsh, “which is going to be really, really fun. And I’m really excited to have four vs. four Fall Ball decide the winner of a show. I think it will be a really, really interesting thing to do. It’s something we’ve always wanted to do.”
The mode changes the complexion of Fall Guys, but it shouldn’t change its economy too much. When we spoke, Mediatonic didn’t have a final decision on how the mode would reward winners but, given that its theoretically easier to win the game, Walsh says the rewards should be “slightly less” than the main game – presumably using the new Crown Shards system.
One thing that will definitively be easier however, is Fall Guys’ notoriously most difficult achievement and trophy. ‘Infallible’ asks you to win five entire episodes of Fall Guys in a row. And yes, Squads wins will count towards that – “In theory, we’ve made it four times as easy for people to achieve that trophy,” says Walsh. “I said in an interview six months ago, I was like ‘We’re going to make it easier over time, for players to get that trophy.’ And this is the future I was talking about. So we’re finally there.”
Joe Skrebels is IGN’s Executive Editor of News. Follow him on Twitter. Have a tip for us? Want to discuss a possible story? Please send an email to [email protected].
You can truly make a video game on anything these days, including a font. Yes, like the font you choose when writing on your computer. We don’t know why someone decided to do this, but the results are marvelous and very, very strange.
Fontemon is available to play for free in your web browser, but you can also install it on your computer’s word processor, an image editor, a code editor, and basically anywhere else that allows for fonts. From the web font player version, all you have to do is starting typing and the introduction sequence will begin. If you want to go back, you can delete text you’ve written and jump to an earlier point. Holding down the space bar also works to just keep the game moving.
Just like at the beginning of each Pokemon game, you can select a starter monster, requiring you to hit a specific key, and then you’re automatically sent to the first gym and begin a battle against the leader. Again, you use specific keys here to give your monster commands, but, at least in our game, things started to get very weird at this point. We don’t want to spoil anything, but Fontemon isn’t what it appears to be at first glance. Check out a video demonstrating the game from River’s Educational Channel below.
You can find a list of the artists and creators who worked on Fontemon through Github. CodeRelay, where the game is hosted, was created by Michael Mulet.
Fontemon is the latest in a list of impressive web-based games that pay tribute to Nintendo and its games. Another classic, The Uncle Who Works For Nintendo, is a play on the classic line every kid has heard on the playground. That game also isn’t what it appears at first glance, and is best experienced knowing as little as possible beforehand.
Anyone who comes away from Yakuza: Like a Dragon will have a strong impression of lead character Kasuga Ichiban. Love him or not, he drives the tone and perspective for an earnest story about living on the margins, loyalty to loved ones, and just being an adult trying to make something of themselves. He’s quite a far cry from the stoic, but lovable Kazuma Kiryu who we grew to know and love through seven previous entries in the series–and I think that speaks to developer Ryu Ga Gotoku Studio’s ability to create layered, expressive characters who drive its dramatic, hilarious, yet sobering stories.
Masayoshi Yokoyama, chief producer and writer, has been at the forefront of Yakuza’s storytelling, and I was able to exchange with him via email through a translator to dissect what went into Yakuza: Like a Dragon in particular. As with any game, a slew of factors go into its creation, and he provided insight into the move to making an RPG, conveying new narrative themes, and what the future holds for the Yakuza franchise. (Hint: It may not come as much of a surprise, but there is another Yakuza game currently in development.)
The following interview was edited for clarity and readability–it also contains spoilers for Yakuza: Like a Dragon, so beware.
Tell me about writing a new story for a brand-new protagonist and following up to a legend like Kazuma Kiryu while managing expectations.
I didn’t feel too much pressure since I already knew and was determined to create a new protagonist when we decided that Yakuza 6 would be the last chapter of Kiryu’s story.
In the past, I have experience portraying other characters as protagonists, such as Shun Akiyama, Taiga Saejima and Masayoshi Tanimura for Yakuza 4, and Tatsuo Shinada and Haruka Sawamura for Yakuza 5, so I think that experience helped and the process came rather naturally.
The character Ichiban Kasuga was originally conceived as a protagonist for the Japan-only mobile game Ryu Ga Gotoku Online. At the time, we just ended the development for Yakuza 6, and needed to come up with a new face for the series. I really wanted to create a character that players felt compelled to help instead of a “flawless” character like Kiryu, so I went with creating a character that looks and acts completely the opposite of him. I then took the concept and presented it to executive director [Toshihiro] Nagoshi and the team, which led to talks of making the Ichiban character the protagonist of the console game as well. Thus began our challenge of using the same protagonist for two stories for two completely different games.
