Super Smash Bros. Ultimate’s newest DLC character is Pyra from Xenoblade Chronicles 2.
Revealed during the February 2021 Nintendo Direct, Pyra a character from Monolith’s Xenoblade Chronicles 2 is coming to Super Smash Bros. Ultimate. Pyra will be coming to the fighter sometime in March.
Xenoblade Chronicles 2 is Monolith’s last RPG. A sequel to Xenoblade on the Wii, Xenoblade Chronicles 2 takes place in a fantastical world where Blades are summoned from “Core Crystals.” Pyra is a blade and partner of the hero, Rex.
A prequel DLC called Xenoblade Chronicles 2: Torna – The Golden Country was released in 2018. Read IGN’s Xenoblade Chronicles 2 review here.
Details are incredibly sparse thus far, including casting details, but the well-received franchise will continue with Heyday Films, the production studio behind the first two Paddington films, as well as the Harry Potter universe films.
Rumors of a third Paddington film kicked off last week when, in an interview with BBC Radio 2, Paddington star Hugh Bonneville said there was “forward momentum” on the production.
Paul King, director of the first two Paddington films, has previously said he will not return to direct a third, but will still be involved in some capacity.
The Paddington movies, based on the 1958 children’s storybook character, proved to be box office successes, pulling in $280 million and $225 million. The films have been equally praised for their message of acceptance of outsiders (Paddington is canonically from Peru) and their dismissal of cynicism, with some even regarding the films as anti-Brexit and pro-immigrant. Even Metal Gear Solid series director Hideo Kojima, a notorious cinephile, has listed it as one of his favorite films in recent history.
You can check out our positive reviews of Paddington and Paddington 2, which we we said “successfully balances its Monty Python-esque brand of humor along with the kind of heart and sense of adventure found in its source material.”
HBO Max’s animated Gremlins prequel series, Gremlins: Secrets of the Mogwai, has officially set its voice cast.
According to Variety, Ming-Na Wen (The Mandalorian, Mulan) will voice Fong Wing, a doctor of Chinese medicine who is said to be “resourceful, slyly funny and fiercely protective of her family,” while BD Wong (Jurassic Park, Mr. Robot) will voice Hon Wing, a character described as a “calm rock” who “never believed his father-in-law’s tales of magic and adventure.”
Together, they will portray the mother and father of 10-year-old Sam Wing, aka the future antique shop owner from the 1984 live-action movie, who will be voiced by Izaac Wang (Raya and the Last Dragon, Clifford the Big Red Dog). Sam’s worldly-wise grandfather will be voiced by James Hong (Big Trouble in Little China, Mulan), while Matthew Rhys (The Americans, Perry Mason) has been cast as the villain.
Rhys’ character, Riley Greene, is described as a “power-hungry English industrialist and treasure hunter who wields black magic that is determined to stop at nothing in his pursuit of Gizmo and the mythical treasure of the Mogwai.” Gizmo will be voiced by A.J. LoCascio, while Sam’s friend Elle will be voiced by Gabrielle Green.
Set in 1920s Shanghai, the animated television adaptation will tell the story of how Sam Wing met the young Mogwai called Gizmo. Sam and Gizmo, together with Elle, will take a perilous journey through the Chinese countryside, encountering, and sometimes battling, colorful monsters and spirits from Chinese folklore. However, on their quest to return Gizmo to his family and uncover a legendary treasure, they will be pursued by Riley Greene and his growing army of evil Gremlins.
Tze Chun is writing and co-executive producing the 10-episode series for HBO Max, though there is no official release date yet. For more on Gremlins, check out our Gremlins Blu-ray review, which we called “Great,” saying, “Director Joe Dante’s token sense of humor, seen in his earlier films like The Howling or Piranha, is perfectly blended with the amusing, and surprisingly scary horror elements, creating a fine horror-comedy genre-bender in a similar vein to something like An American Werewolf in London.”
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Adele Ankers is a Freelance Entertainment Journalist. You can reach her on Twitter.
Xbox has been embracing backwards compatibility in a big way and it has become a major part of the platform’s identity and appeal, especially going into the new generation with the Xbox Series X|S. Microsoft has been open about the ways it’s trying to enhance backwards compatibility with a new, powerful console, and the latest feature is FPS Boost. It comes as a free update for specific games, and increases the frame rate at which those games run.
