Category: Games

Months after launch, both the PlayStation 5 and Xbox Series X are still rapidly selling out as soon as retailers announce they have stock. This shortage has led some UK lawmakers to call for the practice of scalping–where bots are used to purchase multiple units at once to later sell at a higher price–to be banned.

Thanks to the COVID-19 pandemic, the problem of scalping has been exacerbated with most retailers having to go fully online to sell their wares. This makes it that much easier for automated bots to run away with surplus units their owners can then sell at a premium. While some retailers have tried to put forth preventative measures like limiting one purchase per address, scalpers have been able to figure out ways around, and even methods of stopping it have become monetized.

To combat this, Scottish National Party MP Douglas Chapman and other members of parliament are now calling for scalping to be criminalized. Chapman described the practice to Sky News as “profiteering” and “a total scam.” To combat this, Chapman has brought a private members bill called the Gaming Hardware (Automated Purchase and Resale) Bill 2019-21 forward. If it passes, scalping would be banned similarly to how ticket reselling at higher prices was a few years ago. Chapman has acknowledged that the legislation is likely a long shot, but said it was one of the actions available to him in order to make the government “take responsibility” for the issue.

In response to an Early Day Motion Chapman submitted in December, minister of state for digital and culture Caroline Dinenage said: “Officials are discussing this issue with the trade association for the video games industry.”

“We know that bulk purchasing through automated bots is a concern for some of their members who we understand are currently looking at any further actions they can take to prevent these behaviours and are working with their retailers to improve experiences for customers,” she continued. The Department for Digital, Culture, Media, and Sport’s spokesperson has said it has no further comment at this time.

What would happen if one person had the ability to control the weather? That’s the premise of Weathering with You, an anime film about a young girl who wields the strange power and uses it to her advantage. Directed by Makoto Shinkai (known for 2017’s Your Name), Weathering with You is a beautiful story that takes some surprising turns and leaves you with an ending you won’t soon forget. If you missed it when it came to theaters in January 2020, today’s a great day to snag it on Blu-ray, as Amazon currently has Weathering with You on sale for just over $15, down from its $30 list price. To get the full discount, click to apply the coupon on the listing, and you’ll save an additional $2.68 at checkout. This is the cheapest we’ve seen Weathering with You’s Blu-ray since it released.

Those who loved Your Name will find plenty to love about Weathering with You, which has a similar feel and, yes, will probably make you cry. Like Your Name, it begins with the meeting of a boy and a girl from different backgrounds: Hodaka, a runaway from a troubled home, and Hina, an orphan who becomes known as the “sunshine girl” due to her weather-controlling powers. After the two become friends, they decide to start a business where people can hire Hina to clear the sky and ensure sunny weather for weddings, parties, and other gatherings. However, the situation starts to get complicated, and they realize there could be dire consequences for wielding the power so freely.

If you’re looking for cozy Valentine’s Day movie ideas or gift options, Weathering with You would be a great film for curling up to watch with a partner. Amazon has a bunch of other great anime deals today as well, offering an additional 20% off the price of numerous anime Blu-rays. Your Name is actually included in the sale, so you could snag Makoto Shinkai’s two most popular films on Blu-ray for just over $30. Classics like Cowboy Bebop: The Complete Series and Akira are included as well. With over nine pages of deals, there’s a lot on offer, and you can check out the full sale at Amazon below.

Playtonic Games will reveal something new “soon,” according to their official Twitter account. Known for their work on the two Yooka-Laylee games, Playtonic’s last game was Yooka-Laylee and the Impossible Lair, a 2D spinoff of the 3D original that many reviewers compared to the Donkey Kong Country series.

Playtonic was formed back in 2014 by a group of developers who all previously worked at Rare. The studio’s first game, Yooka-Laylee, was marketed as a spiritual successor to Banjo-Kazooie, one of the most beloved 3D platformers of all time, and one of the high water marks of Rare’s legacy. Our reviewer Kallie Plagge was less than impressed with the original game, writing that its “bloated levels and a largely uncooperative camera keep Yooka-Laylee from being more than just a nostalgia trip.”

Yooka-Laylee and the Impossible Lair garnered more positive reviews from other outlets. However, our reviewer Alessandro Barbosa found that the sequel had similar problems to the original, opining that the game was still “too firmly rooted in a bygone era for platformers.” An update for the original Yooka-Laylee added a “64-bit” mode to make it resemble the games that inspired it.

As the new year continues to zoom by at an impressively rapid pace, we now somehow suddenly find ourselves in the week before Valentine’s Day. Whether you’ve got a current boo or not, for the time being the responsible thing to do during COVID is to make plans that center on staying home and watching movies, TV shows, and original content on Netflix. And if not much is really grabbing you, you can also spend this week looking planning ahead by checking out the full list of 70 new movies Netflix will be rolling out throughout 2021.

We won’t sugarcoat it for you–for the week of February 7 through to February 13, there’s not a ton of new stuff rolling out. With just a scant 16 new entries coming to Netflix’s formidable catalog, the pro move to make would be embracing the fact you can only watch so many things in a given week, anyway.