Unfortunately, Ryu Ga Gotoku Online is not available in the West, so you may not be familiar with the other “Ichiban Kasuga epic” but in Japan, the fans were given more than a year to become familiar with the character before the launch of Ryu Ga Gotoku 7 (Yakuza: Like a Dragon in the West). Since we had some good initial reactions from the fans through that, I wasn’t too worried about Ichiban Kasuga.
Chief producer and writer for Yakuza: Like a Dragon, Masayoshi Yokoyama.
On the other hand, if Ryu Ga Gotoku Online didn’t exist, we may have faced more challenges in the development for the sudden change in protagonists.
All the side quests outside of the main story and vast amounts of dialogue in the game were written not only by the story writing team but also by many other game designers. I think it’s because we already had experience with Ichiban Kasuga’s story in Ryu Ga Gotoku Online, that the character remained consistent throughout with a great balance in seriousness and humor.
To complete the difficult mission of changing the main character in a long-running series, you could say that this type of game development process was necessary in addition to story writing techniques.
We would do anything to protect Ichiban, he’s an inspiring character for many of us. What can you tell us about what went into creating him?
Our mission after Yakuza 6 was not to “create the next Yakuza title” but to “create the next protagonist.”
What I tried to do with Ichiban Kasuga was to create a “life-sized hero.” Kazuma Kiryu is a modern version of a typical Japanese hero. He has inherited the spirit of a samurai who lives by the way of the sword, and in embracing elements like that, a man should not talk too much, not act in groups, and above all, be strong. The main characters in traditional Japanese “Ninkyo” movies are usually like this.
Ichiban Kasuga, on the other hand, is not that strong. He’s also not that mature and is, in a sense, a “normal guy.” This is what I wanted to portray.
In reality, I’m pretty close to Kasuga’s age, and not all that an adult either (laughs). This is why I wanted to create a hero that we, the creators of the game and the users, could sympathize with, instead of portraying an unrealistic hero from the perspective of an observer.
The world has changed quite rapidly since Yakuza was born in 2005, fifteen years ago. The means of playing and enjoying games have also shifted and become multifaceted, ranging from TVs to smartphones. YouTube is bigger than it was before.
Yakuza has also had to change with the times. I wanted to shift from the era of enjoying the stories of heroes like Kiryu in solitude to one where everyone can share and empathize with the emotions shown.
In essence, I wanted Ichiban Kasuga to be a catalyst for change in Yakuza. That’s why I created him the way that he is, a character who laughs and cries with his friends and expresses his thoughts unabashedly.
Overturning worldly prejudices and fighting against invisible discrimination may be the greatest role of Ichiban Kasuga in this game.
Like A Dragon was great about humanizing groups of people that face a lot of prejudice and hate (sex workers, immigrants, homeless), and it was refreshing to see a fair representation of them. What was your approach in incorporating these elements in the story?
When writing Ichiban Kasuga’s background, him being born and raised in a soapland was set from the start, so the rest was a rather natural progression.
One of the themes in this game was the struggles of those people who live in Japan’s “grey zone,” so we did portray these people’s standpoint and their profession as they live in an area that isn’t quite black or white.
To Ichiban Kasuga, who grew up right in the middle of this grey zone from the beginning, these people are not “something that shouldn’t be,” but are common everyday people. I always try to avoid portraying unconditional good and evil. There are evil people even among the elderly, and there are righteous people among those with criminal records. Overturning worldly prejudices and fighting against invisible discrimination may be the greatest role of Ichiban Kasuga in this game.
Ichiban is the catalyst for so many heartwarming and uplifting moments in Yakuza: Like a Dragon.
How do you keep yourself in check with all the twists and turns with the story? Do you ever have to reel yourself in?
In the story writing process, coming up with the overall setup is my first task. I make up the major events of the entire story, place the necessary characters, and create a bird’s eye view of the entire story. I often create a character correlation diagram and then build the story from there.
After that, I write up the flow of each chapter, a technique called “box writing,” and it’s around this point that I start to change my original plan a few times over, which often results in some changes from the original plan. For instance, Bleach Japan was originally just an organization that caused trouble here and there, but a little twist was added later on that there was an unexpected mastermind boss controlling the organization, and then making them a party member, and so on.
I do often take a step back to think about things, but for me, it’s important to add a climax to each chapter. I tend to prioritize that over making every little thing in the story make sense. I also adjust the story so that the boss fights are exciting for each chapter.