The rollout of FPS Boost starts today with updates to just a handful of games: Sniper Elite 4, Far Cry 4, Watch Dogs 2, UFC 4, and New Super Lucky’s Tale. However, this is just the start–there are plans to bring this feature to other Xbox games. There’s currently no word on which games will receive future FPS Boost updates or when exactly those updates will go live, but Microsoft says that more are coming soon and in the coming months. It’s worth noting that in October last year, an Xbox blog post first mentioned this feature and used Fallout 4 as an example to show it in action.
For games that receive FPS Boost, you’ll be able to play them running in 60 frames per second as opposed to 30fps, making for a much smoother gameplay experience. In a few cases, such as New Super Lucky’s Tale, frame rate will be boosted to 120fps to take advantage of the platform’s 120Hz capabilities (if you have the proper display).
We’ve been able to access this first wave of games receiving FPS Boost to get hands-on with how it changes the experience–and it pretty much works as advertised. Increasing the frame rate provides a very noticeable improvement to a game such as Sniper Elite 4, which is a third-person shooter–the smoother frame rate makes precision aiming easier, the action more manageable, enabling an overall better gameplay experience. In the case of New Super Lucky’s Tale, it’s another opportunity to put the 120Hz capability to use if you have the right setup–it’s great to see 120fps in action, but it’s not exactly the type of game that showcases the benefits of an ultra-high frame rate.
The power of the Xbox Series X’s GPU and CPU affords games the opportunity to run better than they did in the past. In some cases, you can experience better and more stable performance without the need for updates, depending on the game. But in games with a locked frame rate, work needs to be done in order to see the type of benefits FPS Boost provides.
Speaking with Xbox program management director Jason Ronald, he explained that Xbox has an internal technique that gets these games running at double the frame rate, and that the work is done on Xbox’s end. This means FPS Boost doesn’t require any work from the original developers, but thorough testing is done and publisher approval is required.
“When we came up with the technique, we realized there was a pretty large set of titles we believed we could make this work on,” Ronald explained. “But that’s also why we do all the testing we do. We don’t just want to enable it and hope for the best. It’s really important that we always respect that original intent of the creator, do our due diligence, and provide access to our partners.”
In the top right corner, you can see FPS Boost enabled for Watch Dogs 2.
When digging deeper into the limitations of implementing FPS Boost, Ronald said, “The technique doesn’t work on all titles. A lot of it really hinges on how the engine or the game was originally designed, and how they manage clocks within the game engine. There are some games we’ve seen where it looks beautiful and plays buttery smooth at 60fps, but we’d discover that the animations were running twice as fast or maybe the physics calculations were running so fast that it broke the physics model. In those cases, and since [FPS Boost] is done with no work by the developer, we can’t enable this feature on these titles.”
An update set for this Spring will let you better handle these features with a new Compatibility Options tab in the Manage Games section of the Xbox. FPS Boost and Auto HDR will be options you can toggle on and off before launching the game, so the original experience would still be available.
While a keyboard and mouse are generally considered a better option for games where precision is needed, accessories brand KontrolFreek aims to improve the precision of controller gaming with its line of Precision Rings. Originally launched in 2019 with two resistance options, hard and medium, KontrolFreek’s Precision Rings are tiny circular foam pieces that slip around the thumbsticks on your PlayStation, Xbox, or Nintendo Switch controller to provide more resistance to your movements, which is particularly helpful in shooters when you need to take careful aim. Now, KontrolFreek is expanding the line with a new soft option, which provides less resistance than the medium and hard versions.
Fortunately, you’ll be able to try which firmness is right for you without buying them all separately, as KontrolFreek is also releasing a variety pack with all three strengths. The mixed pack sells for $13 on Amazon and comes with six Precision Rings, two of each strength. Meanwhile, the soft rings are available in a pack of their own with four rings for $12. You can also buy them for slightly cheaper directly from KontrolFreek, though only orders over $25 qualify for free shipping.
Ahead of this announcement, I got the chance to try out all three Precision Ring options. The rings slip easily around each of your thumbsticks, settling into the little groove below. Fortunately, they’re easy to remove as well, but take care that you don’t pull on them too hard–I did manage to break one of mine. Once a ring is added to each thumbstick, you’ll feel much more resistance as you try to move the stick in any direction. The difference between each level of resistance is extremely subtle, but I found myself preferring the new soft rings as they allowed for slightly better movement. However, I still found that using the Precision Rings on their own with the default thumbsticks made me feel as though I couldn’t maneuver or turn as fast, though my aim and precision was improved.