If you’re looking for something that’ll help put a different spin on Valentine’s Day coming up, the Swedish psychological thriller Red Dot is a strong contender on February 11. The film is about a young couple with a child on the way looking to rekindle their marriage with a trip up to the mountains–only to suddenly find themselves “stalked by remorseless killers.” Hint: The red dot doesn’t refer to a hazardous sale, but a sniper rifle’s projected dot on a mountain caked in snow.

Buried by the Bernards, debuting on February 12, explores similarly disturbing subject matter but with a markedly different tone. This reality show about a Memphis family funeral home showcases the frictions and hardships inherent in the industry–but through the lens of the offbeat R. Bernard Funeral Services family, which years ago had a modestly viral commercial where an uncle pops out of a casket, screaming about prices. With where everyone one is in quarantine viewing, it’s always worth giving a new series a try–and this one certainly looks different.

Below, you’ll find everything coming to Netflix this week, and if you’re interested in more streaming news, check out the biggest shows that are just over the horizon in 2021.

What’s new to Netflix this week?

February 8

• iCarly: Seasons 1-2
• War Dogs (2016)

February 10

• Crime Scene: The Vanishing at the Cecil Hotel
• The Misadventures of Hedi and Cokeman
• The World We Make (2019)

February 11

• Capitani
• Layla Majnun
• Middle of Nowhere (2012)
• Red Dot
• Squared Love

February 12

• Buried by the Bernards
• Nadiya Bakes
• Hate by Dani Rovira
• To All The Boys: Always And Forever
• Xico’s Journey

February 13

• Monsoon (2019)

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GameSpot may get a commission from retail offers.

GameSpot may get a commission from retail offers.

GameSpot may get a commission from retail offers.

On a recent Late Show appearance, guest Robert Downey Jr. pitched and offered host Stephen Colbert a role in The Avengers. Instead of having Colbert step in to replace Downey Jr. as Iron Man (the latter made it clear last year he’s “done all [he] could with that character”), he’s got something much more lame and hilarious in mind. Check out the appearance–cued up to this specific exchange–in the video below.

“There’s an opening, right?” says Downey Jr., teasing about his departure as Iron Man. “Cobie Smulders plays Agent Hill, sometimes Commander Hill. I thought if she needed a weekend assistant, right? Cap Colbert. You have a baseball cap, and when you wear it you possess the superpower that no man has. You can multitask and you can take care of all her stuff.”

Colbert laughs and says he’d “be very grateful.” Downey Jr. promised “it’s going to go up the tree to [Marvel Studios head Kevin] Feige.”

Truth be told, it is not as far fetched as it might seem to result in a role. Years ago, Colbert–an outspoken fan of sci-fi and fantasy–had a cameo in Peter Jackson’s The Hobbit: The Desolation of Smaug playing a spy in Lake-town. At the time back in 2013, Vanity Fair published a quick piece on it, which also has some important photographic proof. Maybe he’ll show up in a similar fashion in a future Marvel movie? Or is this a super-slick tease to The Falcon and Winter Soldier, which debuted its first trailer during the Super Bowl–after all, they didn’t explicitly say Colbert isn’t in it?

The first trailer for Dead Pigs, the debut movie from Birds of Prey director Cathy Yan, has been released. Yan’s first film made before her DC movie finally arrives this week.

The film is an ensemble comedy drama set in Shanghai, China. The movie uses a real-life incident, where thousands of dead pigs were dumped into Huangpu river, as a focus point around which Yan tells a variety of stories about life in contemporary China. The trailer is very fast moving doesn’t really provide details about what these stories are–we know there’s some dancing and a car crash–but the movie received rave reviews when it premiered at Sundance in 2019 and film fans will be keen to see the film that helped Yan get hired for Birds of Prey. Check the trailer out below:

Dead Pigs premieres on the streaming platform Mubi on Friday, February 12. Speaking to Entertainment Weekly, Yan admitted that it was strange to be finally talking about her debut movie four years after she shot it. “It feels a little bit like going back to my roots and going home,” she said. “I am deeply proud of the film. It feels good to finally get it out there, and hopefully, it doesn’t feet dated at all. I don’t think it does. If anything, the last crazy four years that we’ve had since I actually made the movie [have made] me see the whole movie in a different light, too.”

Yan also spoke about how the movie’s central event connects the various characters. “I was really intrigued by the network effect of it,” she said. “It made me think, ‘Well, how can that speak to and be a metaphor for the ways in which we do affect each other so much, and that our actions affect the next person and the next person, and the many ways that we are so very intersected?'”

Birds of Prey’s main character, Harley Quinn, will be seen again in the upcoming The Suicide Squad. The film is directed by James Gunn, and sees Margot Robbie play Harley alongside John Cena, Jai Courtney, Viola Davis, Michael Rooker, and Joel Kinnaman. It hits theaters and HBO Max in August.

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