Consider a movie: Even if the first 60-90 minutes are a bit boring at times, the movie can be considered a masterpiece so long as the ending is superb. However, for games and especially for Yakuza, even if chapter 10 and 11 are very good story-wise, it won’t work as a game if there are no battles. Many players would probably put their controllers down at that point.
As developers, one of our goals in game creation is to get the players to clear the game without quitting halfway through. For this reason, what is needed isn’t so much consistency in the story, but rather a clear purpose for each chapter, and that each chapter is always exciting. This may be similar to how Japanese weekly serialized manga are set up.
How do you ride the line between absurdity and humor with the serious side of the story and balancing those two aspects?
I don’t think we consciously try to balance it. I think this is because our team, consisting of narrative, game design, character design, animation, and sound creation staff all have a deep understanding of what the “core” of Yakuza is.
The reason for this isn’t simply how long we’ve known each other, or how well we get along. I think that the biggest reason is that each and every staff member loves Yakuza. I personally am in charge of story writing and am also the chief producer, but I have a hand in ideating and executing on some marketing and PR initiatives as well. Every decision I make is based on how to reflect the content of the game in any kind of promotion or campaign, and how to make the game itself more interesting.
All staff members that are involved with the game, including those outside of core development such as sales, advertising, marketing, are working hard to increase the production value of the game, so everyone’s accumulated effort is what culminates in this great balance.
In a past game, someone on the advertising team even wrote and implemented an original story scenario for a real company that appeared in Kamurocho (laughs), so as you can kind of see what kind of team Ryu Ga Gotoku Studio is.
The hero’s sword, a barbed wire bat.
How did the RPG direction influence the way you crafted the story? What kind of challenges did that create? Did it afford you opportunities you couldn’t get otherwise?
The order is actually the other way around; We chose the RPG direction because of Ichiban Kasuga and this story. With our goal of creating a new relatable hero, we went with the game system that would make Ichiban Kasuga’s story most interesting. We probably wouldn’t have done the same for Kiryu, who fights alone.
One of my beliefs in creating games is to value the core of play. This involves deciding how the game is supposed to entertain, and then assigning the various components to the right places accordingly.
The story is the core element of the Yakuza series. This game was made to enjoy the story, and the other elements such as the city used as the setting, music, mini-games, and battle action are all there to elevate the story experience.
For Yakuza: Like a Dragon, the most optimal way for players to experience the story and show the battles of Ichiban Kasuga and his friends that he gathered, was the RPG style. So, after locking down the overall plot, we then decided on the RPG genre, and continued development from there. There were then a few questions that we had to address to fortify the game’s setting, such as: “How will we make Kasuga relate to the Hero job class?” “How will you be able to change jobs?”
How did you feel about bringing back some of our old favorite characters?
When the main themes of the game were decided–dualities of the front-end and back-end, the hypocrisy and justice, the superficiality and the truth of Japanese society–I thought it was impossible not to have old characters appear as they relate to the criminal underworld. However, we purposefully avoided unnecessarily deep interactions.
This game is entirely seen from Ichiban Kasuga’s perspective, so we omitted any information or connections that Kasuga wouldn’t know on his own.
This is the beginning of the tale of Ichiban Kasuga, and not a continuation of the Kazuma Kiryu saga. We wanted players that started the series with Like a Dragon to have the same amount of knowledge and emotions as Kasuga when interacting with Majima and other characters from the past series.
You’ve been with the Yakuza franchise since the beginning. Do you ever feel like you’re going back to the well too often?
I do think about wanting to work on other titles sometimes. Before the Yakuza series, I worked on the Jet Set Radio series, so perhaps continuous series are my calling.
With the first attempt at a full RPG and your first attempt at bringing Ichiban to life, what lessons have you learned after launch and seeing the reception?
This wasn’t reflected as much in the West, but in Japan, fans were more skeptical about the change in genre more than the change in protagonist. However, as game developers, we knew that the shift to turn-based combat would serve to amplify the story, so in some ways we were confident that the game would be a success.
The Japanese market, especially those who are fans of any serialized content, tend to prefer conservative sequels over anything that’s too big of a departure from the series. Knowing this, it was a huge undertaking for us to change Yakuza as a whole, which has been led by the strong characters. However, the character change, which was what we were most concerned with, didn’t turn out to be a big deal because people had a stronger reaction to the genre change. This was actually quite surprising to me.
Ichiban loves his friends very much and they’re important to his growth as a character.