KontrolFreek Precision rings come in green (soft), purple (medium), and black (hard).
However, KontrolFreek does recommend pairing the Precision Rings with another of its popular accessories, the Performance Thumbsticks. Available in a variety of colors and sizes, these third-party thumbsticks literally attach to the top of the default thumbsticks and offer a better grip due to their non-slip rubber surface. By increasing the height of thumbsticks, you’re also getting a more ergonomic grip on the controller, reducing stress on your thumb, hand, and wrist. You can attach both the Precision Rings and Performance Thumbsticks to a controller, and I found that this is indeed the ideal combination. Not only does your hand feel like it’s in a more natural position; it also gives the thumbstick more space to move around, so the Precision Rings feel less stiff than they do when used on their own.
KontrolFreek’s Performance Thumbsticks pair perfectly with Precision Rings.
I was much happier with my ability to maneuver around when using the Performance Thumbsticks and Precision Rings together, but you may still need to increase your movement speed in the game’s settings to find the perfect level of sensitivity for you. In terms of performance, I was satisfied with how the rings improved my accuracy in games–aiming for headshots in Resident Evil 2 felt noticeably easier with fewer misses, and firing quick shots in succession in Control seemed to take down enemies faster as I was hitting them every time. The Precision Rings cushion the thumbsticks and make them quieter to use as well.
One concern that did cross my mind with the Performance Thumbsticks is the potential for them to leave scratches on the default thumbsticks underneath as you remove them. They come off fairly easily but require a bit more effort to remove than the rings do. If you decide to start using these, you should be aware of that risk–I wouldn’t suggest removing and adding them back on a daily basis.
The bottom line
Ultimately, the KontrolFreek Precision Rings are great accessories to have on hand if you play a lot of shooters, though it’s hard to recommend them without picking up the Performance Thumbsticks as well, which come with the potential risk of minor thumbstick damage. At just $13, the variety pack is worth it for the price, and you’ll get to try out all three resistance strengths to figure out what feels best for you. The Precision Rings take some getting used to, but if you’re someone who struggles to aim with a controller, the benefits are likely worth it.
You can check out both the Precision Rings and Performance Thumbsticks at Amazon below and visit KontrolFreek’s Amazon store page for more of the brand’s gear.
The long-in-development Dungeons & Dragons movie has reportedly added Bridgerton star Rege-Jean Page to its cast. According to The Hollywood Reporter, Page has only recently closed the deal, which sees him joining an ever-growing cast of impressive names.
Dungeons & Dragons doesn’t yet have a release date, its plot is still being kept a secret, and none of these new cast members have even had their roles disclosed. Other than it being a safe bet that the film is going to be a fantasy with some dungeons and dragons in it, it’s still anyone’s guess what the movie will have in store. However, this is not exactly a shock since an earlier Dungeons & Dragons movie was released in 2000 starring Oscar-winner Jeremy Irons, but the movie was both a commercial and critical failure–so it’s also safe to assume this new movie’s creators want to come correct. What’s also not a shock is that there is a flurry of activity around the movie this year, since way back in 2017 The Hollywood Reporter was indicating the D&D movie was set for a 2021 release date.
Jonathan Goldstein and John Francis Daley, the team behind the recent sleeper hit Game Night, are set to direct the Dungeons & Dragons movie. The pair have also reportedly written a new version of the script based on a previous draft by Michael Gilio (Kwik Stop).
Retired gaming executive Reggie Fils-Aime was the face of Nintendo in much of the West for 15 years, and he says that the success of the company’s Switch console made him feel better about retiring. In a recent interview with Gamertag Radio, the former president of Nintendo of America compared the moment that he first saw the Switch prototype to the moment that he first saw other Nintendo consoles in action, particularly the DS and the Wii. “The magic was there,” he said.
“The system was solving for a key player complaint,” Fils-Aime said. “That complaint is, I’m having fun, I’m playing my game, and now I need to stop because I have to go to work, or I have to go to school, I can’t take my game with me…No, the success of the Switch was not a surprise, and candidly, knowing that it was going to be successful is what helped make my retirement decision easy, because I knew the company was going to be in great shape for at least a few years.”
The upcoming animated HBO Max show Gremlins: Secrets of the Mogwai has cast three of its main voice actors. It’s been reported by Variety that Ming-Na Wen, BD Wong, and Matthew Rhys have all joined the cast.