Once that became apparent to us, we pivoted our marketing approach and spent a lot of time to explain the game system. Every time we put out more information, the fans would have their own discussions speaking for or against it.
We wanted all fans to share the excitement of Like a Dragon and develop their own opinions of whether the RPG adaptation was right or wrong, so we didn’t impose any streaming restrictions. As a result, the game greatly exceeded the initial evaluation it had received up until launch and is now one of the most highly rated games in the series.
Personally, I think the main reason for the success of the game wasn’t the shift to RPG, but the fact that we were able to make Ichiban Kasuga a very appealing character. But I think it was through the game system that we could really convey the appeal.
I too believe that Ichiban Kasuga’s journey is not over, and I’d love to write about what happened to him following the events of Like a Dragon in some form. Until then, please sit tight while imagining what kind of life he is leading now!
I came away from the game seeing themes of the power of friendship, standing up to injustice, but also seeing the good in people close to you. What are the game’s biggest themes to you?
Hmm, I actually don’t set a grandiose theme before thinking of the plot, so I never really thought about it. However, for this title, perhaps it’s when the story reaches its climax when Ichiban Kasuga is talking to Masato Arakawa in front of the coin lockers.
“I refuse to just leave you!” This is the line that I wanted to make Ichiban say.
We all know people in our lives that tell us to just leave them alone, right? I feel like those are the types of people who don’t say what they really mean, and sometimes can be a pain in the ass (laughs). But as humans, we can’t leave them alone. Even if it means being overbearing, we still want to do what we can for them. I think that’s how we connect as human beings.
It’s these types of human connections that I like to portray. Blood relations, family, friends, lovers, even rivals. There may be relationships between people who are connected because of money. But that is all part of fate. In this title, I hoped to portray Kasuga’s most important connections.
We’re all convinced this isn’t the last time we’ve seen Ichiban. What can we expect for the future of Yakuza?
We have started working on a new Yakuza title. I can’t say if the story will feature Ichiban Kasuga or even a totally different protagonist, but I too believe that Ichiban Kasuga’s journey is not over, and I’d love to write about what happened to him following the events of Like a Dragon in some form. Until then, please sit tight while imagining what kind of life he is leading now!
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Call of Duty: Modern Warfare has been teasing a nuke event and a possible map change since mysterious bunkers opened up on the Warzone map nine months ago. It hasn’t happened yet and we’re wondering if Cold War season two will finally deliver. There have been a number of unconfirmed leaks recently containing audio files referencing races, plague zones, Verdansk being overrun with zombies, and nukes inbound. These could be hinting at a map change, a limited-time mode similar to The Haunting Of Verdansk, or a season-ending event similar to Know Your History. So far, Cold War Season two has seen a mysterious ship carrying Nova 6 gas crash into the battle royale map and split apart. Zombies that players can trigger and fight by activating Trials computers have migrated from the Ship to the Prison and Hospital as well as started evolving.
In this video, we talk about how slowly the event has been progressing and the mixed messaging about it on official Call Of Duty social media. We’ll cover the audience mismatch between Cold War and Modern Warfare players and why the Cold War takeover is still having a negative impact on the battle royale map. We’ll talk over Warzone’s past events and why limited time modes are important. Finally, we’ll take a look at your comments and how you’re feeling about Modern Warfare and what Activision could do to keep Infinity Ward’s game alive.
Fans are hoping Call Of Duty: Warzone will have some type of major event between Season 2 and Season 3, which could happen in mid-April. Call Of Duty: Warzone seasons typically run about 10 weeks, with the current Battle Pass ending on April 20.
Aaron 0:00
Let’s talk about the new event in Call of Duty. I’m joined here by Richie Bracamonte. And we’re going to go over how odd the rollout has been so far what some of the leaks and rumors are pointing to in the future. And I don’t know if we think it’s even going to happen at this point. This episode is brought to you by Daylight savings, daylight savings, screw your sleep schedule. Alright, Richie, let’s talk about what’s been happening so far, because it’s kind of odd.
Richie 0:25
It is odd. We’re getting a lot of mixed messages from Call of Duty over on Twitter, about this whole zombie Outbreak, and possibly leading to some sort of bigger event like the nuke, the next season will end April 20. And that’s our that’s our latest date, like our big anchor day to see if something happens. But this point, it’s sort of mixed messages between ending the zombies Outbreak event and the future of Warzone.
Aaron 0:50
Yeah, how freakin weird is that that the zombie event ended before the zombies spread on the Warzone map, I’m trying to figure out what they were attempting to accomplish with that other than maybe push people to buy Cold War and play the Outbreak mode in Cold War. But you would think that their main mode involving zombies would tie into Warzone where the zombies are spreading. They’ve also just done a lot of really weird stuff. Like one week they tweeted that zombies were leaving the ship, but the zombies didn’t leave the ship for an entire week. And then just this week, they tweeted enemies with living and undead are all around the shipwreck. How many can you find? No, they aren’t. So like, that was tweeted out this week, and the zombies already moved to the prison and then they’re going to the hospital and they keep removing the challenge machines from places they’ve already been. And by the way, like so far, the zombie event has pretty much come down to a zombie challenge machine moving a couple 100 yards in any given direction, like every two weeks or something like that. So the rollout of this season, and supposedly with leading up to nuke event has been slow and bizarre and starting to actually wonder if they’re going to do much this season. Other than just roll out like an LTM at the very end between Season Two and Season Three, which as you mentioned, you know, given a 10 week credit season should happen sometime mid-April.
Richie 2:08
This whole nuke event has been rumored for almost a year now Aaron I found a video file of me capturing footage of the dam before you know before the new cabin and that was dated last June. This whole nuke event has been teased forever.
Aaron 2:23
So about that Activision, Blizzard’s chief revenue officer, Brandon snow just did a really interesting interview with Inverse, there’s some things that he was saying that made me think that either the nuke event is gonna happen, like in season three, or maybe some of these events are a little bit further out than we think one think he said was in the upcoming seasons, you’re gonna see some really cool new stuff that Warzone has never done before. He said seasons not season. So I don’t know, maybe he’s just really well media trade, and he’s hiding, you know what he means here. But he didn’t say this season, you’re gonna see this stuff. He said seasons, which makes me think they have stuff planned out for the next couple of seasons that they’re not ready for just yet. He then followed that up by saying something along the lines of if we were to check back with each other in about four to five weeks, we might be able to speak a little bit more specifically, four to five weeks is again, you know, mid-April when we’re expecting the Season Two Season Three changeover. So what this is saying to me, is that this is going to be a really slow roll season. I don’t know if a lot is going to happen in Season Two, it looks like they’re not even ready to talk about a lot of these events until the beginning of season three. So I’m now starting to wonder if more is gonna happen in season three in season four.
Okay, so there’s a whole other thing that we should talk about here, which is the way that this is being marketed. This nuke event is being marketed in typical Treyarch fashion. And what they like to do is they like to tease things with alternate reality games, they sent this like giant projector, I’m gonna hold it up here. They sent that giant projector to us before they rolled out Cold War and like we didn’t really know what to do with it and it was like an announcement that was gonna happen anyway. So that’s a very classic Treyarch they’ve been sending these like teasers about the Ghoul-ag to different YouTubers right now indicating like maybe the zombies are evolving. So here’s the problem with that the Modern Warfare crowd doesn’t really care about alternate reality games. Like there’s a very hardcore zombies fan base that you know Treyarch has that love this stuff, and they love all these little teases, but they seldom lead up to anything more than just like an official announcement, which is what the vast majority of Modern Warfare players care about. Also, Warzone is free-to-play. So the people who are playing Warzone aren’t really dialed in on these little ARGs. So example another example of what they did when they sent me that projector was Pawn Takes Pawn, which was this like giant sprawling, like mystery that happened across the internet that wound up showing that like Bowman’s kid was still alive, which was Ice Cubes child in the game. And then they did nothing with it.
Richie 5:06
I forgot about that era. And like, that was such a big like they fluffed up all that stuff for nothing really like I was like, what’s the bottom line here with Pawn Takes Pawn? And it’s like, oh yeah, the bottom line is Cold War’s coming out like, what are they doing with added? Oh, I totally forgot about that whole Bowman thing. And because it led to nowhere, like I thought he might be in the campaign somehow. I mean, it takes place in the 80s well after the first Bowman, you know, played by Ice Cube, but they run with that, at least as far as I know, nothing in any big capacity, but they really do like to try our gloves to play these like mind games, they kind of spawns from like, people who love to dig around for easter eggs and zombies. But that bled into like, the whole Cold War thing. And I don’t know if everyone’s buying it. And to me, it was just kind of like, behind again, I gotta go, I gotta catch up and try to put this together, through every YouTuber who got this care package like…
Aaron 6:01
And it’s just kind of another example of why the Modern Warfare audience and the Cold War audience don’t really belong together. This is not something that the Modern Warfare audience is really going to gravitate towards. So again, like, you know, we get a lot of user comments about how they’re throwing the Modern Warfare audience under the bus for the Cold War audience. It’s just another example, like the Modern Warfare audience, they just want to have fun, they just want to enjoy the Modern Warfare aspects of Warzone. And they just, you know, they just want this zombie event to be better than it already is more more along the lines of Hunting Of Verdansk, they really need to pick up the pace on the zombie event in the Warzone map. Nobody really wants this like giant slow rollout with nothing much happening until the end of the season. Except for maybe some very, very hardcore, like zombies fans who who like following these ARGs. But that’s that’s not the mass audience.