Gremlins: Secrets of the Mogwai is a spin-off from Joe Dante and Steven Spielberg’s classic 1984 horror comedy Gremlins and its 1990 sequel. Wen (Agents of SHIELD) will play Fong Wing, the mom of the show’s young main character Sam, while Wong (Jurassic World) plays his dad Hon. Rhys will voice the show’s main villain Riley Green, a power-hungry English businessman.
The series is a prequel to the movies, and is set in 1920s Shanghai. It focuses on Sam, who grows up to be the elderly shopkeeper from the first movie, and his friendship with the mogwai Gizmo as they embark on a series of adventures. Green is attempting to capture Gizmo and harness the creature’s powers.
The showrunner on Gremlins: Secrets of the Mogwai is Tze Chun, who previously worked on DC’s Gotham and the ABC’s fantasy series Once Upon a Time. It’s produced by Spielberg’s Amblin Television. The series doesn’t have a premiere date yet, but Variety states that it has been in production since 2019, so a 2021 release is possible.
In related news, Chris Columbus, who wrote the original movie, recently revealed that he had written a script for a third Gremlins movie. “I would love to do it,” he sad. “I wrote a script, so there is an existing script. I would still do it the same way–I would do it as tangible puppets, not CGI.”
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By now you’ve probably heard that Rod Serling’s classic series: Twilight Zone has correctly guessed a handful of predictions. The series explored a range of topics such as space travel, technology, and the social evils of the time; And while the many plotlines have predictive accuracy, Serling didn’t get everything right. Greg breaks down 11 Twilight Zone predictions that haven’t come true yet.
Before the two-night Wrestlemania event arrives in April, there are a couple of PPVs on the road to WWE’s biggest event of the year, and the first stop is Elimination Chamber. On February 21, championships will be defended and WWE’s top wrestlers will face each other in one of the company’s most diabolic contraptions: The Elimination Chamber.
This Sunday, the next WWE PPV will put six people inside the steel structure, releasing them one by one in this elimination match. In addition to that, there will be various other matches, many of which will be for championships, and the only way to watch it is on the WWE Network.
The show will once again take place at Tropicana Field in St. Petersburg, Florida, home to the Thunderdome. Check out the start times for the event below, and per usual, UK viewers will have the worst start time.
Start time:
4 PM PT
6 PM CT
7 PM ET
12 AM GMT
11 AM AEDT
There will also be a Kickoff Show which you can watch for free on YouTube and Twitter, and that starts one hour prior to the main card times listed above.
How to watch:
The best way to check out this year’s Elimination Chamber is by watching it on the WWE Network. The streaming service costs $10 a month and will allow you to watch the Rumble live. Aside from live events, the WWE Network has a huge catalog of episodes of Raw, Smackdown, NXT, WCW Nitro, and even original series.
Matches for Elimination Chamber are still coming together, and one or two more matches may be added to the card before Sunday. Check out what has been booked below.
Match card:
Drew McIntyre vs. Jeff Hardy vs. Randy Orton vs. AJ Styles vs. Kofi Kingston vs. Sheamus (Elimination Chamber match for the WWE Championship)
Kevin Owens vs. Daniel Bryan vs. Cesaro vs. Jey Uso vs. Sami Zayn vs. King Corbin (SmackDown Elimination Chamber match)
Roman Reigns vs. Winner of Smackdown Elimination Chamber match (Universal Championship)
Bobby Lashley vs. Keith Lee vs. Riddle (United States Championship)
Asuka vs. Lacey Evans* (Raw Women’s Championship)
*This match is most likely not going to happen. Evans said on Raw that she’s pregnant, which could be part of the story, but there are rumors popping up online that Evans is for real pregnant. If true, someone else will take Evans’ place for the match that evening.
Predictions:
If you want to hear some predictions, make sure to check out a bonus episode of GameSpot’s wrestling podcast Wrestle Buddies, where hosts Mat Elfring and Chris E. Hayner discuss who they think will be the winners and losers of the upcoming PPV. New episodes of Wrestle Buddies are typically released every Thursday on the podcast platform or app of your choice, including Spotify, Stitcher, and Apple Podcasts. You can also keep up to date with the podcast by following it on Twitter.
Make sure to come back to GameSpot on Sunday, February 21 for live coverage of Elimination Chamber featuring results and more.