Okay, so that’s what’s going on so far. In summary, we know that the next time that a an event could happen, such as the nuke event will be mid-April. We know we’ve talked a little bit about the weird, slow rollout of zombies and the mismatch of audience. Now it’s time to talk about what we actually do know about the nuke event and all the leaks that have been coming out lately.
Richie 7:06
So for weeks now, we’ve heard a lot of data-mined audio samples from other game modes. Some include the Exfil mode that already happened, but others are kind of mysterious, and they come from people like Captain Price and all these new game modes that sound like they take place in a zombie-infested post nuclear aftermath of Verdansk. So it’s all a matter of when but these call-outs are pretty specific about plague zones. You hear Captain price in the voiceover saying things like, you know, it’s your last chance to save Verdansk and, you know, Verdansk is lost like you can either win or lose, and it’s all via a big nuclear blast. You know, it sounds like this mode. You can save Verdansk by, you know, stopping the nukes. And I don’t know, it sounds like a big a big mix of like, a Verdansk ending game mode. Also, with these audio leaks, we’re seeing some other game modes that might be kind of fun and more of a distraction. But like, we’re talking like car races or other sort of obstacle modes that require a helicopter or some sort of vehicle. They sound fun, but that’s probably all going to come also later towards the end of the season, or at least the second half. So up next, we have some comments from you guys with some constructive feedback for all things Call of Duty. Our first comment here from Dillon C on YouTube who says Warzone needs more events like the Halloween or Rebirth ones where there’s neither new weather time of day, a new map in general on top of the event where you can earn rewards. This Zombies event feels lazy compared to those events. I’m inclined to agree here because something something like time of day, it’s sort of a change. That sounds subtle, but it’s so cool. I love like nighttime or snow-covered map something to change the environment.
Aaron 8:49
What’s more zombie than nighttime, right? You see their glowing eyes better. It really like enhances the event. It’s what the Haunting Of Verdansk did, definitely miss opportunity. And again, the only thing going on right now is a zombie challenge machine is moving a couple 100 yards every two weeks. Like, come on. That’s not enough.
Richie 9:09
It’s a little lacking. Hopefully, it’s just cooking to something bigger and better. But kind of a slow roll to start with.
Aaron 9:16
We’re at low simmer right now. There’s not enough happening right?
Richie 9:19
We need a hard boil right now. Let’s go. Our next comment over on YouTube is from Player1 who says not everyone likes Battle Royale. What the COD developers need to do is allow a large-scale TDM domination hardpoint and other respawn style games into Verdansk. How about official death races where the squads battle that out and vehicles trying to make a one lap around the entire map. Aaron, I love this idea people already do this with or without being told to and it’s not. It’s not a mode yet, but that’d be so fun. The vehicle racing is always fun. In Warzone they kind of tweak the cars a little bit with their turning radius. But even then it’s still fun to just cruise around in a car. It’s always been fun to run out. People anything with cars in Warzone is always okay by me.
Aaron 10:06
And if those audio leaks are true the first set of audio at least that Richie talked about it basically indicated we are going to get racist. So I think we’re gonna get the fun side of things besides where they may have dropped the ball is when Modern Warfare launched and they had modes like Ground War and and they had the run war map set on the same map as Warzone, I kind of thought they had a chance to knock out Battlefield for the first time in a long time, like they could have kept expanding to larger big team battles. And they have created some new areas like my least favorite map Promenade in Grand war, but they really, really could take that further if they wanted to keep developing in Modern Warfare. This is another way that they can keep the Modern Warfare audience engaged is just take Ground War and rotate it around the Verdansk map randomly, something like that would be so much fun. And like who cares if it’s balanced, it’s just fun to the battle on that map.
Richie 10:54
In game the the map can just keep pushing from one location to another like during one match.
Aaron 11:00
Yeah, and they’re already doing this with Kingslayer Trios and a couple of other ones. So they are doing some of these modes, but they really need to do them for the Modern Warfare crowd and focus back on the Modern Warfare crowd and to me that says do Ground War in more places. That’s how you compete against Battlefield this year. Our next comment here comes from Super Cooper, they could have done much more Spec-Ops I would have liked more missions to play though it felt half-assed the old Modern Warfare two and three have lots of missions compared to the new modern warfare. This ties into another comment by Feelium. Good. Hopefully, the community is a step closer to realizing the obvious Activision doesn’t give an F about their consumers, other than their yearly money injection for a half-assed Call of Duty. Both of these comments touched on half-assed modes, which does make me wonder what a full-assed mode looks like in Call of Duty. I feel like modern warfare was probably a full last game. I mean, it was like well planned out for an entire year. Everybody’s getting it.
Richie 11:55
Yeah, I would say it’s a full-ass game.
Aaron 11:57
You’re right Spec-Ops was a side mode that wasn’t as good. Another way that they could keep developing the Modern Warfare community is take things like Outbreak which they just did in Cold War, Outbreak is such a Spec-Ops kind of mode, they could have just put that into Modern Warfare also, like make zombie-infested Spec-Ops mode, or just do that on the Warzone map the way that they probably should have you know, these are ways that that if they wanted to keep the Modern Warfare audience engaged and not feeling like they got cast aside for the Cold War audience their areas where they could keep improving, and hold on to their Modern Warfare audience.
Richie 12:34
I will die on the hill for supporting Modern Warfare 2019 there’s so many ways they could do it. I don’t know if they will, but this is just another one. I feel like Spec Ops could have used some work. I mean, half-assed is a pretty common comment, like it was half-baked at first it wasn’t even ready I feel and it was over. It was crammed with overpowered enemies and like impossible objectives unless you knew exactly what we were doing. And there was fun to be had once it got fixed and I ended up doing every challenge anyway. But yeah, compared to like Modern Warfare, two or three Spec-Ops. It was pretty half-assed a really cool part was how it introduced the whole Verdansk map. That was something that we Spec-Ops players had an edge on, it’s like, oh, when when Warzone and Verdansk was launched, like I know my way around this, you know, for a few weeks I had to I had the jump on people. But overall, I would say yeah, and the whole full-ass game that is Modern Warfare. Spec-Ops was a little blemish on the butt cheek there, it wasn’t perfect.
Aaron 13:36
This is a great analogy. We’re definitely running with this in future episodes.
Richie 13:40
I’m with it. Our next comment comes from Alejandro who says, Hi, my name is Alejandro. And I’ve been COD free for three months now. I feel great. This one hurts Aaron. But you know, it’s it’s a way for people to it’s how people play the game. This person could either just walk away from Call of Duty wait for Battlefield, wait for the next Call of Duty, or do what we do sometimes just take a break, you know, walk away for a few months. So Alejandro, enjoy your time off, come back if you want and see what happens with this whole new thing because that’s we’re all waiting for. And I know you clicked on that video to check it out too. So I know you’re you’re interested.
Aaron 14:17
So speaking of the next Battlefield or the next Call of Duty, the question that we would like to throw to you out there is if the next battlefield or the next call of duty is World War Two themed or retro-themed is that enough for you? We were recently watching a video by Drift0r, who by the way is having some health concerns. So please go over to his channel and wish him the best who was talking about all the evidence that Sledgehammer might be delivering another retro game. So in that case, let us know if that changes what you’re going to do next, make sure to head on over to GameSpot.com and GameSpot YouTube page. That’s where we’ll be posting these videos and covering the rollout of this new event which will hopefully happen mid-next month. Alright, thanks for watching, everyone.
We’ve all been there: You’re playing your favorite PC game and a ninja emerges from the darkness to strike you down with a single blow. Lenovo has the solution for that with a very-limited katana-equipped gaming chair. No longer will you have to worry, as you’ll be able to parry your attacker while getting Play of the Game as Winston.
Only available to five lucky people in a drawing through Lenovo in Japan, the “Devil’s Blade” chair features a replica katana along with a sheath, as well as a backing design based on the anime Demon Slayer: Kimetsu no Yaiba. It’s a customized version of an existing chair and Lenovo doesn’t have any plans to sell it once the giveaway has completed. That’s probably for the best, lest too many people become katana masters.
“While you played Overwatch, I studied the blade.” It has a nice ring to it.
In actuality, the sword can’t be pulled out of its slot on the side of the chair, so it’s purely for looks. Because it sticks up near the armrest, there is also a chance it could get in the way of your own arms while you’re trying to game. Based on the wording of the requirements, it looks like you also have to actually live in Japan in order to qualify.
If you’re looking for a gaming chair that might be a little more functional, if less deadly, check out or picks for the best gaming chairs of 2021. These include chairs designed specifically for gaming in a variety of form factors–even a bean bag chair.
Jonathan Ferguson, a weapons expert and Keeper of Firearms & Artillery at the Royal Armouries, breaks down the weaponry of Resident Evil 4, including the powerful Striker shotgun, the distinctive Red 9 pistol, and the ridiculous Infinite Rocket Launcher.
Resident Evil 4 saw Capcom’s horror franchise venture into the action genre for the first time and gave players access to an arsenal of unique weapons, including the TMP submachine gun, the H&K VP70M handgun, and the Thompson M1A1, known in-game as the Chicago Typewriter.
In the latest video in the Firearm Expert Reacts series , Jonathan Ferguson–a weapons expert and Keeper of Firearms & Artillery at the Royal Armouries–breaks down the guns of Resident Evil 4, and compares them to their real-life counterparts.
The R1 Shadowhunter weapon released a few days ago in Call of Duty: Black Ops Cold War and Call of Duty: Warzone, but this was accidental. Now, Activision has removed the weapon from both games and it’s issuing refunds to those who grabbed it during this brief period.
Activision shared the news on its official support Twitter page, saying the bundle that included the weapon will be returned to the store at “a later date,” along with an associated challenge. Just when this will be isn’t clear, so it’s possible the weapon went online well before it was supposed to.
An issue with the R1 Shadowhunter weapon appearing earlier than planned in Warzone and Black Ops Cold War has been resolved. Refunds are planned for players who purchased the bundle while it was live in the Store, and the bundle and in-game challenge will return at a later date.
Prior to it being removed, the weapon was available for stealth-minded players. It fired silent crossbow bolts, letting you take out targets without alerting others in the area. This would be especially useful in Warzone, where alerting others to your position is often the difference between life and death. Getting the weapon in Cold War, at least during the initial accidental release, was possible by getting a series of the One Shot, One Kill in 15 games, so players who have been playing for months will likely be able to get it fairly quickly when it comes back.
Plenty of new content did come to the game on purpose recently. A recent update added several different weapon bundles, and an assault rifle that appears to have a dragon spitting out a gun barrel will be live tomorrow, March 21. Zombies continue to spread across Verdansk in Warzone, as well, adding another wrinkle to the game’s ever-changing story. It hasn’t gotten as goofy as something like Fortnite, but the developers certainly seem committed to keeping the battle royale game fresh.
Ubisoft isn’t ready to roll out a permanent fix for Assassin’s Creed Valhalla’s crashing issues yet, but the development team does have a temporary solution. A new hotfix removes certain items and features from the game, which should let you experience Ravensthorpe without getting “desynchronized.”
We’re deploying a server-side hotfix to address a rise in crashing near Ravensthorpe. Settlement decorations will be temporarily removed and Ostara Festival quests involving decorations will not be completable. Thanks for your patience as our team releases a permanent fix soon! pic.twitter.com/gYG7O8dvF3
Settlement decorations appear to be behind the crashes, so those have been removed from the game, as have quests for the Ostara Festival that involve those items. Once the permanent fix is out, these should be back in the game, but you’ll have to wait a bit. Ubisoft set a window of “sometime next week” for the larger, permanent fix.
It’s an issue that has only been in the game for a brief period–at least to this degree–so if you’ve taken more than a few days off from playing Assassin’s Creed Valhalla, you likely haven’t even noticed it. Prior to this, the game did have some technical issues, like characters’ mouths not moving when they spoke or legs not moving when they ran, but crashing seemed to be relatively infrequent. In my own experience, I had one crash in more than 50 hours, and it came as I tried to fast travel away from Ravensthorpe.
However, Ubisoft has still been criticized for how many microtransactions there are in the game, as well as their cost. Bug fixes have been coming more recently, as well, but there are some that seem to persist. At least on PS5, split-second hitching happens fairly frequently.
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Ryan Murphy finally revealed the official name for American Horror Story Season 10: Double Feature. According to the reveal, we’ll be getting two horrifying stories in one season – one by the sea, and one by the sand. Our very own Ryan and Greg react to the AHS 10 title, make predictions and theories based on it, and give updates on production and the cast of the upcoming season!
